Beyond statistics, beyond whether to raise, call, or fold, Elements of Poker reveals a new world of profitability for your bankroll and your life. (...more)

A Rubber Band Story and Other Poker Tales collects the best articles, blogs, and stories from Tommy Angelo's last 12 years of writing and showcases them with eighteen new introductions and afterwords.

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January 1, 2012 update:

I am not taking on new clients for the next couple years because I am working on my third book, Painless Poker. If you would like to receive occasional poker content and career updates from me, please join my mailing list.

Master Outline of Coaching Topics

There are two versions of the master outline. The skeleton version, which is below. This is used to plan a curriculum. And the client version, which is a 50-page, much expanded version of the skeleton outline that clients receive before we start a program. For two of the topics in the skeleton version below — Retention and Follow-up, and Stack Size Matters (Limit Hold'em) — I made links to popups that show the text that is in the client version of the master outline.

Introduction
The premise of the t i l t l e s s program
How we will use the outline
How to use these pages after the program
Retention and follow-up
My Terms
- Table Poker
- Mum Poker
- The Hijack Seat
- Event Odds
- Dollar Value (of a stack in a tournament)
- Worst hand ever play
- Fastroll, fastgrab, slowfold, fastfold, slowcall
- Game rejection
- Bliscipline
- Hard tilt, soft tilt
- Entitlement diseases
- Hufta, hulta
- Twotone, monotone
- Reciprocality: the cause of profit
- Reciprocal analysis
- POOP
- Twotone, monotone
- Splaining
- Betting topics (raise, bet, call, check, fold)
- Non-Betting topics (everything else)
General betting topics
- Each of these topics can/will be discussed in two contexts:
  - Generalities
  - The specific context of you, the games you play in, your opponents, your experiences, etc.
- Universal Starting-Hand Chart
- The various purposes for using the chart
- If you out some or all of a USHC and it gives me a great overview of your preflop game.
- Anticipation
- Full games
- Shorthanded games
- Bluffing
- Showdown poker
- Indiana vs the Arab
- Suitedness
- Connectedness
- Pocket pairs
- Freefolding
- Board types
- Playing draws
- Checking behind
- Betting out on the flop
- Checkraising
- Checky-cally in headsup pots
- Taking turns bluffing
- Passive and aggressive
- Adaptiveness
- Recommended
  - Reading
  - Surfing
General non-betting topics
- Some of these topics are recurring themes. Some of them overlap. Some will lead to specific action items. All of them are aimed at your bottom line.
- Your choice of varieties and venues
- Lopping off the C-game
- Quitting
- Breaks
- Sets and sessions
- Winning, losing, and breaking even
- The Professional
- Some good ideals
- Reciprocality
  - Betting
  - Information
  - Tilt
  - Bankroll
  - Position
  - Quitting
  - Other
- How to play your A-game more often
- Seat selection
- Game selection
- Stake selection
- Table selection
- The rating game
- Low-hanging fruit
- Your bankrolls
- Separating your performance from results
- Stabilizing mental gadgetry
- Defining mistake
  - Betting mistakes
  - Non-betting mistakes
- The Gray Area
- Phrases and thoughts to avoid
- Two ways to improve
  - From the top up
  - From the bottom up
- Fusslessness
- Your fears
- Your emotions
- Inevitability
- Pocket aces
- Streaks
- Tilt and heat
  - Defining tilt and heat
  - Hard and soft tilt
  - The three dimensions of tilt
  - The various kinds of tilt
  - Your tilts
  - Dissipating waves of tilt
- The hierarchy of fear
- Decisions
  - Comparisons
  - Door A - Door B
  - Cowboy Bill quotes
  - No decision before its time
- The information war
  - Table poker
  - Internet poker
- Giving respect
  - Table poker
  - Internet poker
- Getting respect
  - Table poker
  - Internet poker
- Criticising
- Reading opponents
- Going to school
- Keeping score
  - Accounting methods
  - Your accounting
  - Accounting for the rake
- Golf/Poker analogies
- Alexisms: funny ways of seeing how silly we are
- Objects of the game
- Rules
- Moving up
- Going pro
- Recreationism
- Defining success
- Partnering
- Home field vantage
  - Table poker
  - Internet poker
- On the road
- Family, friends, spouses, lovers
- Discretion
- Cravings, medications, and addictions
  - Gambling
  - Caffiene
  - Alcohol
  - Tobacco
  - Pot
  - Drugs
  - Food
  - Drama
- Poker funk
  - causes
  - cures
- Table funk
  - causes
  - cures
- Running good and running bad
- Awareness
- Concentration exercises
- Focus
- Lessnesses
  - Desirelessness
  - Harmlessness
  - Tiltlessness
  - Shamelessness
  - Cravinglessness
  - Fusslessness
  - Blamelessness
  - Stresslessness
