Cash Games at Commerce

So in the last three multi-table tournaments I’d played as of last Monday, I’d gone 2nd, busto, and 1st. A pretty good streak, I’d say. I started to think about things. How can I do so well in tournament play and so mediocre in cash games?

I decided that the reason I didn’t do as well in cash games was that in the games in which I play (i.e., the lower limits), there are many more players seeing the flop than in your average tournament. Players in tournaments are trying to survive, and you can generally assume that if you raise preflop, you will have fewer opponents with narrower hand ranges after the flop. So it becomes easier to put people on hands, and thus you can avoid being trapped or you can take down pots when they have nothing.

In my live games, by contrast, there could be six players seeing the flop after a raise of 5x the big blind and they could be holding virtually anything. Playing only big cards just doesn’t work so well against half the table because most flops are going to give you either a single pair or nothing.

This renders continuation betting virtually useless. Rarely will you be able to take down the pot, so you’d probably better have a fairly strong hand (at least two pair, often) to be betting. But if you adhere to this, your bets will scare out the other players and you won’t get paid off so well.

After reaching this conclusion, I decided to stick to tournaments and forego cash games completely until I could afford to play at higher limits.

This resolution didn’t last long. On Friday, I went back to Hollywood Park to play in the rebuy tourney. Open-ended straight draws got there three times out of three, and I was done quickly. Stupid tourneys, I told myself. I'm going back to cash.

Saturday, I was sitting around my apartment, looking for something to do. The casino was calling. I decided to drive down to Commerce, since I hadn’t been there in a while, and play some live no limit before the UCLA football game. Played pretty well, and didn’t take any major bad beats. I walked out up $340. Hey, I thought, maybe I’m not so bad at cash games after all.

Sunday, I went back, but I had some reservations about it. I was afraid that Saturday had been a fluke, and that I would merely be giving back what I had won the previous day. But again, boredom got the best of me, and I made my way over.

I played good – but not mistake-free – poker, enough to be up $200 after about an hour. Around that time, I saw a familiar face sit down at the table and I could barely believe my eyes. It was Sgt. Donk from Vegas, back when I vacationed there in May. He was visiting a friend in Los Angeles (he lives in Maine, himself), and they randomly decided to play some poker. I couldn’t fathom what the odds were on that. It’s a very small world indeed.

I continued to play well. Took a horrendous beat at one point, for a huge pot, and I completely lost my composure. I was visibly steaming, and in my mind I recognized that I was in grave danger of giving away all my winnings for the day, and maybe even more from my wallet. I could just feel it coming.

But the strangest thing happened. I’m used to seeing poker players try and take advantage of another player who is on tilt. They say things to make him angrier and to play worse, and they gun for him in every pot they can. Didn’t happen last night. Quite the opposite, in fact. The guy to my immediate left, as well as Sgt. Donk, actually went out of their way to talk me off the ledge. They deliberately engaged me in conversation about everything but poker, until I calmed down and was my normal happy-go-lucky poker self. Later on, they let me know that they didn’t want to see me blow up and lose a lot of money. I’m quite grateful to them for that – I’ve never seen that kind of class at a poker table before.

Anyway, thanks in part to them, I later took everything I’d lost back from the guy that put the beat on me, and a few hundred more on top. I ended the day up $701. Combined with Saturday, that makes a nice little two-day run.

I would like to think that my cash game play has been fine all along, and that I had just been having a run of worse than average luck at the casinos. But I know that’s not entirely true. I’ve learned a lot in the past few months, reading the Harrington on Hold’em series, as well as the recently-released Professional No Limit Hold’Em and How to Dominate $1 and $2 No Limit Hold’em. I plugged several leaks in my game with them, and I highly recommend them.

So what does this all mean? I’m up over $3,700 in the past week – by far the best run in my career. Can I keep it up? I certainly hope so.

I left the game last night a little earlier than I might have. But my stack was at a nice round $801, and the guy that had put the bad beat on me had donked his way into a stack of $400. Plus, he had been gunning for me for a while. Every time I entered a pot, he moved all in pre-flop, regardless of his hole cards. I had survived several of those in order to attain my current stack, but with the way his stack was growing, I was getting a little wary of risking my chips. I decided to call it a night.

