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Common Beginner Mistakes

Watching beginners play is often very painful. You can't even count the mistakes they're making and there are plenty of leaks in their game. Fortunately, most of them make common beginners' mistakes. And here they are:

1. He's playing too many hands. Beginners are playing too loosely. Of course, there are some players who are afraid of playing hands at all because they want to avoid making mistakes and looking like a fool. Those players should search for another game. Most of the beginners don't care about starting hand requirements and play almost every hand that looks good to them. By selecting the right hands before the flop, the decisions become quite simple, especially after the flop. Either you hit or not. Situations in which you're not sure if your hand is good or if it isn't are rare. Supposing, you're playing AK and hit the ace on the flop. For sure, you probably have the best hand and should defend it. And if you play AK, miss the flop completely and someone bets out, you can be sure you're beaten. The big problem with playing hands that are too weak is that the decisions after the flop become very tough. For example you think A4 is a playable hand and call a raise before the flop. The flop is A8T and you might be ahead against KK, JJ KQ or something like that but you might be far behind against an ace with a better kicker like AJ or A9. If your opponent bets, you're in a tough situation. You can avoid this ugly situation by playing quality hands.

2. He's playing too passively All the great players out there have something in common: They're playing aggressively – raising or folding, but do rarely call bets and raises. If you raise, there are two ways to win a hand. Either your opponent folds or your opponent calls, but you might get a better hand with the next cards. If you're playing your good hands exactly like your weak hands, you are hard to read and your opponents can't figure out if you got a good or just a junk hand. Beginners call too often and don't even consider raising with drawing or even recognize good made hands. Firstly, they're often paying a wrong price to see a showdown or the next cards. Secondly, they don't extract much value out of their made hands. However, this doesn't mean that you should raise with every hand you play and in every situation after the flop. This would cost you even more chips. But you should definitely learn to fold and raise. A call should be your last option. You have to pick up your spots to raise. This is a question of experience and knowledge.

3. He doesn't care about pot odds Pot odds are very important! If you want to become a successful player you have to pay attention to them all the time. A beginner, however, doesn't even know what pot odds are. He calls a bet with almost every draw because he might hit it with the next card. The pot odds determine your expected value (EV) and thus your profit. If you don't care about them you are likely lose all your money in the long term.

4. He doesn't care about positions Beginners sit at the table; good players are sitting in an early, middle or late position. They know how important the position is and how to adjust to the positions. A beginner knows perhaps that he’s sitting in the big blind because he posted some chips before getting any cards, but that's pretty much it. He doesn't pay attention to whether he's in a position after the flop or not. Not having position is a huge disadvantage you should avoid and having a position is a great advantage you should benefit from.

5. He doesn't pay attention In order to become a successful player you have to pay attention to what's going on at the table. You must know who just suffered a bad round and might be on tilt. You must know where the fishes, rocks, maniacs and sharks are. You must acquire some betting patterns and habits. You must pay attention to everything going on at the table.

6. He can't figure out if he's beaten Beginners lose much of their stack by paying out better hands too often. Sometimes they think they're beaten but call anyways just to be sure and see the opponents’ cards. Or they don't interpret the action rightly, thus overvaluing the strength of their hand. If you think you're defeated you should fold and save the money. It takes some time and practice to define the strength of your hand correctly. Always pay attention to your opponent’s actions and try to find out what those mean. If you see him betting and betting, even top pair top kicker won’t usually be good enough.

7. He can't control the pot Most of the beginners think in black and white. Either they have a good hand or a bad one. If they think their hand is good, they're betting and betting and betting. Usually, this gets very expensive. They blow a pot with mediocre hands just to find out that the opponent is holding the nuts.

"Big hand – big pot, small hand – small pot!" Memorize it, it's very important!