Winning Texas Hold'em

[uDevil]

A while ago, I promised I would buy Matt Maroon's book, Winning Texas Hold'em, which I have. I was partly motivated by some posts in this forum saying that the short-handed section of the book was quite good. So when I got the book I read that section first. On the positive side, I like his writing style, which is conversational and direct. However, I found the content of the SH section a little disappointing, so I'm putting off reading the rest of the book for a while.

The biggest problem I saw was his reasoning for playing more hands in SH games. He says you should play more hands because the of the increased cost of the blinds per hand. This (incorrect) perspective has him recommending what seems to me to be overly loose play before the flop. Though for an expert these extra hands may be slightly +EV, I worry they might be -EV for most of his readers.

I found most of the rest of the advice in this short section to be pretty standard: don't open limp, play big cards and pairs, raise weak limpers, reraise or fold, play aggressively on the flop, defend your blinds more, and so on.

Since I did find a couple of nuggets of advice that I think will help my game, I wouldn't withhold a recommendation at this point; I was just expecting a bit more. Sorry, Matt.

[smbruin22]

i liked the following aspects of matt maroon's book:

the price was right.

pretty straight-forward writing style.

one of the better books about talking about different table conditions and starting hand selection.

talks alot about shorthanded. and i think it was decent.

the book looks really neat (although i think there are different formats)

there are lots of things i could complain about.. and it's probably only a decent buy at its very low price point (at least here in canada)

[Gelford]

Speaking of Matt, here is a bookreview from him posted on his blog recently.

[ QUOTE ]

A week or two ago Matt Matros sent me an IM asking me if I had ever read the short handed section of Hold'em Poker For Advanced Players. I haven't touched that book in probably 5 years, but I remembered it as having been pretty good, with a few major exceptions. I knew it had some terrible advice, such as occasionally limping with pocket aces preflop, but I was willing to chalk it up to the book having been printed in 1999 (it's called the 21st Century Edition). Until I read the short handed section.

I've now removed it from my recommended books list entirely. In his book Matt recommends HPFAP but says "Be sure to ignore the advice on shorthanded and loose games in the 21st century edition." He said he was attacked for that disclaimer by all of the forum cronies. Just from the few stories he has told me, it sounds like his experience with the 2+2 community has been similar to mine, though if anything less deserved. I actually make a lot of jokes at their expense and only rarely bother to tell them why (though when I have, I've gotten the same response). Matros just points out glaring inaccuracies in books and everyone gets angry at him.

Matt's perhaps a little more friendly than I am though. I'm just not recommending the book at all anymore. I could probably write an entire book just on what the shorthanded section gets wrong and why it is wrong. But there is so much bad advice in it that I wouldn't even know where to begin, and I don't see it as being a very profitable endeavor. Perhaps Mason would pay me five figures to review it and tell him why it is so bad, as he offered to do for me, but it probably wouldn't be worth it for him as I hear he rarely plays poker.

Now that I've reread the short handed section I finally understand many of the bad plays I see on a daily basis, such as people who flop top pair with T9 and slowplay it. It's rare at $30/$60 and up online that I find opponents who only play 40% of their hands heads up, since most people know they should be playing double that. It's unusual to find people who reraise out of the big blind and then check 40% of the time (with their best and worst 20% of hands), as almost everyone who has worked their way up to those stakes knows they should be betting 100%, but they do exist and now I know why.

Some of the other sections in the book were pretty humorous too. Matt mentioned the loose games section. It contains such advice as not raising AQ when you know a lot of players are going to come in behind you. Brilliant. That is followed by one priceless gem after another.

I used to think that book was good. Actually, we used to call it the Bible of Poker. Now I realize it's so bad that I can't even have a link to it on my site. I guess that's the poker equivalent of the student taking the coin out of the master's hand.

[/qoute]

[Starfish]

Very interesting quote. No one wants to comment? Sklansky, Mason, others? I liked both of those books' SH sections. My only complain is that they should have been longer and more thorough. Of course, HEPFAP was much more detailed of those.

Mason commented a little while ago Maroon's book - said it had a lot of flaws. I suppose Maroon didn't like it, but is HEPFAP really that flawed? Hard to believe, but at least he gives some examples of those claimed flaws. Discuss. I bet Maroon will show up if Mason or Sklansky comments, maybe otherwise too. Then we could ask him to specify more flaws. And Matros too.

Those two quite known poker authors just questioned the theory behind 2+2 limit books and teachings of the two main authors, so I don't think it should be passed with silence.

[DING-DONG YO]

I'm confused now. In that quote, is he talking about HEPFAP or Winning Texas Hold Em?

[Mason Malmuth]

Hi Gelford:

The material in HPFAP has been debated in extreme detail on these forums.

[ QUOTE ]
Some of the other sections in the book were pretty humorous too. Matt mentioned the loose games section. It contains such advice as not raising AQ when you know a lot of players are going to come in behind you. Brilliant. That is followed by one priceless gem after another.


