''...the bad beat is something every player experiences, but you can learn the secrets of how to handle bad luck..."
As a poker player, there is a high probability that you'll experiences a bad beat in a game. Bad beat is the term given when you have a very strong hand that indicates you'll win, but you're beaten unexpectedly by another hand on the final cards. This bad beat can happen to you even when you do everything right. It all comes down to luck, and that's something in poker you can't control.
When you experience a bad beat it can adversely affect your game, sometimes sending you on tilt. One of the ways to deal with this is to remember that losing can offer the best opportunity to examine and maybe change your game. Most players don't analyse the way they play when they are winning. So, what can you do?
From a playing perpective , slowing down your game may put you back in a good position. It's a good time to slow down and play carefully when you're losing. This is a good time to go back to very basic strategy, avoid further bad beats, and consider only playing the very best hands. It takes discipline to do this, especially as you may be folding possible winning hands.
When you're consistently losing, you've lost your best options for bluffing because your opponents can see what's happening. They'll believe you're going to keep losing because that's what they have seen you do - and this might lead them to play some hands they wouldn't normally play against you.
The main advantage you may gain from a bad beat is a potentially lucrative one, and that's due to what's known as a bad beat jackpot. These are offered by some of the online poker rooms as a special promotion, with a progressive jackpot growing bigger all the time until you strike lucky with a bad beat. This normally means getting beaten when you're holding a hand of at least 4 of a kind...and if you pull this off it will all be down to luck! Assuming you're playing with one of the poker sites offering a bad beat jackpot, you will definitely win more with a bad beat in these circumstances than you would with the hand itself.
Since starting their amazing bad beat poker promotion, Absolute Poker have given away over $2 million in jackpot money at the Bad Beat Jackpot tables.
HOW IT WORKS
Look out for the ‘Bad Beat Jackpot’ tables at Absolute Poker and watch for the jackpot. $0.50 from the pot of each raked hand is added to the Bad Beat Jackpot pool. The jackpot keeps growing until someone hits an unbelievable bad beat.
If you lose a hand holding four eights (8888) or a anything better, that’s a bad beat. But at the special bad beat tables everyone at the table will win a piece of the distributed jackpot. And you’ll take the majority of the prize.
As soon as someone hits a qualifying bad beat, 65% of the jackpot will be shared between everyone at the table where the bad beat occurred. 25% will go towards the next jackpot and 10% will go to the house.
Absolute take the new amount and divide it amongst the players seated at the Bad Beat Jackpot table.
The loser of the hand - ie. the bad beat victim - will take 50% of the prize
The winner of the hand will take 25% of the prize
The rest of the players seated at the table will share the remaining 25%
What are bad beats, and how can you turn them to your advantage?.....
You Are Here Bad Beat Return to online poker, or continue start learning at the Poker Strategy hub page
3 great resources - bad beats
Learn-Texas-Holdem.com has a great article on bad beat stories.
Wikipedia.org bad beat article.
About.com bad beat article.
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