My book: "Professional Poker"

[popniklas]

FYI, you can click on "books" on the left part of the screen to see a list of 2+2 titles. Click on a title name and you will find an excerpt. Also, every 2+2 book I've viewed at Amazon.com had an excerpt available. So 2+2 does have excerpts, you've just happened to miss them. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

FWIW, as a frequent online buyer of books (poker and non poker) I like excerpts a lot. On more than one occasion, I have bought a book online that I probably would not have bought if I had not seen the excerpt.

Personally, I think you can use an excerpt even if the topics are diverse in your book, as long as you make sure that everyone that reads the excerpt also gets detailed info about the rest of the content.

By the way, I just ordered your book today and am looking forward to reading it.

[doc43]

Mark, you sound like a class act who knows how to accept a compliment and take critisism. Best of luck with the book. I look forward to reading it...

[stud7champ]

Are sales so bad already that you have to resort to the topic of touting your own book?
I hope its not a 2 plus 2 book because they are normally great reading.
That being said there is a definite need for a book as you describe it. Hope your's fit's the bill. Right now my next two books will be the Greenstein book and Harrington's volume 2.

If you want to see some of my poker book reviews on Amazon.com they are listed under reviwerparexc
My review of O8 by Zee was voted 12/15 highest rating of any reviewer since 1998
My review of winning O8 by Tenner is the definitive review 27/27 (Just establishing my review credentials!)

[oreogod]

[ QUOTE ]
Are sales so bad already that you have to resort to the topic of touting your own book?

[/ QUOTE ]

Seriously man, all the guy wants is to point out, hey my book is coming out, check it if you're intrested. King Yao did the same thing with his book...and the only reason I knew about it was because of his post and the reviews that followed later...and its one of the best poker books out there.

Its definitly no reason to jump on the guy and come off like a jerk.

[Mark Blade]

popniklas, doc43, and oreogod,

Thank you very much for what each of you wrote. I really appreciate it.

stud7champ,

I haven't had a chance to read a new poker book in a while, but your two next choices are also among the titles on my must-read list. I've got very high hopes for both.

Best regards,
Mark Blade

[Mark Blade]

popniklas,

I forgot to specifically respond to you regarding the excerpt issue. I must've been brain dead to not think about the "search inside this book" option at Amazon and to notice the places where 2 + 2 excerpts can be easily found. That will perfectly address all my concerns as an excerpt can now be personally catered to each specific reader's interests without giving the whole book away to everyone. Thank you for reminding me. I will get on that.

By the way, I notice that you're from Sweden. I was just in Stockholm a couple months ago. I thought that one of the most interesting things (besides the beautiful city and country, of course) is that when I went into a large bookstore there (possibly the largest in Stockholm), I found the shelves to be loaded with poker books. I would have thought I was in a Barnes & Noble superstore in New York or L.A., except for the fact that there were probably even more copies of each title there than there are in stores here. And I'm talking about even some of 2 + 2's less popular titles. It was insane. Maybe the buyer at that store is just a poker nut, but I think it says a lot about the popularity of poker worldwide and also about 2 + 2 books and a few others.

Also, I flipped on the TV once while I was there and there were about four channels in English and one of them was playing one of the celebrity tournaments that the American company here "Bravo" produces.

Obviously, I shouldn't have been so surprised. All I need to do is look at all the hometowns of every player online to see what's going on.

I hope you enjoy the book.

Warmest regards,
Mark Blade

[oreogod]

Actually Mark, Im curious to what you think of Middle Limit Holdem by Ciaffone. I know he put a review on your book, so you can always PM me if u dont feel like giving a "public" review.

It seems to be a good book (definitly picking up more than a couple things reading it), just a little weak in some parts and more situational dependant than player dependant.

[Mark Blade]

Hi Oreogod,

First, thank you for your sensitivity regarding my review self-interests. That was very insightful. However, I don’t have a problem sharing honest criticism, as long as it is constructive and never mean-spirited.

I think that “Middle Limit Holdem Poker” is one of the most valuable books you could possibly own. That does not necessarily mean, however, that I agree with every single check, call, fold, or raise. I don’t. Although on the large majority I do. Before I get into my review, let me tell you a couple problems I have with some people who disagree with some of the specific advice in this book and then decide to rent a steamroller so they can smash the book into the ground.

