Today's course topic is about The Power of Position. We have had numerous threads in the forum asking about how important position really is. Now that you have completed Day 1 you know - it is everything.

If you have not yet read Day 1 and watched the video for Day 1 - take a few minutes now to do that and then come back here to discuss it:

The Power of Position

If you have any questions about the different positions on a table, playing hands from each position, or about any of the hands discussed in Day 1 of the ebook or the Day 1 video - this is the place to ask them!

Both Collin and Katie will be available to assist you as well as other members of the CardsChat community.

I like Day 1 , I use the 10 Player Table EP as SB, BB, UTG, and UTG+1, Middle Position as seats 5,6 and 7 , Late Position as HJ CO and Button.
9 Player table ; SB, BB, UTG, MP ,as UTG+1, seats 5and 6, LP as HJ, CO, and Button.

Yea I have seen that it can vary depending on who is labeling them even with 9 players.

Glad you enjoyed chapter 1 - hope you are going to continue with the rest of them!

I just finished the Day #1.

Very interesting course. I've completely forgotten to concept of "Relative Position", and it's really very useful in some situations.

Tomorrow with the Day #2.

Katie's excitement about the term LoJack got me to wondering. There must be some colorful history behind it. Anybody able to share some light? Katie perhaps?

Awesome!

She might be able to shed some light on that!

Hi Collin and Katie!

Thanks for the video.

However, I have a question which sometimes troubled me.

When we are on button or CO position and before us someone on UTG or UTG+1 raises with 3BB+, what should we do when we doesn't have best starting hand? Let's assume it's K10o or Q10o.

I'm asking because in every course it says about late position being looser. And sometimes I met people who raise in early position with premium hands and sometimes maniac who does not have anything.

FYI, I am still on NL2.

Happy to see we already have members who are through day 1% already!

MattRyder, that's a great question. I'll ask Katie but my guess is that:

Hijack is called that because you're "hijacking" the ability to open the pot away from the later position button and cutoff. So then "lojack" is just a fun variation on that going from high to low. I really like that term too, Katie taught it to me initially!

Wizcup, You should generally fold almost any offsuit broadway hand in late position facing an early position raise. Against a very loose opponent, calling with KQo would be reasonable. But as a rule of thumb, you should fold there because you're too easily dominated and these hands don't play as well as the suited broadway hands.

We'll go into a lot more detail on this in future days of the course too

hi hi everyone
i obtain the book: "Winning Poker Player on 30 Days"
i just start it it excellent!!!
i excited now... everyone watch me in 30 days... hummm in may 20 i going to start winning! lol

highly recommend this book, it on amazon, if you have kindle unlimted no costs

Position is #1!
Aggression is #2!
Selection (ranges) is #3!

Looks like you have the a great foundation for the course in place.

Great job team!

Hahaha I am amused by using it as though it’s as common as saying hijack when it’s not of course lol. The LoJack always struck me as a celebrity couple type name—back when the trend was to combine every Hollywood couple’s names into one

Hey Collin - why do suited hands play better than non-suited ones? A simple 88 v KQ pre-flop flip only gives the KQs a 3% edge over the KQo hand. A3 v 88 - the A3s has a 4% advantage over A3o. There is a difference, but is 3 - 4% enough to make a suited hand worth playing when the non-suited variant isn't?

Well, it's lesson number one and I've already learned valuable things. This relative position topic is very interesting.
One question:
If you have a player in SB or BB who always defends his blinds aggressively, what is the best strategy for play from late position?

Blinds 100/200 the hero receives T9o from the big blind, is raised 440 from the cotoff, the button limps, then the hero only completes to see the flop.
Flop: heroe check, Cotoff: bet 648, reraise button 3564 and heroe folds.

learning because the last one to speak, is a huge advantage. it is very important to be aware of the position

day 1 - eBook and video done

relative position first time to hear this one

interesting

thank you to all appreciate the book and video

Just finished day 1 course!

A bit late, just before starting to read it I went all in from UTG+1, with a not so strong hand... a KK called and I was out of the game.

If I had read the chapter 1 before, I wou.d have waited to be on a better position.

1st lesson learned! lol

Thanks a lot Evan, we appreciate that!

Good question! In general, we're not only looking for good hands in terms of pre-flop all-ins percentages. The extra few percent is definitely important, but the suitedness has a bigger impact than that, particularly when stacks are deep.

It allows you to have more profitable spots to float with backdoor draws, semi-bluff the flop or turn, and otherwise be able to contest pots more often post-flop.

Thanks!

To answer your quetion: Attack the blinds more often when they fold more, and don't be as aggressive if they're always defending. But you don't have to tighten up a lot. Position is very powerful, so if you have a hand like 97s on the button and stacks are deep, you can raise that hand even if both blinds are usually defending a lot.

Thank you for your answer, Collin.

Regarding position, say I'm joining a live $1-$2 NLH game at 2 am at Bally's in LV because I can't sleep. I see there are only two games going, some players are drunk (but seem sharp) and have the largest chip stacks, there are several women at the tables, some people look frazzled (like myself) .. some have Gucci shoes .. some have sandals and there are 2 spots open at one table and one spot at another.
How much should I buy-in for, should I wait for the button or should I just jump right in and what should I look for to choose the right table to play at assuming I'll stay for about two hours? Based on your experience(s) what should I win/lose (proportional to my buy-in) after two hours ...and would you change tables if you were losing? Now, what would both of you do if you were in my shoes/sandals/socks...never barefoot though!

