Friday, November 30, 2007
10/20 Live at the Bellagio
I played this for a few hours last night, thinking the games would be softer than usual because of the current Five Diamond series they are running. Wrong. Almost everyone in the game was a regular, and although I was still one of the best players at the table, there was only one guy there who could be described as bad, and even he was bad in a loose aggressive sort of way, making him much tougher than the typical loose passive bad player.
It didn't help that I wasn't playing very well. For one thing, the last few times I've played live, it's been 2/5 and 5/10 NL games, both of which use the $5 chip as the standard betting unit. When you play live, you generally keep your chips in stacks of 20, so I'm accustomed to a stack being worth $100. The Bellagio 10/20 game uses $20 chips, and for some reason I could not get the idea out of my head that these stacks were worth $200 rather than $400. As you can imagine, that's a pretty big error to make.
I got a seat pretty quickly, and folded the first few hands just trying to observe the table. Just after I sat, a very well-dressed and sophisticated-looking young Asian man sat down. He looked wealthy, and I was hoping he was going to be a rich fish, but he was only holding two $500 chips in his hand, enough to buy a 50 BB stack. But then he passed one of the chips to the runner and told her he wanted "1000 in orange [20-dollar] chips and the rest in black [100-dollar chips]." I looked closer at his remaining chip, and saw that he was in fact casually spinning not $500 but $5000 on the felt as though it were a penny. There's no cap on the buy-in for this game, and he was in for 10 Grand. I had a little over $6000 with me and no way to get more that night, so I was only putting $2000 at a time on the table myself.
This guy immediately started raising every pot and showing garbage hands. This was a typical live table, though, so no one was playing back at him. I finally reraised him with QTo on my BB, and he folded. A few hands later, he opened to $80 UTG and got called by the second most active player at the table. I held AJs on the button. Ordinarily I'd just call here against an UTG raise, or maybe even fold. I was way ahead of this guy's range, though, so I slid two nearly full stacks into the pot, intending to reraise to $380.
His eyes bugged out and he folded. No sooner did I see his reaction than I realized what I'd done. Goddammit, those stacks are worth $400 each! To my greater dismay, the second player asked how much I had behind. It was just shy of $1200, meaning that 40% of my stack was already in the pot. He moved all in, and I knew I was going to have to call it off. Against anything except AA, I was getting more than the right price. Thankfully, he turned over KK, but the flop gave him top set, and just like that, I was reaching into my pocket again. 'At least stacking off with AJ pre-flop should give me a good table image,' I thought to myself.
I counted out twenty bills and laid them in a stack in front of me. Bills play at the Bellagio, so I didn't even need to bother converting them to chips. A few hands later, I got 99 in the CO and opened for $80. The same Asian guy called in the small blind, and we went heads up to a Jc 4d 3d flop, a pretty favorable one for me. He checked, I bet $140, and he raised to $300. I'd previously seen him call down two bets out of position with K4 on a Kxxx board, so I didn't think he was too likely to be check-raising me with top pair. That means he probably had either a set, an unlikely two pair, or much more likely, a bluff or semi-bluff. I called.
The turn brought the 5s, and he bet $400, which I called again, planning to call a non-diamond river. The river was not a diamond, but it was an Ace, also a bad card for me. I was really torn over whether to call on this particular card, since if I was right that he was on a flush draw, the nut draw was his most likely holding.
Ultimately, it was his bet sizing that convinced me to fold. He bet just $700 into a pot of more than $2100, which really felt like a blocking/value bet. Looking at the numbers now, I kind of feel like I should have called, since he doesn't have to be bluffing very often to make it profitable, but at the time I just didn't feel there was any chance he'd do this as a bluff. Ironically, I would have been more inclined to call an all in bet. I agonized and folded. He didn't show his hand, which he'd generally been doing when he bluffed, so I felt pretty good about the decision at the time.
I didn't feel good about laying out five more bills on the table, but I didn't want to play a real short stack. Those bills didn't have a bright future with me. The next pot I played, the same guy raised my big blind to $80, and the other softish spot at the table, a young Asian woman who was tight but not particularly good, called from the SB. I decided to come in with Jh 6h on my BB. Not exactly a monster, but these two were the ones I wanted to play pots with.
The flop came Qc Tc 9h, giving me an open-ended straight draw. We both checked to the aggressive Asian, who also checked. That told me a lot: he didn't have a strong made hand, a club draw, or an open-ended straight draw. I was pretty sure he would have bet any of those.
A 5h on the turn gave me a flush draw to go with with my straight draw. The Asian woman bet $160 from the SB, and I just called. Given how tight she was, I might have been able to get her to fold with a semi-bluff raise, but the stacks were awkward for it, and I figured I could represent clubs if they got there on the river but my draws did not. The Asian guy called as well.
The river brought the 4c, completing a potential flush but not the one I wanted. Still, I was pretty sure neither of my opponents had made it, either. The woman checked, and I tossed my $500 in bills into the pot. The man quickly grabbed five black chips, thought for a minute, and placed them in the pot. The woman reluctantly folded, and he showed me 54o for two pair. It's not a bad call if he realizes that my range is going to consist of exactly flushes and bluffs, and that there are two busted draws I could be bluffing, but I had a feeling he only called because he made two pair.
That left me with about $1200 in chips and a little under $2000 in my pocket. I decided I was just going to play short stacked for a bit, since I wanted to preserve enough for one more nearly 100BB stack. I was thinking that at least I'd have an action image that would help me get paid off, but around this time I realized how many players were getting moved away from the table. It dawned on me that we must be a 'must-move' table, meaning that players are seated at our table from the waiting list but required to move to one of the other 10-20 tables when a seat opens. So most of the players who had seen my unintentionally wild play were getting dispersed, and soon enough, so was I.
My new table was no better than the last, filled mostly with competent, tight young men. Thankfully the aggressive Asian guy got moved over with us, so there was at least some action at the table. I started reraising him pretty aggressively and win a few hundred dollars pre-flop. I built up to around $1700, then found AJ on my BB after an $80 raise from my little yellow friend and a call from someone else. I popped it to $400, and this time he shot me a dirty look and called. The other guy folded, but the flop was an awful Q98. I was sure he wasn't going anywhere, so I just checked and folded. "Bad flop for Aces," I told him.
"Yeah sure," he smiled.
The next orbit, a pretty tight aggressive kid to my left who was playing a kind of short stack opened to $100, and the Asian guy called, as did the button. I called with Qs Js on my BB, and the flop came down 9s 7s 4d. I checked, the kid bet $300, and the Asian called. I felt like the kid probably had an overpair, but there was a chance at least one of my high card outs was good, along with the flush outs, of course. So I moved all in, and to my surprise the kid folded. The Asian guy asked if I had a flush draw and then called. The Ks came on the turn, I showed my flush, and he mucked, so I don't know what he called with, but he was kind of upset. I, on the other hand, was happy to get my stack well over $2000 for the first time all night.
I won a few more medium-sized pots, and once again found myself squeezing the Asian guy with AJ in my BB. Again he called, but this time the flop was a bit more favorable to me: 9c 7c 2c, with me holding the Jc. It was from a monster, but I knew he was calling light pre-flop, and he'd seen me check and give up in this spot before, so I thought a bet would get some respect. I bet out $800, nearly the size of the pot, with about $1200 behind, obviously planning to call it off if he moved in. "Aces this time?" he asked as he folded.
The very next hand, he raised again, and this time I really did have Aces. I reraised, but he finally figured out how to fold a hand pre-flop. Possibly for the better, since playing out of position against him, even in a reraised pot, could have gotten ugly now that I was >300 BB deep.
By the time this next hand rolled around, I was sitting on a stack of nearly $3600. I limped UTG with 43s. Limping in is something I pretty much never do online, especially at a 6-max game, but at more passive full ring live tables, it's easier to get away with. The tightish kid from before raised to $100, the Asian called, and I called.
The flop was a potentially interesting 234r, giving me top two pair on a coordinated board out of position against two opponents with very differently sized stacks. The kid had just over $1000 left, and I had a feeling he'd move all in with an overpair or a big Ace, since those hands would have a gutshot and, from his perspective, overcards to a pair as well. Sure enough, he did start counting his bills, but as he did, I noticed that the Asian was watching him intently and loading up his own chips.
Ugh, what did that mean? He was loose, but he wasn't stupid. How light was he going to call $1000 with me already showing interest and with another $3000 or so that I could still move into the pot after he acted?
The kid did indeed move all in, and the other guy quickly called. Christ. I could see him calling with a big pair, maybe JJ+, but I think he reraises most of those pre-flop. The last time he had K's he made a huge reraise and showed the hand. Was he dumb enough to call with a smaller pair like 88? I wasn't sure, but his call was awfully quick and confident. I didn't think he'd call 23 or 24 preflop, and while it would be a fine play for the kid to move all in with AK, it would be suicidal for the Asian to call the all in with it. Fold equity is an important part of that play.
So what did that leave? Draws? He's already getting bad odds on those, plus he has to be concerned about me forcing him to put in another pot-sized bet before showdown. Maybe a combo draw, but only 54 was likely to be in his range. That leaves sets and straights as a substantial part of his range. I folded.
The turn brought a 3, which would have filled me up. The river was a 2. "I missed," the kid said.
"7 high," the Asian announced, still not turning over his cards.
Blood pounded in my temples. Are you fucking serious? He must have had exactly 75, if that was true. The kid turned over AK. The Asian mucked. Jesus fucking Christ, I am such a fish. Why am I making nittish folds against a rich, crazy Asian gambler? Why am I assuming he knows what he's doing? He was the reason I hadn't quit the game already! Plus I held a 3 and a 4, making 22 his most likely set if he was going to have one at all, and I have four outs against that unlikely scenario. Why didn't I think this shit through?
It was my turn to post the BB, but I indicated for the dealer to skip me and packed up my things. The game was bad, I was frustrated, and I wasn't playing well. No reason to chase losses, I finished down barely $1000, just half a buyin and well within a standard deviation for me these days, though it always hurts more to lose at live poker than online.
And of course it always hurts more to lose when you know it is your own fault. I've had enough bad beats and cold decks to know they are par for the course and not get too upset no matter how much I lose as a result. But when I have a bad night because of my own mistakes, a bad fold or a failure of 3rd grade math skills, I beat myself up over it for days, no matter how much it did or didn't cost me in the end.
Stumble It!
It didn't help that I wasn't playing very well. For one thing, the last few times I've played live, it's been 2/5 and 5/10 NL games, both of which use the $5 chip as the standard betting unit. When you play live, you generally keep your chips in stacks of 20, so I'm accustomed to a stack being worth $100. The Bellagio 10/20 game uses $20 chips, and for some reason I could not get the idea out of my head that these stacks were worth $200 rather than $400. As you can imagine, that's a pretty big error to make.
I got a seat pretty quickly, and folded the first few hands just trying to observe the table. Just after I sat, a very well-dressed and sophisticated-looking young Asian man sat down. He looked wealthy, and I was hoping he was going to be a rich fish, but he was only holding two $500 chips in his hand, enough to buy a 50 BB stack. But then he passed one of the chips to the runner and told her he wanted "1000 in orange [20-dollar] chips and the rest in black [100-dollar chips]." I looked closer at his remaining chip, and saw that he was in fact casually spinning not $500 but $5000 on the felt as though it were a penny. There's no cap on the buy-in for this game, and he was in for 10 Grand. I had a little over $6000 with me and no way to get more that night, so I was only putting $2000 at a time on the table myself.
This guy immediately started raising every pot and showing garbage hands. This was a typical live table, though, so no one was playing back at him. I finally reraised him with QTo on my BB, and he folded. A few hands later, he opened to $80 UTG and got called by the second most active player at the table. I held AJs on the button. Ordinarily I'd just call here against an UTG raise, or maybe even fold. I was way ahead of this guy's range, though, so I slid two nearly full stacks into the pot, intending to reraise to $380.
His eyes bugged out and he folded. No sooner did I see his reaction than I realized what I'd done. Goddammit, those stacks are worth $400 each! To my greater dismay, the second player asked how much I had behind. It was just shy of $1200, meaning that 40% of my stack was already in the pot. He moved all in, and I knew I was going to have to call it off. Against anything except AA, I was getting more than the right price. Thankfully, he turned over KK, but the flop gave him top set, and just like that, I was reaching into my pocket again. 'At least stacking off with AJ pre-flop should give me a good table image,' I thought to myself.
I counted out twenty bills and laid them in a stack in front of me. Bills play at the Bellagio, so I didn't even need to bother converting them to chips. A few hands later, I got 99 in the CO and opened for $80. The same Asian guy called in the small blind, and we went heads up to a Jc 4d 3d flop, a pretty favorable one for me. He checked, I bet $140, and he raised to $300. I'd previously seen him call down two bets out of position with K4 on a Kxxx board, so I didn't think he was too likely to be check-raising me with top pair. That means he probably had either a set, an unlikely two pair, or much more likely, a bluff or semi-bluff. I called.
The turn brought the 5s, and he bet $400, which I called again, planning to call a non-diamond river. The river was not a diamond, but it was an Ace, also a bad card for me. I was really torn over whether to call on this particular card, since if I was right that he was on a flush draw, the nut draw was his most likely holding.
Ultimately, it was his bet sizing that convinced me to fold. He bet just $700 into a pot of more than $2100, which really felt like a blocking/value bet. Looking at the numbers now, I kind of feel like I should have called, since he doesn't have to be bluffing very often to make it profitable, but at the time I just didn't feel there was any chance he'd do this as a bluff. Ironically, I would have been more inclined to call an all in bet. I agonized and folded. He didn't show his hand, which he'd generally been doing when he bluffed, so I felt pretty good about the decision at the time.
I didn't feel good about laying out five more bills on the table, but I didn't want to play a real short stack. Those bills didn't have a bright future with me. The next pot I played, the same guy raised my big blind to $80, and the other softish spot at the table, a young Asian woman who was tight but not particularly good, called from the SB. I decided to come in with Jh 6h on my BB. Not exactly a monster, but these two were the ones I wanted to play pots with.
The flop came Qc Tc 9h, giving me an open-ended straight draw. We both checked to the aggressive Asian, who also checked. That told me a lot: he didn't have a strong made hand, a club draw, or an open-ended straight draw. I was pretty sure he would have bet any of those.
A 5h on the turn gave me a flush draw to go with with my straight draw. The Asian woman bet $160 from the SB, and I just called. Given how tight she was, I might have been able to get her to fold with a semi-bluff raise, but the stacks were awkward for it, and I figured I could represent clubs if they got there on the river but my draws did not. The Asian guy called as well.
The river brought the 4c, completing a potential flush but not the one I wanted. Still, I was pretty sure neither of my opponents had made it, either. The woman checked, and I tossed my $500 in bills into the pot. The man quickly grabbed five black chips, thought for a minute, and placed them in the pot. The woman reluctantly folded, and he showed me 54o for two pair. It's not a bad call if he realizes that my range is going to consist of exactly flushes and bluffs, and that there are two busted draws I could be bluffing, but I had a feeling he only called because he made two pair.
That left me with about $1200 in chips and a little under $2000 in my pocket. I decided I was just going to play short stacked for a bit, since I wanted to preserve enough for one more nearly 100BB stack. I was thinking that at least I'd have an action image that would help me get paid off, but around this time I realized how many players were getting moved away from the table. It dawned on me that we must be a 'must-move' table, meaning that players are seated at our table from the waiting list but required to move to one of the other 10-20 tables when a seat opens. So most of the players who had seen my unintentionally wild play were getting dispersed, and soon enough, so was I.
