[Talking Poker]

It's simple. Once you understand it and start to see it in action, I know you will agree it is the single best piece of limit advice someone has given you, and you won't believe you didn't think of this yourself.

Remember, you are heads up on the river and you are the first to act. Say you have top pair with a decent kicker or something like that - not the nuts, but something you're definitely not going to fold either. Let's look at your choices and what can happen:

Ok, I started typing up the varius scenarios, and it started looking too confusing. It's not, so I'll just try to type it out.

Basically, there's no reason for you to bet here. If you bet and he has a great hand, he's going to raise, and you're going to lose two bets instead of one (had you checked and then called).

If he has a bad hand (like if he missed a draw) and you bet - he's going to fold. So you're not going to win any more by betting than by checking. As a bonus, by checking, you get to see his cards and learn something about him.

Ok, now here is the key to this whole thing and what makes this play so great. A lot of times, when you check, he will bet here, regardless of what he has! Second pair, a missed draw, it doesn't matter. If he senses any weakness, he's going to bet (bluff) here, and you're going to call and win an extra bet!

Get it?

Yes, there are times when he will check a good hand behind you that is worse than yours (you could have won another bet by betting), but those are greatly outweighed by how many extra bets you will win (and save) from the above scenarios.

I hope I explained this ok. It's a thing of beauty, is it not?