This book does not take the easy road. It would be easy for a book to have hundreds and hundreds of sample hands with situations such as: “When you are heads-up and hit your royal flush on the river, if your opponent acts first and bets into you, this is what you should do…” This book tackles many situations where the playing decisions can be close calls. If you write a book filled with many close-call decisions, it is impossible that you could ever please every poker expert on every hand analysis you have made. First, many of the experts would obviously disagree among themselves on many of the hands, so it would be impossible to please them all. Second, on close calls an entire slew of other factors come into play. An obvious factor is: Who are the players that you are playing against in this hand? What are their playing tendencies and how do they factor into your decision? Some less obvious factors are things like: -What is your table image? –Do you know how to best exploit that table image you naturally have (or that you’ve concocted by design) for maximum profitability? –How might observant players play against you in the future because of how you played this hand? I could go on and on with these things. It is possible that some specific hand advice they give could work very well for them because of the games they play in and how they have crafted (and are able to exploit) their own table images. For many reasons like this, some of this same “correct” advice might not be correct for “you.” It gets to be extremely complex, much more so than most readers realize. So I agree with you that this book does not address playing the players much and concentrates on playing the hands. But this black and white approach is almost a necessity if the authors want to tackle this many hands and not make the book the size of the entire Encyclopedia Britannica. It’s going to be an extremely dense read for the average reader already. If they gave each hand an even more comprehensive dissection, addressing each and every possible variable in your decision equation, almost no one would read it and that would be a real disservice to the majority of players who could really benefit from the book as it is now. So a critical reader should understand that although the authors, out of practical necessity, have explained things in black & white, you can see things in shades of gray as a reader. And you should.

So here is how I think you should view this book. Read Small Stakes Hold ‘em and/or (although I’d highly recommend “and”) Hold ‘em Poker For Advanced Players first. Then get Middle Limit Holdem Poker. Think of Ciaffone and Brier as your two successful poker playing buddies. You are all sitting around the dinner table discussing hands. You get to pick their brains on all these topics. Are you going to agree with every single thought on every single hand? Of course not. (I imagine that in the real world, if you could somehow fix the deck and have Ciaffone and Brier at separate tables being dealt the same exact hands from the book, it would be almost impossible that both of them would even play identically.) But are you going to be an incredibly more thoughtful player after many nights at this dinner table discussion? Are you going to be able to start dissecting hands with some of the same sophisticated thought processes that they go through in the book? And will this elevated knowledge improve your game tremendously? YES, YES, AND YES!

I may not be right about this, but I think it was Brier who first popularized the idea of walking people through every step of a hand over and over again. If I am right, Brier deserves to be in the Poker Writer Hall Of Fame for this teaching technique contribution alone. (Ciaffone would already be in there.) This style of teaching is extremely helpful for students who read masterpieces like The Theory Of Poker but then have a hard time with the practical application of specific decisions at the table.

Now, you probably just wanted to know what I thought about their particular strategies. We’d probably have to go hand by hand to point out the specific instances where I disagree. My general reaction, though, is that there may be too many folds simply because of the fact that strong players adapt to this in the future. That may just be a personal reaction on my part because of my playing style. For example, if Ciaffone and Brier are so skillful at recognizing which players are observant about this fact, and if C & B also have tremendous skills at recognizing when these observant players use their newfound knowledge in the future to try to run over them, and if C & B are great at picking up tells, and therefore adapt by snapping off bluffs that are attempted against them that wouldn’t have otherwise been attempted were it not for their marginal over-folding, then this marginal over-folding could turn out to be a long-term expectation positive. In other words, it is theoretically possible that buying a tight image (with the price being the cost of some marginally over-folding) could pay for itself and then some if you exploit this tight image to maximum profit by using it as bait for bluffers that you later trap. I just think that such a course of action is very hard to pull off to maximum profitability in limit poker. C & B may be skillful enough to do so, especially because there is the added benefit of a tight image which is all the successful bluffs it allows you to pull off throughout a session. But if you want a tight image so that you can exploit it for bluffing purposes later, a tight starting hand selection strategy will already buy you this image. So this marginal over-folding only really benefits you additionally in regards to the baiting of bluffers, and again, I personally don’t choose this course of play.