But before I took off, Sgt. Donk spoke to me away from the table for a little bit. I found out that his real name was Adam, and he apologized profusely for mispronouncing my name in Vegas and last night. He asked for my contact information, so that we could stay in touch. He said that he really liked the way I played, and asked if I ever needed a backer or someone to stake me in the WSOP or anything. He said that in Maine and being in the military, he didn't get to play very often. But he recognized a great player on the rise, and he wanted a piece of my action if I ever made it big.

I was stunned. It was the last thing I had expected from a guy like this. I graciously gave him my information, and I told him that I would love the opportunity to have such an arrangement with him. We parted ways as friends.

I can hardly describe what it felt like to hear that from a guy. That level of respect ... just made me feel validated. All the hard work that I had put in over the past three years. Everything I had learned. All the frustration and the euphoria, the backaches and the headaches, the laughs and the cries -- it was all worth it now. I didn't really care about the $701 I'd won any more. Hearing those words of praise for my poker-playing ability was worth a hell of a lot more.

First

Wow, been forever since I’ve blogged – over a month, actually. Well, the past week has generated some huge developments in my poker career so I had to put some stuff up. My career rounded the three-year mark over the summer, and for most of that period, the growth that I experienced has been notable, but slow.

Over the summer, I decided to do something about it. If I was going to maintain my goal of playing in the World Series of Poker in 2010, I was going to have to crank it up and get some practice playing live tournaments. So back in August, I re-read the first two Harrington books, and then I worked through the third. After doing better than I had expected in the Workbook, I decided that I would play in one live multi-table tournament (MTT) per month for the next three years to get some practice and build up my stamina. And who knows, I thought at the time, maybe I’ll cash in one or two of ‘em.

The first one I played (back in August) went about as I'd expected. I played extremely tight for about an hour and a half, and eventually the increasing blinds forced me to push all-in with Ace-Queen offsuit. I got called by pocket Jacks, lost the race, and was out of the tournament well short of the money. $150 down the drain.

After that experience, I decided to try and find a smaller tournament for my next attempt. I was delighted to find that Hollywood Park holds a daily $20+$10 rebuy tournament at 11:30am. And since I’ve been out of work since late August, I was sure to have a few spare days to give it a shot. Job interviews and other commitments prevented me from doing so until last Monday. But as soon as I had the free time, I made my way down to Inglewood.

I played well. I was able to steadily increase my stack as the blinds went up, with only a few setbacks along the way. Thankfully, the bad beats I took were by players with smaller stacks than mine, so I was able to survive their donkery. I surprised myself by making it all the way to the final table, and as a 3:1 chip leader when it got down to heads up, I decided to make a deal with the other player. I took down a first prize of $2,625, and my confidence in my poker-playing ability had never been higher.

Among my group of friends, I had been the first to do a lot of things. I was the first among us to start playing online poker. I was the first to start playing at casinos. I had been the first to play in a live MTT. And now, I had become the first of us to cash in and to win a live MTT.

I’ve realized as my friends and I have moved on from college that they don’t share the same dreams as me. Unlike me, they don’t realistically see themselves playing poker full-time in the near future. They don’t seem to have the same goals of rounding for a living, or being top-name tournament pros some day. I guess I’m the only one who believes that, given time, I can become the best player in poker history. I freely admit how silly an aspiration that is, but I feel that since it'll be nearly impossible to accomplish, I will always have something to motivate me.

A week ago today, I took the next step down the path of my poker career. I’m very excited to discover where it will ultimately lead.

Runner-Runner, Runner-Up

I went to Vegas last weekend, and I had been feeling a little bit donkish after tilting away all my winnings for the trip in the last 10 minutes at Bally’s. I pretty much reverted back to my former self at the poker table – pushing too hard with top pair, paying off sets, putting everyone on draws. Basically the way I played when I first started playing poker in the 714.

Came back, had a productive day at work on Monday. I arrived home to find out that Billy was back on Full Tilt, playing cash games. I was immediately stricken with jealousy, and it wasn’t long before I was on it again too. I played some small games early on – a limit Sit n Go (took 3rd … damn those donkeys) and some HORSE. It was fun – it felt good to be back.

But a part of me really wanted to play in a multi-table tournament. After reading so much Dan Harrington over the past month, I was itching to put myself to the test. I signed up for a 90-player Sit n Go and it was off to the races.