[This kind of scenario happened and the table I chose had a prior year WSOP "in the money" player and several internationally ranked chess players (who also couldn't sleep..Alex Katz was one). I did win some money after two hours when it became a one table game after our table broke up.]

I am very happy to be learning on this high level poker course at no extra cost. I mean that the teachers are very good and with a high level of humor, which makes learning a lot easier (at least I like it: P). I am excited for the next chapters.

Aw thanks, best of luck!

Great content, well explained, helped me a lot.
I'm learning, I hope I can put it into practice at the table.
I hope to face the sharks soon.
Good study to all.

very important leason,im a cash player so the possition in table is very simple UTG,MP,CO,BTN,SB and BB but when im playing MTT 8 or 9 players table it was a litle dificult for me to know the exact possition i was, now with Katie explination it gets all cristal clear.

When someone asks me about the "value" of position, I like to tell them that any value we get from being in position is only achieved by taking action on the additional knowledge we receive. If we play passively when we are in position, we have no advantage and position now means very little.

When we see wider ranges proposed when in position, it is not because our QTs has more equity when we are in position. It means we may be able to actively play QTs when in position and be successful.

Do you guys agree with this?

When you’re in position, that means you get to go last. When you’re out of position, you don’t know what’s going to happen behind you, you might get raised, you might get bluffed. A whole bunch of bad things could happen. So when you’re out of position, you want to keep your guard up.

Just finished my Day1 - position , position , position. After I came back to poker after 4 years long break I went back to basic while playing .Means playing positions and pot odds. Thank you for giving me this course at the correct time to revisit it to see how much it is important . Position and aggression where you can see what whole table is doing before you act.

Thanks a lot CC

Yes that's exactly right NWPatriot. If you didn't adjust and take advantage of the information you had, you wouldn't be using your position effectively at all and couldn't open up ranges likes we recommend doing.

Thanks for the nice words and congrats to everyone who's moved on to day 2 so far!

wow. I just discovered these videos and I love them! The videos are short and to the point. Thank you so much for taking the time to make these.

Already watched the first week of CC poker tutorials and really appreciate the walkthroughs. I’ve been reading through the 30 day guide as well to reinforce the learning from the videos.

My main takeaways from the video that I implement on a regular basis are: raising on the button is often a profitable play given position. I often couple a raise on the button with a c-bet to get most people to fold.

I also play pretty tight UTG, but sometimes I’ll raise 3x BB with garbage hands and then c-bet and that show of aggression does get folds too. Definitely not conventional, but I find it works if you play the board well.

I have just started the course day 1 about the position, I think that when I finish the 30 days it will help me a lot. It is time to sleep tomorrow I will continue with day 2.

day one of the book is the foundation to be a good player how important is the position of the table and how to take advantage of it according to the value of the hand trying to make the majority of the opponents walk away and have a confrontation with the least number of opponents, the good thing would be that they mention in the book that this importance of qualifying fold is not the same in a tournament as in a freeroll

In this lesson , i really appreciate the relative position concept.
i love playing tournament, and i think that relative position is a very important concept when you progress in a tournament.
Because you will be moved from one table to another, and you will find yourself with new players with different chips stack.
And i think that you have to consider always your position with the player with big chips stack in the table and maybe consider him like he was always sitting in the big blind position.

what's your opinion ?

That’s an interesting idea! In general though, I find it can create problems to generalize players based on their stack size because we don’t really learn much about their play from the size of their stack alone. In the event that the big stack truly is rarely folding anything, then we’ll def need to make our adjustments then

Great starting topic. As Evan calls it, in "the triple threat" the most important is position. And relative position works magic. In tourneys especially. In cash, in my limited experience, a great money maker is the relatively late position of the BB Vs the SB in the battle of the blinds. Unless the SB has a monster, a call pre- and a raise post-flop takes the pot down.

The last time I learned to memorize all the 9 planets in order, I used My Very Earthy Mother Just Served Us Nice Pie which stood for Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto.
S,B,U,U,M,L,H,C,B would be quite the 9 word sentence to figure out the seating positions.

Just took a while, but here is what I came up with...

Six Brothers Under Umbrellas
Marching Like Hungry Choir Boys

Eberetta that's a good mnemonic device, we'll have to use that!

Thanks for the course. Everything is accessible and understandable.

Hi!

Nice content and great lesson!
I read it first on the pdf then watched the video! Watching the video was like having a summary to what I read on the book!

The bonus concept of relative position is very helpful to understanding how to percieve one's self in hand with a key player! Good stuff for a 1st lesson!

Can't wait to get to the next lessons!

gl gl gl

So glad you’re enjoying both the ebook and videos—thank so much for letting us know!!

Great course, watching it all.
I most liked that tip when we are at 3 players, and has a very agressive player at button and have other player at BB and you are at mid position, you are very well positioned, because you can check, wait for the raise of the button and see what the BB WILL do before you take your really action. Very wise.

Hi guys,


Thank you for the 30 days Course, I really enjoy it and I am looking forward to go through all lessons to get an important knowledge to improve my poker game. Well done! :-)


I would like to ask you a question. When playing 8-handed table. Is HJ to be considered as Middle Position or Late Position?


Thanks and GL at the tables!

Just finished day 1, thanks for this course, I'm looking forward to the rest of the course. On to day two

Woohoo I found my motivation and started the course. Of course it was in between playing poker. Looking forward to learning more skills to take to the tables.
Position is power unless you are up against a calling station...you best have the nuts.


Thanks for the course.

Thanks! And good question, I would call the HJ to be one of the middle positions at an 8-handed table (and probably at a 9-handed table as well).