My new table was no better than the last, filled mostly with competent, tight young men. Thankfully the aggressive Asian guy got moved over with us, so there was at least some action at the table. I started reraising him pretty aggressively and win a few hundred dollars pre-flop. I built up to around $1700, then found AJ on my BB after an $80 raise from my little yellow friend and a call from someone else. I popped it to $400, and this time he shot me a dirty look and called. The other guy folded, but the flop was an awful Q98. I was sure he wasn't going anywhere, so I just checked and folded. "Bad flop for Aces," I told him.
"Yeah sure," he smiled.
The next orbit, a pretty tight aggressive kid to my left who was playing a kind of short stack opened to $100, and the Asian guy called, as did the button. I called with Qs Js on my BB, and the flop came down 9s 7s 4d. I checked, the kid bet $300, and the Asian called. I felt like the kid probably had an overpair, but there was a chance at least one of my high card outs was good, along with the flush outs, of course. So I moved all in, and to my surprise the kid folded. The Asian guy asked if I had a flush draw and then called. The Ks came on the turn, I showed my flush, and he mucked, so I don't know what he called with, but he was kind of upset. I, on the other hand, was happy to get my stack well over $2000 for the first time all night.
I won a few more medium-sized pots, and once again found myself squeezing the Asian guy with AJ in my BB. Again he called, but this time the flop was a bit more favorable to me: 9c 7c 2c, with me holding the Jc. It was from a monster, but I knew he was calling light pre-flop, and he'd seen me check and give up in this spot before, so I thought a bet would get some respect. I bet out $800, nearly the size of the pot, with about $1200 behind, obviously planning to call it off if he moved in. "Aces this time?" he asked as he folded.
The very next hand, he raised again, and this time I really did have Aces. I reraised, but he finally figured out how to fold a hand pre-flop. Possibly for the better, since playing out of position against him, even in a reraised pot, could have gotten ugly now that I was >300 BB deep.
By the time this next hand rolled around, I was sitting on a stack of nearly $3600. I limped UTG with 43s. Limping in is something I pretty much never do online, especially at a 6-max game, but at more passive full ring live tables, it's easier to get away with. The tightish kid from before raised to $100, the Asian called, and I called.
The flop was a potentially interesting 234r, giving me top two pair on a coordinated board out of position against two opponents with very differently sized stacks. The kid had just over $1000 left, and I had a feeling he'd move all in with an overpair or a big Ace, since those hands would have a gutshot and, from his perspective, overcards to a pair as well. Sure enough, he did start counting his bills, but as he did, I noticed that the Asian was watching him intently and loading up his own chips.
Ugh, what did that mean? He was loose, but he wasn't stupid. How light was he going to call $1000 with me already showing interest and with another $3000 or so that I could still move into the pot after he acted?
The kid did indeed move all in, and the other guy quickly called. Christ. I could see him calling with a big pair, maybe JJ+, but I think he reraises most of those pre-flop. The last time he had K's he made a huge reraise and showed the hand. Was he dumb enough to call with a smaller pair like 88? I wasn't sure, but his call was awfully quick and confident. I didn't think he'd call 23 or 24 preflop, and while it would be a fine play for the kid to move all in with AK, it would be suicidal for the Asian to call the all in with it. Fold equity is an important part of that play.
So what did that leave? Draws? He's already getting bad odds on those, plus he has to be concerned about me forcing him to put in another pot-sized bet before showdown. Maybe a combo draw, but only 54 was likely to be in his range. That leaves sets and straights as a substantial part of his range. I folded.
The turn brought a 3, which would have filled me up. The river was a 2. "I missed," the kid said.
"7 high," the Asian announced, still not turning over his cards.
Blood pounded in my temples. Are you fucking serious? He must have had exactly 75, if that was true. The kid turned over AK. The Asian mucked. Jesus fucking Christ, I am such a fish. Why am I making nittish folds against a rich, crazy Asian gambler? Why am I assuming he knows what he's doing? He was the reason I hadn't quit the game already! Plus I held a 3 and a 4, making 22 his most likely set if he was going to have one at all, and I have four outs against that unlikely scenario. Why didn't I think this shit through?
It was my turn to post the BB, but I indicated for the dealer to skip me and packed up my things. The game was bad, I was frustrated, and I wasn't playing well. No reason to chase losses, I finished down barely $1000, just half a buyin and well within a standard deviation for me these days, though it always hurts more to lose at live poker than online.
And of course it always hurts more to lose when you know it is your own fault. I've had enough bad beats and cold decks to know they are par for the course and not get too upset no matter how much I lose as a result. But when I have a bad night because of my own mistakes, a bad fold or a failure of 3rd grade math skills, I beat myself up over it for days, no matter how much it did or didn't cost me in the end.
Labels: Las Vegas, poker, poker strategy, session review, trip report
Stumble It!
Thursday, November 29, 2007
Book Review: Limit Hold 'Em
I might as well disclose up front that I am not very good at or knowledgeable about fixed limit hold 'em. In some ways, that makes me unqualified to review a text on the subject, but it also plants me squarely within the target audience of Howard Lederer's contribution to the Full Tilt Poker Strategy Guide: Tournament Edition. Reading Lederer's chapter left me with a strong sense, not only of how to handle the individual, nuts-and-bolts decisions of the game but also how to integrate those decisions into a coherent, profitable strategy.
When feeling my way around a new game, I like to know where a winning player's edge comes from, what situations he seeks to create. I am trying to figure out what I will need to do well, what concepts I will need to master in order to win. Oddly, it takes a while for Lederer to answer this question, and he doesn't do in the section called, "The Starting Framework for Limit Hold 'Em Tournament Play". Eventually, however, he does tell me very clearly what I've been waiting to hear: "It's not about winning pots. It's about winning bets in limit hold 'em. Being in position... is where you earn your bets."
Although it isn't articulated clearly until the middle of the chapter, this is clearly the organizing principle of the strategy Lederer outlines. Street-by-street, he explains both how to take advantage of position when you have it and how to minimize your opponents' ability to profit from their position. His advice ranges from the very specific, in the form of charts for which hands to play from which position with which action in front of you, to the very general, in the form of an overarching strategy that will keep your opponents guessing, prevent them from taking free cards when they want them, and enable you to get free cards when you need them.
As strong as Lederer's chapter is as an introduction to the fundamentals of Fixed Limit Hold 'Em, it is a bit lacking in tournament-specific advice given the context in which it is published. One can infer from his introduction that he believes tight aggressive play to be even more important in a tournament format, where all players are working with a limited number of bets. He warns that, "If you build a loose image, it undercuts your ability to steal."
The fundamental idea, never articulated as clearly as it could be, seems to be that in tournament Fixed Limit Hold 'Em, you need to be able to do a lot with a little. As he puts it, "The beauty of my strategy is that you don't need a big stack to execute it. If you have enough chips to comfortably bet through the hand, that is enough for it to work." The cut-off, in other words, is four big bets, equivalent to a pre-flop raise, a flop raise, a turn bet, and a river bet.
This makes a lot of sense, since below this critical stack size, you will not have all of your tools at your disposal and probably will not be able to generate the fold equity you need to stay alive. It would have been nice to see more advice about how to maintain this minimum workable stack size. Should I tighten my pre-flop raising standards when I have a six bet stack? Bluff the flop less often? Be more inclined to fold my blinds?
Similarly, should I target the blinds of players hovering just above this critical stack size, on the assumption that they will be playing tighter than usual? Although Lederer suggests that a check-raise bluff on a dry Ace-high flop might have more fold equity in a shallow tournament setting than in a ring game, he never integrates this very specific suggestion into a larger strategy, something that does so well elsewhere in the chapter.
To his credit, he does address other aspects of tournament play, such as adapting to the bubble, adapting to the payout structure of the final table, playing short-handed, and playing short stacked. But ultimately, the tournament advice feels less coherent than the rest of the otherwise very enlightening article.
Howard Lederer's "Limit Hold 'Em" chapter is a very helpful introduction to a complex game. He argues that players of no limit hold 'em have a lot to gain from learning this game, and I would add that they have a lot to gain from reading this chapter. Players already confident in their Fixed Limit Hold 'Em game and looking for advice about adapting to a tournament format would do well to look elsewhere, though. David Sklansky's Tournament Poker for Advanced Players remains the best resource for them.
Stumble It!
When feeling my way around a new game, I like to know where a winning player's edge comes from, what situations he seeks to create. I am trying to figure out what I will need to do well, what concepts I will need to master in order to win. Oddly, it takes a while for Lederer to answer this question, and he doesn't do in the section called, "The Starting Framework for Limit Hold 'Em Tournament Play". Eventually, however, he does tell me very clearly what I've been waiting to hear: "It's not about winning pots. It's about winning bets in limit hold 'em. Being in position... is where you earn your bets."
Although it isn't articulated clearly until the middle of the chapter, this is clearly the organizing principle of the strategy Lederer outlines. Street-by-street, he explains both how to take advantage of position when you have it and how to minimize your opponents' ability to profit from their position. His advice ranges from the very specific, in the form of charts for which hands to play from which position with which action in front of you, to the very general, in the form of an overarching strategy that will keep your opponents guessing, prevent them from taking free cards when they want them, and enable you to get free cards when you need them.
As strong as Lederer's chapter is as an introduction to the fundamentals of Fixed Limit Hold 'Em, it is a bit lacking in tournament-specific advice given the context in which it is published. One can infer from his introduction that he believes tight aggressive play to be even more important in a tournament format, where all players are working with a limited number of bets. He warns that, "If you build a loose image, it undercuts your ability to steal."
The fundamental idea, never articulated as clearly as it could be, seems to be that in tournament Fixed Limit Hold 'Em, you need to be able to do a lot with a little. As he puts it, "The beauty of my strategy is that you don't need a big stack to execute it. If you have enough chips to comfortably bet through the hand, that is enough for it to work." The cut-off, in other words, is four big bets, equivalent to a pre-flop raise, a flop raise, a turn bet, and a river bet.
This makes a lot of sense, since below this critical stack size, you will not have all of your tools at your disposal and probably will not be able to generate the fold equity you need to stay alive. It would have been nice to see more advice about how to maintain this minimum workable stack size. Should I tighten my pre-flop raising standards when I have a six bet stack? Bluff the flop less often? Be more inclined to fold my blinds?
Similarly, should I target the blinds of players hovering just above this critical stack size, on the assumption that they will be playing tighter than usual? Although Lederer suggests that a check-raise bluff on a dry Ace-high flop might have more fold equity in a shallow tournament setting than in a ring game, he never integrates this very specific suggestion into a larger strategy, something that does so well elsewhere in the chapter.
To his credit, he does address other aspects of tournament play, such as adapting to the bubble, adapting to the payout structure of the final table, playing short-handed, and playing short stacked. But ultimately, the tournament advice feels less coherent than the rest of the otherwise very enlightening article.
Howard Lederer's "Limit Hold 'Em" chapter is a very helpful introduction to a complex game. He argues that players of no limit hold 'em have a lot to gain from learning this game, and I would add that they have a lot to gain from reading this chapter. Players already confident in their Fixed Limit Hold 'Em game and looking for advice about adapting to a tournament format would do well to look elsewhere, though. David Sklansky's Tournament Poker for Advanced Players remains the best resource for them.
Labels: book review, FLHE, poker, poker strategy
Stumble It!
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
I Can't Believe I Got Away With This
Sorry I don't have an exact hand history, as this came from a heads up match on UB, which doesn't write HH files to your hard drive, and on a computer without Poker Tracker. I was playing against an aggressive but not great player, and we had a history of mutual aggression both from this match and prior ones. He doubled through me once with J8 versus my KQ on a JTx flop in a 3-bet pot, and once the match got deep, I really amped up the aggression. I was potting most flops after raising pre-flop, and he'd already folded suspiciously to one big river bet after I triple barreled. I'd actually rivered the nuts that hand, but he didn't see it.
So in this hand, effective stacks were about $1400, with $3/$6 blinds. I potted it to $18 with Ac 5c, and he called. The flop came Kc Td 9s, and he checked and called a $36 bet. I was ready to give up, but then a 6c came on the turn, and he lead into me for like $60 or so. That felt weak to me, so I potted it again to $288, and he called. The river was a blank, he checked, and I pulled the trigger for one more pot-sized bet of nearly $900. He thought for a while and folded 99 face up (UB lets you do that)!
Granted it was like the 5th nuts and I was showing a lot of strength, but independent of my bluffs I'm sometimes going to show up with a worse set and maybe even KT here that I'm trying to bet for value. I don't even mean to imply that it was a bad fold, but it's not one I ever expect anyone to make, especially not in an aggressive heads up game.
Stumble It!
So in this hand, effective stacks were about $1400, with $3/$6 blinds. I potted it to $18 with Ac 5c, and he called. The flop came Kc Td 9s, and he checked and called a $36 bet. I was ready to give up, but then a 6c came on the turn, and he lead into me for like $60 or so. That felt weak to me, so I potted it again to $288, and he called. The river was a blank, he checked, and I pulled the trigger for one more pot-sized bet of nearly $900. He thought for a while and folded 99 face up (UB lets you do that)!
Granted it was like the 5th nuts and I was showing a lot of strength, but independent of my bluffs I'm sometimes going to show up with a worse set and maybe even KT here that I'm trying to bet for value. I don't even mean to imply that it was a bad fold, but it's not one I ever expect anyone to make, especially not in an aggressive heads up game.
Labels: poker, session review
Stumble It!
Book Review: Read 'Em and Reap
Although retired FBI Special Agent Joe Navarro is the primary author of this book, the largest name on the cover is that of Phil Hellmuth. This establishes the tone of the entire book, whose very valuable core content is surrounded by an equal amount of fluff, hero worship, and self-promotion.
Most successful online poker players already possess a level of poker knowledge well beyond that of the target audience for most poker books, particularly with regard to the strategic and mathematical elements of the game. It is in the realm of psychology and reading people where most of us are lacking, and so studying tells is one of the best things the average internet player can do to improve his success in a live setting.
Mike Caro has already written a seminal text on the subject, Caro's Book of Poker Tells, and I was slow to read Navarro's book on the mistaken assumption that much of it would be old hat. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Navarro has in fact managed to take both a fundamentally different approach to thinking about tells and to examine many new categories of tells that receive little if any treatment in Caro's book. These include tells related to feet, hand, mouth, and eye movement.
Whereas Caro draws an important distinction between tells from actors and tells from non-actors and devotes more of his book to the former, Navarro focuses almost exclusively on the latter. He begins by establishing the physiological foundation of unconscious tells in what he calls the limbic brain. As he describes it, the limbic brain "react[s] to things that are heard, seen, sensed, or felt. It does so instantaneously, in real time, without thought; and, for that reason, it gives off an honest reponse to information from the environment."
When confronted with stressful situations, such as those in a high stakes poker game, the limbic brain prepares the body to freeze, fight, or flee. In later chapters, Navarro goes on to detail how these limbic responses manifest themselves in instinctive body movements. These chapters, which form the core of the book, contain numerous photographs and written descriptions of the tells he has in mind.