In the beginning, I definitely caught more than my fair share of cards. I hit sets on probably three of my first five pocket pairs. But I played them well also, and made sure that I got paid off nicely each time. I was the tournament chip leader for at least half of the tournament’s four hours. Still, I can’t say my results were entirely due to good cards; around about the middle of the tournament, the deck just about froze on me. But since blinds were going up, and everyone wanted to cash, I was able to increase my chip lead by being aggressive and picking my spots well. I applied Harrington’s concept of “sticking and moving” in the middle rounds as best I could, and when it came to be bubble time, I was had a 2 to 1 chip advantage over the next biggest stack. I was in pretty good position to secure my second ever multi-table tournament win.

As we neared the final table, I relinquished the chip lead but continued to play well. Stayed patient, stayed alive, and didn’t get timid. The final table was ridiculous – it seemed like there were a lot of huge all-in preflop races where the overcards flopped a pair, but the pocket pair rivered the set to either double up or knock someone out. Must have happened six or seven times at least … even I was the beneficiary of one of those. (I guess it’s true that the pocket pair is the favorite in those situations, haha.)

Finally I made it to heads up play, and my top pair got cracked by a runner-runner two pair. Of course, I had my Phil Hellmuth moment, stomping and screaming around my living room. I didn’t care so much about the difference in monetary prizes. I just wanted the title. I wanted some more bragging rights for Grind or Gamble. For UCLA. For the 714. But it wasn’t to be.

Still, I learned a lot about myself. I learned that I have what it takes to do well in big tournaments. In an upcoming post, I will probably lay out my plan to play a lot of live MTT’s over the next three years, in order to stay on track to start playing WSOP events in 2010. But for now, I’ll just smile through gritted teeth for my second-place finish. I should have won. Maybe next time.

A Game to Improve my Memory (Seven-Card Stud)

A year-and-a-half ago, I was primarily a Seven-Card Stud player. This was after experiencing mind-bottling swings back and forth in my bankroll playing online, and pretty much losing all confidence in my ability to be a consistent winner at no limit Texas hold’em.

But there was no way I was quitting poker entirely. I just needed a new game to learn. My first trips to casinos started me out with limit hold’em, so I was fairly familiar with that game. I had read books on it, played a lot of it, but was weary of it after 9-4 offsuit rivering a third 4 to crack my overpair too many times. No thanks on going back to that.

There was also Omaha 8, a game that’s spread in a lot of the casinos here in Southern California. The fish that frequent the cardrooms seem to enjoy it, as they feel fully justified in playing lots of starting hands and chasing a lot. It satisfies their desire to gamble in ways that limit hold’em can only begin to approach. I’d been told by a few savvy players that Omaha was the game to play, because so few people played it well and there was so much action. Still, I didn’t relish the thought of putting significant portions of my bankroll in jeopardy learning a game that was brand new to me. Furthermore, there wasn’t a preponderance of literature on the subject at the time, so I decided that Omaha wasn’t yet the game for me.

How about Stud? All I really knew about it was the basic format, and that the tables seemed to be mostly filled with old timers and young donkeys that were running bad at hold’em. (I’m trying my best not to think about how well that second category fit me at the time.) But I had a copy of Supersystem, and thus I decided to read Chip Reese’s section on Seven-Card Stud. The strategy that Mr. Reese outlined seemed fairly straightforward, and so I committed it to memory and soon tried my hand at the $4-8 Stud games at the Commerce Casino.

I enjoyed early successes. The more experienced players at the tables rarely gave me credit for having anything. I played aggressively, and I generally got paid off. Their lack of respect for my abilities ensured that I could expect to leave each session ahead a few hundred dollars on average. However, as a few months passed, and I was playing with the same players regularly, they began go to get a handle on my game. I found that I was getting trapped more often, and that my big hands were getting paid off less. I went back to the text of Supersystem, and tried to plug the holes in my game as best I could. I also tried finding articles online, but for the most part they were written for a pretty basic level of play. A skill level that would get eaten alive in the games I played in. I was missing something, but I didn’t really know what it was. I was completely baffled on how I could be a winner at Stud. Just like no limit hold’em, it seemed that I couldn’t beat the game any more.

