Posts Tagged ‘heads up’

PokerStars No-Limit Hold’em, $4.00 BB (2 handed) – PokerStars Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

BB ($819.50)
Hero (SB) ($1000)

Preflop: Hero is SB with 6♥, J♣
Hero bets $9.60, BB calls $5.60

Flop: ($20.80) 2♠, 5♣, 5♦ (2 players)
BB checks, Hero checks

Turn: ($20.80) K♦ (2 players)
BB checks, Hero checks

River: ($20.80) A♠ (2 players)
BB bets $12, Hero calls $12

Total pot: $44.80 | Rake: $0.50

Results:
Hero had 6♥, J♣ (one pair, fives).
BB had 8♦, 10♥ (one pair, fives).
Outcome: Hero won $44.30

With my line, it looks a lot like I have either A-high trying to showdown cheaply or air that I declined to bluff. In either case, I’m likely to bet the river. Thus, it doesn’t really make that much sense for Villain to bet if he paired the Ace, and it makes even less sense for him to try to value bet a K. There’s also not much point in bluffing if he has Q-high, so my Jack starts looking pretty good.

Of course this all falls apart if Villain realizes how FOS his river bet will look and expects me to call with J-high

Round 1

My first opponent was a guy I didn’t recognize from China. Before cards were even dealt, he typed “lololol pro so cool”. Based on that alone, I predicted that he was going to give me no credit and try to outplay me.

Picking up JJ on the first hand was a dream come true. Blinds were 25/50, and he opened to 150. I made it 550, and he shoved for 7500.

This wasn’t precisely the result I wanted. I generally prefer not to play big pre-flop pots in these tournaments when I’m up against someone I expect to have an edge against, because in deep-stacked HU NLHE, edges can be very big. Based on his pre-flop chatter, I expected that he would be spazzing here a lot and dominating me rarely to never. It’s unfortunate that some of his spazzes are near-coinflips against me, but I’m on the right side of the coinflip, and even a 5% edge in a 300BB pot is pretty significant. He could also have some pairs that I dominate. So I called and won a flip against KQo to win the match on the first hand.

FWIW I probably would have folded AQ, not because I expected to be behind, but because I’d expect to find better spots.  Read the complete post...

Edit: Oh snap! I just saw that Villain in this hand went on to win the tournament! And it was his second WCOOP bracelet. Congratulations 2FLY2TILT!

I skipped the PL Draw event because I don’t know how to play that game, and I registered three hours into the Triple Stud because I wanted to be fresh for the $1000 NLHE rather than frustrated from three hours of Stud. I won a nice pot almost immediately in Razz, but it was all downhill from there. I think this is pretty standard for people who know something about Razz, but it illustrated the problem with trying to bluff in this game:
PokerStars Game #67119394260: Tournament #2011090008, $200+$15 USD Triple Stud (Razz Limit) – Level VIII (200/400) – 2011/09/06 14:48:20 MT [2011/09/06 16:48:20 ET]
Table ’2011090008 11′ 8-max
Seat 1: capoch (2998 in chips) is sitting out
Seat 2: 2FLY2TILT (5744 in chips)
Seat 3: kasparov007 (7808 in chips)
Seat 4: kimsen (5902 in chips)
Seat 5: johnny5rings (3754 in chips)
Seat 6: Ghoyteep (8772 in chips)
Seat 7: Terry_Toria (3799 in chips)
Seat 8: foucault82 (4960 in chips)
capoch: posts the ante 40
2FLY2TILT: posts the ante 40
kasparov007: posts the ante 40
kimsen: posts the ante 40
johnny5rings: posts the ante 40
Ghoyteep: posts the ante 40
Terry_Toria: posts the ante 40
foucault82: posts the ante 40
*** 3rd STREET ***
Dealt to capoch [3s]
Dealt to 2FLY2TILT [Jd]
Dealt to kasparov007 [7s]
Dealt to kimsen [8s]
Dealt to johnny5rings [Tc]
Dealt to Ghoyteep [4d]
Dealt to Terry_Toria [Th]
Dealt to foucault82 [7c 3h 4s]
2FLY2TILT: brings in for 60
kasparov007: folds
kimsen: folds
johnny5rings: folds
Ghoyteep: folds
Terry_Toria: folds
foucault82: raises 140 to 200
capoch: folds
2FLY2TILT: calls 140
*** 4th STREET ***
Dealt to 2FLY2TILT [Jd] [5h]
Dealt to foucault82 [7c 3h 4s] [Qd]
2FLY2TILT: bets 200
foucault82: calls 200
*** 5th STREET ***
Dealt to 2FLY2TILT [Jd 5h] [Jh]
Dealt to foucault82 [7c 3h 4s Qd] [Qc]
2FLY2TILT: bets 400
foucault82: calls 400
*** 6th STREET ***
Dealt to 2FLY2TILT [Jd 5h Jh] [5s]
Dealt to foucault82 [7c 3h 4s Qd Qc] [8h]
foucault82: bets 400
2FLY2TILT: calls 400
*** RIVER ***
Dealt to foucault82 [7c 3h 4s Qd Qc 8h] [Ks]
foucault82: checks
2FLY2TILT: bets 400
foucault82: calls 400
*** SHOW DOWN ***
2FLY2TILT: shows [3d Ac Jd 5h Jh 5s Ad] (Lo: A,A,J,5,3)
foucault82: shows [7c 3h 4s Qd Qc 8h Ks] (Lo: Q,8,7,4,3)
foucault82 collected 3520 from pot  Read the complete post...