Perhaps more importantly, Navarro always returns to the physiological motivation for a particular tell, which presumably will aid in interpreting not only that exact movement but also others of a similar kind. Thus, he has a chapter on "Gravity-Defying Tells" which gives examples of how raised eyebrows, hands, nostrils, or feet all indicate strength, whereas a decline of any of these body parts indicates the opposite. As a result of Navarro's thorough explanation of the reason for his interpretations, one can easily imagine similar tells coming from the knees or shoulders that are not explicitly considered in the chapter. The insights he offers promise to pay off well beyond the specific information he provides in the book.
Still, it would have been nice to see more individual tells covered in detail in a 213-page book. Some of the other content, such as the section of physiology and the section on how to avoid giving off tells of your own, is well worth including. Indeed, much of the value of this book comes from the perspective from outside of poker that Navarro is able to bring to his interpretation of tells. He establishes context for the phenomena he discusses by drawing connections to such disparate subjects as the behavior of juries during courtroom trials, the responses of Mission Control to the Apollo 13 crisis, and his own experience interrogating witnesses and suspects.
Other chapters, most notably "What You Should Know to Vanquish a Pro," contain advice that is irrelevant to the subject of the book and sometimes downright bad. For example, should you find yourself playing with Phil Hellmuth or Lyle Berman (Navarro's examples, not mine), he assures you that "you're going to be in awe of this player.... Don't be afraid to exhibit a bit of hero worship and even deferential behavior to this living legend when you first meet him or her."
Read 'Em and Reap certainly does not shy away from hero worship. It is peppered with references to the greatness of Annie Duke, TJ Cloutier, and of course Phil Hellmuth, who is allowed to conclude nearly every chapter with a self-absorbed rant about some amazing laydown he made based on a recently analyzed tell. Moreover, the index shows Camp Hellmuth referenced on no fewer than 13 pages, almost always in a shamelessly promotional context about how great the staff is or how quickly attendees were able "to win back their seminar costs and much more."
Navarro also spends much of his clunky introduction (what I consider to me the real meat of the book doesn't start until page 79) overselling the value of the information he's about to present. The most blatant example of this is the "Hellmuth Tournament Poker 70-30 Rule", which states that 70% of tournament poker is tells. I'm not even certain what exactly that is supposed to mean, but I'm sure it's wrong. There's no getting around the fact that, Hellmuth's anecdotes aside, tells are almost exclusively useful as a tie-breaker when facing a close decision.
Still, it's by far the most underexploited aspect of the game by the average internet donkey, and I found the meat of Navarro's book very valuable for this reason. It's well worth working through the corny packaging and shameless self-promotion to find smart analysis of dozens of new tells that, to my knowledge, have not been discussed elsewhere in print.
Stumble It!
Most successful online poker players already possess a level of poker knowledge well beyond that of the target audience for most poker books, particularly with regard to the strategic and mathematical elements of the game. It is in the realm of psychology and reading people where most of us are lacking, and so studying tells is one of the best things the average internet player can do to improve his success in a live setting.
Mike Caro has already written a seminal text on the subject, Caro's Book of Poker Tells, and I was slow to read Navarro's book on the mistaken assumption that much of it would be old hat. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Navarro has in fact managed to take both a fundamentally different approach to thinking about tells and to examine many new categories of tells that receive little if any treatment in Caro's book. These include tells related to feet, hand, mouth, and eye movement.
Whereas Caro draws an important distinction between tells from actors and tells from non-actors and devotes more of his book to the former, Navarro focuses almost exclusively on the latter. He begins by establishing the physiological foundation of unconscious tells in what he calls the limbic brain. As he describes it, the limbic brain "react[s] to things that are heard, seen, sensed, or felt. It does so instantaneously, in real time, without thought; and, for that reason, it gives off an honest reponse to information from the environment."
When confronted with stressful situations, such as those in a high stakes poker game, the limbic brain prepares the body to freeze, fight, or flee. In later chapters, Navarro goes on to detail how these limbic responses manifest themselves in instinctive body movements. These chapters, which form the core of the book, contain numerous photographs and written descriptions of the tells he has in mind.
Perhaps more importantly, Navarro always returns to the physiological motivation for a particular tell, which presumably will aid in interpreting not only that exact movement but also others of a similar kind. Thus, he has a chapter on "Gravity-Defying Tells" which gives examples of how raised eyebrows, hands, nostrils, or feet all indicate strength, whereas a decline of any of these body parts indicates the opposite. As a result of Navarro's thorough explanation of the reason for his interpretations, one can easily imagine similar tells coming from the knees or shoulders that are not explicitly considered in the chapter. The insights he offers promise to pay off well beyond the specific information he provides in the book.
Still, it would have been nice to see more individual tells covered in detail in a 213-page book. Some of the other content, such as the section of physiology and the section on how to avoid giving off tells of your own, is well worth including. Indeed, much of the value of this book comes from the perspective from outside of poker that Navarro is able to bring to his interpretation of tells. He establishes context for the phenomena he discusses by drawing connections to such disparate subjects as the behavior of juries during courtroom trials, the responses of Mission Control to the Apollo 13 crisis, and his own experience interrogating witnesses and suspects.
Other chapters, most notably "What You Should Know to Vanquish a Pro," contain advice that is irrelevant to the subject of the book and sometimes downright bad. For example, should you find yourself playing with Phil Hellmuth or Lyle Berman (Navarro's examples, not mine), he assures you that "you're going to be in awe of this player.... Don't be afraid to exhibit a bit of hero worship and even deferential behavior to this living legend when you first meet him or her."
Read 'Em and Reap certainly does not shy away from hero worship. It is peppered with references to the greatness of Annie Duke, TJ Cloutier, and of course Phil Hellmuth, who is allowed to conclude nearly every chapter with a self-absorbed rant about some amazing laydown he made based on a recently analyzed tell. Moreover, the index shows Camp Hellmuth referenced on no fewer than 13 pages, almost always in a shamelessly promotional context about how great the staff is or how quickly attendees were able "to win back their seminar costs and much more."
Navarro also spends much of his clunky introduction (what I consider to me the real meat of the book doesn't start until page 79) overselling the value of the information he's about to present. The most blatant example of this is the "Hellmuth Tournament Poker 70-30 Rule", which states that 70% of tournament poker is tells. I'm not even certain what exactly that is supposed to mean, but I'm sure it's wrong. There's no getting around the fact that, Hellmuth's anecdotes aside, tells are almost exclusively useful as a tie-breaker when facing a close decision.
Still, it's by far the most underexploited aspect of the game by the average internet donkey, and I found the meat of Navarro's book very valuable for this reason. It's well worth working through the corny packaging and shameless self-promotion to find smart analysis of dozens of new tells that, to my knowledge, have not been discussed elsewhere in print.
Labels: book review, poker
Stumble It!
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
$1500 Bellagio Prelim
Man I hate live poker tournaments. Only the biggest buy-in events have a reasonable structure, such that even when you're playing for thousands of dollars, you don't get a lot of room to play poker. But every now and again I tempted by them, because the atrocious play does kind of make up for the bad structure. Generally I feel like my time would be better spent playing live cash games, though.
Anyway, my starting table was about as good as I could have hoped. Jonathan Little (2p2's Fiery Justice, currently 2nd in Cardplayer's Player of the Year rankings) was a few seats to my right, but mostly the table was comprised of middle-aged wannabes who operated at various levels of cluelessness. They weren't very animated or talkative, though, so I've just got a few hands to mention, no good stories from the first table. But hang in there, there's a real character at my second table.
Slow and Steady
We started with 25/50 blinds and 3000 chips. The guys on my left were kind of loose, so I was playing very tight and straightforward poker for a while. The first real pot I played, I raised to 150 with 99 and got three callers, including the BB. I bet 400 at a K85hh flop, and only the BB called. He was the player I thought would have the most K's in his pre-flop range, and I figured I was probably beat. The turn was a T, and we both checked. But then a 9 came off on the river, and he checked, called 1000, and mucked when I showed my set. That provided some breathing room for me right off the bat.
I folded some garbage for a while, then re-popped the guy on my right with ATo when we were both in late position, taking it down pre-flop.
After one hour of play, the blinds doubled to 50-100. The first pot I played at this level, I opened to 300 with TT in relatively early position, and the SB moved all in for 1250. Live players are notoriously nitty, but I'd already seen this guy open shove UTG once (he wasn't called), and he wasn't giving off any strong tells. Also, he was Asian, and absent evidence to the contrary, I always assume Asians are about 20% more aggressive than their Occidental equivalents. So I called and won a race against his AQ.
Jonathan was raising a lot of pots, but he also seemed to be getting a lot of good hands, and I wasn't really interested in tangling with him anyway, since almost everyone else at the table was bad. The only pot we played, I re-raised him with QQ and he folded.
Spotting Tells
I just finished reading Joe Navarro's Read 'Em and Weep (review coming soon) and was trying to make more of an effort to spot people's tells. I never picked up anything really blatant during a pot in which I was involved, but a few things I spotted during other pots seemed to be accurate, so I was feeling confident about that. For example, I twice saw players in early position raise their eyebrows and sit up a bit in their seats before limping into the pot, and both times they ended up reraising. Though I didn't get to see the cards of either, I think it's safe to say they were both pretty strong.
The only move I tried to make based on a read did back-fire, though. There was an early position limper, and I completed something like T4s in the SB. The flop came AJ2, and the action checked to the limper, who bet 200. I generally don't give early position limpers credit for an Ace, though that's a better assumption online than live. In this case, though, the guy had stared at the flop for a long time when it came out, which both Navarro and Caro say is a sign of weakness. This is a decent spot to check-raise bluff anyway, since the limper will often stab at this flop with anything, so I raised to 550. Unfortunately, the BB cold called the raise, so I had to give it up on the turn. The limper did fold, though, so my read on him may have been correct.
Next orbit, an early position player limped in for 100, and I raised to 400 with KQo from relatively early position myself. One of the looser players on my left called, as did the limper. The flop came KJ5, I bet 800, the loose player called, and the limper folded. I wasn't particularly concerned about being beat, but I felt the best way to get in two value bets would be to check the turn (it was a blank) and value bet the river. To my surprise, though, the guy bet 1500. This was a bit troubling, because he was kind of passive, but I just couldn't lay down top pair second kicker yet. I called, we checked through the river, and he showed me AK. This is a spot where I feel like a really good live player might be able to get away on the turn if he had enough trust in his read. It was a big blow to my stack.
The same guy won a small pot off of me a few hands later when I raised KQ again and he called. The flop came 983r, not a great board for a c-bet, but he was calling such a wide range pre-flop that I had to try. Unfortunately, he called. The turn was an 8c, putting a flush draw on the board, and we both checked. I checked again on a river T, and now he bet 1500. When he checked the turn, I figured he was probably drawing, but his most likely draws (76 and JT) both just made something, so I folded, and he showed me 76s, having also picked up a flush draw on the turn.
Short Stack Ninja
At the end of the second hour, we got a 15 minute break, then blinds doubled again. Like I said, it was a disgusting structure. Having just lost a big pot, I was now down to like 11 or 12 BB's. The guy on my right tried to open limp from the SB, but I shoved on him without even looking at my cards and he folded. I open shoved AT from late position and took the blinds, then did the same thing with a small pair the next orbit. A few hands later I got AK UTG, and even though I had about 14 BB's at that point, I went ahead and just shoved anyway, hoping to get looked up light. No such luck, though I was happy to take the blinds.
Now with a bit more room to maneuver, I opened to 550 with 55 on the button, and both blinds called. I couldn't afford to bet at a 984 flop, so we checked it down all the way, and amazingly my 55 held up. That's one of the perks of live poker: you get to showdown marginal hands that no good player would ever allow you to see a river with.
Accumulation
We'd been busting a lot of people from out table, and eventually another familiar face showed up: Allen Cunningham. I've played mid-stakes Razz with him online a few times, but had no NLHE experience with him. Everything I've heard suggests he's very good, though, and I definitely got that sense from him today. He's a quiet but likable guy and very focused at the table. He just kind of exudes competence and intelligence, which isn't a feel that I've gotten from a lot of the other well-known pros with whom I've played.
He started off fairly short and tight, but then won two big pots and seemed to open up a little. He'd just folded to a re-raise from the SB and opened to 600 the next hand when I found 66 in the SB with a stack of about 4000. I thought for a while about whether he'd be more or less likely to have a hand given that he'd just been re-raised, but then I decided that I had a good resteal stack with a pair against a kinda late position raiser and I was just going to stick it in. He asked for a count but folded before I gave him a number, which was fine by me.
After this hour, we finally got a reprieve from the doubling blinds. They stayed at 100/200 and we added a 25 ante. This was incentive for me to open up a bit, and for some reason the guys on my left started calling a bit less, which was perfect. I stole the blinds a few times, but didn't get into any big pots this level.
After another hour, blinds doubled yet again to 200/400/25. With about 6000 chips, I open completed 98s in the SB against a pretty bad player in the BB. He checked his option, and the flop came AT7. Most players, even bad ones, will raise an A in this spot pre-flop, so I often bet a flop like this with air. The straight draw just made it that much more attractive of a proposition. I bet 700, and he raised to 1400. Fuck you. All in. He stared at me for a while and folded angrily. Yeah I didn't think so, you little min-raising bitch.
"Works every time except the last," he muttered. The other annoying thing about live poker is the dumb shit people say. I had my Ipod on, but with the sound on fairly low. Although I heard him perfectly well, I wanted to give him a hard time for mouthing off to me, so I took the ear buds out and asked him to repeat himself, as though I were really interested in this little nugget of wisdom he'd just laid on me. Looking even more annoyed, he said, "That all in works every time except the last." I made a point of laughing really loud as though this was the first time I'd heard that and as though he were trying to be friendly.
A few orbits later, the same clown called an UTG raise from Cunningham and moved all in over a bet on a J75 flop. His AJ lost to Cunningham's 77, and I was tempted to repeat his stupid line back to him, but I behaved myself and kept quiet.
A very tight guy on my right made a donkishly huge open raise to 1800 from kind of late position, and I honestly considered folding AQ, but I just wasn't in the mood. Although this is often AK, it's rarely AA, and the possibility of AJ/AQ/maybe even smaller pairs and worse Aces convinced me I should shove for 9K. He folded, which was fine.
After that pot and a few blinds steals, I was finally sitting on a healthy stack again, and then got a pair of K's, the best hand I'd seen all day. I raised to 1200, and one of the loose bad players called in the SB. Thankfully, he'd luckboxed his way into a nice stack of his own, and I was licking my chops at the prospect of adding it to my own. The 456 flop was not exactly what I was hoping for, but when he led into me for 2500, I had a feeling he was trying to protect a pair rather than semi-bluff a draw, which meant he was right where I wanted him. I asked for a chip count, then moved all in. He called me pretty quickly with 22, and I busted him to win my largest pot of the tournament. It put me over 20,000 chips and probably in the top 15% or so of the remaining players. I didn't get a chance to count, though, as our table was broken and I had to take my newfound winnings over to another table post-haste. That's ok, my work there was done.
The Story Gets Good
Naturally, when I took my new seat, there were several dumb comments about how many chips I had. I heard one person say, "You and the 10 seat should play a big pot. Then we'd really have a chipleader." I glanced over to the dealer's right and saw a middle-aged guy in a beard and a Las Vegas hat sitting on a stack at least twice the size of mine. Then I saw the beer in his hand. Then I saw the way he was swaying in his seat and slurring his speech. Good lord, he was drunk off his ass and sitting on about $20,000 of cash equity! I was literally salivating as I stacked my chips.
