by FTR Poker Admin | May 18, 2015 | Editorials
From May 27-July 14, the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas will host poker’s most popular tournament series, the World Series of Poker. The 46th annual edition will feature 68 events and close to $200 million in prize money. The venue itself is also...
by FTR Poker Admin | May 18, 2015 | Editorials, Featured Poker News
For as long as online poker existed, conspiracy theories about every aspect of it have constantly been floating around. Just like any other persistent conspiracy theories, logic and facts never really phased any of them and the craziest ones live on to this day. Most...
by FTR Poker Admin | May 12, 2015 | Editorials
Only a small percentage of dedicated professionals choose poker as their lifelong career and most of those who consider themselves professional poker players sooner or later choose to move on to a different career path. Fortunately, poker leaves long time players with...
by FTR Poker Admin | May 4, 2015 | Editorials
Is poker a game of skill or luck? Does it really take skill to win? Isn’t it just a gamble, like roulette or the slot machines? These age-old questions have dogged poker since its inception, and I want to set the record straight. While there is no denying that luck...
by FTR Poker Admin | Apr 26, 2015 | Editorials
Poker, much like most other forms of competition, has real-life parallels. The skills you learn grinding it out on the felt have more use than just getting your opponent to jam into your nut flush (although that is important). Controlling emotions, dissecting other...
by FTR Poker Admin | Apr 25, 2015 | Editorials, Featured Poker News
A few weeks ago it was announced that 2015 will see the launch of the first 24/7 poker channel. While many poker players agree that the heyday of televised poker has passed, this is still an interesting development for poker, which shows that the game is not as ‘dead’...
by FTR Poker Admin | Apr 22, 2015 | Editorials
Move over, Big One For Big Drop; there’s a new super high roller about to grab the world’s attention: the $500k Super High Roller Bowl at ARIA Resort & Casino in Las Vegas. The second largest buy-in tournament in the history of poker is set to run from July 2-4...
by FTR Poker Admin | Apr 17, 2015 | Editorials
Every year, poker players and organizations alike donate millions to various causes all around the world. Just a few decades ago, poker may not have been associated very closely with charitable causes, but this perception has been strongly changing ever since the...
by FTR Poker Admin | Apr 10, 2015 | Editorials
As poker players know, very few things can’t be measured in dollars, but health is definitely one of them. Staying healthy should be a top priority for anyone, especially someone sitting at a PC or a poker table for hours and hours at a time. Improving your heath is...
by FTR Poker Admin | Apr 8, 2015 | Editorials
For most of us out there, poker is a fun (and hopefully financially rewarding) hobby, but at the end of the day, it’s exactly that: a hobby. While everyone has dreamed about turning poker into a full-time profession, usually it is something you play when you get home...
by FTR Poker Admin | Apr 3, 2015 | Editorials
Just like any sport where money is involved, poker faces a number of its own challenges. For online poker, the most recent challenge has been the huge number of hackings taking place. While live poker is immune to the perils of the internet, it is by no means...
by FTR Poker Admin | Mar 28, 2015 | Editorials, Poker News
From 2005 until 2011, online poker was unstoppable. Unlike many of their “real life” counterparts, who were typically grizzled veterans (or at least 30-year-olds), the rulers of online poker were often young college kids. Hundreds of thousands of dollars were won,...
by FTR Poker Admin | Mar 26, 2015 | Editorials
An overlay is a tournament player’s best friend and a casino’s worst nightmare. When the number of players registered for a tournament is not enough to cover the guarantee of the tournament, then we have an overlay, meaning free money for the players. The one thing...
by FTR Poker Admin | Mar 22, 2015 | Editorials, Poker News
In 2003, a Tennessee accountant by the name of Chris Moneymaker turned a $39 satellite entry on PokerStars into $2.5 million and the WSOP Main Event championship, and in the process ignited a worldwide fervor for poker. In the same year, the inaugural season of the...
by FTR Poker Admin | Mar 18, 2015 | Editorials
Players can argue for ages about which poker room is the best and there are good arguments for many of them. However, no one can argue with size. If you are a recreational player, you don’t want to wait for ages on waiting lists and if you’re a pro, having a vast...
by FTR Poker Admin | Mar 11, 2015 | Editorials
For the second week in a row, FTR is looking into some unique results produced by players in the brief period of online poker’s dominance. Just in case you didn’t feel like framing any of the great artworks featured in the first part of this series, check out these...