I played all of today’s WCOOPs but only did anything notable in the $320 6-handed shootout. My starting table feature PokerStars Pro Lex Veldhuis, thankfully on my right, and four players I didn’t recognize. I’d been playing aggressively against Lex, generally with the best hand, and finally he’d had enough. I picked up QQ in the BB and got him to 4-bet all-in with A7o in the BB. With his chips in my stack it wasn’t too much trouble to get down to the heads up.

My opponent was pretty much an ideal heads up opponent. I felt totally in control of the match the entire time, since by the time two bets had gone into the pot I knew everything I needed to know about what he had and where I stood. I played extreme smallball with him because I was sure my edge was huge. At first he was only continuing past the flop if he had a pair, so I was c-betting everything and calling all of his pre-flop raises. Eventually he started continuation betting, but again I caught on so quickly to what he was doing that I started check-raising him and was back in control in no time. I polished him off and waited a solid hour and a half for the next match to start.  Read the complete post...

There were tons of comments on the most recent “What’s Your Play?” post, which is awesome. I’m going to go ahead and post the results, but especially after seeing the comments I think it’s very close and I don’t mean to hold my play up as the best possible decision. This is really one I posted because I thought it was interesting and close, not because I thought there was a clear but unconventional best play.

PokerStars No-Limit Hold’em, $10.00 BB (2 handed) – PokerStars Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

Hero (SB) ($2074)
BB ($1113.50)

Preflop: Hero is SB with K♦, J♥
Hero bets $20, BB raises to $66, Hero calls $46

Flop: ($132) 3♦, 5♦, 5♣ (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $44, BB calls $44

Turn: ($220) 8♦ (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $123, BB calls $123

River: ($466) 7♦ (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $333, BB raises to $880.50 (All-In), Hero folds

Total pot: $1132 | Rake: $0.50

Results:
BB didn’t show
Outcome: BB won $1131.50

I went for the bet-fold line, which quite a few of you suggested. Special props to jas and bond2king for predicting my exact bet size! (I do have a penchant for betting all one digit).  Read the complete post...

Hero and Villain are heads up on four tables at Villain’s request. Villain bought in short at all four but promised not to quit no matter how big his stack got, and he’s been true to his word. He’s not a professional but has proven surprisingly capable. He is playing 71/60 with a 21% 3-bet and 49% Aggression Frequency. His c-bet % in 3-bet pots is 67%.

Hero is likely perceived as aggressive but good, have attempted some big bluffs and also some thin value bets. Hero has not folded often when in position on dry flops. He has taken stabs like this when checked to in the past, sometimes getting folds and sometimes not. Villain is the guy who made this call. Other than that there’s no history particularly relevant to this situation.

PokerStars No-Limit Hold’em, $10.00 BB (2 handed) – PokerStars Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

Hero (SB) ($2074)
BB ($1113.50)

Preflop: Hero is SB with K♦, J♥
Hero bets $20, BB raises to $66, Hero calls $46

Flop: ($132) 3♦, 5♦, 5♣ (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $44, BB calls $44

Turn: ($220) 8♦ (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $123, BB calls $123

River: ($466) 7♦ (2 players)
BB checks, Hero?

If you want to bet, please specify your size and your plan if raised. I’ll post my thoughts on Monday.

Unfortunately I was the victim of this one. Honestly I don’t think his river call is too good. If diamonds miss, he can snap-call, but a huge chunk of my range just got there. It’s possible he didn’t think I would value bet a flush, but I absolutely would. The more likely explanation is that he thinks I’m floating with overcards or weaker draws on the flop. I’ve been known to do that, but not often enough that he’s good 1/3 of the time on the river.

PokerStars No-Limit Hold’em, $10.00 BB (2 handed) – PokerStars Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

Hero (SB) ($1015)
BB ($1495)

Preflop: Hero is SB with 6♠, 7♦
Hero bets $20, BB calls $10

Flop: ($40) 8♦, 5♣, 5♦ (2 players)
BB bets $20, Hero raises to $55, BB raises to $110, Hero calls $55

Turn: ($260) 8♣ (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $99, BB calls $99

River: ($458) 3♦ (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $333, BB calls $333

Total pot: $1124 | Rake: $0.50

Results:
Hero had 6♠, 7♦ (two pair, eights and fives).
BB had J♥, Q♣ (two pair, eights and fives).
Outcome: BB won $1123.50

Earlier this week I posted a new What’s Your Play, and now it’s time for the results and my analysis! First off thanks to everyone who commented, there were a lot of really interesting ideas and good questions, and I’m going to address a few of them here.

In this hand, I was actually the BB. I had 8d 6d for a flush draw and turned gutshot, and my opponent checked back his set of Tens on the river, which I thought was interesting and very good. Despite rivering a pair, I had no intention of putting any more money into the pot.

I think that Bond2King pretty much nailed it with his comment:

“A very player dependent spot, but given the minimal information I think I would just check back. Given the deep stacks you can’t rule out AJ just because he didn’t 3-bet, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he would take this line with that and J9 a lot. I think he probably shuts down on the turn with any two pair worse than KQ (and you have two Tens as blockers anyway), so KQ and Kx with two diamonds seem like the only hands to get value from, and I doubt that he’s calling with one pair (I think he might play Kxdd differently anyhow). Unless you’re pretty sure he wouldn’t check a straight on the river, the range he’s calling you with seems smaller than the range that beats you (more combos of just AJ than KQ, not even counting the J9). Besides, he could always find the fold with KQ or check-raise bluff you on the river if you bet small (you would have to fold).”  Read the complete post...