Posts Tagged ‘bet sizing’

PokerStars’ Poker School Online recently released a video that I made for them quite some time ago (as evidenced by my introduction of myself as “one of the newest members of Team Online”). It’s very basic, strategy-wise – I’m playing one table of $.05/$.10 6-max NLHE – but if that’s what you’re looking for, I think you’ll get a lot out of it. It contains clear explanations of important concepts like pre-flop hand selection, semi-bluffing, bet sizing, and building the pot. So far I’ve got a unanimous five stars from five reviews and ten positive comments, so if you like the video, please let PSO know! Who knows? You just might get to see more…

A friend shared this hand with me, and I thought it was a solid example of a good, creative line. The small bet on the flop helps him draw cheaply, establishes who if anyone is interested in the pot, and depending on what happens with regard to (2) possibly sets up  a multi-barrel bluff. With only one opponent on the turn and his hand presumably not good enough to raise, Hero turns up the heat with a larger bluff. By calling that bet, Villain makes clear that he has a good hand, so when Hero rivers his straight, he overbets the pot for value. Great examples of creative bet sizing!

PokerStars:  Hold’em No Limit ($0.25/$0.50 USD)
Table ‘Warck VI’ 6-max Seat #3 is the button
Seat 1: UTG ($125 in chips)
Seat 2: CO ($71.10 in chips)
Seat 3: .BN ($50 in chips)
Seat 5: SB ($50 in chips)
Seat 6: HERO ($89.59 in chips)
universal ki will be allowed to play after the button
SB: posts small blind $0.25
HERO: posts big blind $0.50
UTG: posts the ante $0.10
CO: posts the ante $0.10
.BN: posts the ante $0.10
SB: posts the ante $0.10
HERO: posts the ante $0.10
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to HERO [9s Jh]
UTG: raises $0.75 to $1.25
CO: calls $1.25
.BN: calls $1.25
SB: folds
HERO: calls $0.75
*** FLOP *** [Td Qs 3d]
HERO: bets $1.50
UTG: folds
CO: calls $1.50
.BN: folds
*** TURN *** [Td Qs 3d] [3h]
HERO: bets $6
CO: calls $6
*** RIVER *** [Td Qs 3d 3h] [Ks]
HERO: bets $23
CO: calls $23  Read the complete post...

Edit: Hero holds Qh Th. Thanks to Georgios for pointing that rather significant omission!

This is a key hand from the final table of a tournament a friend recently won. It was a $125 freezeout at Aria. Hero is in his late 20′s and has been playing aggressively and well – you can read the trip report linked above if you want a better idea of what exactly his table image might be.

Blinds are 3K/6K/1K, and four players remain in the tournament. I don’t know the exact payout structure, but it’s not particularly top heavy.

The SB is an older gentleman with 110K who is exceedingly tight and cautious. Hero is in the BB with 265K. The CO is a very tight 22-year old with 150K. The BTN is the chipleader with 320K.

Hero and Button have been running over the other two over. The BTN seems generally to be on the reckless side of loose-aggressive. He opens tons of pots and hates to fold. He ran up a huge stack by getting slapped with the deck (he’s shown down Aces four times already at the final table) but has since given away nearly half of that with some questionable calls, including raise-calling 53s against a 110K shove getting nowhere near the appropriate odds.  Read the complete post...

This is a guest post from a friend of mine who just won his first live tournament last week. It was a $125 freezeout at Aria. He sent this to me in an e-mail and was gracious enough to permit me to publish it. There’s some interesting stuff in here about what it takes to do well in a small-stakes live tournament, what you can get away with, and what it feels to be really keyed up and in the zone while you’re playing. I think everyone can relate to the feelings of frustration that come from banging your head against the wall in poorly structure tournaments and also the exhilaration of finally taking one down. Of course once you’re capable of calls like this it’s only a matter of time before you win one!