by FTR Poker Admin | Mar 4, 2015 | Editorials
The world of poker has oft been described as a vast wilderness; it is a ravenous jungle full of all sorts of animals and creatures, some friendly, and some formidable. From the fearsome lion and the mischievous jackal, all the way down to the minuscule goldfish and...
by FTR Poker Admin | Mar 2, 2015 | Editorials
Over the years, all sorts of players have graced the online poker felts, producing all kinds of results. Some have soul crushed every opponent they met, some called down three barrels with ace high every time and some have banked scores larger than they ever thought...
by FTR Poker Admin | Feb 23, 2015 | Editorials
Online poker is an industry that has seen a meteoric rise in popularity in a very short amount of time. It’s safe to say that the spread of internet access across the world and the general appeal of the game are the two main things that contributed to the success of...
by FTR Poker Admin | Feb 22, 2015 | Editorials
I’ve been a poker player for the better part of a decade, and during my up-and-down journey I’ve read my fair share of poker strategy books. We all have. Virtually every player serious about winning has taken a peak in Doyle Brunson’s Super System books, leafed...
by FTR Poker Admin | Feb 18, 2015 | Editorials
In the first half of our two-part series, we turned our attention towards some serious real-life afflictions that affected some of our favorite poker players. As the writer of said editorial, I’ll be the first to admit that the subject matter was awfully depressing...
by FTR Poker Admin | Feb 16, 2015 | Editorials
Most poker players have dreamed about making the biggest final table on the yearly poker calendar, although probably most of them never realize the amount of taxes they would have to pay if they actually did win the Main Event. Looking back at the winners of the last...
by FTR Poker Admin | Feb 9, 2015 | Editorials
So you are somewhere in the vicinity of the legal drinking age and you would do anything to avoid a boring 9-to-5 job? In that case, you might be thinking about becoming a poker pro. Playing poker for a living might sound like a great proposition for someone young and...
by FTR Poker Admin | Feb 7, 2015 | Editorials
More often than not, poker is game of fun, glitz, and glamour, even when one is losing—and let’s face it: for most of us, that is a frequent occurrence. Despite the obvious highs and lows involved with gabling, one can never take it too seriously; it is, after all,...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jan 30, 2015 | Editorials
Nowadays, there are hundreds of poker strategy books available, but most of them are likely not worth your time. On the other hand, some poker strategy books that were written decades ago still hold valuable information for modern poker players. If you are looking...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jan 28, 2015 | Editorials
In life, the winners and losers aren’t always so clear-cut—there are a lot of people that just scrape by, living lives of quiet desperation. In poker, we are not afforded the same luxury: either you are a winner, or you are a loser. In part 1 of this editorial we...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jan 23, 2015 | Editorials
It takes luck to win any individual tournament. If you are an amateur player, you need a lot more luck to do it. It’s fairly easy for an amateur player to win a small entry field tournament in his local casino, but most major tournaments across the world attract the...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jan 14, 2015 | Editorials
Most poker pros grind hard to get ever higher up the stakes ladder and moving up to the highest stakes is an understandable dream of most poker players. What most pros don’t consider is that with great opportunity comes great risk of running into the downswing of a...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jan 12, 2015 | Editorials
Poker, unlike many of the other professions and past-times you may encounter in this bountiful world, is easily quantifiable: either you are a winner, or you are a loser. There are no bonus points for effort, golden stars for attendance, or special monetary...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jan 9, 2015 | Editorials
Being a successful online pro, be it in cash games or tournaments, doesn’t necessarily mean an easy transition to live games. There are huge differences between sitting in front of your PC while making split second decisions on multiple tables and being physically...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jan 4, 2015 | Editorials
Every New Year, countless people make outlandish claims about starting fresh, making new goals, and improving upon all the mistakes they made in the previous year. For some, this means a new (and overpriced) gym membership; for others, it means quitting smoking or...
by FTR Poker Admin | Dec 25, 2014 | Editorials
10. Layne Flack 2002 Cashes: 3 Final Tables: 2 Bracelets: 2 Not only did ‘Back-to-Back Flack’ manage to win two bracelets in a single year twice in his career, he managed to do it in back-to-back years in 2002 and 2003. Despite this amazing achievement, this list only...
by FTR Poker Admin | Dec 21, 2014 | Editorials
‘Tis the season to be jolly, and while there’s no gift quite like a giant pile of cash-—or getting dealt pocket aces on the button with two raises in front of you—-we’ve managed to come up with some great holiday gifts for you and all your poker friends. Some of them...
