Poker Strategies
After receiving pocket cards, you are immediately faced with a choice: play your cards and either raise or call the blinds, or fold.
Practice Matters
Openers
Openers The player who opens the pot must hold in his hand a pair of jacks or a higher-ranking hand. It is essential for the stability of the game that a player have jacks or better when opening. If this rule is not enforced and a player opens the pot any time he feels like it, one of the greatest factors of skill in the game is automatically eliminated— that which depends on knowing that the opener holds at least a pair of jacks.
Splitting Openers
Splitting Openers The player who opened the pot has the right to discard his openers or part of his openers, but he must announce "splitting" and place his openers or the discarded part of his openers face down beneath a chip or coin to one side to verify at the showdown the fact that he had them. If the player splits but fails to declare he was splitting, that player's hand is declared foul or dead.