Helmuth: Bad Beats & Lucky Draws?

[GeoffM]

Can I get some opinions on this book? I enjoyed his first read and was curious how this book stacks up against it. I will likely buy it anyway, but just wondering what people thought of it, if of course you have read it.

I'm interested to see if he still has it in him to tell the readers to keep their cool when they suffer a bad beat, since he doesn't know how to himself .

[Penguinfan]

Damn it , there goes all that respect I was building up for you. Seriously, you liked Phils first book?

[GeoffM]

LOL, it was a pretty decent read. More of a reinforcer for me, since I was learning how to play O8B at the time and he echoed my thoughts on the game pretty well. It was a little bit repetitive and what not, and I think he could have added a few hand situations from his live play, but the only other books I've read were the Killer Poker books, so it was an improvement, but then again, anything would have been .

I want your respect back .

[Penguinfan]

Unfortunatly my respect and $2.00 won't get you a seat at a .25/.50 game so don't worry about that. I always consider a book worth the read if you get even 1 piece of information that helps you and I did indeed get that from Phil's book, though I thought the self promotion was shameless, though I guess you should expect nothing less from Phil. I actually like Phil more than most people believe it or not and in his first book a light went on for me when he said if you can never fold what you THINK may be the best hand then you will never be a good No-Limit player. That piece of advice was worth the price of the book to me. I can tell you I was one of those guys who couldn't throw away QQ before the flop or top 2 pr after the flop for any reason, sometimes it is the right move though and if you don't know that you have to learn it for yourself. Now I do think Phil makes very questionable laydowns with big hands, but he is the guy with the bracelets so for now he wins (for now).

[Jackass_man]

I bought Phil's new book it has some interesting stories in it, I'd say it's definitely worth reading if you're a poker junkie. It's all a collection of hand stories from phil and a wack of top pro's . I wouldn't say it's worth the $20 bucks I payed for it since you can easily read the whole thing ina couple days. Get it from the libraby if you can,or just return it to the book store like I did(but make sure you don't fold up the pages or your screwed)

[GeoffM]

Eh, for $20 I don't care. Xmas time anyway so I'll probably just get my gf to buy it for me.

[bigjohnstud2o]

i just picked it up. its a cool book. I can hardly believe some of these beats. I am prolly one of his biggest fans so my opinion might be slightly biased on this one. I also recently bought his poker chip set. Comes with 500 chips+2 DVD's+ his old book "Play Poker Like the Pro's"+ Metal locking Case with glass top+4 lithographed chips for collectors. $195 total on ebay. MSRP$399.99

[johnbaker]

...whats wrong with his first book? there WAS a lot of bullshit in it, but there were also some interesting facts and ideas that i havent read anywhere else.... plus i assume you dont like phil.... whatever to each his own

-jB

[bigjohnstud2o]

Like him or not you have to respect him. Thats the bottom line. He has the jewelry to back his game up. He gets more respect from me than any other touring professional in any sport. Sure he vents about bad beats...........dont we all?????? We even have a section for it. The only difference in his emotions and everyone elses at the tables is that he is verbal with his. He dont just say NH thinking in his head "you fucking tard.......how can you risk 22% of your chips on that".

[junYUN]

i like phil helmuth personally, he's definatly one of my favorite players. i'm gonna go out and get this book and tell you what i think.

[GeoffM]

Great, I'd love to hear some feedback.

His first book was rather basic, considering I was learning my game, O8B at the time, and it didn't really teach me anything new about it. But I am now entry level schooled in lowball stud.

If you don't know how to play O8B, pick up this book, even though there is only 1 chapter, it is an excellent introduction with lots of hand examples and such.

Love to hear some thoughts on this book when you guys get around to reading it. I am currently reading the first one again to pick up on anything I missed, then I'd say I'll be buying this one.

[eddo31]

i respect him as a tournament, nlhe player, but not really for anything else. all of his jewelry is in that game, and i respect players who can play a number of games well, rather than those that are specialists. players like lederer or negreanu, who seem to do well in side games and tournaments, and in a variety of games.

the only chapter of his first book that i put a lot of stock in was the tournament hold em section. i liked some of the others, but in general i thought they were a bit basic.

[Penguinfan]

I even said earlier in this thread that I like Phil more than most people do, but I thought his first book was a little off the mark, however it may be because he assumes you are playing live against decent players and not the garbage you find on the internet, they are two completely different games. Betting out with nothing after the flop to "see where your at" is a bad idea in most low limit on-line games because people will chase you down with any draw in the deck, so you have bought very little in the way of information, I prefer to check and see if I get bet into simply because MOST players at that level will check their draws, but call if they have to, I think that give you the info you need to continue or not. Again this is only if you had good cards and missed the flop completly, if I make a hand I am sure not giving up a free card, but I don't think any valuable info can be obtained by betting into a ragged flop with A-Q in your hand.

Seemed like there was alot of stuff like that in the book.

[GeoffM]

I think when you first join the table, it is actually a good idea to start betting to "see where you are", as it will give you a feel of what types of players you are playing again. However, once you have established who the skanks on the table are, then you can tighten up and check-call or check-raise accordingly.

[TajaUk]

I would be interested in any book he wrote becasue I find him an interesting person. Whenever I have seen him bust out of a tourny on TV it's thru a horrid bad beat. I watched him on stars when they had those massive $1m tournys had it was very entertaining watching him play, he loved the attention and he took so many bad beats it was untrue. I hope it comes out in the Uk if not I will have to download it :P