by FTR Poker Admin | Dec 18, 2014 | Editorials
Good poker players know that profit in poker not only comes from maximizing your winnings, but also cutting short your losses. In the long run, making big laydowns is not a huge part of that equation, but if you are in a major tournament, a big laydown may make or...
by FTR Poker Admin | Dec 8, 2014 | Editorials
10. Joe Hachem Final Table Year: 2005 Place: 1st ME Final Table Winning: $7,500,000 Non-ME Final Table Winnings: $4,365,859 Joe Hachem is only one of two Main Event champions on this list He is widely recognized as a poker ambassador and is credited for helping...
by FTR Poker Admin | Dec 6, 2014 | Editorials
Are you constantly losing money on the poker table? Are you blaming bad luck for those thousand dollar downswings? Do your friends always invite you over to their poker games, and then proceed to annihilate you hand after hand? Do you think Q-6 suited is a good...
by FTR Poker Admin | Dec 1, 2014 | Editorials
Even when a poker player is considered to be great at what he does, it still doesn’t make him invulnerable to vices that can ruin a life and these 10 players are the best examples of this. 10. Gavin Smith Gavin Smith has long been considered a great tournament pro and...
by FTR Poker Admin | Nov 26, 2014 | Editorials
Everybody loves watching drama unfold, especially when there are hundreds of thousands of dollars at stake, and when it comes to rivalries on the poker table, there is no shortage of bad blood. Last week, we focused our attention on the modern era of poker beefs. Now,...
by FTR Poker Admin | Nov 24, 2014 | Editorials
Already got yourself a Geoffrey Parker $7.5 Million Poker Chip Set? Then you should definitely look into buying yourself a poker table to go along with it. Of course, you cannot just buy a $200 table cover and expect your friends to be impressed, so check out these...
by FTR Poker Admin | Nov 19, 2014 | Editorials
In the world of high stakes poker, it’s easy for tempers to flare. With hundreds of thousands, even millions of dollars in table action, WSOP bracelet bragging rights, and various side bets, not to mention a hodge-podge of eccentric personalities, arguments and...
by FTR Poker Admin | Nov 17, 2014 | Editorials
A few weeks ago, FTR brought you the first installment of the Top 10 Hero Calls with 10 of the sickest televised hero calls ever made. Well, hero calls look amazing when they work, but it’s fair to say that most of the time they don’t. So this week, let’s take a look...
by FTR Poker Admin | Nov 12, 2014 | Editorials
On Tuesday night, Martin Jacobson was crowned the 2014 World Series of Poker Main Event champion, earning a cool $10,000,000 for his efforts and a place in poker history. Speaking of poker history, just how does he rank up against the last decade of Main Event...
by FTR Poker Admin | Nov 10, 2014 | Editorials
Over the past decade, Phil Ivey has appeared on numerous TV shows and tournament broadcasts, providing the poker world with hundreds of entertaining moments. Let’s take a look at ten moments from Ivey’s televised appearances that show off his abilities. 10. Making...
by FTR Poker Admin | Nov 3, 2014 | Editorials
In the game of poker, a single mental mistake can be the difference between becoming a World Series of Poker bracelet winner and a cautionary tale. It’s not always easy, however, as long hours and a continuous, relentless mental grind can cause even the smartest...
by FTR Poker Admin | Nov 3, 2014 | Editorials
Over the years, a lot of players have set off to accomplish various poker challenges. Many of them failed all together, some succeeded. However, some of those who succeeded will always stand out and be remembered in the poker world due to the difficulty of the...
by FTR Poker Admin | Oct 27, 2014 | Editorials
Halloween is right around the corner, which means candy, confections, and costumes! Unfortunately, if you’re looking to dress up in a poker-themed costume this Oct. 31, your options are pretty limited. You can either dress up in suggestive (and revealing) woman’s...
by FTR Poker Admin | Oct 27, 2014 | Editorials
The term “hero call” may be defined somewhat differently in various sources, but in general, a hero call is a very rare situation in poker where a player calls a sizable bet in a marginal situation, mostly based on his read of his opponent. Hero calls are generally...
by FTR Poker Admin | Oct 21, 2014 | Editorials, Featured Poker News
There’s nothing sweeter than pulling off a sick bluff on your opponent. On the flipside, there is nothing more demoralizing and mortifying than losing a pile of chips (and cash) with a misplaced bluff. Sometimes, the player is short on chips; other times, the player...
