This is now the third article in the series I’ve written on Lowball Poker games at Bill’s blog and will cover Badugi Poker. The post will take a look at Badugi poker history and provide a short how to play Badugi guide. If you want to check out the other two articles in my series then here are the links:
Introduction to Lowball Poker
Razz Poker and the World Greatest Gambler
I’m hoping everyone’s enjoyed what I’ve written so far and finds this article interesting as well.
Badugi Poker History Then and Now
Badugi is one of the newer games to hit the live and online poker scene. It is thought that the game was first invented in South Korea around the 1960’s but obviously it’s impossible to pin point it’s exact conception. Paul Eskimo Clark a poker player who served in the USA army during the Vietnam War is credited with bringing the game back to America and although he claims to have invented the game as well it’s pretty clear it was being played over in South Korea well before the war broke out.
When Badugi poker first hit the Las Vegas poker scene it was mainly played at the higher limits, it is traditionally considered to be a real gamblers game which at the time was really attractive to the high stakes players in Vegas. The truth of the matter is though that there is a lot of Skill involved in Badugi and like in any form of poker the better players end up with the money in the long run.
Today Badugi is played in various live mixed cash games and it was reported that at last years World Series of Poker Greg Raymer and Todd Brunson among others where playing $400/$800 Badugi in the side games. Badugi doesn’t yet have a dedicated WSOP tournament but there is plenty of action online at PokerStars who include it in their SCOOP and WCOOP poker tournament series.
How To Play Badugi Poker
It’s not actually that difficult to learn how to play Badugi, in fact if you’ve ever played 2-7 Triple Draw then you’ll probably get the hang of it pretty quickly. The first thing you need to know about Badugi is that it has its own unique hand rankings system. The system is a lowball hand rankings system in which an unsuited A-2-3-4 would be the holy nuts, you only get 4 cards when playing Badugi. Any hand that has 4 cards of different suits and numerical value is known as a Badugi and your aim is to make the lowest Badugi possible. Pairs and suited cards will count against you.
Any hand of Badugi poker starts with the posting of the blinds, the dealer then deals each player 4 cards. A betting round takes place which is followed by a drawing round. During the drawing round players can draw as many or as few cards as they wish, choosing not to draw is known as standing pat. There are a total of three drawing rounds when playing Badugi and once the final drawing round and final betting round has taken place the hand goes to a showdown, much like in any Triple Draw game. The winner is then determined and the pot is shipped in their direction.
The above is just about as much information as you need to play a hand of Badugi but if you’re interested in finding out more about the game then why don’t you check out one of my newest sites: Badugi Poker, it covers how to play the game, strategy, drawing odds and where to play online.
Next week I’ll close out the series with an article on 2-7 lowball poker games.
photocred to RodrigoFavera
Last week I said the Razz poker article that was coming up included one of my favorite all time poker stories. Instead of writing your standard how to play Razz article which you’ll be able to find in about 5 seconds on Google I’m just going to dive straight in and try to write something that’s exciting and more importantly interesting!
If you didn’t catch my first article then you can find it here: Introduction to Low Ball poker
Some of you might have heard of Archie ‘The Greek’ Karas but most of you probably haven’t. His story is one of true greatness. Archie is a man who is considered to be the greatest gambler of all time and when he arrived in Las Vegas to shoot pool in 1992 no one could have guessed what was about to go down.
Archie was in town to shoot pool but his love of gambling and natural talent for poker was where his story really stars. With just $50 in his poker Archie rocked up to Binions Horseshoe and started playing in the Razz poker games. In no time at all Archie had ran his $50 into a massive $30,000. During this heater Archie player only Razz and by the end of it he was sat in one of the biggest games in town a $200/$400 fixed limit Razz cash game.
With $30,000 in his pocket Archie then began shooting pool and after some truly epic battles with a player who to this day remains nameless Archie had turned his $30,000 in to a staggering $7,000,000!
It was at this point that Archie entered Binions Horseshoe sat at a heads up table with $5,000,000 in front of him and presented an open challenge to anyone with the bottle to come and play him. Of course the game was Razz and the first challenger was the legendary Stu Ungar. The two greats of the game battled for 3 straight days until finally Archie broke Stu Ungar taking a total of $500,000 from him. At the time it was the biggest game the poker world had ever seen. After Stu Ungar challengers came and went but no one ever got the best of Archie.
In fact the only person to ever get the best of Archie was Archie himself. He got bored with playing poker, the action wasn’t fast enough and the stakes weren’t high enough. Archie moved to the craps tables where his Vegas heater would finally end. At his highest point it’s said Archie was up over $50,000,000 but slowly and surely he went broke shooting craps for over $200,000 a point.