Eventually, I just gave up poker entirely.

It started out as just a break. But with Billy out of the country, I didn’t really have anyone to get my competitive fire going. Didn’t have anyone in my ear yapping about bad beats, or blogging about improving their game. I lost interest in it. My girlfriend was happier when I wasn’t playing poker. My family was happy to hear that I was off it. I was focused on work and the classes I was taking at night. Poker was no longer a part of my life.

Well, eventually all that changed, and when I came back to the game, it was playing no limit hold’em. I came back to find out that the live games were as juicy as ever, and I saw some of the biggest cashouts of my life in early 2007. Since then, my game has steadily improved (though I can’t say the same for my bankroll), including a sharp increase in poker acumen over the past month or so. I feel like my skills at no limit hold’em have never been better.

Recently, Billy and I were jokingly brainstorming on ways he could improve his memory of his hole cards in hold’em. He has a history of forgetting exactly which two cards he’s holding, and for some reason, he still hasn’t taught himself to consistently double-check. We always get a good laugh when he quickly mucks a hand based upon what he convinced himself he was holding rather than what he actually had.

And even though I give Billy a hard time for failing to remember cards he had just seen, the discussion caused me to realize an area in which my Stud game could use a lot of improvement. As they say, Seven-Card Stud is “a game of live cards.” This means that it is crucial to always be aware of how live your hand is at all times. That is, you have to have a very good idea of how many outs you and your opponents have to make their hands.

As you play Stud, the reasons that memory is important become obvious. Say you have an open-ended straight draw on 5th Street, and need either a King or an 8 to make your hand. However, a player to your right who had been inactive until this point just caught a King, and leads out with a bet, representing that the King helped him. In order to know how many outs you have left, you have to think back to the earlier streets and the cards people folded. Did anyone fold a King or an 8? Do I have the full seven outs, or is it fewer? You cannot determine if you are being offered the right pot odds if you cannot recall how live your hand is.

Assume for a second that again, a King is leading out on 5th Street, but this time you have two Queens in the hole. Now, it’s pretty clear that if he has the pair of Kings that he is representing, you will want to know if any Queens have been folded already. Chances are, you’ve been paying careful attention to the cards out there, and you will immediately know if a Queen or any of your kickers has been folded somewhere. You’ll be looking out for that. But you should remember all the cards that come out. Have two people folded Kings already? If so, then it’s unlikely that your opponent actually has the case King. But if you only focus on the cards that help you, you likely would have missed whether or not anyone had folded a King.

At least, I would have. Everyone can remember what they have seen. Some simply have a better sense than others, and I’m definitely among the ‘others.’ I recognized that I had been probably sacrificing a ton of profit by not having a better handle on what my outs and my opponent’s outs were. Either by calling bets when I didn’t have live cards, or not extracting the maximum when my cards were the best. But like with Omaha 8, I didn’t want to lose a lot of money just practicing improving my memory at the tables.

So I came up with a game that would help me remember what cards have been folded in Seven-Card Stud. It is set up like an eight-handed Stud game, except there are no hole cards. Eight door cards are dealt out. The low card stays in, and then the three players to act after the low card all fold. The folded cards go into a discard pile.

On 4th Street, I act as if the high hand leads with a bet (though no chips are necessary). The two players left of the high both fold and their cards are placed into a second discard pile.

On 5th Street, there are three “players” remaining. Once again, the high hand stays in, and the hand immediately to the left discards into a third pile.

On 6th Street, it is heads up and the low hand discards into a fourth pile, and the game is over.

Next, I create a chart of the hands that I can remember being folded, as follows:

I give myself 1 point for every card I can remember from 6th Street. 5th Street cards are worth 2 points each. 4th Street cards are worth 4 points each and 3rd street are worth 8 point apiece. If I did my math correctly, that should work out to a total of 50 points possible.

As I get better and better at identifying how many of each card rank have been folded, I’ll start upping the ante by attempting to remember the specific suits. Once I’ve played this game enough times and remembering what’s been folded becomes second nature, then I can go back to the tables and focus more on watching my opponents instead of watching the cards. Who knows? Maybe one day I’ll be able to perform the Rounders scene in real life, and read all my opponents’ hands blind.

