01-28-2002, 08:20 AM
I know Mason likes to write reviews of poker books – and I like to read them. Lately I went to the Gamblers Book Shop in Las Vegas and found I new poker book. Here is my review of this book, maybe you find it useful. Note: I rate the book by the same number scale (1 .. 10) Mason uses.
William Edwin Barnes, When To Hold’em and When To Fold’em, Chandler 2001, $24.95 (2)
The book is divided into three parts: friendly critiques, Hold’em quizzes and miscellanea. Let me first quote from the publisher’s preface: “He (Barnes) has the ability to transform the complicated and the esoteric into that which is simple and easy to understand. He can almost instantaneously discern the mistakes of others, often calling to the attention of the very top poker authors their errors, but doing so in a friendly and fatherly way.” Now that gets our attention. So what is the first part (friendly critiques) all about. Unfortunately it’s only about one point, that several authors confuse the term “probability” with “odds”. Probability is a number between zero and one or it is expressed in per cent. Odds on the other hand is a ratio, the ratio of the number of times on the average an event will not occur to the number of times the event will occur. E. g. in his book “Getting The Best Of It” Sklansky confuses “odds against” with “odds for”. It takes the author two pages to point that out. Big deal.
The main part of the book is the second one (Hold’em quizzes). The first question is: “Disregarding suits, how many different two card starting hands are possible in Hold’em?” Every Hold’em player would come up with the answer 169. But the author tells us the correct answer is 91. If you take the question literally (“Disregarding suits”) he is right. There are 13 pairs and 78 non-pairs (13 + 78 = 91). For Hold’em purposes (and this is a book about Hold’em) this is totally nonsense. Sure it makes no difference if you have AcKd or AsKc as a starting hand because the EV is the same, but it makes a difference if your hand is suited or not. Though there are actually 169 possible starting hands in Hold’em (13 pairs, 78 unsuited non-pairs and 78 suited non-pairs).
The author states that there are in the whole USA only four persons who have a higher IQ than he has and he calls himself a mathematical genius. Now you would suspect that our self-proclaimed genius is at least capable of solving a basic probability question correctly. Let’s see. Here is the scenario: A friend of his played in a no limit Hold’em tournament. “On the button he was dealt AQ suited in hearts. The big blind’s bet was called by four players which included the two table chip leader and my friend. The flop came A-Q-2. The A and 2 were in diamonds. The Q was a spade. The chip leader made a small bet and my friend raised all in. The other player dropped out. The chip leader … called. The turn card was a rag and the river card a seven of diamonds. The chip leader laid down K-3 of diamonds for the nut flush and my friend was gone with the wind. He wanted me to tell him what was the probability of this happening after the flop gave him As over Qs [Aces over Queens]. After a short pause, I told him the answer to his question was approximately 31 percent.” So far we are impressed. Then the author shows us how to solve the problem mathematically. How can the chip leader win? He can improve to a flush while his friend misses his full house (he thinks the likelihood is 29.2 per cent) or he can catch runner-runner for a straight or trips. He calculates the probability that the last two cards are a jack and a ten to complete the straight are 0.9 per cent and that the probability that the two last cards are two kings or treys are 0.6 per cent. Now he adds up all these figures (29.2 + 0.9 + 0.6) and comes up with the answer of 30.7 per cent. Is this correct? No! Every experienced Hold’em player sees the flaw in the analysis pretty quickly. The chip leader can not only make an ace high straight but a low straight as well. A four and a five for the last two cards will give the chip leader a wheel. So the correct solution to the problem above looks like this: 29.39 % (flush without a full house) + 1.82 % (straight) + 0.61 % (trips) = 31.92 %.
Sometimes you wonder if the author has any idea about Hold’em. Look at a statement like this: “The third player known as the ‘Maniac’ will raise in early position with any of the top six-pairs plus any Ace/King or any King/Queen suited.” Does this sound like a maniac? Any knowledgeable Hold’em player will play like this (KQs, TT and 99 might be debatable but it’s certainly not wrong to raise with these hands). Most Hold’em books contains tables with recommendations which starting hands to play in which position. Barnes book is no exception. It gives you starting hand recommendations for loose, moderate and tight play. The author doesn’t say what he means with loose, moderate and tight play, oddly he gives no explanation for the charts at all. It’s easy to see that he underestimates the power of position. If the game is tight he advises you to play AT off-suite, but to fold JJ! How strange is this! Many chapter in the second part of the book have nothing to do with Hold’em at all. There are some basic problems you will find in any schoolbook about mathematics, two letters the author wrote to the Salt River Pima Maricopa Indian Tribe where he complains that in a specific casino he was not allowed to use two chairs because of a bad hip and more nonsense like this.
The third part (miscellanea) contains some filler material and has mostly nothing to do with poker. E. g. you are bored with a grand master chess quiz (“What does FIDE stand for?”). In the introduction the publisher promises you the author will even correct a International Chess Grand Master. What do the corrections look like? Well, for two pages it goes like this: “In Diagram 36 ‘3Nde6’ should be ’32. Nde6’. Who wants to read such imbecilities? Obviously the author likes quizzes. So here is another one: How can a Hold’em player save $24.95? The answer is up to you.