Unfortunately, he wasn't playing as many pots as I expected, though he was making an ass of himself in other, often humorous, ways. For one thing, he was trying to flirt with a skinny but otherwise unattractive middle-aged dealer and asked her if she didn't use to do interviews for Cardplayer's website (if you've never seen their 'reporters', they are mostly attractive young airheads). She sort of laughed awkwardly, and he slurred, "You did, didn't you?!" and touched her shoulder. She jerked away from him quickly.
Then he tried to hit on a very attractive Eastern European woman who was serving drinks. He was tipping well and ordering a ton of drinks, so she would usually give him a little shoulder pat and a few seconds of conversation when she came by. All that friendliness evaporated pretty quickly after this interaction:
Drunk: "You've got a beautiful accent."
Hot Waitress: "Thank you."
Drunk: "Where are you from?"
Hot Waitress: "Ukraine"
Drunk: "Where's that, like Russia?"
Talk about the wrong thing to say. The look on her face was priceless. To her credit, she handed him his drink and walked off without another word.
I decided I should get on Drunky's good side, so I asked where he was from. "Right here. Well, Pahrump," he responded.
"I've been to Pahrump," I told him, which was true. My girlfriend and I had lunch there on our way to Death Valley back in February.
"That's where all the..." he kind of trailed off, as though he were about to say something inappopriate, and the whole table started laughing.
I quickly figured out what he was talking about: Pahrump has legalized prostitution, and it's brothels are a popular side trip for a particular type of Vegas tourist. I laughed and nodded along with him as though I'd known that all along. "Yep, I know," I assured him
The rest of the table assumed something else from this. "Of course he knows," I heard someone on my right say. "Why else would he have gone to Pahrump?" I may have tarnished my reputation, but I succeeded in getting on Drunky's good side.
He was also constantly forgetting when it was his turn to act and how much he ought to be betting or raising. Once, without even looking at his hand, he announced that anyone who tried to steal this pot was going to be in trouble. "Even you, Boston," he warned me with a smile. Everyone must have believed him, because the action folded to him in the SB. By this point, he'd lost interest and was looking around the casino. The dealer tapped him on the shoulder. He swiveled in his seat, teetered for a moment, regained his balance, and asked, in all seriousness, "Did I win the pot yet?" The whole table laughed, he raised, and the BB folded.
What Goes Up
The last significant pot I played at this level occurred when there were three limpers and I checked 52o on my BB. The flop came K74, and I figured I was done with the hand, but the action checked around, and a turn 3 brought me an open-ended draw. There aren't a lot of K's I'd expect anyone to be limping at this level, there were no flush draws on the board, and there weren't really even any plausible two pair hands for any of them. I, however, playing as the unraised blind, could have absolutely anything. I led out for 1600, and only the first limper called.
The river brought an 8, and I decided to follow up my bluff with one more big bet, thinking I could get him off of like 99 or 76 or something. I bet 5000, and he tanked for a while before moving all in. Whoops. A few players on my speculated that he might have had KK for a slow-played top set, which seems plausible.
The next blind increase was less than double for once, jumping only to 300/600/50. I tried opening AJs UTG to 1650, but an aggressive and seemingly competent young guy in the SB reraised to 5000, and I had to fold. I thought he might have been from 2+2, and after the table broke, he did indeed introduce himself as JP OSU.
I finally got to play a pot with Drunky when he raised my BB. Even though we weren't that deep anymore, I decided I was going to call him with anything and check-raise all in on most flops, simply because he was playing so erratically. He made it 2200, and I called with T8s. We went heads up to a K95 flop, which was ideal for my plan, assuming he'd bet anything but only call all in with a K or better. I guess I was wrong, though, because he checked behind.
A turn J gave me an open-ended draw, but I still wanted to check-raise all in, so I checked to him again. To my frustration, he checked it back again. A 7 on the river gave me the nuts, and I decided just to bet out 4000 and hope he'd feel obligated to call since he'd played so passively up to this point. Infuriatingly, he folded.
Worst Beat of the Day
My worst bad beat of the day had nothing to do with the cards I was dealt. It was having this second table break and getting moved away from the drunk with the massive stack.
I was still unracking my chips when I got dealt JJ. Someone in early position raised in front of me to 1800. A quick count told me I had about 16,000 chips, an awkward size. I decided just to call the raise. I was still getting my bearings at the table and hadn't even taken a look at the raiser or his stack.
We went heads up to a T53 flop, and he bet out 3500. Ugh. I looked over and saw he had about 9000 behind, meaning that his pre-flop raise had been for more than 10% of his stack. Ugh. If he was a knowledgeable player, he wouldn't be raising so much without a strong hand, and he wouldn't be betting this flop with like AK for 25% of his stack. Ugh. Maybe if I'd been at the table for a bit and knew something about this guy, I could have laid it down, but I'd put in more than 10% of my stack pre-flop as well, and now I couldn't bring myself to fold an overpair to one bet with such shallow stacks. I moved in, he called with QQ, and I was crippled.
The next hand, I open shoved 77 for less than 2 BB's and lost to KQ.
There's a $3K prelim event on Friday that I may play, but frankly I'm tempted to just to go play cash games instead. They had like three tables of 10-20 NL going yesterday, plus at least one 25-50 and 50-100, which meant that the best players weren't going to be at 10-20. I'm 90% sure that would be more profitable than the tournament, but for some reason I feel a strange compulsion to play the tournament anyway. We'll see.
By the way, JP OSU has final tabled the tournament along with Layne Flack, Nick Binger, and Pocket Fives' Basebaldy. He's 4/10 coming in, and they start play at 3PM today. Goooooooo JP!
Stumble It!
Anyway, my starting table was about as good as I could have hoped. Jonathan Little (2p2's Fiery Justice, currently 2nd in Cardplayer's Player of the Year rankings) was a few seats to my right, but mostly the table was comprised of middle-aged wannabes who operated at various levels of cluelessness. They weren't very animated or talkative, though, so I've just got a few hands to mention, no good stories from the first table. But hang in there, there's a real character at my second table.
Slow and Steady
We started with 25/50 blinds and 3000 chips. The guys on my left were kind of loose, so I was playing very tight and straightforward poker for a while. The first real pot I played, I raised to 150 with 99 and got three callers, including the BB. I bet 400 at a K85hh flop, and only the BB called. He was the player I thought would have the most K's in his pre-flop range, and I figured I was probably beat. The turn was a T, and we both checked. But then a 9 came off on the river, and he checked, called 1000, and mucked when I showed my set. That provided some breathing room for me right off the bat.
I folded some garbage for a while, then re-popped the guy on my right with ATo when we were both in late position, taking it down pre-flop.
After one hour of play, the blinds doubled to 50-100. The first pot I played at this level, I opened to 300 with TT in relatively early position, and the SB moved all in for 1250. Live players are notoriously nitty, but I'd already seen this guy open shove UTG once (he wasn't called), and he wasn't giving off any strong tells. Also, he was Asian, and absent evidence to the contrary, I always assume Asians are about 20% more aggressive than their Occidental equivalents. So I called and won a race against his AQ.
Jonathan was raising a lot of pots, but he also seemed to be getting a lot of good hands, and I wasn't really interested in tangling with him anyway, since almost everyone else at the table was bad. The only pot we played, I re-raised him with QQ and he folded.
Spotting Tells
I just finished reading Joe Navarro's Read 'Em and Weep (review coming soon) and was trying to make more of an effort to spot people's tells. I never picked up anything really blatant during a pot in which I was involved, but a few things I spotted during other pots seemed to be accurate, so I was feeling confident about that. For example, I twice saw players in early position raise their eyebrows and sit up a bit in their seats before limping into the pot, and both times they ended up reraising. Though I didn't get to see the cards of either, I think it's safe to say they were both pretty strong.
The only move I tried to make based on a read did back-fire, though. There was an early position limper, and I completed something like T4s in the SB. The flop came AJ2, and the action checked to the limper, who bet 200. I generally don't give early position limpers credit for an Ace, though that's a better assumption online than live. In this case, though, the guy had stared at the flop for a long time when it came out, which both Navarro and Caro say is a sign of weakness. This is a decent spot to check-raise bluff anyway, since the limper will often stab at this flop with anything, so I raised to 550. Unfortunately, the BB cold called the raise, so I had to give it up on the turn. The limper did fold, though, so my read on him may have been correct.
Next orbit, an early position player limped in for 100, and I raised to 400 with KQo from relatively early position myself. One of the looser players on my left called, as did the limper. The flop came KJ5, I bet 800, the loose player called, and the limper folded. I wasn't particularly concerned about being beat, but I felt the best way to get in two value bets would be to check the turn (it was a blank) and value bet the river. To my surprise, though, the guy bet 1500. This was a bit troubling, because he was kind of passive, but I just couldn't lay down top pair second kicker yet. I called, we checked through the river, and he showed me AK. This is a spot where I feel like a really good live player might be able to get away on the turn if he had enough trust in his read. It was a big blow to my stack.
The same guy won a small pot off of me a few hands later when I raised KQ again and he called. The flop came 983r, not a great board for a c-bet, but he was calling such a wide range pre-flop that I had to try. Unfortunately, he called. The turn was an 8c, putting a flush draw on the board, and we both checked. I checked again on a river T, and now he bet 1500. When he checked the turn, I figured he was probably drawing, but his most likely draws (76 and JT) both just made something, so I folded, and he showed me 76s, having also picked up a flush draw on the turn.
Short Stack Ninja
At the end of the second hour, we got a 15 minute break, then blinds doubled again. Like I said, it was a disgusting structure. Having just lost a big pot, I was now down to like 11 or 12 BB's. The guy on my right tried to open limp from the SB, but I shoved on him without even looking at my cards and he folded. I open shoved AT from late position and took the blinds, then did the same thing with a small pair the next orbit. A few hands later I got AK UTG, and even though I had about 14 BB's at that point, I went ahead and just shoved anyway, hoping to get looked up light. No such luck, though I was happy to take the blinds.
Now with a bit more room to maneuver, I opened to 550 with 55 on the button, and both blinds called. I couldn't afford to bet at a 984 flop, so we checked it down all the way, and amazingly my 55 held up. That's one of the perks of live poker: you get to showdown marginal hands that no good player would ever allow you to see a river with.
Accumulation
We'd been busting a lot of people from out table, and eventually another familiar face showed up: Allen Cunningham. I've played mid-stakes Razz with him online a few times, but had no NLHE experience with him. Everything I've heard suggests he's very good, though, and I definitely got that sense from him today. He's a quiet but likable guy and very focused at the table. He just kind of exudes competence and intelligence, which isn't a feel that I've gotten from a lot of the other well-known pros with whom I've played.
He started off fairly short and tight, but then won two big pots and seemed to open up a little. He'd just folded to a re-raise from the SB and opened to 600 the next hand when I found 66 in the SB with a stack of about 4000. I thought for a while about whether he'd be more or less likely to have a hand given that he'd just been re-raised, but then I decided that I had a good resteal stack with a pair against a kinda late position raiser and I was just going to stick it in. He asked for a count but folded before I gave him a number, which was fine by me.
After this hour, we finally got a reprieve from the doubling blinds. They stayed at 100/200 and we added a 25 ante. This was incentive for me to open up a bit, and for some reason the guys on my left started calling a bit less, which was perfect. I stole the blinds a few times, but didn't get into any big pots this level.
After another hour, blinds doubled yet again to 200/400/25. With about 6000 chips, I open completed 98s in the SB against a pretty bad player in the BB. He checked his option, and the flop came AT7. Most players, even bad ones, will raise an A in this spot pre-flop, so I often bet a flop like this with air. The straight draw just made it that much more attractive of a proposition. I bet 700, and he raised to 1400. Fuck you. All in. He stared at me for a while and folded angrily. Yeah I didn't think so, you little min-raising bitch.
"Works every time except the last," he muttered. The other annoying thing about live poker is the dumb shit people say. I had my Ipod on, but with the sound on fairly low. Although I heard him perfectly well, I wanted to give him a hard time for mouthing off to me, so I took the ear buds out and asked him to repeat himself, as though I were really interested in this little nugget of wisdom he'd just laid on me. Looking even more annoyed, he said, "That all in works every time except the last." I made a point of laughing really loud as though this was the first time I'd heard that and as though he were trying to be friendly.
A few orbits later, the same clown called an UTG raise from Cunningham and moved all in over a bet on a J75 flop. His AJ lost to Cunningham's 77, and I was tempted to repeat his stupid line back to him, but I behaved myself and kept quiet.
A very tight guy on my right made a donkishly huge open raise to 1800 from kind of late position, and I honestly considered folding AQ, but I just wasn't in the mood. Although this is often AK, it's rarely AA, and the possibility of AJ/AQ/maybe even smaller pairs and worse Aces convinced me I should shove for 9K. He folded, which was fine.
After that pot and a few blinds steals, I was finally sitting on a healthy stack again, and then got a pair of K's, the best hand I'd seen all day. I raised to 1200, and one of the loose bad players called in the SB. Thankfully, he'd luckboxed his way into a nice stack of his own, and I was licking my chops at the prospect of adding it to my own. The 456 flop was not exactly what I was hoping for, but when he led into me for 2500, I had a feeling he was trying to protect a pair rather than semi-bluff a draw, which meant he was right where I wanted him. I asked for a chip count, then moved all in. He called me pretty quickly with 22, and I busted him to win my largest pot of the tournament. It put me over 20,000 chips and probably in the top 15% or so of the remaining players. I didn't get a chance to count, though, as our table was broken and I had to take my newfound winnings over to another table post-haste. That's ok, my work there was done.
The Story Gets Good
Naturally, when I took my new seat, there were several dumb comments about how many chips I had. I heard one person say, "You and the 10 seat should play a big pot. Then we'd really have a chipleader." I glanced over to the dealer's right and saw a middle-aged guy in a beard and a Las Vegas hat sitting on a stack at least twice the size of mine. Then I saw the beer in his hand. Then I saw the way he was swaying in his seat and slurring his speech. Good lord, he was drunk off his ass and sitting on about $20,000 of cash equity! I was literally salivating as I stacked my chips.
Unfortunately, he wasn't playing as many pots as I expected, though he was making an ass of himself in other, often humorous, ways. For one thing, he was trying to flirt with a skinny but otherwise unattractive middle-aged dealer and asked her if she didn't use to do interviews for Cardplayer's website (if you've never seen their 'reporters', they are mostly attractive young airheads). She sort of laughed awkwardly, and he slurred, "You did, didn't you?!" and touched her shoulder. She jerked away from him quickly.
Then he tried to hit on a very attractive Eastern European woman who was serving drinks. He was tipping well and ordering a ton of drinks, so she would usually give him a little shoulder pat and a few seconds of conversation when she came by. All that friendliness evaporated pretty quickly after this interaction:
Drunk: "You've got a beautiful accent."
Hot Waitress: "Thank you."
Drunk: "Where are you from?"
Hot Waitress: "Ukraine"
Drunk: "Where's that, like Russia?"
Talk about the wrong thing to say. The look on her face was priceless. To her credit, she handed him his drink and walked off without another word.
I decided I should get on Drunky's good side, so I asked where he was from. "Right here. Well, Pahrump," he responded.
"I've been to Pahrump," I told him, which was true. My girlfriend and I had lunch there on our way to Death Valley back in February.
"That's where all the..." he kind of trailed off, as though he were about to say something inappopriate, and the whole table started laughing.