Acting Strong when you’re Strong (Follow-Up)

So last night was the big home game, and I had a couple of opportunities to practice what I just preached in the last post. I flopped some huge hands early in the session, and each time I was faced with the question of how best to get paid off. (FYI: Our home game is a no limit hold’em cash game, with $0.10 and $0.25 blinds.)

Hand A
I picked up the 7s-6c in the cutoff seat, and decided to limp in after several people limped in front of me. The button folded, and the small and big blind called and checked, respectively. The flop was nice – Qh-7c-7h. Ben, a loose-aggressive player, bet out $1.25 into the pot of $1.50 from the small blind. It was folded around to me, and I was pretty sure that Ben was holding a Queen only. Since he is an aggressive player, I figured a call would probably get him to bet out again on the turn. A raise here would probably scare him off. So I just called -- standard play.

The turn brought the 7d, giving me four of a kind. Ben, as expected, bet out again – this time for $1.50. Now, how to get him to pay off my quads with his full house? Instead of smooth-calling his little bet, I decided I was going to come in for a raise. However, I didn’t want to completely announce that I was holding the case 7. I decided to “Hollywood” him a little bit, and represent that I also held a Queen.

“I think we’re probably chopping here [i.e., splitting the pot with a tied hand],” I said to him casually, “but I’m going to raise just in case you don’t have a Queen.” I made it $4.50 to go, and he nodded his head dutifully and called.

The river was a King, which wasn’t the greatest card for me because now he might fear a bigger boat. Ben checked to me, and I considered making a small bet that he would have to call. But it occurred to me that he would probably have to call all in, since the turn bet had knocked his stack down to about $5 and the pot was $13. I put him all in, and he called. He didn’t seem all that surprised to see my quads, which, considering my little speech, I guess I can’t blame him for.

Maybe acting isn’t my strong suit?

Hand B
A little later, I was in the in big blind with As-Kc. Nice. I love picking up big hands in the big blind, because I get to see what everyone else does before I decide how strong I want to play them. Especially when it's the Ace of spades. Just a beautiful card.

Anyway, there was an early position limper, and then Sean raised it up to $1 in middle position. Sean is a tight-aggressive player, which normally would be considered a good thing. But unfortunately, he has two major holes in his game: inability to extract the maximum from his opponents and inability to get away from second best hands. Another thing that isn’t necessarily a hole but hurts him is a huge fear of being bluffed. Not the best combination of liabilities for a no limit hold’em player.

It was folded around to me, and I re-raised to $3.25. The limper folded, and Sean thought for a moment before calling. The flop was almost too good: Ac-Ad-4s. A monster for me, but normally trip Aces don’t get paid off all that well. So I had to ask myself, How do I make sure I get something out of this for once? I don’t want to scare Sean out of the pot. But if I check, I’ll have two options if he bets. I can either check-call or check-raise him. Either of these moves looks scary to most hands he could have that don't contain an Ace.

What I want to do is make it look like I’m trying to steal the pot from him. With a board like A-A-x, most players just won’t put you on the Ace until your actions say that you have it. Furthermore, just about no one is expecting you to bet a flop like that if you’re holding an Ace. If I bet here, I can really use Sean’s fear of being bluffed against him. I decided to make a smallish bet relative to the pot size ($3.75 into $6.85) and hope to the poker gods that he was holding a pocket pair. A bigger bet might look even more like a steal, but there's a chance Sean will fold to it anyway just because it's so large.

After I bet, I thought I would try and augment my deceptive play with a little more acting. Sean is an experienced enough player to recognize that typically weak means strong and strong means weak when it comes to physical tells. Initially, I considered acting strong in hopes that he would read me as weak. Still, that wouldn’t be convincing enough. Even better would be if I could act like I was acting strong. That is, I wanted to appear that I was weak and trying to appear strong. Do all the things players do when they're afraid but are trying their hardest not to show it. I pulled my hat down low so that he couldn’t see my eyes. I balled my hands into fists and used them to cover my mouth. I sat there like a statue, waiting for him to act, hoping he would take the bait.

He thought for a while, and called.

The turn was a bit of a scare card for me – the Jack of clubs. I was still pretty sure I had him beat, but immediately I started getting nervous. I had put him on a high-ish pair, and if he’d had pocket Jacks, he had just made a full house on me. Similarly, if he had smooth-called on the flop trying to trap me with A-J, he had just made an even better full house. I wasn’t all that happy to see it.

