• Crazy Pineapple Poker Rules How To Play
• Crazy Pineapple Poker Rules Card Game
• Crazy Pineapple Poker Rules Poker
• Crazy Pineapple Poker Rules For Beginners

Crazy Pineapple Rules for Poker. Crazy Pineapple is a rather interesting variation to the standard Texas Hold Em style of poker. To begin, each player in the game is dealt three cards that are face-down. These are called pocket or hole cards. Crazy Pineapple Poker strategy (where you receive three three hole cards and must muck one on the flop) is very similar to Texas Hold’em strategy (where you receive two hole cards) and Omaha strategy (where you receive four hole cards, but may only use two of them at showdown). The rule in Crazy Pineapple Poker states that you must discard one of your three-hole cards A Crazy Pineapple Poker player must make a critical decision for future play at this stage in the game. You must be able to analyze your hand and determine its value in relation to the other hands you observe and then make the necessary discard.

Tired of playing plain old Texas Hold'em? Try these variations on the game—Pineapple Poker or its close relative, Crazy Pineapple. Pineapple poker is almost identical to Hold'em, so first make sure you're familiar with the rules to that game. Pineapple Poker and Crazy Pineapple start out a little differently but they end up the same.

How to Play Pineapple Poker

Just as in Hold'em, the two players to the left of the dealer post blinds or forced bets before the deal, but this is where the similarities end—at least for a while. Instead of being dealt two hole cards as in Texas Hold'em, each player gets three hole cards to begin in Pineapple Poker.

Crazy Pineapple Poker Rules How To Play

Now comes the betting round. If you're playing regular Pineapple, every player discards one of his three hole cards. Now everyone has only the regular two hole cards they would have had in a Texas Hold'em game. Play continues just like in Texas Hold'em. Hand values are a little inflated, but nothing too crazy happens.

After the betting is complete, the flop is dealt—five community cards face up on the table—and another round of betting begins.

The 'Crazy' in Crazy Pineapple

Here's where it gets 'crazy.' In Crazy Pineapple, players have held on to their three starting cards up until this point. After the second round of betting is completed, this is when players can discard one of their three cards. Having seen how the flop hits their hands, players can make far better decisions about which two cards to keep and which one to throw away. This makes for big hands, big pots, and big bad beats. That ought to keep the boredom away.

From here on, the game is identical to Texas Hold'em. The turn is dealt, a round of betting happens, the river is dealt, there is a final betting round, then there's a showdown if anyone is left. Players can use any combination of the two hole cards in their hands and the five board or community cards on the table to make the best hand, and the best hand wins the pot.

Pot Limits

Like Hold'em, Pineapple can be played limit, pot-limit, or no-limit. No-limit is especially interesting as opposed to Hold'em where if you get all in pre-flop, you're just a passive observer for the rest of the hand. If all the money goes in pre-flop in Pineapple, there is still one more decision to be made that will affect the outcome of the hand.

Crazy Pineapple High-Low Split

Introduce Pineapple Poker and Crazy Pineapple to your home game and it will make things a little crazy. If you want to make the night not just crazy but absolutely insane, play Crazy Pineapple High-Low split. The decisions players face on the flop when deciding whether to go for high or low will make them sweat and squirm no matter the stakes. And if there's an eight qualifier on the low like in Omaha Eight or Better, the game can really test your nerves.

Crazy Pineapple Poker is a popular up-and-coming game in many home games and poker rooms. This game is a spin-off of its more often played cousin – Texas Hold’em. It creates a bit more diversity to Hold’em so you don’t have to sit around playing the same boring hands as always. Crazy Pineapple Poker allows players to stretch their wings and hone new skills.

Playing Crazy Pineapple Poker is easy once you get the hang of the rules. The basic Crazy Pineapple rules are not complicated to remember, but practice is the key to becoming a great player (as with all games of poker). This article will hopefully help you develop a Crazy Pineapple strategy so you can enjoy this fun game and hopefully win a few bucks if you play with your friends.

Crazy Pineapple Poker Rules

Crazy Pineapple Poker Rules Card Game

To deal Crazy Pineapple Poker, just act like you are dealing Texas Hold’em, but deal three cards to each player instead of two. You still have your small and big blind to the left of the dealer button, there may be antes included, and betting will occur like normal preflop betting.

Crazy Pineapple Poker Rules Poker

Note: in Pineapple Hold’em (non-crazy version) each player would discard one card and make a two-card hand before the flop.

Immediately following the first round of betting, the dealer turns over three community cards known as the flop. These community cards can be used with your hand to make the best five card poker hand. Another round of betting will take place just like in Texas Hold’em. After this flop bet, before the turn card, everyone must discard one of their hole cards and create a two-card hand.

Following the discard, the rest of the hand will play out like a Hold’em hand. The dealer will deal the fourth community card known as the turn and there will be a round of betting. Then the final community card, the river, is dealt and there is the final round of betting. Showdown happens and the player that makes the best hand wins. You may use zero, one, or two hold cards along with any of the community cards to make your hand.

Play Crazy Pineapple Online

Crazy Pineapple is primarily played as a home game as a fun variation of Texas Hold 'em. This means it is not found very often online. PokerStars is the one poker room that offers Pineapple Hold 'em, but it rarely has people sitting down to play. If you really want to play Pineapple Hold 'em online, I would wait until a weekend or a holiday to play. This will ensure that the most players will be on at the same time and it will improve your chances of a game running. Good luck at the tables.

This article was submitted by my friend Josh. I made some edits, but he did the most work.

Crazy Pineapple Poker Rules For Beginners