If you ever see an angry poker player carrying on and throwing a fit about a hand, you can generally assume this player has taken a bad beat. “Bad beat” is a poker term referring to having a strong dominating hand lose to a much weaker hand held by another player.

If you’ve read my previous uplifting article about bad beat jackpots, you might be excited about the possibility of experiencing a large bad beat in a brick-and-mortar casino, but most players hope they can defy the laws of the universe and never have to experience bad beat poker.

It doesn’t matter whether you’re playing online poker or brick-and-mortar poker, players are constantly getting frustrated and complaining about bad beats. If I had a dollar for every bad beat story I’ve heard in my life, I wouldn’t be sitting here playing a $20 online multi-table tournament; I’d be vacationing at the beach.

Generally it’s the better and more experienced players who are amazed at losing to large underdog hands. Newer players often don’t realize the odds of a bad beat poker hand like pushing all in with AdJc and miraculously beating AsKs by spiking a Jack on the river.

Experienced and educated poker players need to take a step back and realize that bad beats will always happen when playing poker. Most decent poker players always talk about how amazed they are when they experience a bad beat, and they try to claim that it always happens to them. One thing that experienced players don’t realize is that if they are constantly playing with weaker opponents and experiencing bad beats, it’s because they always have the dominating hand.

You hardly ever see an advanced poker player lay down a bad beat on a much weaker player, especially in a no-limit game. The reasoning behind this is because as the better player, he generally has the better hand going into an all-in situation, so it seems like weaker players never experience bad beats. Players have to learn to take pride in generally making the correct play with the better hand and simply brush it off when they finally experience a horrifying bad beat.

Another common topic arises when talking about bad beats: how bad beats seem to happen far more often while playing online poker than when playing in a casino. For years players have spread myths and rumors that online poker is rigged. These players accuse the online card rooms of creating large action hands for the players involved in a game to drive up the size of the pot, which spikes up the casino rake. These myths and rumors are exactly that: all fake. All online poker rooms experience rigorous pattern testing and verification to provide completely random hands for all games at all times.

The truth of the matter is, when playing online poker, you see far more hands than when you are playing in an actual casino. Playing brick-and-mortar poker, you might be dealt around 30 hands an hour, depending on the game, the dealer, and the other players at the table. However, while playing online poker, you are probably seeing 50+ hands an hour. You might be experiencing double the number of hands as compared to casino poker, which might make it seem like bad beats are dealt more often, when actually their occurrence is generally about the same. If you are playing two tables at once in an online poker room, you are easily seeing 40-50 more hands per hour than if you were playing one table in a brick-and-mortar casino.
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If you aren’t familiar with bad beat jackpots, let me explain. In most brick and mortar casinos there is a progressive jackpot that builds over time, called the bad beat jackpot. Poker rooms usually take out a dollar or two out of every raked pot and put it into? the bad beat jackpot.

The rules for hitting the jackpot are different in each casino. At some casinos you only need Aces full of Jacks or better beaten, while some casinos offer even harder beats such as a four of a kind beaten. In most card rooms, you must also be playing at a limit table. No limit games generally don’t qualify, as the jackpot would be hit much more frequently with players constantly all in and seeing every card the board has to offer. When a bad beat happens and is verified, everyone gets paid.

The structure for a bad beat jackpot payout also varies from casino to casino. It is common to see the losing hand receive 40% of the jackpot, the winning hand receive 25% of the jackpot, the rest of the table split 15% of the jackpot, and the rest of the poker room split the remaining 20%. As you can see, when someone hits a jackpot, there is plenty of room for everyone to celebrate.

In the last four years I’ve played countless hours of poker in casinos in Missouri, Mississippi, Nevada, New Mexico, and Oklahoma and had never experienced a bad beat jackpot until last night.

I headed up to Cherokee Casino, in West Siloam Springs, Oklahoma, with a buddy of mine, to get a few hours of play in. While waiting for our seats to open, we sat down in fairly loose $4/$8 limit game. In this poker room, $4/$8 limit is the lowest limit game offered, so it feels much like playing $2/$4 and $3/$6, where having 7 callers pre-flop on a raised hand is common and where Aces hardly stand a chance.

We had only been playing for about 30 minutes when it all went down. I was sitting in seat 9, with a loose player sitting to my right, in seat 8. This player was 23 years old and was also a dealer at the casino. (In the larger casinos, usually if you are a dealer you are not allowed to play in games in your own card room, but this isn’t a rule at Cherokee Casino.)

The player in seat 8 was holding JJ and the player in seat 5 was holding QQ. The majority of this hand was heads up and the final board was:
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Did you know that Baccarat is James Bond’s favorite casino game? Neither did I, but apparently it’s true! Unfortunately I wasn’t able to discover if it is traditional baccarat that 007 likes or if it is one of the many variations. Anyway; just so that every-one is aware of the types of baccarat in existence and on offer, here’s a brief overview of some of the variations:

Mini Baccarat

This is the most commonly found form of Baccarat in American Casinos and online casinos; it is very similar to traditional baccarat but with lower limits to enable wider accessibility. Other variations include: a smaller table, only the dealer handles the shoe, and the table is worked by one dealer only.

Chemin-de-fer

If the name wasn’t enough of a give away, this is a French variation of the originally Italian game, Baccarat. It’s translation ‘railroad’ doesn’t sound quite so romantic but quite fitting due to the main difference between Chemin-de-fer and traditional baccarat; namely that the French variation insists on the passing of the shoe from one player to the next when the first player has lost his hand; this ensures a railroading of the shoe around the table.

Super Pan Nine

This is a slim lined version of traditional baccarat; the decks are reduced by having the 7, 8, 9, and 10 cards removed from the decks. To compensate for the low numbers present three cards are dealt rather than two, with an option for drawing a fourth. In this version a hand of 3 or 4 only will result in the banker drawing a fourth card.

Private Baccarat

This is an unusual variation of baccarat in which the banker may choose whether to deal one or two hands to the player. Should he choose to deal the player two, the player then has the choice to play them both or to pick which one to play. If he picks one the game is as a traditional baccarat game. If however he choose to play both hands he must win both of them in order to beat the dealer; winning one and loosing one results in a tie.
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Baccarat is one of the easiest casino games to play and is very popular with high rollers online and big gamblers at online and land based casinos around the world. It is simple to master your skills, fun and easy to play.

Comparing to other casino card games Baccarat has clear advantage for players because of the low house edge, so the odds to win for players are higher. It is a game of guessing, therefore no real strategy will work in this game.

In the Baccarat gambling game there are three possible betting options available- on the player, on the banker and on the tie. Betting on the player and on the banker both have about the same house edge percentage, so you have almost a 50% chance of picking the right outcome and in the event of a tie winning you get your initial bet back. Your odds are slightly better for betting on the banker. Sometimes the game offers a commission on the banker bet (usually 4-5%) which reduce the advantage of this method. Above all avoid betting on the tie, the the house edge is the highest for that.

You should not waste your time trying to spot a pattern of the game and then to chase it pointlessly. There can not be a pattern in the Baccarat gambling game simply because one hand has no bearing on the next, and is never influenced by the preceding hands. Same as trying to guess how the previous slots spin will affect the next one.
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