Ok - this is a legitmate poker post which has legitimate news and info for the blogger community and may be of particular relevance to the WPBT Winter Classic community.

I have watched Phil Gordon's Expert Insight DVD that we got at the tourney from our friends at Full Tilt. It's pretty darned good... Here's some of the best stuff.

1. Phil doesn't waste time with poker catchup filler - no introductory chapters on how to play - I caught Howard Lederer's first DVD in a bin at a drugstore, and I knew virtually everything on it - with Phil, you dive right into the final table with faux characters like "Butch" from the cool kids crew and a woman named Harmony who is one of the top female players in the world. Chris "Jesus" Ferguson plays himself however.

I don't think there's anything more misleading in poker's image then final table televised poker. Edited in a way to leave in action hands, the general impression is a final table is all reraise/all-in/showdown every hand when actually we had 20 hands of raise/fold that never made the final table cause who cares if heads up the SB raised with AK into a 72 BB if the BB folded?

if he REPOPS, however, he becomes a pro if it's televised :) - it'll become an action hand that's televisied - swear to god....I think I'll try it sometime just to get some tv time and establish my image as a manaic on television - LOL -

BUT - in truthfulness, we have few sources for final table poker - Dan Harrington's book - Harrington on Holdem, Vol 2 - is the best - but Phil's is the funniest and I've missed something all these years..

I missed the rule of 4 and rule of 2 -

I'm trying to do pot odds as fractions in my head or decimals and it wasn't working - Phil describes the rule of 4 and rule of 2 as ways to compute pot percentages - basically post flop - you have 9 cards you think will give you the best hand - that's 9x4 = 36% chance to win the hand. - It's then easy to figure out bet percentages - if he's betting 100 into a 400 pot - that's a 20% pot odds - so I can easily call this with my % pot odds and can maybe even justify a raise to get a free turn card.

So THAT is great - easier then going 47 cards left - 7 outs, 40/7 which is sorta 5 and 3/4th to one blah balbahob

and I was GREAT at Math, so the way Phil describes it - (with decimal and percentages instead of ratios and fractions) - is so much easier for me to wrap my brain around -

He stresses Position - He stresses it early in it's own chapter, but virtually every following example hand he goes back to, his first analysis after his hand is position. Is he in or out of position. It's even more important to him then whether the raiser is a manaic, as far as I can tell. Not to sound modest, but a lot of the stuff he's preaching has become much clearer to me in recent months, but to hear it again helps a lot - esp. when it's entertaining.

and no FILLER - it went over 100 minutes and even covered short stack play. It also got a couple tricky sections in there about tells where characters will do certain things again - and they kinda see if you catch it.

This was an awesome DVD, and everything in it becomes pretty much solid poker from the bubble on up to the final table - so it's a nice compliment to Dan's book.

sidenote - can I just get an aside and talk about how fucking cool Phil Gordon is? - In addition to all his antics at the MGM that I miss, I've been to his website and especially the travel section - http://www.philgordonpoker.com/travel.html - is awesome. I use poker as an excuse to travel and work and hope to make enough money to retire and do that sort of thing. He just got rich and retired - good for him.

Good guy, good CD - and that is that.

I gotta meet my boss tonight at work. I'll have to dive in the shower and clean up. I don't really think I wanna meet this guy a lot....holy moly - do I ass kiss or be tough? - I used to be able to pull off the impressionable eager upstart looking for knowledge but I've drifted into grinding techie who wants more pay, more 3rd level tech experience, and less experience with management. And they've been trying to sell me on management for a bit now, but I think I'm more 3rd level tech status -

good times.

RB