reading hands

I realize I have to get much better on putting oponents on hands.

How should I practice this, it's a bit frustrating doing it while actually playing since I don't get feedback so often because there was no showdown or people muck. Also online gaming doesn't offer enough time for a beginner to think and I cannot play live as often as I would like.

Also, is there any good reading material on the subject? How do you practice this, is it just by playing or something else?

definitely comes with practice. as time passes, think about how much strength your opponent is showing. not even necessarily "i think he has ak", but, does that bet seem like he really has a good hand, he missed and wants me gone, why is he betting like this? to me putting people on specific hands is only useful in very specific circumstances, but gauging how much someone likes their hand can be used all the time. you will just gain experience with what your opponents will bet like with certain hands, don't force it, just wait for you to start "knowing" he hit or missed. eventually you will be michael who you might as well show your cards to preflop.

Experience will allow you to start seeing patterns between lines of betting and hand types. There are of course "standard" ways of playing different hands, but sometimes a player will have unique tendencies which you can only learn by studying him/her.

With risk of sounding Freudian, here's how I view reads. Your subconscious brain is capable of knowing things you can't access voluntarily in a conscious state.

This is what intuition is. It's the gut. The gut is your brain letting you know it senses a pattern. It's saying that something is fishy here. The reason only exerience can help you is because your brain needs to compile a huge amount of information from the same source to begin building patterns about it. It then feeds you intuition based on thousand of hours of pattern material from a common source. You can't rush that. It's like watering a plant.

Originally Posted by Rondavu

With risk of sounding Freudian, here's how I view reads. Your subconscious brain is capable of knowing things you can't access voluntarily in a conscious state.

This is what intuition is. It's the gut. The gut is your brain letting you know it senses a pattern. It's saying that something is fishy here. The reason only exerience can help you is because your brain needs to compile a huge amount of information from the same source to begin building patterns about it. It then feeds you intuition based on thousand of hours of pattern material from a common source. You can't rush that. It's like watering a plant.

That is great Rondavu. I think it goes to the idea of trusting your initial instinct when you play. How many times have you supressed your initial read or sense on a hand only to find out after it is too late that you were right and talked yourself out of it!

I think you ARE practicing it, you just don't know it. As others said, more and more when you've folded you'll watch a hand being played and you'll think "Boy, can't call that without top pair" or "If he had a hand, why would he make that play"... etc, etc.

I wouldn't worry so much about being "right" the goal is just to look at someone's betting in a hand and guess the most likely holdings that they might have - from there you can determine how you should play given your hand, and given the board. Example - I think the guy has a PP underneath AA, there is an A on the board, I can probably fold him out here.

What they actually had is less important, you aren't Kreskin and never will be.

From here you get to the next level - for example -I'll bet my draw like I have top pair, maybe people will fold, maybe I'll hit... or the standard play when I flop top set iwth no draw is to check, so I'll bet to make it look like I'm bluffing, etc.

PS not sure what site you play on but UB and PS both have instant hand histories that you can pull up to see cards that were mucked on the river. I didn't know this until a couple months ago and it helps to get insight on what specific players are doing.

Originally Posted by Rondavu

With risk of sounding Freudian, here's how I view reads. Your subconscious brain is capable of knowing things you can't access voluntarily in a conscious state.

This is what intuition is. It's the gut. The gut is your brain letting you know it senses a pattern. It's saying that something is fishy here. The reason only exerience can help you is because your brain needs to compile a huge amount of information from the same source to begin building patterns about it. It then feeds you intuition based on thousand of hours of pattern material from a common source. You can't rush that. It's like watering a plant.

you are absolutely right.. im finding when i trust my gut i make the right decision more often then not... and its something that im starting to notice.. its done amazing things for my NL bankroll

One of the first areas you improve in when your intuition begins functioning is the scenerio where one person in hand has high pair on a rag board like A8 to 3 6 8 flop, and the other person has an overpair such as TT. Before playing a lot, this is a hand you get married to with A8. After you develop a sense, you get away from it almost every time.