Sports & Gaming
Table Talk
Lesson time 10:29 min
Learn the sophisticated ways Daniel uses table talk to get valuable information from his opponents and the steps you can take to protect yourself from prying players.
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Topics include: Get All the Information You Can • Elicit Reactions Through Outside Conversations • Give Your Bluffs Credibility • Tips for Avoiding Table Talk • Be Careful With Table Talk If You’re a Beginner
Teaches Poker
Join Daniel at the poker table. Learn his strategies to advance your cash, tournament, and online play.
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- I'm going to guess you had a pair of aces. - Kings. - No, I think it was aces. You said kings? He said kings? No, you just think it's kings. - Yeah. - I think it's aces. PLAYER: Nope. - He was better than me. PLAYER: Yep. - Throughout my life, I've always been a pretty talkative guy. And that doesn't change when I come to the poker table. If you've seen me play on TV, you'll know that. I do a lot of chitchat. And one of the benefits or the side benefits I get from that is I get more information about who I'm up against, right? So if I'm playing with somebody, and I just ask him a simple question, like, well, what do you do for a living, right? And I get an answer like, I am a criminal trial lawyer, or I am a Sunday school teacher, my perception of those two people is going to change. And how I play against those two people-- I'm going to make some assumptions, right? Not solid, always or nevers, but typically that lawyer, by day, is spending time twisting facts, trying to, you know, manipulate, confuse people. So I'm going to look at this guy and think that he's probably capable of lying or twisting the truth, whereas maybe-- and I don't know this for true-- maybe the Sunday school teacher is more conservative, and is maybe potentially even conflicted with the idea of lying or bluffing. So that's just a very, you know, obvious and simple example of how I may profile at the table. You know, stereotyping and profiling is obviously something we don't want to do in society, but at the poker table, every bit of information you can get about your opponent-- you know, how long they've been playing? Where do they come from? How much experience they have? You'll find that, if you sit at a table and you're cordial and you're friendly, you'll be able to divulge so much more information from your opponents just by being a nice person. And that's going to help your win rate in the long run as well because you get to have more information to make better decisions when it's crunch time. Table talk is something, you know, obviously, I just do naturally when I'm just chit chatting with players. But there's also situations that come up mid hand when I'm on the river. And I might, you know, engage in some table talk to try to elicit information from my opponent. Maybe try to get them to crack a smile. And then I can have a better read in, what does that smile mean? Did that seem like a genuine smile or a fake smile? I'll give you a real life example of me engaging in table talk. It was 2004, the Bellagio 5 Diamond Championship. We were already in the money. And play was much tighter back then. And a player named Russell Rosenbloom raised from under the gun. And I was on the button with ace queen. And that's a marginal hand, especially back then. Like, you could theoretically fold that hand back then because the ranges for openers were very, very tight. I decided to call, and the flop came ace, ace, 6. Russel...
About the Instructor
Put yourself across the felt from Daniel Negreanu, the biggest live tournament poker winner of all time. The six-time World Series of Poker champion teaches poker strategy, advanced theory, and practice through hand-reviews of his winning games. Learn how to sharpen your mental game through demos on reading opponents and spotting tells. Join Daniel at the table to increase your win rate, grow your ROI, and get your game “in the money.”
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Daniel Negreanu
Join Daniel at the poker table. Learn his strategies to advance your cash, tournament, and online play.
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