Thinking Poker Podcast co-host Nate Meyvis just published his first e-book, and it’s a humdinger! He reviews every hand he played on Day 1 of the 2014 WSOP Main Event, and you’ll see not only his own thoughts on each hand but also commentary from myself and podcast regulars Gareth Chantler and Leo Wolpert.
This excerpt from an Amazon review sells the book better than anything I could write:
“The book is organized such that you feel like you are being placed in a tournament post-mortem among experts—the kind of conversations that happen between pros at the summer poker houses or pros and their backers at Vegas diners. Key, however, is the attention to detail. Nate deconstructs the hands and questions decision after decision, often identifying mistakes and finding better lines.
The value of this book, however, is not in understanding how Nate approaches a flush draw on the turn in level 2 of the WSOP. Instead, the reader is overwhelmed by the realization of just how much actionable information—observational, historical, and physical—is available to you at the outset of a hand of tournament poker, and how much of an edge can be gained simply by putting in the effort to try to make sense of it. The overwhelming feeling one gets from the book is not “wow, this guy is absolutely amazing at poker.” It is “wow, I can’t believe how little I actually think about during a poker hand. This is embarrassing.” I assure you that after you read this book, you will only be bored at a poker table if you willfully choose to ignore its implicit commandment to start paying attention. And to start thinking.”
You can buy Thinking Tournament Poker directly from us to get Kindle, Epub, and PDF files, or you can pick it up in the Amazon Kindle Store.
Bought this a few days ago and tore through it, really enjoyed it and looking forward to the next one.
Thanks very much, Duggs!
Wondering how valuable this book would be to a cash player. Is it so tournament oriented that it is not applicable to cash games?
HistNerd–
The series is definitely tournament-oriented. Frequent reference is made to the sort of opponent one finds in the WSOP ME, the effect of antes, the value of survival, the effect of having 50BB-ish stack sizes, and so on. It’s entirely possible that your cash-game study time is better spent elsewhere.
That said, writing this book certainly helped my cash game, and the process of thinking through decision after decision in a NLHE context is going to be valuable wherever you play NLHE. A lot of the commentary is about stuff that isn’t tournament-specific. So the tournament basis for the book might or might not be a reason not to buy it.
Thanks for asking this question.
Picked up your book Nate – a great little read – also look forward to more. The format really works with your analysis of the situation and how the lads chime in with their thoughts. Perhaps a little more on the meta-game / psychological state of your opponents / table dynamics stuff with your future issues, although some of that was there so it’s hardly a complaint. Nice work!