“I was able to build a good stack pretty early on, even before we hit the antes I had about 38k from a 10k stack. I was pretty aggressive and the table never gave me credit for anything. Because of this I was able to get paid when hitting a straight and hitting Aces up vs my opponent’s worst aces up.  Read the complete post...

The exciting (?) conclusion of my 2012 PCA Trip Report has just been published in the February issue of 2+2 Magazine. Regular readers of “What’s Your Play?” will recognize a few of the hands, but there’s plenty of new content for everyone, plus it turns out the Mizrachis’ mother is hilarious! Here’s a little taste:

I got off to a good start, calling a raise to 2,200 from a seemingly tight-aggressive player in middle position with AJo in the CO. The big blind called as well, and we saw a K82 rainbow flop.

The pre-flop raiser bet 4,500. Against some players this would be a snap-call with a good Ace-high, but his TAG image gave me pause. I ultimately called because the board was so good for a continuation bet and the odds so tempting, but I didn’t feel great about it. The third player folded.

We both checked an 8 on the turn. The river brought a Q, and he checked again. AJ has considerable showdown value here, but I decided to turn it into a bluff by betting 7,500….

Give it a read and let me know what you think!

It eventually disappeared, but initially I noticed an interesting pattern in the comments that this week’s “What’s Your Play?” received on Thinking Poker vs. Card Player. The vast majority of the early posters on my website argued for an admittedly tight fold, while the first Card Player responders unanimously wanted to call. As time went on, the responses on both sites became more mixed, but I think this disparity is meaningful. There is one sort of player who looks first to pot odds, and, when they are good, asks “Can you give me a damn good reason to fold?”

The other sort seek to put an opponent on a hand first, or perhaps just to get a feel for how likely they are to be good. If they don’t like what they see, then they ask, “Just how good are those pot odds?”  Read the complete post...

I concluded last week’s “What’s Your Play?” by saying that, “I should have been more open to taking in new information and re-evaluating my plan,” since I’d just admitted to following through on a big semi-bluff despite obvious shows of strength from my opponent.

I also said that, in the absence of such tells, I still thought that check-raising all-in on the turn was the best play. Now, a few very good comments on that post have me re-evaluating that opinion. Here, thanks to commenter Todd, is the short version of the argument for betting the turn, planning to fold to a raise but to bluff most rivers if called:

I think the reasons you list, specifically the lack of planning and the value of survival make bet turn bet river a better plan than check shove. I don’t think you are going to get bluff raised virtually ever on your turn bet, and you stand to get the same folds you get by the c/r by barreling all the way – but for a cheaper price. Yes, if he raises the turn bet you have to fold, but if we believe he only raises with the strongest portion of his range such as sets, the alternative is having him call our c/r with that same range and us playing a big pot with one card to come… so bet fold isn’t the worst thing in the world here, and as long as we are correct about our other assumptions (he gets to the turn with a fairly wide range, he is less likely to have a multi-street plan than other players, and he has some value on his tourney life, double barelling the turn and river gets the same folds as c/r) then it seems to be the better line to me.  Read the complete post...

Edit: Effective stacks are $2000. The fact that I didn’t think to include that should tell you something about how relevant I think that is. Thanks to Ian for pointing out the error.

This hand comes from a live $5/$10 NLHE game at the Hollywood Casino in Charleston, West Virginia. Villain has been at the table for about an hour and hasn’t proven particularly active or nitty in that time. He seems to be a regular in his late 20′s, probably professional or semi-professional. He doesn’t seem super-talented but good enough to be a modest winner in a live $5/$10 game.

The one hand that I saw him play that’s of interest here, he check-called three bets with A9 on AQ68Q. He was in the BB and lost to the Button, who had QJ. The significant thing is that when he called on the flop and turn he literally beat his opponent into the pot. Like he held chips in his hand, hovering over the pot, and dropped in the appropriate amount as soon as his opponent announced a bet. He vocalized some frustration after losing that pot but hasn’t seemed tilty since. It’s been about half an hour since then.  Read the complete post...