The years Archie spent gambling in Vegas will always be remembered and his reputation as the worlds greatest ever gambler is firmly set in Las Vegas history.
If this story has sparked an interest in Razz poker for you then you should check my new Razz poker website. It covers everything you’ll need to learn the game and play online.
Photocred to Andrew 鐘
Editor’s Note: Dave has written some interesting stuff about low ball poker and I asked if he could share some of his thoughts here with you guys. Show him a little love by giving his site a visit and checking him out.
Introduction To Lowball Poker
Lowball poker is a term used to encompass all games which use a variety of low hand rankings as opposed to the more traditional high hand rankings used in No Limit Holdem and many other popular poker variants. Texas Holdem and Pot Limit Omaha dominate the online poker world in fact there’s probably quite a few online players out there who have no idea how to play the different lowball games on offer.
This article will be part of series of guest posts Bill has kindly allowed me to make on his awesome poker blog! Today we’ll just start with an introduction to the most popular forms of lowball poker but in coming weeks the series will take a much more in depth look at the various lowball poker games you can play online. I’ll be doing my best to make all the posts as informative as possible as well as entertaining.
Popular Online Lowball Poker Games
Razz – Razz poker is without a doubt the most popular lowball poker game around. It’s got a reputation for being a bit crazy and outdrawtastic. A lot of players first come into contact with Razz via H.O.R.S.E and it’s considered one of the more tricky games in the H.O.R.S.E rotation.
Razz is essentially 7 Card Stud but using ace to five hand rankings. When playing Razz the holy nuts is A-2-3-4-5, straights and flushes don’t count against you when playing Razz but pairs and obviously high cards do. Aces are always considered low cards only.
Badugi – Badugi poker is the most recent form of lowball poker to be spread online and it’s thought to have originated from South Korea. It’s a four card triple draw lowball game which uses it’s own very unique system to rank hands. Badugi is a real favorite among high stakes live pro’s who consider it a real gambling game, don’t let that fool you though there’s a lot of skill involved.
When playing Badugi the aim is to make what is known as a Badugi. A Badugi consists of four cards which are all of different values and different suits. The best possible Badugi you can make is A-2-3-4. Pokerstars is pretty much the only place you can get a game online, it is spread at Merge networked poker rooms but their traffic sucks and the games never run.
2-7 Triple Draw – 2-7 Triple Draw is comfortably the second most popular lowball poker game but still sits firmly behind Razz in the popularity stakes. It first appeared online in 2003 when Pokerstars added it to their spread of games. 2-7 Triple Draw uses the deuce to seven hand rankings system in which a non flushing 2-3-4-5-7 is the absolute nuts. Aces are high cards and when playing 2-7 Triple Draw straights and flushes both count against you.
It’s usually played as a fixed limit game, sometimes played as pot limit game and very very rarely played as a no limit game. Online action can get pretty high and it’s not unusual to see the $1,000/$2,000 2-7 Triple Draw games running at Pokerstars.
2-7 Single Draw – Well as you probably already guessed 2-7 Single Draw is the same as Triple Draw aside from the fact there’s one draw and not three. As a result of less draws it’s played as a no limit game far more often than a fixed limit or pot limit game.
Single Draw is much less popular than Triple Draw online but is still spread on the cash tables at Pokerstars as well as featuring in their World Championship of Online Poker. Single Draw is sometimes referred to as Kansas City Lowball and you’ll virtually never find it spread in any live poker rooms.
Next Week Razz
Hopefully you enjoyed this introduction to lowball poker article, next time out we’ll take a much closer look at Razz poker. I’ll write a bit about it’s history, including on of the most exciting moments in Vegas poker history ever and give you a basic how to play guide.
Want to read more about lowball poker right now? Then you should check out my site playlowballpoker.com, I’ve covered all the lowball games above in much more depth and also some of the more popular hi/lo games. Check it out, I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it!
Hi, my name is Bill Rini and this is my poker blog. I've been blogging about poker and the poker industry since around 2003-ish. Like most people I started out playing poker as entertainment in home games whenever we wanted to sit around and smoke cigars, drink beer, and eat pizza, and needed a good excuse. I started playing online shortly after the first online card rooms opened and it wasn't long before I was playing 20, 30, or even 40 hours a week or more. One day I received a phone call about a program manager position at Tiltware which was the company that consulted to Full Tilt Poker on software development and marketing. After Tiltware I spent about 2.5 years working at Party Poker where I was the poker room manager.