Short and sweet

I lucked out tonight; I only played about 10 or 12 hands but had two super ones -- a flush and four queens. On the four queen hand, I was only dealt one queen. I bet the pot on the river, and someone actually called me.

Watching poker on ESPN is where I first learned about value bets. A value bet is betting the maximum you think an opponent might call, and not a single dollar more. The theory is that if you bet more than the value bet amount, players with marginal hands will simply fold, whereas they'll be tempted to call the value bet. I later learned that sometimes players bluff by betting a value bet amount when they actually have nothing. Closely related to the value bet bluff is the bet the pot bluff. The player who called my four queens obviously thought I was bluffing. So reverse psychology, double reverse psychology and endless further layers of reverse psychology can and are used in poker.

delta: $2,020
balance: $269,327