[/ QUOTE ]

I believe this reference is to pages 175 and 176. The explanation for why we advise just calling with AQ in early position when "you are in a game where your raise will fail to cut down the field" is pretty straight forward.

Authors like these are always trying to show everyone that they are the ones who understand that we have it wrong. This gives them instant recognition and will fuel their effort to achieve success.

But they generally never get specific as to why our advice is inaccurate and they generally never address the specifics of what we wrote. If you want to do that, I suggest you read the pages I just mentioned along with the whole section and then ask your questions.

Best wishes,
Mason

[Starfish]

HEPFAP.

[Starfish]

[ QUOTE ]
If you want to do that, I suggest you read the pages I just mentioned along with the whole section and then ask your questions.

[/ QUOTE ]

Of course, I'm not in a position to question anything, but I'm quoting Maroon:

[ QUOTE ]
It's rare at $30/$60 and up online that I find opponents who only play 40% of their hands heads up, since most people know they should be playing double that. It's unusual to find people who reraise out of the big blind and then check 40% of the time (with their best and worst 20% of hands), as almost everyone who has worked their way up to those stakes knows they should be betting 100%, but they do exist and now I know why.

Some of the other sections in the book were pretty humorous too.

[/ QUOTE ]

He obviously refers to pages 187-191. He didn't mention it, but that 40% best hands refers to when being in bb (sb is the button here), that is recommended to call or re-raise with (so supposedly sb/button has raised, because it's said re-raise but not raise). I understand Maroon recommends to play about 80% of the hands in this situation. Comments?

That another point, after pf re-raise from bb to check with 40% hands on the flop, he doesn't mention but it was for setting up a check-raise.

And if you always check-raise then and never check-fold, where's the disguise? Anyway, Maroon says that almost all players playing that high always raise on the flop in that situation - so no check-raising. Comments?

[jacksup]

[ QUOTE ]

I believe this reference is to pages 175 and 176. The explanation for why we advise just calling with AQ in early position when "you are in a game where your raise will fail to cut down the field" is pretty straight forward.


[/ QUOTE ]

Maybe, but it's not internally consistent. You're talking about a loose game, and say that if many people will enter the pot after you raise, then you want someone with 87o to call your raise. You conclude with, "if you knew a raise with the AQ would force 87o out, but a call will not, that's not a reason to raise." But we're talking about a loose game, so how would you ever know that a raise will force 87o out? In fact, most opponents will call two cold with 87o if it's a loose game, almost by definition. Indeed, that was the whole premise of the section, that a raise won't cut down the field. Hence, by your own logic, you should raise the AQ.

[ QUOTE ]

Authors like these are always trying to show everyone that they are the ones who understand that we have it wrong. This gives them instant recognition and will fuel their effort to achieve success.


[/ QUOTE ]

I can't speak for Matt Maroon, but to say I am "always" trying to show everyone why 2+2 has it wrong is ridiculous. First of all, I haven't written or posted anything negative about 2+2 strategy in a year and a half. Second, in my book I recommend without reservation not one, not two, but three 2+2 books that I believe would be beneficial to anyone who reads them. In addition, I call David Sklansky "one of the game's greatest minds" and I say that this forum contains "a lot of focused, thought-out responses from dedicated twoplustwoers." Now, I also mentioned some things I didn't like about this forum, and I failed to recommend to my readership every section of every 2+2 book. I guess people tend to ignore all positives and cling to the few negatives.

[ QUOTE ]

But they generally never get specific as to why our advice is inaccurate and they generally never address the specifics of what we wrote.


[/ QUOTE ]

I remember something that happened not to long ago. You said that Matt Maroon's book contained many errors. Then, when he asked you to address the specifics of what he wrote, you said it would cost him at least $10,000. Explain then, why anyone would want to go over the issues in your books for free. Information/idea-sharing is a two-way street.

[TheMaroon]

I also highly recommend a number of 2+2 books, just not that one because it's riddled with bad advice. It contains monkey logic like "you should sometimes open limp with aces to disguise your hand when you open limp with other stuff" which is the equivalent of "you should make one bad play to make another bad play less bad".

If I really wanted to show off I could have specifically pointed out scores of errors (and contradictions, as Matt Matros did above) and explained why they were wrong. But I don't. As I've said before, I was asked to write one book and did. I'll most likely never write another. I don't write strategy columns in magazines. I don't attempt to make any money at all off of teaching people how to play and I have no desire to in the future. I have no use for recognition, I make my money at the tables. I merely pointed out that the book doesn't meet my quality standards for recommended reading because it is a bad book.

You are basically doing the exact same thing you accuse me of but in reverse. You take any criticism and turn it into "we're the top dogs and anyone who criticizes us is merely trying to gain recognition" in order to further imprint your cheesy logo onto the brains of your readers. Sometimes when people say that something in a 2+2 book is incorrect it's just because they think that something in a 2+2 book is incorrect. And sometimes when people say that a 2+2 book is bad it's just because they think that a 2+2 book is bad. Sometimes they are right.