I know that Mason Malmuth has criticized C & B for this marginal over-folding and you can see that I generally agree. Mason also has criticized C & B for their excessive calls out of the blind. I only half agree on this point. Yes, I would probably fold some of the hands that C & B recommend you call with against certain players, but not against others. There are a few things you should keep in mind. First, and this is obvious, your decisions should be very dependent on which particular player is doing the raising. Second, you must keep in mind the fact that against certain observant players, if you are repeatedly folding your blinds during a session, they will try to run over your blinds just as they will try to run over you on other rounds if you fold too much. So sometimes it pays to make a marginally unprofitable stand with your blinds just so that you don’t get a reputation as a blind folder. Third, I think that players who are absolutely exceptional players (at least compared to their competition at that table) on the flop, turn, and raise can probably call from the blinds all the raises that C & B recommend you call from those positions. Maybe C & B are that exceptional compared to their competition at the middle limits. So, in effect, they have soundly concluded these calls to be optimally profitable when integrated into a great player’s game. If that is the case, then why wouldn’t we expect them to give such advice? If instead they choose to cater their advice toward the average reader of their books and this average reader’s lesser skills, then maybe Mason’s advice is best. But is this the right thing to do? It’s tricky. Again, this is one of many reasons why I totally understand when authors give advice in basic black & white, but why readers should always read poker books with a critical eye and try to see poker for the incredibly complex, innumerably factor dependent, shades of grey at many turns, game that it is.

And you should retain this critical eye for every poker book you ever read including Middle Limit Holdem Poker, my own book (I certainly don’t deserve any exception), and even including whatever book you consider to be the best poker book ever written such as The Theory Of Poker by Sklansky.

I hope this helps. I spent a little more extra time than I normally would have writing it, but that's the least I could do for someone who so valiantly came to my defense as you did in your previous post. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Warm regards,
Mark Blade

[Mason Malmuth]

[ QUOTE ]
For example, if Ciaffone and Brier are so skillful at recognizing which players are observant about this fact, and if C & B also have tremendous skills at recognizing when these observant players use their newfound knowledge in the future to try to run over them, and if C & B are great at picking up tells, and therefore adapt by snapping off bluffs that are attempted against them that wouldn’t have otherwise been attempted were it not for their marginal over-folding, then this marginal over-folding could turn out to be a long-term expectation positive.

[/ QUOTE ]

I hope everyone reads this statement. It's totally ridiculous. No ne has this type of skill and ability, and if someone was to claim they did, they would not be very truthful.

I have heard this sort of argument for years about players who have developed these extraneous skills to incredible high degree but have never seen one in action. Also, what if you're playing on the Internet?

I have now read only a few pages of your book, and it seems okay to me though most everthing has already been written elsewhere (but at least you do give credit to other writers which is much more than I can say for a few other authors). But if you use logic like this in your book, then everything you write must be called in question.

I'll let others elaborate.


[ QUOTE ]
So sometimes it pays to make a marginally unprofitable stand with your blinds just so that you don’t get a reputation as a blind folder. Third, I think that players who are absolutely exceptional players (at least compared to their competition at that table) on the flop, turn, and raise can probably call from the blinds all the raises that C & B recommend you call from those positions.

[/ QUOTE ]

Or maybe they got pot limit strategy confused with limit strategy. Notice in pot limit when you catch just right you can win a lot more than you do in limit. Thus you can play many more questionable hands from the blinds and fold them much more than you do in limit. Part of the reason for these folds is that your immediate pot odds will be much lower in the pot limit game, thus these questionable hands have to win much more than they would in a limit game to show a profit.

Mark, I don't know where you are in the process fo writing your strategy books, but if you're thinking like this and don't understand the glaring errors that I'm pointing out, you have a lot of work to do, or the amount of criticism you'll receive will make my comments appear slight.

Best wishes,
Mason

[Peter666]

But Ken Warren calls it the best poker book ever written.......................