by FTR Poker Admin | Oct 21, 2014 | Editorials
Before the poker boom came around, you could safely bet that you would see at least a couple of big names at the final table of any big event like the WSOP Main Event. The boom brought changes to the poker world in unexpected ways, one of which was the absence of...
by FTR Poker Admin | Oct 13, 2014 | Editorials
If you know someone who leaves and breathes online poker, then sooner or later you might encounter him somewhere beyond his workplace. Not only that, but it might be his birthday or Christmas! If you did remember that you should buy a present but have no idea what to...
by FTR Poker Admin | Oct 9, 2014 | Editorials
When it comes to fearless bluffs, few if any, poker players compare to Tom “durrrr” Dwan. In fact, he’s had so many bluffs he needed his own editorial to cover them all, which you can find here. That being said, he’s not the only one with balls of steel, as the...
by FTR Poker Admin | Oct 6, 2014 | Editorials
Let’s face it, the game of poker has always had an aura of shadiness around it. There’s a reason why Doyle Brunson had guns pulled on him several times while playing poker, after all. Even though poker is not usually associated with violence nowadays, it has become...
by FTR Poker Admin | Oct 2, 2014 | Editorials
In the world of poker, there is nothing quite as awesome and inspiring as a well-placed bluff. It takes some serious guts to pull off, but there is something inherently satisfying about winning a pot that you shouldn’t have. A well-timed bluff can demoralize an...
by FTR Poker Admin | Sep 23, 2014 | Editorials, WSOP
Dan Marino. Charles Barkley. Barry Bonds. All of these famous athletes, despite their gaudy stats, MVP awards, and multi-million dollar advertising deals, are best known for one thing: NOT winning a championship. In the world of professional sports, this is how people...
by FTR Poker Admin | Sep 23, 2014 | Editorials
Heads up poker is considered by many as the hardest form of poker to master. Many players have made their fortunes in high stakes heads up battles. Even in the most popular poker themed movies, the highlight scenes are usually heads up cash games. With that in mind,...
by FTR Poker Admin | Sep 17, 2014 | Editorials
It seems like only a few years ago most of the world’s governments were oblivious to the presence of online poker and online gambling in general. The complete lack of any regulation had its drawbacks, but when governments finally woke up to the industry that was...
by FTR Poker Admin | Sep 12, 2014 | Editorials
You’ve seen the money, the glitz, the glamour, and all the fancy television shows, but there is more to poker than million-dollar buy-ins: there is also a dark side. Never mind the problems with gambling addiction and bankroll management, we’re talking about the...
by FTR Poker Admin | Sep 10, 2014 | Editorials
Every tournament, especially the most high profile ones, usually has several bubbles. It can be soul-crushing to get knocked out on the money bubble of the WSOP or WPT Main Event, but what really hurts is just missing out on the final table. Perhaps the worst thing...
by FTR Poker Admin | Sep 2, 2014 | Editorials
Every year, thousands of people sit down at the poker table. Poker, much like life, brings in all different kinds of players, from all different shapes, sizes, and mentalities. It’s fun (and often quite hilarious) to try and compartmentalize each player into a...
by FTR Poker Admin | Sep 1, 2014 | Editorials
Only a handful of players can say that they got to two final tables in a row, especially when it comes to high profile tournaments like the EPT, WTP or WSOP. These tournaments feature the highest buy-ins in the world, which inevitably produce the toughest fields. The...
by FTR Poker Admin | Aug 20, 2014 | Editorials
Last week, we covered the 9 Most Unforgettable Hands in the History of the WSOP ME. Now, we take a look at the Hollywood side of things to honor our favorite poker scenes from the silver screen. Some of them—Ok, most of them—are improbable, dare we say impossible,...
by FTR Poker Admin | Aug 17, 2014 | Editorials
If you play poker regularly and have no idea who Norman Chad is, you should really be ashamed of yourself! Before Norman started his poker commentary career, he was better known as a sportswriter and syndicated columnist, as well as the occasional host of ESPN’s...
by FTR Poker Admin | Aug 12, 2014 | Editorials
Rarely does a WSOP go by without some sort of controversy emerging about players celebrating way too much after winning pots. This year, Mike Matusow was in the center of the biggest one when he got a one-round penalty for excessive celebration with 22 players left in...