I quickly figured out what he was talking about: Pahrump has legalized prostitution, and it's brothels are a popular side trip for a particular type of Vegas tourist. I laughed and nodded along with him as though I'd known that all along. "Yep, I know," I assured him
The rest of the table assumed something else from this. "Of course he knows," I heard someone on my right say. "Why else would he have gone to Pahrump?" I may have tarnished my reputation, but I succeeded in getting on Drunky's good side.
He was also constantly forgetting when it was his turn to act and how much he ought to be betting or raising. Once, without even looking at his hand, he announced that anyone who tried to steal this pot was going to be in trouble. "Even you, Boston," he warned me with a smile. Everyone must have believed him, because the action folded to him in the SB. By this point, he'd lost interest and was looking around the casino. The dealer tapped him on the shoulder. He swiveled in his seat, teetered for a moment, regained his balance, and asked, in all seriousness, "Did I win the pot yet?" The whole table laughed, he raised, and the BB folded.
What Goes Up
The last significant pot I played at this level occurred when there were three limpers and I checked 52o on my BB. The flop came K74, and I figured I was done with the hand, but the action checked around, and a turn 3 brought me an open-ended draw. There aren't a lot of K's I'd expect anyone to be limping at this level, there were no flush draws on the board, and there weren't really even any plausible two pair hands for any of them. I, however, playing as the unraised blind, could have absolutely anything. I led out for 1600, and only the first limper called.
The river brought an 8, and I decided to follow up my bluff with one more big bet, thinking I could get him off of like 99 or 76 or something. I bet 5000, and he tanked for a while before moving all in. Whoops. A few players on my speculated that he might have had KK for a slow-played top set, which seems plausible.
The next blind increase was less than double for once, jumping only to 300/600/50. I tried opening AJs UTG to 1650, but an aggressive and seemingly competent young guy in the SB reraised to 5000, and I had to fold. I thought he might have been from 2+2, and after the table broke, he did indeed introduce himself as JP OSU.
I finally got to play a pot with Drunky when he raised my BB. Even though we weren't that deep anymore, I decided I was going to call him with anything and check-raise all in on most flops, simply because he was playing so erratically. He made it 2200, and I called with T8s. We went heads up to a K95 flop, which was ideal for my plan, assuming he'd bet anything but only call all in with a K or better. I guess I was wrong, though, because he checked behind.
A turn J gave me an open-ended draw, but I still wanted to check-raise all in, so I checked to him again. To my frustration, he checked it back again. A 7 on the river gave me the nuts, and I decided just to bet out 4000 and hope he'd feel obligated to call since he'd played so passively up to this point. Infuriatingly, he folded.
Worst Beat of the Day
My worst bad beat of the day had nothing to do with the cards I was dealt. It was having this second table break and getting moved away from the drunk with the massive stack.
I was still unracking my chips when I got dealt JJ. Someone in early position raised in front of me to 1800. A quick count told me I had about 16,000 chips, an awkward size. I decided just to call the raise. I was still getting my bearings at the table and hadn't even taken a look at the raiser or his stack.
We went heads up to a T53 flop, and he bet out 3500. Ugh. I looked over and saw he had about 9000 behind, meaning that his pre-flop raise had been for more than 10% of his stack. Ugh. If he was a knowledgeable player, he wouldn't be raising so much without a strong hand, and he wouldn't be betting this flop with like AK for 25% of his stack. Ugh. Maybe if I'd been at the table for a bit and knew something about this guy, I could have laid it down, but I'd put in more than 10% of my stack pre-flop as well, and now I couldn't bring myself to fold an overpair to one bet with such shallow stacks. I moved in, he called with QQ, and I was crippled.
The next hand, I open shoved 77 for less than 2 BB's and lost to KQ.
There's a $3K prelim event on Friday that I may play, but frankly I'm tempted to just to go play cash games instead. They had like three tables of 10-20 NL going yesterday, plus at least one 25-50 and 50-100, which meant that the best players weren't going to be at 10-20. I'm 90% sure that would be more profitable than the tournament, but for some reason I feel a strange compulsion to play the tournament anyway. We'll see.
By the way, JP OSU has final tabled the tournament along with Layne Flack, Nick Binger, and Pocket Fives' Basebaldy. He's 4/10 coming in, and they start play at 3PM today. Goooooooo JP!
Labels: Las Vegas, poker, poker strategy, session review, trip report
Stumble It!
Monday, November 26, 2007
Book Review: Pot Limit Hold 'Em
Andy Bloch and Rafe Furst co-authored this chapter of the Full Tilt Poker Strategy Guide: Tournament Edition. It's a solid if elementary introduction to pot limit for players of no limit hold 'em and outlines the basic differences between the games, though not in great detail.
They correctly identify the inability to overbet the pot as the central difference between pot limit and no limit hold 'em and go on to enumerate some of the implications of this limitation. Specifically, they address the Gap Concept, the stop-and-go, slowplaying, how short stack play changes, and some unique opportunities for restealing.
Unfortunately, their explanations and advice are overly cursory and sometimes questionable. Their discussion of short stack play, for instance, mentions neither the go-and-go, in which you make a raise or re-raise from out of position with the intention of moving all in on most flops, nor the limp-re-raise, which are both much more important plays as a short stack in pot limit than in no limit hold 'em given the inability to overbet shove pre-flop.
More troublingly, they suggest that with 200-400 blinds, 4000 chips, and a pair of T's UTG, you might open to 1400 and fold to a reraise. Similarly, they argue that with the same stack "you are in a position to possibly take the pot from the initial raiser without a showdown. If the raiser makes it 1400, you can move in your entire 4000" as a re-steal. Although it's true that you may sometimes find yourself making more folds and resteals because one raise is less likely to commit a player to the pot, the raiser in both of these examples is getting well over 2:1 on a call and shouldn't be folding anything.
When discussing starting hand requirements, they suggest playing tighter than in no limit hold 'em for two reasons: the lack of antes and less emphasis on implied odds. This is good advice, but could use some elaboration, particularly the part about implied odds. Although the inability to overbet the pot makes it a bit more difficult to play for stacks, there is still plenty of room to play big pots in pot limit hold 'em, particularly after the first few levels of a tournament.
Moreover, the fact that the pre-flop raiser cannot open for more than three and a half times the big blind makes it a bit easier to take a flop with a speculative hand like a suited connector, especially when you have position. In fact, TJ Cloutier and Tom McEvoy argue in Championship No Limit and Pot Limit Hold 'Em that small pairs and suited connectors are ideal pot limit hold 'em hands, even more valuable than in no limit hold 'em.
"Pot Limit Hold 'Em" is the second shortest chapter in the book (after Furst's solo chapter on Roshambo), and it shows. Although the general strategy that Bloch and Furst outline is on point, a lot of the important details are either missing or misleading.
Stumble It!
They correctly identify the inability to overbet the pot as the central difference between pot limit and no limit hold 'em and go on to enumerate some of the implications of this limitation. Specifically, they address the Gap Concept, the stop-and-go, slowplaying, how short stack play changes, and some unique opportunities for restealing.
Unfortunately, their explanations and advice are overly cursory and sometimes questionable. Their discussion of short stack play, for instance, mentions neither the go-and-go, in which you make a raise or re-raise from out of position with the intention of moving all in on most flops, nor the limp-re-raise, which are both much more important plays as a short stack in pot limit than in no limit hold 'em given the inability to overbet shove pre-flop.
More troublingly, they suggest that with 200-400 blinds, 4000 chips, and a pair of T's UTG, you might open to 1400 and fold to a reraise. Similarly, they argue that with the same stack "you are in a position to possibly take the pot from the initial raiser without a showdown. If the raiser makes it 1400, you can move in your entire 4000" as a re-steal. Although it's true that you may sometimes find yourself making more folds and resteals because one raise is less likely to commit a player to the pot, the raiser in both of these examples is getting well over 2:1 on a call and shouldn't be folding anything.
When discussing starting hand requirements, they suggest playing tighter than in no limit hold 'em for two reasons: the lack of antes and less emphasis on implied odds. This is good advice, but could use some elaboration, particularly the part about implied odds. Although the inability to overbet the pot makes it a bit more difficult to play for stacks, there is still plenty of room to play big pots in pot limit hold 'em, particularly after the first few levels of a tournament.
Moreover, the fact that the pre-flop raiser cannot open for more than three and a half times the big blind makes it a bit easier to take a flop with a speculative hand like a suited connector, especially when you have position. In fact, TJ Cloutier and Tom McEvoy argue in Championship No Limit and Pot Limit Hold 'Em that small pairs and suited connectors are ideal pot limit hold 'em hands, even more valuable than in no limit hold 'em.
"Pot Limit Hold 'Em" is the second shortest chapter in the book (after Furst's solo chapter on Roshambo), and it shows. Although the general strategy that Bloch and Furst outline is on point, a lot of the important details are either missing or misleading.
Labels: book review, poker, poker strategy
Stumble It!
Tricky Deep PLO Spot
Poker Stars
Pot Limit Omaha Ring game
Blinds: $2/$4
5 players
Converter
Stack sizes:
CO: $784.95
Button: $146.10
SB: $662.20
Foucault: $702.30
UTG: $397.40
Pre-flop: (5 players) Foucault is BB with :4s :2d :3s :5d
UTG raises to $12, CO calls, Button folds, SB calls Foucault calls.
Flop: :qd :5h :3h ($46, 4 players)
UTG checks, Foucault checks, SB checks, CO bets $46, SB folds, Foucault calls, UTG folds.
Turn: :ts ($136, 2 players)
Foucault checks, CO bets $108, Foucault raises $434, Co raises $729 (all-in) Foucault calls
Uncalled bets: $0.3 returned to Foucault.
River: :8h
Results: He had QQxx and won the pot with top set.
I put him on either a set or the nut flush draw from the beginning, possibly with a pair or flush draw to go along with the latter. Against that range, I don't have great equity, so even with two pair and an open-ended draw, I'm just going to call and see what the turn brings.
I would have folded a heart turn, but on this safe card, I decided to commit to a big pot. He definitely ought to be firing again with a flush draw with these stacks, because it puts a lot of pressure on me to fold something like two pair and I'm rarely going to be slowplaying the flop looking to check-raise him. However, people do tend to play very straight-forwardly in PLO, and although he shouldn't, I don't know for sure that he wouldn't have checked behind with a flush draw on the turn. However, the fact that I held a 3 and a 5 made those sets less likely, which made me somewhat more comfortable against his range.
Stumble It!
Pot Limit Omaha Ring game
Blinds: $2/$4
5 players
Converter
Stack sizes:
CO: $784.95
Button: $146.10
SB: $662.20
Foucault: $702.30
UTG: $397.40
Pre-flop: (5 players) Foucault is BB with :4s :2d :3s :5d
UTG raises to $12, CO calls, Button folds, SB calls Foucault calls.
Flop: :qd :5h :3h ($46, 4 players)
UTG checks, Foucault checks, SB checks, CO bets $46, SB folds, Foucault calls, UTG folds.
Turn: :ts ($136, 2 players)
Foucault checks, CO bets $108, Foucault raises $434, Co raises $729 (all-in) Foucault calls
Uncalled bets: $0.3 returned to Foucault.
River: :8h
Results: He had QQxx and won the pot with top set.
I put him on either a set or the nut flush draw from the beginning, possibly with a pair or flush draw to go along with the latter. Against that range, I don't have great equity, so even with two pair and an open-ended draw, I'm just going to call and see what the turn brings.
I would have folded a heart turn, but on this safe card, I decided to commit to a big pot. He definitely ought to be firing again with a flush draw with these stacks, because it puts a lot of pressure on me to fold something like two pair and I'm rarely going to be slowplaying the flop looking to check-raise him. However, people do tend to play very straight-forwardly in PLO, and although he shouldn't, I don't know for sure that he wouldn't have checked behind with a flush draw on the turn. However, the fact that I held a 3 and a 5 made those sets less likely, which made me somewhat more comfortable against his range.
Labels: PLO, poker, poker strategy, session review
Stumble It!
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Book Review: Online Tournament Strategy
Richard Brodie's contribution to the Full Tilt Poker Strategy Guide: Tournament Edition is a solid introduction to playing online poker tournaments. As is appropriate for the format of a relatively short chapter on the subject, he focuses on broad strategic concepts such as when implied odds, blind stealing, continuation betting, and bet sizing.
I don't want to harp too much on what he's left out, because there are inevitably going to be omissions in so short a work, and he does do a good job of providing a strategic framework that should be very useful to beginners as they work out the details for themselves. However, given his space constraints, it is a mistake to attempt to address but Sit'n'Go and Multi-Table Tournaments in the same chapter.
The result is a badly lacking SNG section that condenses bubble play, which is the crucial element of a good player's edge in these tournaments, into a single, useless sentence: "This will take all of your poker experience to decide whether to play very aggressively or very carefully depending on what the other players are doing."
Even the MTT section is better on large-scale strategic thinking than on its more specific advice and examples. For example, the implied odds section correctly suggests playing hands like pairs and suited connectors when you can see a flop for about 5% of the effective stacks and emphasizes that position is more important with the connectors than with pairs. However,
Richard also says that with 6-6 and 20 BB's, "I might limp under the gun and hope the pot is unraised and that I can get a set and win some money if someone makes top pair or two pair." The confluence of these fortunate circumstances will not occur often enough to make a limp UTG for 5% of your stack profitable with 66, especially since the hands that he admits he wants to be up against, such as AA and KK, are going to raise. He claims he can call one raise, but by that time, he has put too much money into the pot to play for set value alone.
Still, this chapter generally provides a solid introduction to online tournament play and could probably shave several months off of a beginning player's development.
Stumble It!
I don't want to harp too much on what he's left out, because there are inevitably going to be omissions in so short a work, and he does do a good job of providing a strategic framework that should be very useful to beginners as they work out the details for themselves. However, given his space constraints, it is a mistake to attempt to address but Sit'n'Go and Multi-Table Tournaments in the same chapter.
The result is a badly lacking SNG section that condenses bubble play, which is the crucial element of a good player's edge in these tournaments, into a single, useless sentence: "This will take all of your poker experience to decide whether to play very aggressively or very carefully depending on what the other players are doing."
Even the MTT section is better on large-scale strategic thinking than on its more specific advice and examples. For example, the implied odds section correctly suggests playing hands like pairs and suited connectors when you can see a flop for about 5% of the effective stacks and emphasizes that position is more important with the connectors than with pairs. However,
Richard also says that with 6-6 and 20 BB's, "I might limp under the gun and hope the pot is unraised and that I can get a set and win some money if someone makes top pair or two pair." The confluence of these fortunate circumstances will not occur often enough to make a limp UTG for 5% of your stack profitable with 66, especially since the hands that he admits he wants to be up against, such as AA and KK, are going to raise. He claims he can call one raise, but by that time, he has put too much money into the pot to play for set value alone.
Still, this chapter generally provides a solid introduction to online tournament play and could probably shave several months off of a beginning player's development.
Labels: book review, poker, poker strategy
Stumble It!
Saturday, November 24, 2007
The Narrows
On Friday morning, we got the chance to explore the region of Zion called The Narrows that we had to pass on Sunday. As the name suggests, it's a particularly narrow portion of the canyon that is both one of the most scenic and one of the most difficult to traverse. In many places, the canyon floor is completely immersed by the Virgin River. During summer months, the water is warm enough for even amateur hikers to wade through The Narrows and appreciate its stunning, other-worldly assets.November, however, is a different story. The water temperature hovers not far above freezing, cold enough to numb unprotected limbs in a matter of minutes. Undeterred, intrepid explorers such as ourselves rent waterproof pants and shoes and Neoprene socks to protect against the frigid water. Armed with sturdy walking sticks to help us keep our footing despite slick rocks and swift currents, we plunged into the heart of Zion.