William Edwin Barnes, When To Hold’em and When To Fold’em, Chandler 2001, $24.95 (2)
The book is divided into three parts: friendly critiques, Hold’em quizzes and miscellanea. Let me first quote from the publisher’s preface: “He (Barnes) has the ability to transform the complicated and the esoteric into that which is simple and easy to understand. He can almost instantaneously discern the mistakes of others, often calling to the attention of the very top poker authors their errors, but doing so in a friendly and fatherly way.” Now that gets our attention. So what is the first part (friendly critiques) all about. Unfortunately it’s only about one point, that several authors confuse the term “probability” with “odds”. Probability is a number between zero and one or it is expressed in per cent. Odds on the other hand is a ratio, the ratio of the number of times on the average an event will not occur to the number of times the event will occur. E. g. in his book “Getting The Best Of It” Sklansky confuses “odds against” with “odds for”. It takes the author two pages to point that out. Big deal.
The main part of the book is the second one (Hold’em quizzes). The first question is: “Disregarding suits, how many different two card starting hands are possible in Hold’em?” Every Hold’em player would come up with the answer 169. But the author tells us the correct answer is 91. If you take the question literally (“Disregarding suits”) he is right. There are 13 pairs and 78 non-pairs (13 + 78 = 91). For Hold’em purposes (and this is a book about Hold’em) this is totally nonsense. Sure it makes no difference if you have AcKd or AsKc as a starting hand because the EV is the same, but it makes a difference if your hand is suited or not. Though there are actually 169 possible starting hands in Hold’em (13 pairs, 78 unsuited non-pairs and 78 suited non-pairs).
The author states that there are in the whole USA only four persons who have a higher IQ than he has and he calls himself a mathematical genius. Now you would suspect that our self-proclaimed genius is at least capable of solving a basic probability question correctly. Let’s see. Here is the scenario: A friend of his played in a no limit Hold’em tournament. “On the button he was dealt AQ suited in hearts. The big blind’s bet was called by four players which included the two table chip leader and my friend. The flop came A-Q-2. The A and 2 were in diamonds. The Q was a spade. The chip leader made a small bet and my friend raised all in. The other player dropped out. The chip leader … called. The turn card was a rag and the river card a seven of diamonds. The chip leader laid down K-3 of diamonds for the nut flush and my friend was gone with the wind. He wanted me to tell him what was the probability of this happening after the flop gave him As over Qs [Aces over Queens]. After a short pause, I told him the answer to his question was approximately 31 percent.” So far we are impressed. Then the author shows us how to solve the problem mathematically. How can the chip leader win? He can improve to a flush while his friend misses his full house (he thinks the likelihood is 29.2 per cent) or he can catch runner-runner for a straight or trips. He calculates the probability that the last two cards are a jack and a ten to complete the straight are 0.9 per cent and that the probability that the two last cards are two kings or treys are 0.6 per cent. Now he adds up all these figures (29.2 + 0.9 + 0.6) and comes up with the answer of 30.7 per cent. Is this correct? No! Every experienced Hold’em player sees the flaw in the analysis pretty quickly. The chip leader can not only make an ace high straight but a low straight as well. A four and a five for the last two cards will give the chip leader a wheel. So the correct solution to the problem above looks like this: 29.39 % (flush without a full house) + 1.82 % (straight) + 0.61 % (trips) = 31.92 %.
Sometimes you wonder if the author has any idea about Hold’em. Look at a statement like this: “The third player known as the ‘Maniac’ will raise in early position with any of the top six-pairs plus any Ace/King or any King/Queen suited.” Does this sound like a maniac? Any knowledgeable Hold’em player will play like this (KQs, TT and 99 might be debatable but it’s certainly not wrong to raise with these hands). Most Hold’em books contains tables with recommendations which starting hands to play in which position. Barnes book is no exception. It gives you starting hand recommendations for loose, moderate and tight play. The author doesn’t say what he means with loose, moderate and tight play, oddly he gives no explanation for the charts at all. It’s easy to see that he underestimates the power of position. If the game is tight he advises you to play AT off-suite, but to fold JJ! How strange is this! Many chapter in the second part of the book have nothing to do with Hold’em at all. There are some basic problems you will find in any schoolbook about mathematics, two letters the author wrote to the Salt River Pima Maricopa Indian Tribe where he complains that in a specific casino he was not allowed to use two chairs because of a bad hip and more nonsense like this.
The third part (miscellanea) contains some filler material and has mostly nothing to do with poker. E. g. you are bored with a grand master chess quiz (“What does FIDE stand for?”). In the introduction the publisher promises you the author will even correct a International Chess Grand Master. What do the corrections look like? Well, for two pages it goes like this: “In Diagram 36 ‘3Nde6’ should be ’32. Nde6’. Who wants to read such imbecilities? Obviously the author likes quizzes. So here is another one: How can a Hold’em player save $24.95? The answer is up to you.