  - Opinionlessness
  - Goallessness
- Rising above
- Letting go
- Meditation
  - How
  - Why
  - When
- Yoga
- Mindfulness
- Sitting
- Breathing
- Wellness
- Resistance
- Change
- Self-perpetuating tiltlessness
  - Resolve in reserve
  - Practicing losing
  - Energy conservation
  - A reminder about odds
  - Plugging leaks
  - Indifference, detachment, aloofness
  - Ignoring and not-reacting
  - The path of leak resistance
- Recommended
  - Reading
  - Surfing
  - Movies
- Various short writings by me and by clients
Table Poker
- Getting set
- Tempo
- Information reciprocality
- How, why, and when to look left
- Stack size scan
- Protection
- Flowchart of a hold'em hand
- Betting and behaving with style
- The showdown
  - Shameless showdowns
  - Showing bluffs
  - Slowrolling
  - Slowcalling
  - Slowfolding
  - Fastfolding
  - Fastgrabbing
  - Fastrolling
- Sixth street
- Mum poker
- Constructing and employing your poker face
- Hands on face
- How to be unreadable
- How to read others
- Ignoring, and not reacting
- Fantasy poker
- The sanctity of a live hand
- Talk lines
- Forbidden words
- Shutoff answers
- Forbidden thoughts
- How to sit
- Sunglasses and hats
- Folding
- How to look at your cards
- When to look at your cards
- When to announce your action
- Chip stack management
- Changing seats
- Pushing the button
- Tipping
- The dealer made a mistake. Should I speak up?
- Dealers
- Floorpersons
- Disputes and mishaps
- The Chain of Complain
- Working the room
- Be the house
Internet Poker
- Internet forums
- Software
- Information recirpocality
- Finger tilt
- Prehand warmups
- Rake rates
- Rakebacks
- Site selection
- Game selection
- Table selection
- Number of tables to play
- Notes to self
- Breaks
- Chatting, IMing, emailing, surfing
- Comparing internet to live / golf analogy
- Sitting and breathing
Cash Games
- Fluctuation
- Game selection and table selection
- Game rejection
- Get set
- Prehand warmups
- Buying in, adding on, and cashing out
  - Table poker
  - Internet poker
- Take the blind or post behind?
- Chopping blinds
- Buy the button
- Tipping
Tournaments
- Event odds
- The bubble
- Tournament time
- Things to know
- Dollar value of a stack
- Stack size matters
  - Playing with a big stack
  - Playing against a big stack
  - Playing with a small stack
  - Playing against a small stack
- 50-50 situations before the flop
- Stealing
- Reasons to play tournaments
- Reasons to not play tournaments
- Making deals
- Tipping
Hold'em
- Position
- Acting last
- Position reciprocality
- Firstlessness
- Preflop play, examined by position
  - Button
  - Cutoff
  - Hijack
  - Early position
  - Big blind
  - Small blind
- Postflop play, examined by position
  - Hulta
  - Hufta
  - Postflop button
  - Postflop cutoff
  - Postflop hijack
  - WOOPS
- Positional redeployment of chips
- Flops-seen percentages by position
- Common confrontations
  - Button vs blind
  - Blind vs button
  - Blind vs blind
  - Others
- The Universal Starting-Hand Chart
Limit Hold'em
- Betting topics
  - Bread-and-butter situations
  - My starting-hand groups for limit hold'em
  - The queen-ten bar
  - I started with two big cards, I raised before the flop, and I missed the flop. Now what?
  - I started with a big pocket pair smaller than aces, and I raised preflop, and an ace came on the flop. Now what?
  - The raise-flop-and-drop play.
  - My most profitable hands are QT and KT
  - Betting out on the flop compared to checkraising.
  - Why open-limping at LHE is not a good idea.
  - Why a 2/3 blind structure is fundamentally more profitable than 2/4 blinds.
  - The raise-and-fold-preflop play
  - Suitedness and connectedness
- Non-betting topics
  - Stack size matters
  - Sizing up games
No-limit hold'em
- Betting topics
  - Raising style
  - Shoot 'em in the nest
  - Stack size matters
  - Pair poker
  - AA and KK preflop, how much to raise?
  - What it means to "control" the pot.
  - Playing with a small stack
  - Playing against a small stack
  - Playing with a big stack
  - Playing against a big stack
  - Aiming for half a stack or all
  - Your AK vs his QQ and the other way around
  - 1/3 stack concept
  - Calling preflop raises with pocket pairs and connectors
  - I started with two big cards, I raised before the flop, and I missed the flop. Now what?
  - I started with a big pocket pair smaller than aces, and I raised preflop, and an ace came on the flop. Now what?
  - Free plays from the big blind
  - Suitedness and connectedness
- Non-betting topics
  - Stack size
  - How much to buy in for, and add on, and when?
  - Quitting based on stacks
  - On stack sizes
  - On stack locations.
  - No brainers such as set vs set
  - How to lose a big pot
The Penalty Plan, and the origin of the T i l t l e s s program

poker player, writer, and coach