Gamble Gamble

It worked out well that we were going to skip this week, because I was busy winning the $1000 Battle of the Bay tournament at Lucky Chances last night! This annual event is the premier tournament at what is now my local casino, so although I’ve been playing cash there exclusively, I decided to make an exception for this.

I played Day 1A on Saturday and got off to a very nice start but eventually lost most of my chips with QT vs 99 on a J9x flop. The guy min check-raised the flop, took about forty seconds to call my shove (nitroll, not slowroll), then bragged to the guy sitting next to him that he knew I would shove because I was too aggressive and that’s why he raised me.

A few hands later I shoved my last 4.5 BBs with 73o on the button. This one was debated a bit on Twitter, and I agree that it’s not a shove in a vacuum, but I crunched some numbers on SB/BB calling ranges and feel good about jamming any two there. I beat the BB’s K4s, and he muttered something about “nice catch”, to which I responded, “Is this your first time playing poker, sir?”

This is really out of character for me, and I’m ashamed to tell you about it. In my defense, I wasn’t feeling well, but I also think tournaments, especially live tournaments, bring this out in me. I’m trying to play fewer of them for that reason.

To paraphrase Tommy Angelo, the pleasure/pain ratio is all out of whack in a tournament. I can shrug off a loss of a couple thousand dollars at a $5/$10 game with literally no problem. I’m not just putting on a stoic front, it truly doesn’t affect me, at least not until it happens a few sessions in a row. But there’s something about a tournament, the “one-and-done” nature of it I think, encourages that kind of emotional investment that, at least in my opinion, is really undesirable.

The pleasure I get from playing cash, especially a deep-stacked cash game, is akin to the pleasure of solving a puzzle. I enjoy the challenge of trying to construct the perfect ranges for a given spot, there’s a much stronger correlation (though far from 1:1, of course) between the quality of my decisions and the outcome of a given hand or session, and during and after the experience I feel stimulated intellectually.

The appeal that tournaments hold for me has a lot more in common with gambling. There’s certainly nothing more exciting in poker than getting deep in a big tournament, but ultimately it feels like I’m just chasing a high when I play them. That said, there are some really high-value tournaments out there, too good to pass up, and this was one of them.

Sunday Funday

I was sorely tempted not to re-enter on Sunday. As I mentioned, I was (still am, in fact – staying up late last night didn’t help) under the weather, and the tournament started at 9:30 AM. On top of that, I really had not enjoyed my play on Saturday at all. Ten-handed poker with shallow effective stacks and small antes (e.g. 200/400/25) is almost entirely devoid of strategic depth. It’s mostly just a game of waiting for cards. That’s not to say there’s no edge there, just that the edge doesn’t come from anything interesting. I don’t find it stimulating, I find it annoying and boring, which of course undermines the patience that is paramount in such a structure.

So, I nearly didn’t return on Sunday. One of the factors that put me over the top was that I really wanted to meet Neil Blumenfield, who is apparently a regular at Lucky Chances tournaments though he and I have yet to cross paths in person. He wasn’t there on Saturday, so I figured he would surely play Sunday.

He didn’t, but I did, and first place was a fine consolation prize. I got off to a good start, winning some big pots in the first level and winning a big one with 55 vs AJ and 54 on a J54 flop. I eventually got involved in a three-way all in that ended with my KK losing to QQ, and then it was back to grinding a short stack for me.

For all my disparagement of short-stacked poker, it turns out there are some big edges to be had when your opponents aren’t accustomed or adapting properly to it. The thing about a flagship tournament like this is that it’s a major event for a lot of the people playing it. They either won a satellite or ponied up the $1000 as a one-time splurge, and they’re risk averse in a way that you simply can’t afford to be when you’re grinding a 20BB stack. This enabled me to pick up a few pots I had no business winning and stay afloat despite dry spells and bad beats/coolers.

Triple Barreling Off a 20BB Stack

The best example was towards the end of the day, when our table was eight-handed. Blinds must have been 1200/2400, and the player on my right open limped off of a stack of 55K or so. There was nothing suspicious about this – even at this late stage, plenty of people were limping. I made the questionable decision to limp behind with 8s 7s and 48K in the hijack. I’m still not sure this is good, but I believed I could get away with it because everyone was so passive with regard to raising pre-flop, and I expected a big post-flop edge to compensate for the times I would have to fold to a raise (and, of course, the fact that I was putting in 5% of my stack with 8-high and no chance of winning pre-flop).