This was our first river hike, and it's a fun but tricky skill to acquire. It takes some trust to splash fully clothed into the knee-deep, icy cold river. The water rushes into your socks and momentarily chills your toes, but this is normal. Soon, your body heat warms that water and keeps your feet even more comfortable than if they were dry. Meanwhile, a rubber gasket around your ankle prevents any water from rushing up your pants legs and freezing the rest of your body. Instead, you feel a strange sucking sensation on your legs as the Gore-Tex material forms a water-tight seal against your skin.
Using your thick, shoulder-height pole for balance, you can walk relatively comfortably even through the more shallow rapids. The trick is to realize that you have three points of contact with the riverbed: two feet and the tip of your walking stick. As long as two of these are secured at any given time, the going won't be too difficult.
If you can see the bottom of the river, then stepping there is safe. Beyond that, your stick is also useful for probing the depths of the murky, dark green sections where you can't see the bottom. We were wearing only waterproof pants, so water that came up over our waists would be a disaster. Fortunately, the low water level meant that we could traverse the entire 16-mile length of The Narrows, if we wanted, without ever wading deeper than our thights. If we could remain on our feet, that is.
Generally, the river was shallower near either wall of the canyon, but when it did start to get deep on the side where you'd been walking, the only option was to cut horizontally across the deepest water and strongest current at the center of the river in order to reach the opposite shallows. Sometimes, particularly because of the low water level, we were able to walk across dry ground or very shallow sandbars.
Even during the hottest part of the afternoon, the bottom of The Narrows receives very little direct sunlight. The light does reflect magnificently off of the amber walls that tower overhead, however, making for some brilliant colors and an awe-inspiring atmosphere. You quickly become accustomed to the cliffs that soar hundreds of feet directly above you, because at a sharp angle you can't really appreciate their scale anyway, but sometimes you see another hiker in the distance and realize just how tiny he, and therefore you, are in relation to the massive canyon walls.Just as in the rest of the canyon, there are occasional crags, waterfalls, caves, and even side canyons hidden along the way. It's a real challenge to pay attention to your footing with so much fascinating scenery constantly seducing your gaze.
The best place to pause and take it all in is on one of the larger 'islands' where heaps of sand and stone rise well above water level. The highest of these sustain shrubs, grasses, and sometimes even deciduous trees. In November, the leaves of these trees have all turned yellow, orange, and pink, falling from their branches and blanketing the land around them in a pastel carpet. When illuminated by the soft light filtering in from the crack of sky far above, these islands adopt a heavenly glow, and I feel like Odysseus venturing into the Elysian fields (look it up, cretin).
November is generally a dead month in Zion, but Thanksgiving weekend is a tremendous exception. We waited in a line of cars 100-deep to get into the park and had to improvise a parking spot in the overcrowded lot near a rock formation called the Temple of Sinawava.
It's a different story in The Narrows, however, and we encounter only about twenty other hikers during our four hour tour. These range from grizzled veterans carrying packs large enough for multi-day hikes and ropes for thorough exploration of side canyons to other novices like ourselves wielding red-tassled walking sticks that mark them as renters from the same company that outfitted Emily and me.
We even encounter one particularly fool-hardy couple carrying no walking stick and wearing only sandles with jeens rolled up to their knees. "Can you still feel your toes?" Emily asks them.
"Barely," replies the woman, who seems much less excited about this trek than her partner. When they are out of earshot, we joke about how we will manage to carry their hypothermic bodies out of the canyon.
Unfortunately, we got kind of a late start on the day and have to turn back well before we would have preferred to avoid being caught in The Narrows after sunset, when the temperature plummets and the canyon is pitch black. Still, it was a great hike, one of the most interesting and beautiful we've done and also unique in its challenges.
The only bad news is that we forgot the replacement battery for Emily's camera and were left with only a cheap disposable that was no match for the majestic canyon. Those also haven't been developed yet, so unlike the pictures from my previous posts, the ones on here all come courtesy of PDPhoto.
Labels: narrative, personal, travel, trip report
Stumble It!
Thanksgiving in Utah
The plan for Thursday was to rise early, rent appropriate gear, and hike/wade Zion's most famous region, The Narrows. Emily woke up not feeling particularly well, however, and so we nixed that and I got breakfast alone while she slept.It was a crisp, quiet morning, and I enjoyed the solitary walk from our motel to a nearby restaurant called The Pioneer, the only place in town open for breakfast Thanksgiving morning. The dim orange walls of Zion hovered quietly nearby, so large, still, and beautiful that they seemed almost surreal.
My walk took me past an elk farm where I was fortunate enough to catch two males in combat, antlers locked together and powerful shoulder muscles twisting in opposition to one another. From time to time, the larger of the two would gain the upper hand and twist the neck of his opponent until the beast whimpered in submission. Then he would release the loser and eye him warily. This proved wise, as the smaller male came back three or four times to test his luck before finally giving up. This was already more excitement than I usually see in a day, and I hadn't even had my coffee yet!
After breakfast and some coaxing, Emily finally felt up to a short hike. We headed for the 
Emerald Pools, a "must see" destination in Zion, and had ourselves a nice hike. We were looking for something very basic, and though this path turned out to be a bit longer and more strenuous than we anticipated, Emily was recovering quickly and ultimately it was a pretty good fit for us.
Emerald Pools, a "must see" destination in Zion, and had ourselves a nice hike. We were looking for something very basic, and though this path turned out to be a bit longer and more strenuous than we anticipated, Emily was recovering quickly and ultimately it was a pretty good fit for us.The path itself followed the banks of the Virgin for a ways through a lightly forested region to the Lower Pools, which was the bottom of three pools formed by water that seemed to cascade out of the rocks themselves. In actuality, this was rainwater that had seeped into the porous sandstone and came to the surface only when it encountered a layer of shale that it could not pass, so in a way, it really was coming out of the rocks. Unfortunately, it hadn't rained in a while, so the cascades were little more than trickles.
The pools themselves, however, were still pretty neat. The slow but steady flow of water had carved an impressive cave into the canyon wall, and the algae in the pools gave them the green color for which they were named. From the right angle, it also lent them a mirrored surface that reflected back the majesty of the nearby cliffs.
After ascending to the highest of the three pools, we made our way back down to the main trail and followed a two-mile loop back to the parking lot. This trek took us along the rim of one of the lower canyon walls and provided some spectacular views of the valley and river below:
By the time we got back to the car, we were quite hungry and looking forward to a big Thanksgiving dinner. The only problem was that we didn't have a reservation anywhere, and only a few of nearby Springdale's restaurants were open to accomodate the swarm of tourists who descended on Zion for a long weekend. Thankfully, a willingness to sit at the bar meant that we were able to get seats right away at The Switchback, where we'd had a delicious meal our first night in the area. They offered a great buffet with a wide variety of entrees, sides, and desserts for something like $30/person. A similar holiday mean in Boston would have been more than twice as much, I'm sure.
The only drawback was that the buffet was poorly laid out and we had to wait in a fairly long line with a bunch of families that, it being Utah, were either Mormon or at least weird. There were a lot of women in plain dresses and unfashionably long hair, well-dressed and well-behaved children, and tall, quiet man with greying, carefully parted hair.
One of these gentlemen was just ahead of me in the line, and for ten minutes or so I had nothing better to do than contemplate what a creepy looking guy he was. He was a slender man and carried himself with an awkwardly stiff posture, wore neatly pressed black slacks with a zip-up red turtleneck thing, and sported one of those conservative haircuts. The creepiest thing by far, however, were his grey eyes that stared straight ahead as though he could see his personal salvation just ahead of him.
When we finally got to the first station, the salad bar, he methodically scooped several tongfuls of lettuce into his bowl, occasionally glancing up at me but saying nothing. He was very insistent on getting a description of each of the eight salad dressings available. When the server finished her litany, the man looked at me as though he and I alone shared in the secret that Our Lord And Savior would not approve of these options, and in fact he walked off without any dressing at all.
I thought nothing further of it until we met again at the bread station. His cold dead eyes locked with mine, and he asked, with no hint of mirth in his voice, "Are you following me?"
After several full-body shivers, I responded, "You must have good taste," but he just turned and walked away without another word.
The line died down after that, so subsequent trips didn't take nearly so long, and all in all it was an enjoyable meal and a great Thanksgiving.
Labels: narrative, personal, travel
Stumble It!
Thursday, November 22, 2007
Angel's Landing
I'm currently on vacation, spending Thanksgiving with my girlfriend in Utah's Zion Canyon. Yesterday, we hiked a beautiful trail called Angel's Landing. Though most of it was paved, it was still strenuous at times, as were ascending over 1000 feet in about two miles of horizontal distance.We departed from a parking lot and picnic area called The Grotto. In the shadow of towering peaks, dotted with bright yellow trees, and adjoined by a wide but shallow river, our jumping off point already had an exciting feel about it. Other hikers unloaded gear from their cars and snapped photographs of the prismatic canyon walls as small children played in the fallen leaves that carpeted the lawn. You'd never believe that driving just a few dozen miles in any direction would plunge you into the midst of a vast, dry, brown and featureless desert, in no small part because it was quite chilly in the shade and the morning wind. I donned a fleece, wind shell, hat, and gloves before leaving the car.
Our trail crossed the river via a sturdy bridge and began its ascent up a sloping rock pile that formed the base of a sheer-faced peak. The terrain here was scrubby and green, with few leafy trees to shield us from the desert sun that beat down on the exposed mountainside. Within minutes, my hat and gloves were in my pockets and my jacket was unzipped. A few minutes after that, I was carrying the jacket and regretting having brought it at all.
When we summited the rock pile and reached the canyon wall proper, the nature of the trail changed dramatically from a gentle, diagonal slice across the debris to a sharp series of switchbacks up and around the cliff face. After a few of these demanding circuits, the path opened onto a bridge across a dry ravine and over to the side of an adjacent peak. This once again put us on flat terrain that followed a riverbed for a while. Judging from the lush plant life, this wasn't ordinarily a dry riverbed, just one that hadn't seen rain for a month or so. That was a shame, because flowing water surely would have made for an even more picturesque hike.
Eventually, we left the river's edge and began ascending again, now flanked by the wind-shaped walls of Zion Canyon. From up close, you can see a remarkable amount of texture and sometimes even find tiny caves large enough to hold a person.
Towards the end of the trail, it gave way to a series of extremely steep and tightly wrapped switchbacks with no purpose other than to rush us as quickly as possible up the last hundred feet or so to the summit.
As it turned out, however, this brought us only to Scout's Landing, still an impressive vista but 
not the endpoint of the trail. To reach Angel's Landing, we'd need to undertake a perilous climb across about 500 feet of sheer cliff face. Chains embedded in the rock to aid climbers would be the only thing standing between us and a plunge of more than 1000 feet to the canyon floor.
Multiple signs cautioned against horseplay and warned that slips on the path to Angel's Landing had resulted in death. Near where we stopped to snack at Scout's Landing, several other hikers were discussing the recent sentencing of a man who allegedly pushed his wife off of this very cliff.
It occurred to me that if Emily were to slip, I might find myself falsely accused of murder. Besides, I'm not much for heights, and there were other sights to see, so we elected not to undertake the last 500 feet of the climb to Angel's Landing. We still had a quite nice view from where we were:
Labels: personal
Stumble It!
Monday, November 19, 2007
FTOPS Main Event
The $500 NLHE Main Event was yet another in a long series "close but no cigar" FTOPS finishes for me. We started with quite deep stacks, and so I came out of the gate swinging:
Full Tilt Poker, NL Hold'em Tournament, 15/30 Blinds, 9 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
BTN: 5,060
SB: 4,970
BB: 5,000
UTG: 5,000
UTG+1: 5,000
UTG+2: 4,970
MP1: 5,000
MP2: 5,000
Hero (CO): 5,000
Pre-Flop: (45) K
J
dealt to Hero (CO)
4 folds, MP2 raises to 90, Hero raises to 315, BTN folds, MP2 calls 225
Flop: (675) T 3 8 (2 Players)
MP2 checks, Hero bets 385, MP2 folds
Full Tilt Poker, NL Hold'em Tournament, 15/30 Blinds, 9 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
BTN: 5,015
SB: 5,435
BB: 4,955
UTG: 5,000
UTG+1: 4,475
UTG+2: 4,910
MP1: 5,030
MP2: 4,975
Hero (CO): 5,205
Pre-Flop: (45) J
A dealt to Hero (CO)
4 folds, MP2 raises to 105, Hero raises to 355, 2 folds, BB calls 325, MP2 calls 250
Flop: (1,080) 5 7
A (3 Players)
BB checks, MP2 checks, Hero bets 550, BB folds, MP2 calls 550
Turn: (2,180) 8 (2 Players)
MP2 checks, Hero checks
River: (2,180) 5 (2 Players)
MP2 bets 1,470, Hero folds
This was a kind of big laydown, but there were no missed draws, so either my opponent was floating me out of position, or he was betting for value, and most of his Aces are better than mine.
Full Tilt Poker, NL Hold'em Tournament, 15/30 Blinds, 9 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
UTG+2: 5,015
MP1: 5,465
MP2: 4,585
CO: 4,955
BTN: 4,520
SB: 4,880
BB: 5,030
UTG: 6,250
Hero (UTG+1): 4,300
Pre-Flop: (45) 3 3 dealt to Hero (UTG+1)
UTG folds, Hero raises to 90, 6 folds, BB calls 60
Flop: (195) 4 5 Q (2 Players)
BB checks, Hero bets 160, BB calls 160
Turn: (515) 7 (2 Players)
BB checks, Hero bets 400, BB calls 400
River: (1,315) 6 (2 Players)
BB checks, Hero bets 1,150, BB folds
Obviously I was betting a lot rivers whether or not they gave me a straight.
This was a really critical hand for me:
Full Tilt Poker, NL Hold'em Tournament, 20/40 Blinds, 9 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
MP1: 5,365
MP2: 10,230
CO: 9,280
BTN: 4,530
SB: 4,970
BB: 5,845
UTG: 3,500
UTG+1: 5,270
Hero (UTG+2): 5,530
Pre-Flop: (60) T T dealt to Hero (UTG+2)
2 folds, Hero raises to 130, 3 folds, BTN calls 130, SB calls 110, BB folds
Flop: (430) T A 2 (3 Players)
SB checks, Hero bets 400, BTN folds, SB calls 400
Turn: (1,230) J (2 Players)
SB checks, Hero bets 1,230, SB calls 1,230
River: (3,690) 2 (2 Players)
SB checks, Hero bets 3,770 and is All-In, SB calls 3,210 and is All-In
Results: 10,110 Pot
SB mucked K Q (a straight, Ace high) and LOST (-4,970 NET)
Hero showed T T (a full house, Tens full of Twos) and WON 10,110 (+5,140 NET)
This hand also illustrates an edge that my cash experience gives me over a lot of tournament players when stacks are deep: I know how to size my bets so as to get a guy's entire stack when I hit hard (and apparently, re-suckout on the river).
