Winning Texas Hold'em - The Power of Position

By Steve Schafer

In Texas Hold'em, a player's table position is one of the most important elements of developing a winning game. A player's position in Hold'em is where he/she is seated relative to the player on the "button". Your position is vital when deciding how (or if) you should play a hand. Despite it's importance, position strategies are surprisingly underutilized by most novice Hold'em players.

There are four basic positions in Hold'em: Late position, middle position, early position and the blinds. The blinds are often lumped in with "early position", but since they are played a little differently, I gave them their own category. The following guidelines are just that - guidelines. There are many more factors to consider when playing Hold'em, but you should always default to the following rules. Here are the four positions and how they relate to your game play:

Early position in Texas Hold'em is the two seats just left of the blinds. Those players are the first to act pre-flop and most of the other players act after them post flop.The problem with EP is that if you play too loose here, you will find yourself stuck in a pot against a premium hand and you can easily loose a bunch of chips. Play really tight here. Play only premium hole cards (AA, KK, QQ, AK, AQ). Your goal here is to take the pot down early if you can. Raise with high pocket pairs (aces, kings and queens). Limp with you AK or AQ. If someone in late position raises after you limped your AK, go ahead and re-raise them. If they call you, you can bet into them after the flop and try to win the pot there. If they re-raise your re-raise, you are likely either dominated, or at best facing a coin-flip.

Next is middle position. These are the two positions just to the left of the two early position seats. You have a little more room to play here, but not much. Play it pretty much like early position, with the exception of maybe adding JJ or suited AJ to your starting hand arsenal. Be wary of early position limpers (unless you have already seen them limp in EP with junk) and you should fold to just about any raises from EP.

Late position in Hold'em is the button and player to his immediate right. Being in late position has a huge advantage over everyone else, in that they are allowed to see what everyone else does before they have to do anything. This basically gives them a license to steal. The button and the cut-off get to see the action and decide whether or not they want any part of it. They have the freedom to raise the blinds at will and see flops with all kinds of speculative hands, because they have the advantage of great position. Go ahead and raise the blinds with 88 or suited 89. Then just outplay any callers after the flop. Yes, you will be up against winning hands sometimes that people won't want to lay down, but you position gives you a better chance of spotting when that is and getting out of the hand before it gets ugly.

One of the most difficult positions to play in Texas Hold'em is the small and big blinds. You already have chips committed to the pot before it is your turn to act and everyone is trying to raise your blind. The good news is that you often have the correct pot odds to call raises, since you already have in the pot. The bad news is that unless you are really really good at playing from the blinds, your position will put you at too big a disadvantage to be able to outplay your opponent post flop. In less you can see a flop cheaply, or have premium hole cards, I would fold.

Texas Hold'em is really a waiting game. Be patient and play your position. If you follow these strategies you could be well on your way towards winning at Texas Hold'em. Now "Let's shuffle up and deal!

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For a more detailed description of Hold'em position, check out Steve Schafer's How to Win at Texas Hold'em site. Click here to get your own unique version of this article with free reprint rights.