The action folded to the SB, who completed. The BB checked, so four of us saw a Qh 7c 3h flop. When everyone checked to me, I bet 4500, about 1/3 of the pot. This was primarily a protection bet, though it was already in the back of my mind that it might also become the first leg of a three barrel bluff.

The small blind and the MP limper both called, and the turn brought an offsuit 9. They checked to me again. In a heads up pot, I would have considered checking and trying to show my hand down, but with two people calling there was little chance my 7 was good. It might sound ridiculous to talk about running someone off of top pair with 20 BB effective stacks, but it seemed very plausible to me at the time. That’s how scared everyone was playing. They were all terrified to slowplay with a flush draw on the board, so their calls could only indicate a lack of confidence or an extremely strong hand, to which my 7 was a significant blocker. I bet 11K, still a small fraction of the pot, but I wanted to be sure to leave myself a meaningful river bet. They both called.

The river was an off-suit A (I would have given up a heart). They both checked, I jammed my last 30K or so, and they both folded. And that’s how you triple barrel off of a 20 BB stack in a multi-way pot.

Another Cheap Steal

The other fun one from Day One began with me opening 22 from the CO. The button and SB called. I don’t remember the level, but there was about 26K in the pot on the flop, which came AJ5. We checked it around. The turn was a 4, and the SB bet 6K, hardly a show of confidence. I also thought it was quite unlikely that the button was slowplaying anything. Everyone had been playing so straight-forwardly that I expected to get way too much credit for a monster, simply because no one else in the tournament seemed willing to take a line like this as a bluff, so I raised to 22K, and they both quickly folded, the SB flashing KJ as he did so.

After that I was card- and spot- dead for the rest of the night and ended up squeaking into the money with 123K and blinds about to go to 5K/10K. That’s not as bad as it sounds, as the average was about 200K, and only 43 players remained, with 40 to be paid. Still, my aspirations for Day 2 were not much higher than surviving the bubble and collecting enough of a prize to cover train fare, meals, and my two buy-ins.

I wasn’t alone in this regard. Another player, who actually had far more chips than I did and ultimately bubbled the final table, opened the pot on one of the last hands of the night. After he won, his wife scolded him from the rail, “Don’t play anything until you’re in the money!”

PokerStars – $2 NL FAST (6 max) – Holdem – 6 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4: http://www.pokertracker.com

BTN: 299.68 BB
Hero (SB): 210.95 BB
BB: 48.52 BB
UTG: 212.99 BB
MP: 100 BB
CO: 116.12 BB

Hero posts SB 0.5 BB, BB posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 1.5 BB) Hero has Td Qd
fold, fold, fold, BTN raises to 2 BB, Hero raises to 7 BB, fold, BTN calls 5 BB

Flop : (15 BB, 2 players) 7c 9s Kh
Hero bets 9 BB, BTN calls 9 BB

Turn : (33 BB, 2 players) Ad
Hero checks, BTN bets 22 BB, Hero raises to 62 BB, BTN calls 40 BB

River : (157 BB, 2 players) 3d
Hero checks, BTN bets 76 BB, Hero calls 76 BB

BTN shows Ac Ks (Two Pair, Aces and Kings) (Pre 60%, Flop 80%, Turn 91%)
Hero mucks Td Qd (High Card, Ace) (Pre 40%, Flop 20%, Turn 9%)
BTN wins 307.6 BB

It’s a beautiful morning in the Bahamas. Walking around in the morning is a totally different experience, because they are empty except for some grounds crew and a few early risers such as myself. Later today there will be screaming kids and booming speakers, but right now it’s oddly serene.

I’ve got stuff with PokerStars all day today and then I’ll be playing the tournament hopefully all day tomorrow, which means I won’t be able to take full advantage of the facilities until Sunday. Of course I wouldn’t be here at all if it weren’t for those other things, so I can’t complain. I just hope the weather stays nice. One time!

We were in a bit of a rush to get to the hotel in time for a coaching session I had scheduled, so there wasn’t time for me to pose with the welcome sign or anything, but I did manage to snap a picture as we blew past it:

Huzzah!