Here was another key one that I think I played pretty well:
Full Tilt Poker, NL Hold'em Tournament, 50/100 Blinds, 9 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
BTN: 6,465
SB: 13,360
BB: 6,840
UTG: 3,463
UTG+1: 11,987
UTG+2: 11,445
MP1: 1,936
MP2: 3,992
Hero (CO): 13,400
Pre-Flop: (150) A K dealt to Hero (CO)
5 folds, Hero raises to 300, BTN folds, SB raises to 1,000, BB folds, Hero calls 700
Flop: (2,100) 5 5 7 (2 Players)
SB bets 1,800, Hero calls 1,800
Turn: (5,700) 9 (2 Players)
SB checks, Hero checks
River: (5,700) A (2 Players)
SB checks, Hero bets 4,600, SB calls 4,600
Results: 14,900 Pot
SB mucked 4 A (two pair, Aces and Fives) and LOST (-7,400 NET)
Hero showed A K (two pair, Aces and Fives) and WON 14,900 (+7,500 NET)
It's tempting to 4-bet pre-flop, and I wouldn't argue with anyone who wanted to do that, but with these stacks it's going to create a kind of awkward stack. I had position, and I figured there were a lot of dominated hands in his range that I would fold out if I 4-bet him.
His river play here is atrocious. He played his Ace like a bluff-catcher, but I'm never going to be bluffing here, and he doesn't beat anything I'm betting for value. When I call flop, I have a big Ace or a pocket pair 90%+ of the time. I might call a river bet with a pair, but I'm rarely going to bet a pair on this river. I was pretty sure he was only going to call if he had a worse Ace, so I bet big. Frankly, I probably should have bet bigger. But it proved unnecessary, because a little while later I stacked him again with JJ>33 or something on a dry board in a reraised pot (sorry can't find HH for some reason).
That was all in the first two hours or so, then I was real card dead for a while, won a big card flip, real card dead, then this big hand:
Full Tilt Poker, NL Hold'em Tournament, 400/800 Blinds, 100 Ante, 8 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
SB: 19,676
BB: 12,644
UTG: 18,175
UTG+1: 16,482
MP1: 19,668
MP2: 36,951
CO: 15,841
Hero (BTN): 19,800
Pre-Flop: (2,000) 6 7 dealt to Hero (BTN)
5 folds, Hero raises to 2,200, SB folds, BB calls 1,400
Flop: (5,600) 7 9 K (2 Players)
BB checks, Hero checks
Turn: (5,600) 6 (2 Players)
BB bets 4,000, Hero raises to 17,500 and is All-In, BB calls 6,344 and is All-In
River: (26,288) T (2 Players - 1 is All-In)
Results: 26,288 Pot
BB showed K Q (a pair of Kings) and LOST (-12,644 NET)
Hero showed 6 7 (two pair, Sevens and Sixes) and WON 26,288 (+13,644 NET)
I was kind of suspicious of his cold call pre-flop and figured he was going to check-raise the flop quite often, so I just took a free card. Glad I did.
Card dead again for a while after this, won a big pot with a set, stole some blinds, won another key coin flip, then lost AT to JJ with about 25 BB's in a blind battle and that was it.
Stumble It!
Full Tilt Poker, NL Hold'em Tournament, 15/30 Blinds, 9 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
BTN: 5,060
SB: 4,970
BB: 5,000
UTG: 5,000
UTG+1: 5,000
UTG+2: 4,970
MP1: 5,000
MP2: 5,000
Hero (CO): 5,000
Pre-Flop: (45) K
J dealt to Hero (CO)4 folds, MP2 raises to 90, Hero raises to 315, BTN folds, MP2 calls 225
Flop: (675) T
3 8 (2 Players)MP2 checks, Hero bets 385, MP2 folds
Full Tilt Poker, NL Hold'em Tournament, 15/30 Blinds, 9 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
BTN: 5,015
SB: 5,435
BB: 4,955
UTG: 5,000
UTG+1: 4,475
UTG+2: 4,910
MP1: 5,030
MP2: 4,975
Hero (CO): 5,205
Pre-Flop: (45) J
A dealt to Hero (CO)4 folds, MP2 raises to 105, Hero raises to 355, 2 folds, BB calls 325, MP2 calls 250
Flop: (1,080) 5
7 A (3 Players)BB checks, MP2 checks, Hero bets 550, BB folds, MP2 calls 550
Turn: (2,180) 8
(2 Players)MP2 checks, Hero checks
River: (2,180) 5
(2 Players)MP2 bets 1,470, Hero folds
This was a kind of big laydown, but there were no missed draws, so either my opponent was floating me out of position, or he was betting for value, and most of his Aces are better than mine.
Full Tilt Poker, NL Hold'em Tournament, 15/30 Blinds, 9 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
UTG+2: 5,015
MP1: 5,465
MP2: 4,585
CO: 4,955
BTN: 4,520
SB: 4,880
BB: 5,030
UTG: 6,250
Hero (UTG+1): 4,300
Pre-Flop: (45) 3
3 dealt to Hero (UTG+1)UTG folds, Hero raises to 90, 6 folds, BB calls 60
Flop: (195) 4
5 Q (2 Players)BB checks, Hero bets 160, BB calls 160
Turn: (515) 7
(2 Players)BB checks, Hero bets 400, BB calls 400
River: (1,315) 6
(2 Players)BB checks, Hero bets 1,150, BB folds
Obviously I was betting a lot rivers whether or not they gave me a straight.
This was a really critical hand for me:
Full Tilt Poker, NL Hold'em Tournament, 20/40 Blinds, 9 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
MP1: 5,365
MP2: 10,230
CO: 9,280
BTN: 4,530
SB: 4,970
BB: 5,845
UTG: 3,500
UTG+1: 5,270
Hero (UTG+2): 5,530
Pre-Flop: (60) T
T dealt to Hero (UTG+2)2 folds, Hero raises to 130, 3 folds, BTN calls 130, SB calls 110, BB folds
Flop: (430) T
A 2 (3 Players)SB checks, Hero bets 400, BTN folds, SB calls 400
Turn: (1,230) J
(2 Players)SB checks, Hero bets 1,230, SB calls 1,230
River: (3,690) 2
(2 Players)SB checks, Hero bets 3,770 and is All-In, SB calls 3,210 and is All-In
Results: 10,110 Pot
SB mucked K
Q (a straight, Ace high) and LOST (-4,970 NET)Hero showed T
T (a full house, Tens full of Twos) and WON 10,110 (+5,140 NET)This hand also illustrates an edge that my cash experience gives me over a lot of tournament players when stacks are deep: I know how to size my bets so as to get a guy's entire stack when I hit hard (and apparently, re-suckout on the river).
Here was another key one that I think I played pretty well:
Full Tilt Poker, NL Hold'em Tournament, 50/100 Blinds, 9 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
BTN: 6,465
SB: 13,360
BB: 6,840
UTG: 3,463
UTG+1: 11,987
UTG+2: 11,445
MP1: 1,936
MP2: 3,992
Hero (CO): 13,400
Pre-Flop: (150) A
K dealt to Hero (CO)5 folds, Hero raises to 300, BTN folds, SB raises to 1,000, BB folds, Hero calls 700
Flop: (2,100) 5
5 7 (2 Players)SB bets 1,800, Hero calls 1,800
Turn: (5,700) 9
(2 Players)SB checks, Hero checks
River: (5,700) A
(2 Players)SB checks, Hero bets 4,600, SB calls 4,600
Results: 14,900 Pot
SB mucked 4
A (two pair, Aces and Fives) and LOST (-7,400 NET)Hero showed A
K (two pair, Aces and Fives) and WON 14,900 (+7,500 NET)It's tempting to 4-bet pre-flop, and I wouldn't argue with anyone who wanted to do that, but with these stacks it's going to create a kind of awkward stack. I had position, and I figured there were a lot of dominated hands in his range that I would fold out if I 4-bet him.
His river play here is atrocious. He played his Ace like a bluff-catcher, but I'm never going to be bluffing here, and he doesn't beat anything I'm betting for value. When I call flop, I have a big Ace or a pocket pair 90%+ of the time. I might call a river bet with a pair, but I'm rarely going to bet a pair on this river. I was pretty sure he was only going to call if he had a worse Ace, so I bet big. Frankly, I probably should have bet bigger. But it proved unnecessary, because a little while later I stacked him again with JJ>33 or something on a dry board in a reraised pot (sorry can't find HH for some reason).
That was all in the first two hours or so, then I was real card dead for a while, won a big card flip, real card dead, then this big hand:
Full Tilt Poker, NL Hold'em Tournament, 400/800 Blinds, 100 Ante, 8 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
SB: 19,676
BB: 12,644
UTG: 18,175
UTG+1: 16,482
MP1: 19,668
MP2: 36,951
CO: 15,841
Hero (BTN): 19,800
Pre-Flop: (2,000) 6
7 dealt to Hero (BTN)5 folds, Hero raises to 2,200, SB folds, BB calls 1,400
Flop: (5,600) 7
9 K (2 Players)BB checks, Hero checks
Turn: (5,600) 6
(2 Players)BB bets 4,000, Hero raises to 17,500 and is All-In, BB calls 6,344 and is All-In
River: (26,288) T
(2 Players - 1 is All-In)Results: 26,288 Pot
BB showed K
Q (a pair of Kings) and LOST (-12,644 NET)Hero showed 6
7 (two pair, Sevens and Sixes) and WON 26,288 (+13,644 NET)I was kind of suspicious of his cold call pre-flop and figured he was going to check-raise the flop quite often, so I just took a free card. Glad I did.
Card dead again for a while after this, won a big pot with a set, stole some blinds, won another key coin flip, then lost AT to JJ with about 25 BB's in a blind battle and that was it.
Labels: poker, session review, urban debate league
Stumble It!
Sunday, November 18, 2007
I Have a Set LOL
Full Tilt Poker, $10/$20 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 9 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
UTG+1: $1,960
UTG+2: $2,468
MP1: $2,114
Hero (MP2): $6,516
CO: $336
BTN: $1,092.70
SB: $2,411
BB: $2,543
UTG: $2,484
Pre-Flop: J T dealt to Hero (MP2)
UTG raises to $70, 3 folds, Hero calls $70, 4 folds
Flop: ($170) 5 T 7 (2 Players)
UTG bets $115, Hero calls $115
Turn: ($400) 4 (2 Players)
UTG bets $275, Hero raises to $881, UTG folds
Results: $950 Pot ($3 Rake)
Hero mucked J T and WON $947 (+$487 NET)
This is just taking advantage of a really rough spot for my opponent. He's made it pretty clear he has an overpair, and probably he realizes that that's what I'll put him on. So now he just has to play a guessing game as to how often I will raise the turn as a bluff and thus how often he should be folding his overpairs. This isn't something I advise trying in a tournament or in a 6-max cash game, but full ring cash players are often pretty nitty, meaning that they don't expect to get bluff-raised on the turn and don't like to play big pots with one pair, even a good one.
Stumble It!
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
UTG+1: $1,960
UTG+2: $2,468
MP1: $2,114
Hero (MP2): $6,516
CO: $336
BTN: $1,092.70
SB: $2,411
BB: $2,543
UTG: $2,484
Pre-Flop: J
T dealt to Hero (MP2)UTG raises to $70, 3 folds, Hero calls $70, 4 folds
Flop: ($170) 5
T 7 (2 Players)UTG bets $115, Hero calls $115
Turn: ($400) 4
(2 Players)UTG bets $275, Hero raises to $881, UTG folds
Results: $950 Pot ($3 Rake)
Hero mucked J
T and WON $947 (+$487 NET)This is just taking advantage of a really rough spot for my opponent. He's made it pretty clear he has an overpair, and probably he realizes that that's what I'll put him on. So now he just has to play a guessing game as to how often I will raise the turn as a bluff and thus how often he should be folding his overpairs. This isn't something I advise trying in a tournament or in a 6-max cash game, but full ring cash players are often pretty nitty, meaning that they don't expect to get bluff-raised on the turn and don't like to play big pots with one pair, even a good one.
Labels: poker, poker strategy, session review
Stumble It!
Saturday, November 17, 2007
My Cousin
There are a lot of things I like about living in Boston that I didn't like about the area where I grew up in Maryland. But I do miss my family, which particularly on my father's side is very close, and nothing kills me like my 10-year old cousin Hannah, whose birthday is today.
She's far from my closest relative, but whenever I see her (which is not very often), I get the biggest guilt trip you could imagine. She and her mother drove down from Pennsylvania for my birthday (I was in Maryland at the time), and when she walked into the restaurant where we were meeting for dinner, she dashed across the room screaming, "Andrew! It's been so long!"
What 10-year old talks like that?
And when I left, she literally put one hands on her hip, wagged her finger at me, and said quite sternly, "Don't make it so long next time!"
If I saw the scene in a movie, I would think it was cliched, shameless heartstring-tugging. Just imagine this adorable little girl, tall with shiny red hair down to her waist and a bit of a lisp, singing to me, "I'll see you at Cwissmass." Kills me.
Stumble It!
She's far from my closest relative, but whenever I see her (which is not very often), I get the biggest guilt trip you could imagine. She and her mother drove down from Pennsylvania for my birthday (I was in Maryland at the time), and when she walked into the restaurant where we were meeting for dinner, she dashed across the room screaming, "Andrew! It's been so long!"
What 10-year old talks like that?
And when I left, she literally put one hands on her hip, wagged her finger at me, and said quite sternly, "Don't make it so long next time!"
If I saw the scene in a movie, I would think it was cliched, shameless heartstring-tugging. Just imagine this adorable little girl, tall with shiny red hair down to her waist and a bit of a lisp, singing to me, "I'll see you at Cwissmass." Kills me.
Labels: personal
Stumble It!
Friday, November 16, 2007
Recent History
These hands were both against an absolutely atrocious player. The first one is pretty straightforward and solidified for me just how wide is range is going to be when he makes these stupid little 4-bets pre-flop:
Full Tilt Poker, $4/$8 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 5 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
Hero (UTG): $1,600
CO: $1,612.50
BTN: $2,074.60
SB: $1,078.20
BB: $1,899
Pre-Flop: 7 7 dealt to Hero (UTG)
Hero raises to $28, CO folds, BTN raises to $48, 2 folds, Hero calls $20
Flop: ($108) 2 8 A (2 Players)
Hero checks, BTN checks
Turn: ($108) 7 (2 Players)
Hero bets $108, BTN calls $108
River: ($324) 3 (2 Players)
Hero bets $324, BTN calls $324
Results: $972 Pot ($3 Rake)
Hero showed 7 7 (three of a kind, Sevens) and WON $969 (+$489 NET)
BTN mucked 5 8 (a pair of Eights) and LOST (-$480 NET)
Note that once I hit, I just potted the turn and river. Often, people will feel foolish calling two big bets when they are so far behind. Although I didn't plan this next hand from the get-go, that's what I was counting on:
Full Tilt Poker, $4/$8 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 5 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
Hero (UTG): $2,265
CO: $1,884.50
BTN: $2,381.60
SB: $906.20
BB: $1,588
Pre-Flop: A 6 dealt to Hero (UTG)
Hero raises to $28, CO folds, BTN raises to $48, 2 folds, Hero calls $20
Flop: ($108) 5 T 8 (2 Players)
Hero checks, BTN bets $56, Hero raises to $217, BTN calls $161
Turn: ($542) K (2 Players)
Hero bets $542, BTN calls $542
River: ($1,626) 3 (2 Players)
Hero bets $1,458 and is All-In, BTN folds
Results: $1,626 Pot ($3 Rake)
On the flop, I just didn't think he had anything given his weak bet on a pretty drawy board and his general tendency to show up with garbage (though this is a good flop for 85o). I would have given up on most turns, but when I pick up the flush draw and a scare card hits- not that I'm actually like to have a K, but it will make him feel that much weaker if he has like 87 or something.
