Yet Another Point on Poker Position

We know, we know: the theory of poker isn’t as interesting as actually going out to play poker. You need to make sure that you understand the fundamentals of poker before you fan implement any type of fancy strategy work. You need to get the basics when someone is trying to explain higher level topics. It’s going to be fine, you just need to figure out what you’re actually going to be able to do.

Poker position is a fundamental topic. Without position, you’re going t be playing a lot from the gut. Who really wants to lose money by playing from the gut? Make sure that you’re aware of that. Let’s go into poker position right now.

Poker position actually refers to where a player sits in reference to other players. So if someone tells you that they’ve got position on you, it means that they are sitting to your left. They will always act after you.

Position is generally used to point out where you sit in relation to the dealer, and whether or not you’ll be acting first or last in a round of betting. Where you are in a bet is very powerful. You need to keep that in mind. The dealer position rotates around the table. After the dealer comes the small blind and the large blind.

As the dealer, you’re referred to as being “on the button”. After the flop, you’re the last one to act in the betting rounds. You can get away with playing some marginal hands on the button because of this advantage…not that marginal hands are always a good thing.

The players that are seated three seats to the left of the dealer are considered in early position. You have to act first without knowing how the other players are going to play their hands. You have to be prepared to lose your blinds, because the players in late position will be able to steal them from you. There’s nothing worse than having a medium hand and then someone in late position going all in. This is also the case when you have a modest pre-flop raise, and someone slams down more. That’s hard to deal with when you’re really thinking about getting things done in a pot. You can indeed fold if you don’t feel you have a good hand to go all in with. It’s completely up to you.

The next set of players after that are in middle position. You get to see what the early position players do, but you still have a wildcard with the late position players. You can get a little loose, but you need to still be careful. Anything can happen — really!

You need to think about late position as well. This is where the dealer is and the two players to their right.

Late position is honestly where you can do some serious damage. You have seen how the majority of the table is going to act, and that knowledge is powerful. If nobody has bet in a round, the late position players may end up winning because they placed a bet and ran everyone off.

Keep position in mind while you play. It can really pay off big when you’re really ready to get it in!