1. Bragging.

2. If you’re a Thinking Poker reader who happens to live in or around that area, drop me a line and hopefully we can meet up for a beer or something- I plan to increase my beer consumption drastically while in Germany.

3. If you live in, have visited, or otherwise know the area, I’d appreciate your advice about what I ought to see and do while I’m there. I’ll mostly be staying at his place in Berlin, though we’re planning to travel around the surrounding area together for 3-5 days as well. One possibility for this is a loop that would encompass some combination of Dresden – Prag – Chemnitz – Leipzig – Magdeburg. I want to make a day trip to Potsdam as well. Thoughts? Suggestions?

Full Tilt No-Limit Hold’em, $10.00 BB (6 handed) – Full-Tilt Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

UTG ($1209)
MP ($1027)
Hero (CO) ($1302)
Button ($1490.75)
SB ($2925)
BB ($1748)

Preflop: Hero is CO with 6, A
UTG bets $35, MP calls $35, Hero calls $35, Button calls $35, 2 folds

Flop: ($155) 2, 9, 8 (4 players)
UTG bets $95, 1 fold, Hero calls $95, Button calls $95

Turn: ($440) 4 (3 players)
UTG bets $240, Hero raises to $1172 (All-In), Button calls $1172, UTG calls $839 (All-In)

River: ($3863) 5 (3 players, 2 all-in)

Total pot: $3863 | Rake: $3

Results:
Button had 9, J (flush, Jack high).
UTG had J, 10 (high card, Jack).
Hero had 6, A (flush, Ace high).
Outcome: Hero won $3860

River Check-Raise

Two limpers, I complete J6s in the SB, BB checks. Flop KJ6, all diamonds. I bet $35, the first limper raises to $75, the other players fold, and I call.

Turn 5d, we both check.

River Jc, I check, he bets $150, I raise to $550, he pays me off.

Slowishroll

Two limpers, I raise to $65 with 88 in MP and get 3 calls. Flop 458 rainbow, I bet $200 into a $275 pot, one of the limpers calls and the others fold.

Turn J, he check-calls $400.

River is an offsuit 3, and he open shoves about $1500. I actually thought for a while before calling here just because I couldn’t figure out what he had. With two pair or a lower set, I’d expect him to have raised by now for fear of letting a four-straight show on the board. There also weren’t many draws to speak of that he could have missed and would now be turning into a bluff. I kind of felt like 76 was his single most likely holding, but I certainly wasn’t sure enough that he couldn’t have a lower set or a random bluff or something. I called and he indicated for me to show first, basically saying he was bluffing, and he mucked when I showed.

The whole table gave me shit for not snap-calling, but I don’t regret thinking it through. It was such a weird spot for him to shove, and it was a 150BB decision, so I’m not going to apologize for taking my time even with a strong hand.

Oh, OK- That Works

This one was at 10/25. I open to $100 with KJo in MP. Action folds to the BB, who is the weakest player at the table, a white guy in his late 50’s or early 60’s who played pretty loose-passive relative to the rest of the table. He looked like he wanted to call before even looking at his cards, and sure enough he tossed in three more green chips pretty quickly.

Flop comes 952r. He checks, I bet $125, he calls very quickly and nonchalantly.

Turn 2. He checks, and I feel like he probably just has A-high here (and not AK, so my outs are usually live), so I bet $325. He again calls quickly.

River Q, and I give up and I tell him that a pair is good. He tables KT. Ship it.

The Best Thing About Live Cash Games

You get to see and hold your winnings:

Full Tilt No-Limit Hold’em, $80.00 BB (5 handed) – Full-Tilt Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

BB ($19098.50)
Hero (UTG) ($16000)
MP ($16538.30)
Button ($16485)
SB ($15277)

Preflop: Hero is UTG with K, K
Hero bets $280, 2 folds, SB raises to $1120, 1 fold, Hero raises to $2720, SB raises to $15277 (All-In), Hero calls $12557

Flop: ($30634) 3, A, 6 (2 players, 1 all-in)

Turn: ($30634) J (2 players, 1 all-in)

River: ($30634) 8 (2 players, 1 all-in)

Total pot: $30634 | Rake: $3

Results:
SB had Q, Q (one pair, Queens).
Hero had K, K (one pair, Kings).
Outcome: Hero won $30631

Believe it or not, I still managed to finish the day stuck, substantially.