He called sooooo quickly on the turn that there was no way he had anything stronger than one pair. If he actually had a big hand, he would have at least thought about raising, since there are a lot of draws out there and I look committed to the pot. I just had to pull the trigger on the river.
As I argued in my recent 2+2 article How to Bluff a Calling Station, you've got fire multiple big barrels to punish these guys for playing pots that are too big for their marginal hands.
By the way, I showed him the bluff. Since I don't expect I'll have cause to bluff him much in the future, I might as well encourage him to pay me off next time I have a monster.
Stumble It!
Full Tilt Poker, $4/$8 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 5 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
Hero (UTG): $1,600
CO: $1,612.50
BTN: $2,074.60
SB: $1,078.20
BB: $1,899
Pre-Flop: 7
7 dealt to Hero (UTG)Hero raises to $28, CO folds, BTN raises to $48, 2 folds, Hero calls $20
Flop: ($108) 2
8 A (2 Players)Hero checks, BTN checks
Turn: ($108) 7
(2 Players)Hero bets $108, BTN calls $108
River: ($324) 3
(2 Players)Hero bets $324, BTN calls $324
Results: $972 Pot ($3 Rake)
Hero showed 7
7 (three of a kind, Sevens) and WON $969 (+$489 NET)BTN mucked 5
8 (a pair of Eights) and LOST (-$480 NET)Note that once I hit, I just potted the turn and river. Often, people will feel foolish calling two big bets when they are so far behind. Although I didn't plan this next hand from the get-go, that's what I was counting on:
Full Tilt Poker, $4/$8 NL Hold'em Cash Game, 5 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter
Hero (UTG): $2,265
CO: $1,884.50
BTN: $2,381.60
SB: $906.20
BB: $1,588
Pre-Flop: A
6 dealt to Hero (UTG)Hero raises to $28, CO folds, BTN raises to $48, 2 folds, Hero calls $20
Flop: ($108) 5
T 8 (2 Players)Hero checks, BTN bets $56, Hero raises to $217, BTN calls $161
Turn: ($542) K
(2 Players)Hero bets $542, BTN calls $542
River: ($1,626) 3
(2 Players)Hero bets $1,458 and is All-In, BTN folds
Results: $1,626 Pot ($3 Rake)
On the flop, I just didn't think he had anything given his weak bet on a pretty drawy board and his general tendency to show up with garbage (though this is a good flop for 85o). I would have given up on most turns, but when I pick up the flush draw and a scare card hits- not that I'm actually like to have a K, but it will make him feel that much weaker if he has like 87 or something.
He called sooooo quickly on the turn that there was no way he had anything stronger than one pair. If he actually had a big hand, he would have at least thought about raising, since there are a lot of draws out there and I look committed to the pot. I just had to pull the trigger on the river.
As I argued in my recent 2+2 article How to Bluff a Calling Station, you've got fire multiple big barrels to punish these guys for playing pots that are too big for their marginal hands.
By the way, I showed him the bluff. Since I don't expect I'll have cause to bluff him much in the future, I might as well encourage him to pay me off next time I have a monster.
Labels: poker, poker strategy, session review
Stumble It!
FTOPS Event 11
I almost didn't play the $500 HORSE FTOPS event last night because I was pretty tired, but generally the quality of play in these things is so bad, and the opportunity to play large-field, mixed-game tournaments so rare, that I didn't want to pass it up. I had also forgotten that it was Thursday, the only night on which I enjoy watching TV (30 Rock is the best show on TV, and the rest of the NBC line-up is solid enough), and frankly, had I remembered, I would have skipped playing poker. I'm glad that didn't happen, because even though I didn't cash in the HORSE, I found some good 10/20 NL games and made like six buy-ins!
But what you're all interested in is HORSE hands, right? Any you say you prefer raw hand histories to those that have been converted? No? Well I don't get to post them very often, so that's what you're getting! And as far as I know, there is no converter than can handle tournament Stud hands from FTP. Sorry, but I'll try to clean them up a bit.
FullTiltPoker Game #4190756474: FTOPS Event #11 (30641978), Table 50 - 400/800 Ante 75 - Limit Razz - 0:27:01 ET - 2007/11/16
Seat 1: urbandb888 (8,544)
Seat 2: Nospleen (20,221)
Seat 3: kawookey (12,905)
Seat 4: gretamy12 (7,052)
Seat 5: khalwat (14,152)
Seat 6: ags104 (7,409)
Seat 7: Chamonyx (6,349)
Seat 8: biggdeebee (5,629)
*** 3RD STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [2c 4d] [3h]
Dealt to Nospleen [4c]
Dealt to kawookey [Jc]
Dealt to gretamy12 [Qd]
Dealt to khalwat [7s]
Dealt to ags104 [Ac]
Dealt to Chamonyx [6s]
Dealt to biggdeebee [4h]
gretamy12 brings in for 100
khalwat folds
ags104 completes it to 400
Chamonyx folds
biggdeebee calls 400
urbandb888 raises to 800
Nospleen folds
kawookey folds
gretamy12 folds
ags104 calls 400
biggdeebee calls 400
*** 4TH STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [2c 4d 3h] [Js]
Dealt to ags104 [Ac] [Ks]
Dealt to biggdeebee [4h] [Qh]
urbandb888 bets 400
ags104 calls 400
biggdeebee calls 400
*** 5TH STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [2c 4d 3h Js] [Qs]
Dealt to ags104 [Ac Ks] [5d]
Dealt to biggdeebee [4h Qh] [8h]
biggdeebee bets 800
urbandb888 folds
ags104 folds
biggdeebee wins the pot (4,300)
I don't 3-bet on 3rd street very often in Razz unless the effective stacks are very small or I have reason to think the opener is raising light. Even A23 isn't a monster unless it improves on 4th street, and by bloating the pot, you reveal information about your hand and help loose opponents play more correctly when they peel a brick. This is particularly true in shallow tournament situations, where you need to conserve your bets, since you're roping yourself into a situation that could easily go south.
I made an exception here for two reasons. The main one was that I had reason to think my hand was a bit more live than that of the opener. With two 4's showing and another in my hand, that's a wheel card that he probably doesn't have and probably isn't going to catch. Also, 99% of the time that I 3-bet here, I'm going to have an Ace in my hand, and smart opponents will therefore think that if I later catch an Ace, it probably paired me. Since in this case I actually had three good wheel cards without an Ace, and one of the cards that would pair (a 4) was pretty unlikely to come, I felt that the information I revealed about my hand would be less exploitable.
4th is an easy bet since I'm almost always ahead and it's huge if I can get even one of them to fold. It absolutely sucks having to fold 5th, and if the better had caught a less scary card like an 8, I might peel, but with both of them catching well, and one of them possibly drawing very smooth, and my relative position being bad, I don't think I can continue.
Here was another hand that really hurt me:
FullTiltPoker Game #4190896062: FTOPS Event #11 (30641978), Table 50 - 500/1000 Ante 100 - Limit Stud Hi - 0:42:22 ET - 2007/11/16
Seat 1: urbandb888 (6,769)
Seat 2: Nospleen (14,046)
Seat 3: kawookey (16,030)
Seat 4: gretamy12 (5,877)
Seat 5: khalwat (9,527)
Seat 6: ags104 (8,584)
Seat 7: Chamonyx (6,174)
Seat 8: biggdeebee (15,254)
*** 3RD STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [Jh Kh] [Qc]
Dealt to Nospleen [Ah]
Dealt to kawookey [7s]
Dealt to gretamy12 [Qh]
Dealt to khalwat [Ac]
Dealt to ags104 [Jc]
Dealt to Chamonyx [Ts]
Dealt to biggdeebee [8d]
kawookey brings in for 150
gretamy12 calls 150
khalwat folds
ags104 folds
Chamonyx folds
biggdeebee calls 150
urbandb888 calls 150
Nospleen calls 150
*** 4TH STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [Jh Kh Qc] [Th]
Dealt to Nospleen [Ah] [6d]
Dealt to kawookey [7s] [3c]
Dealt to gretamy12 [Qh] [Td]
Dealt to biggdeebee [8d] [7d]
Nospleen checks
kawookey checks
gretamy12 checks
biggdeebee bets 500
urbandb888 raises to 1,000
Nospleen folds
kawookey folds
gretamy12 folds
biggdeebee calls 500
*** 5TH STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [Jh Kh Qc Th] [4s]
Dealt to biggdeebee [8d 7d] [5s]
urbandb888 bets 1,000
biggdeebee calls 1,000
*** 6TH STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [Jh Kh Qc Th 4s] [4d]
Dealt to biggdeebee [8d 7d 5s] [7h]
biggdeebee checks
urbandb888 checks
*** 7TH STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [Jh Kh Qc Th 4s 4d] [8h]
biggdeebee bets 1,000
urbandb888 folds
Uncalled bet of 1,000 returned to biggdeebee
biggdeebee mucks
biggdeebee wins the pot (5,550)
On 3rd, this is a pretty nice opportunity to play a big drawing hand for cheap in a multiway pot. My decision on 4th is an interesting one, because I can choose either to just call the bet, invite others in, and look to improve to a straight or I can raise and hopefully get the pot heads up with someone who could easily be on a worse draw than mine. I opted for the latter, since I felt it was more important to improve my odds of winning the pot by cleaning up my pair outs. I'm not sure about the bet on 5th- my intention was to set myself up to bluff 6th if it looked like he'd caught anothe
But what you're all interested in is HORSE hands, right? Any you say you prefer raw hand histories to those that have been converted? No? Well I don't get to post them very often, so that's what you're getting! And as far as I know, there is no converter than can handle tournament Stud hands from FTP. Sorry, but I'll try to clean them up a bit.
FullTiltPoker Game #4190756474: FTOPS Event #11 (30641978), Table 50 - 400/800 Ante 75 - Limit Razz - 0:27:01 ET - 2007/11/16
Seat 1: urbandb888 (8,544)
Seat 2: Nospleen (20,221)
Seat 3: kawookey (12,905)
Seat 4: gretamy12 (7,052)
Seat 5: khalwat (14,152)
Seat 6: ags104 (7,409)
Seat 7: Chamonyx (6,349)
Seat 8: biggdeebee (5,629)
*** 3RD STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [2c 4d] [3h]
Dealt to Nospleen [4c]
Dealt to kawookey [Jc]
Dealt to gretamy12 [Qd]
Dealt to khalwat [7s]
Dealt to ags104 [Ac]
Dealt to Chamonyx [6s]
Dealt to biggdeebee [4h]
gretamy12 brings in for 100
khalwat folds
ags104 completes it to 400
Chamonyx folds
biggdeebee calls 400
urbandb888 raises to 800
Nospleen folds
kawookey folds
gretamy12 folds
ags104 calls 400
biggdeebee calls 400
*** 4TH STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [2c 4d 3h] [Js]
Dealt to ags104 [Ac] [Ks]
Dealt to biggdeebee [4h] [Qh]
urbandb888 bets 400
ags104 calls 400
biggdeebee calls 400
*** 5TH STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [2c 4d 3h Js] [Qs]
Dealt to ags104 [Ac Ks] [5d]
Dealt to biggdeebee [4h Qh] [8h]
biggdeebee bets 800
urbandb888 folds
ags104 folds
biggdeebee wins the pot (4,300)
I don't 3-bet on 3rd street very often in Razz unless the effective stacks are very small or I have reason to think the opener is raising light. Even A23 isn't a monster unless it improves on 4th street, and by bloating the pot, you reveal information about your hand and help loose opponents play more correctly when they peel a brick. This is particularly true in shallow tournament situations, where you need to conserve your bets, since you're roping yourself into a situation that could easily go south.
I made an exception here for two reasons. The main one was that I had reason to think my hand was a bit more live than that of the opener. With two 4's showing and another in my hand, that's a wheel card that he probably doesn't have and probably isn't going to catch. Also, 99% of the time that I 3-bet here, I'm going to have an Ace in my hand, and smart opponents will therefore think that if I later catch an Ace, it probably paired me. Since in this case I actually had three good wheel cards without an Ace, and one of the cards that would pair (a 4) was pretty unlikely to come, I felt that the information I revealed about my hand would be less exploitable.
4th is an easy bet since I'm almost always ahead and it's huge if I can get even one of them to fold. It absolutely sucks having to fold 5th, and if the better had caught a less scary card like an 8, I might peel, but with both of them catching well, and one of them possibly drawing very smooth, and my relative position being bad, I don't think I can continue.
Here was another hand that really hurt me:
FullTiltPoker Game #4190896062: FTOPS Event #11 (30641978), Table 50 - 500/1000 Ante 100 - Limit Stud Hi - 0:42:22 ET - 2007/11/16
Seat 1: urbandb888 (6,769)
Seat 2: Nospleen (14,046)
Seat 3: kawookey (16,030)
Seat 4: gretamy12 (5,877)
Seat 5: khalwat (9,527)
Seat 6: ags104 (8,584)
Seat 7: Chamonyx (6,174)
Seat 8: biggdeebee (15,254)
*** 3RD STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [Jh Kh] [Qc]
Dealt to Nospleen [Ah]
Dealt to kawookey [7s]
Dealt to gretamy12 [Qh]
Dealt to khalwat [Ac]
Dealt to ags104 [Jc]
Dealt to Chamonyx [Ts]
Dealt to biggdeebee [8d]
kawookey brings in for 150
gretamy12 calls 150
khalwat folds
ags104 folds
Chamonyx folds
biggdeebee calls 150
urbandb888 calls 150
Nospleen calls 150
*** 4TH STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [Jh Kh Qc] [Th]
Dealt to Nospleen [Ah] [6d]
Dealt to kawookey [7s] [3c]
Dealt to gretamy12 [Qh] [Td]
Dealt to biggdeebee [8d] [7d]
Nospleen checks
kawookey checks
gretamy12 checks
biggdeebee bets 500
urbandb888 raises to 1,000
Nospleen folds
kawookey folds
gretamy12 folds
biggdeebee calls 500
*** 5TH STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [Jh Kh Qc Th] [4s]
Dealt to biggdeebee [8d 7d] [5s]
urbandb888 bets 1,000
biggdeebee calls 1,000
*** 6TH STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [Jh Kh Qc Th 4s] [4d]
Dealt to biggdeebee [8d 7d 5s] [7h]
biggdeebee checks
urbandb888 checks
*** 7TH STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [Jh Kh Qc Th 4s 4d] [8h]
biggdeebee bets 1,000
urbandb888 folds
Uncalled bet of 1,000 returned to biggdeebee
biggdeebee mucks
biggdeebee wins the pot (5,550)
On 3rd, this is a pretty nice opportunity to play a big drawing hand for cheap in a multiway pot. My decision on 4th is an interesting one, because I can choose either to just call the bet, invite others in, and look to improve to a straight or I can raise and hopefully get the pot heads up with someone who could easily be on a worse draw than mine. I opted for the latter, since I felt it was more important to improve my odds of winning the pot by cleaning up my pair outs. I'm not sure about the bet on 5th- my intention was to set myself up to bluff 6th if it looked like he'd caught anothe