Matt Affleck

If any of my students happen to be reading, they know what a stickler I am when it comes to preflop ranges. Preflop is the most important street in all of poker, as you are required to make a preflop decision every single hand. When you make mistakes preflop, you set yourself up to make …...

One of the best things you can do as a poker player is study the hands that put you in tough spots. While we would all like to be dealt pocket aces every hand, it can be discouraging when three diamonds come on the flop and both of your aces happen to be black. Just …...

Flopping one draw is fantastic, but flopping two draws provides a poker player with endless possibilities. In this poker hand, PokerCoaching.com coach Matt Affleck revisits a hand he played at the Venetian in Las Vegas. Seeing a flop with tons of equity, how did Matt respond? Would you have made the same decisions? Take in …...

Today I am going to write about one of the more famous hands in poker. We will look back at my famous hand 12 years later and see what decisions I may have changed. I am going to discuss my thought process in the A-A/J-J hand versus Jon Duhamel during the 2010 WSOP Main Event. … My Pocket Aces...

For today’s, article I want to write about the process and journey of a poker player. Being a poker player, or at least a successful, high-level one, involves a process outside just sitting down at the table and playing. Such a process involves countless hours of study, warm-up routines, cool-down routines, and reviewing play among …...

Gut instincts are often misunderstood, especially by weak poker players and those who are superstitious. I’ll preface this article by stating I am no psychologist and everything I write today is from my experience and discussions with Jared Tendler, a highly regarded mental performance coach. My inspiration for this article stemmed from being at the …...

I want to discuss three relating poker terms that often get mixed up and misused by players. We will be discussing the relationship between equity, expected value, and equity realization. Equity is the most common term that most serious to even recreational players have heard before. Equity is simply the percentage share of the pot …...

Choosing the correct poker hands to three-bet as a bluff can be very difficult. Many professionals of all levels fail to study enough and know the correct hands to bluff with in certain situations. Mistakes that are made in three-bet pots are magnified due to the size of the pot. Constructing a proper three-betting range …...

In today’s article, I want to talk about what it takes to become a winning poker player in today’s environment. With solvers, GTO strategy and other complex systems, it can be as confusing as ever to become a winning poker player in 2022. However, the opposite can also be said where it is as easy …...

One of the biggest mistakes that I see in weak players is that they defend their big blind too wide when facing multiway action. In today’s article, I want to discuss adjustments that need to be made when calling in the big blind multiway. Poker is a game that is constantly evolving, 5-6 years ago …...

I recently asked for topics to write about on Twitter and had a couple questions regarding donk betting. Followers were interested in hearing when is the correct time to donk bet and what strategies to use when implementing a donk betting strategy. Today we will define donk bet, equity/betting, donk betting later streets, and exploits. …...

Today we will talk about a mental issue that I see in a lot of poker players, including myself. The issue in question is the failure to realize that the objective of this game is to not win the most pots, but to win the most money. The ability to recognize in your game when … Maintaining...

In today’s article we are going to discuss three of the typical mistakes I see from weak tournament players. The three mistakes we will discuss are over continuation betting (c-betting) on the flop, playing too passive/not fighting for pots, and hand selection at various stack depths. Over C-Betting Let’s cut right to the chase, you …...

I am often asked what are the strategies that pros use to build big stacks early on in tournaments. Many players believe that it is some secret strategy that pros use to build huge stacks in tournaments. First, variance is a big part of getting a big stack. Anyone that has doubled up early in …...

Continuation betting (or c-betting) is one of the core fundamentals of No- Limit Hold’em. It is however one of the most misunderstood aspects of the game. Many players simply do not understand the reason for the continuation betting or why they would want or not want to do so. There are certain properties that are present …...

Today I am going to talk about one of the mental issues that I am working the hardest on in my poker play, impulse plays. Impulse plays are hard to describe, some may call them something different, for me, its any play I make and immediately regret. Acting on impulse is different than being results … Impulse Plays At...

Today I am going to talk about one of the mental issues that I am working the hardest on in my poker play, impulse plays. Impulse plays are hard to describe, some may call them something different, for me, its any play I make and immediately regret. Acting on impulse is different than being results …...

After a deep run in a tournament, it is common practice to do a hand history review of the tournament. Essentially, this is a check-up on your game to find any major leak and spend extra time on decisions you are unsure of. This doesn’t even have to be a deep run in a tournament, … How to...

Today's article comes from a Twitter question asked by one of my followers. This player wanted advice on how to build a bankroll from $1,000. This is a common question as this is a reasonable amount of money to scrape up for a starter bankroll. First, with a bankroll of this size, you must have …...

As the pre-flop aggressor, one of the natural follow-ups is to continuation bet the flop. The continuation bet is one of the first strategies that we learned coming up in poker during the “Moneymaker Boom”. We were told to follow thru with our story pre-flop and bet every flop. As poker has progressed over the …...