Lasted a little over three hours in the $500 HORSE, then made an illustrative Stud mistake:
FullTiltPoker Game #5166723748: FTOPS Event #3 (35825861), Table 26 – 500/1000 Ante 100 – Limit Stud Hi – 0:35:56 ET – 2008/02/08
Seat 1: zartarious (10,468)
Seat 2: WCJOKER (16,873)
Seat 3: Rambo no5 (2,006)
Seat 4: jesseja777 (17,150)
Seat 5: joshuah333 (9,909)
Seat 6: Sira21 (6,110)
Seat 7: urbandb888 (3,792)
Seat 8: hattrick8810 (5,714)
*** 3RD STREET ***
Dealt to zartarious [Ad]
Dealt to WCJOKER [7c]
Dealt to Rambo no5 [6s]
Dealt to jesseja777 [4s]
Dealt to joshuah333 [5h]
Dealt to Sira21 [4d]
Dealt to urbandb888 [4c 5c] [Jc]
Dealt to hattrick8810 [Ks]
Sira21 is low with [4d]
Sira21 brings in for 150
urbandb888 completes it to 500
hattrick8810 folds
zartarious raises to 1,000
WCJOKER folds
Rambo no5 folds
jesseja777 folds
joshuah333 folds
Sira21 folds
urbandb888 calls 500
*** 4TH STREET ***
Dealt to zartarious [Ad] [8c]
Dealt to urbandb888 [4c 5c Jc] [Tc]
zartarious bets 500
urbandb888 calls 500
*** 5TH STREET ***
Dealt to zartarious [Ad 8c] [Ac]
Dealt to urbandb888 [4c 5c Jc Tc] [Jh]
zartarious bets 1,000
urbandb888 calls 1,000
*** 6TH STREET ***
Dealt to zartarious [Ad 8c Ac] [9c]
Dealt to urbandb888 [4c 5c Jc Tc Jh] [Qs]
zartarious bets 1,000
urbandb888 calls 1,000
*** 7TH STREET ***
Dealt to urbandb888 [4c 5c Jc Tc Jh Qs] [7s]
zartarious bets 1,000
urbandb888 folds
Uncalled bet of 1,000 returned to zartarious
zartarious shows [Ah 7h Ad 8c Ac 9c 6h] three of a kind, Aces
zartarious wins the pot (7,950)
There are a couple of things wrong with my play on 3rd street here. I’d been playing very tight, partially because that’s just the right strategy in fixed limit tournaments and partially because of some lackluster cards, and so I thought my raise would get some credit. It was a semi-bluff, hoping to represent a pair of Jacks but actually holding a three flush.
However, my hole cards are small, making them less valuable, and worse, they are dead. That is, a 5 and two 4’s are showing, making it more likely that I will brick future streets. Stud is a game about constant improvement. Generally your hand needs to keep getting better, either by pairing or improving draws, for you to continue with it on each street. And those dead cards make it harder me to improve my hand.
Raising into two bigger cards behind me is also problematic. No matter how tight my image, no one is folding a pair of K’s or A’s when a J raises.
Three flushes are also generally less playable in tournament Stud, especially when stacks are shallow. This is because pots are more likely to be contested heads up and you will often commit a lot of chips chasing only to fold the river, as I did here, and leave yourself crippled.
It’s always true in tournament poker that your last chips are worth more than the others, but it’s especially true in fixed limit games. In NLHE, a short stack is worth more than half a stack of twice its size because of the value of survival, but it also has its disadvantages. With a short stack, you lose the ability to make certain plays, such as to re-raise with fold equity pre-flop or to make a continuation bet on the flop. In a game where the bet sizes are fixed, a guy with enough chips to bet every street to the river is almost exactly as threatening as a guy with ten times his chips. There is very little the bigger stack can do that the shorter cannot. Thus, it is especially important not to put your last chips in jeopardy in a marginal spot. Like I did.