by FTR Poker Admin | Aug 10, 2014 | Editorials
The final table is set for the 2014 World Series of Poker Main Event. Among the nine players in the November Nine, one of them is going to walk away with the world championship, $10 million dollars, and a spot in history. In honor of the final nine, here are the nine...
by FTR Poker Admin | Aug 4, 2014 | Editorials
Since the beginning of the poker boom, poker’s rising popularity led to an inevitable flood of TV ads across the US and the rest of the world. While you can still catch an ad or two on TV today and many more are bound to appear with the legalization of online poker in...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jul 26, 2014 | Editorials
Over the last decade, many celebrities took to the felt to try their luck at the poker tables. Some of them only visit certain tournaments and don’t play all that much while others are die-hard poker fans, attending the WSOP every year and playing in tournaments all...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jul 21, 2014 | Editorials, WSOP
Another World Series of Poker has come to an end and this summer is was bigger and better than ever. Players saw the return of the $1 million buy-in Big One for One Drop, the second Millionaire Maker event, the first-ever Dealer’s Choice event, a Monster Stack...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jul 15, 2014 | Editorials
Superstitions have been around since the dawn of humanity and it is no wonder that they made their way into gambling and eventually, poker. Superstitions can range widely and influence players in a lot of ways; they can be generally accepted or personal. A good...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jul 14, 2014 | Editorials
Poker is a game of the brain, the gut, and, perhaps most importantly, the heart. That being said, as a poker player, romance can be hard to come by. For starts, it isn’t the best profession to find a significant other. It also isn’t very financially stable and the job...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jul 10, 2014 | Editorials
Actor/musician Dean Martin once said, “You’re nobody till somebody loves you.” In poker, you’re nobody until somebody gives you a cool nickname. While other sports might have nicknames such as “The Great One” or “King James,” poker is similar to boxing and MMA in that...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jul 10, 2014 | Editorials
Poker can be a very brutal game and many players have surely experienced a situation where the world collapses on you at the turn of a card. While most players handle these situations in stride, sometimes emotions boil over in unpredictable ways. Let’s take a look at...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jul 7, 2014 | Editorials
“I Bet You” was a TV show which aired in 2007-2008 starring poker pros, Phil “The Unabomber” Laak and Antonio “The Magician” Esfandiari. The series was produced for the MOJO HD network and ran for two seasons before the network went out of...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jul 1, 2014 | Editorials
Whether you watched them win world championships and WSOP bracelets on television or win millions of dollars playing high stakes poker online, at some time in your gambling career you’ve probably thought to yourself, “Hey, these poker players are pretty cool!” That...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jun 27, 2014 | Editorials
Since the 1960’s, places like Las Vegas in the US and Monaco in Europe have been the world’s leading gambling hubs, but now the epicenters of the gambling world are steadily shifting to another part of the world – Asia. Even with vast political turmoil surrounding the...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jun 24, 2014 | Editorials
Many players have been very close or even to the WSOP Main Event final table, at times virtually holding the bracelet in the palm of their hand only to make a move or a series of plays that would undo everything they had done to get to that point. With the 2014 WSOP...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jun 19, 2014 | Editorials
Since poker exploded at the turn of the century, the world has seen an ever-increasing number of online and live tournaments available for everyone to participate in. Whether you like live super deep stack $10K’s or online hyper turbo tournaments for a few bucks, you...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jun 16, 2014 | Editorials
Have you ever been on a plane next to someone who smelled badly or had the snivels? Have you been on a date only to realize that the person you thought was hotter than hell chews her food with her mouth open just like your dog? Have you thought about how you’d react...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jun 12, 2014 | Editorials
If you thought playing poker was hard enough under normal conditions, try playing it while suffering from these ailments! 1. Carpel Tunnel Symptoms include pain, numbness, and the inability to move your hand back and forth, all of which spell disaster for a long poker...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jun 11, 2014 | Editorials
Now that the World Series of Poker is underway, I got together with some self-proclaimed poker know-it-alls to come up with a list of the people we think are the most likely to win this year’s Main Event. Naturally, as the alcohol flowed and conversation continued, we...
by FTR Poker Admin | Jun 8, 2014 | Editorials, Nevada
Matt Stout Matt Stout is an online and live poker pro who has amassed more than $2.5 million in tournament cashes. As impressive as that is, Matt’s success on the felt is nothing compared to the number of lives he’s changed as a volunteer, fundraiser and humanitarian....