Still, this is poker, not tiddly-winks. If my charade was going to work, I had to keep looking like I was bluffing him. I bet out $5.75, throwing the chips out aggressively and in his direction. I was acting like I wanted him out of the pot, and I have to admit, the wee bit of nervousness I felt from seeing the Jack come out probably helped me to appear afraid of a call.

Sean thought a little longer this time, and the longer he thought the more convinced I became that he was holding either pocket Queens or pocket 10’s. He would have re-raised me preflop with Kings, and he would not have thought this long with any Ace or with pocket Jacks. He definitely would have folded a pair smaller than 10’s to my re-raise before the flop. Eventually Sean decided to push all in. I called and showed him the bad news. He groaned and showed me pocket Queens.**

I felt for him, he was in a rough spot there. But I was also kinda satisfied with myself. See, Sean is a full-time actor, and probably sees bad performances all the time. So maybe my acting ability isn’t quite as terrible as I’d thought; I had just managed to act my way into $30 worth of his chips. :-P


**As a side note, I think him losing that pot ended up costing him even more money later on. He got bluffed out of a very large pot while holding pocket Queens when there was a King on the board. He bet and called a raise on the flop, then checked and thought forever before folding to a big bet on the turn. I can’t be sure, but something tells me that losing the pot to me with Queens earlier was bouncing around in his head when he made the laydown later in the evening. Ouch.

Acting Strong when you’re Strong

It’s heads up on the turn, and you’re out of position against a solid player. You’re holding the Js-9c when the flop came Qh-Tc-6s. The turn is the 8s, giving you the nut straight. You check, because your opponent showed some strength on the flop and now that you have the nuts, you hope that she will bet again. Sure enough, she does bet half the pot. You pretend to think a while, trying to decide what to do, and decide to just call hoping that she will put you on some kind of draw. That way, if the draw misses, you may be able to get some kind of action out of her on the river.

The river is the 2h. Bingo! The board did not pair, did not complete a flush and did not complete a bigger straight. So we still have the nuts. Now, how do we get paid off?

Out of position, there are three options**. You can check again, hoping that she will bet out and you can get in a check-raise. You can make a value bet, hoping that she will call or raise you. Or you can move all-in and hope that she calls. Let see how each of these courses of action plays out.

1) Checking
This is the play that a lot of players would make. Since our opponent has bet on the flop and the turn, chances are she has at least a Queen (unless she’s totally bluffing). Even better would be if she has something as strong as two pair or trips, or 7-9 for a smaller straight. These are hands she would probably bet for value since the river was a blank. So it seems like checking in hopes of check-raising might be a good way to get our big hand paid off.

The problem with a check here is if she isn’t all that strong. How many times have you checked the river to trap only to kick yourself when the opponent checks as well? If she only has a Queen (one pair) or if she was totally bluffing, then there is a good chance that our opponent will check right behind us. Remember, that we’re up against a solid player. She will recognize that we have checked and called on two streets, and she isn’t likely to fire a third bullet without a huge hand. If she senses weakness, she might try and make a big bet to push us out, but few players have the fortitude to fire the third bullet on the river when they have been called down to that point. So there is a real danger that checking the river will not induce a third bet from our opponent.

2) Betting for Value
Another play that I see a lot is the value bet on the river. We want to avoid the pitfall of checking the river and having our solid opponent check as well. So we make a smallish suck-bet (perhaps 30-40% of the pot) in hopes that we will be called. It looks suspicious, since the 2h likely didn’t help us any. So we may get called by hands like A-Q, and we may even get raised by other hands. Since our opponent appears strong, let’s see if she’ll pay us off.

This option also has its issues. One big problem with a value bet is that, to a solid player, it looks like a value bet. Solid players will begin to consider the possibilities of what you could be betting for value, and will make the appropriate response. A bluffer will surely fold, and single pairs might do the same. Hands that are two pair or better might still reluctantly call, but then they might not depending on how good our opponent is.

3) Moving All-In
Most players shy away from this move when they have the nuts. They want to be sure they get paid off, and they feel that moving all-in will scare off hands that they want calling. The obvious benefit to moving all-in is that if you’re called, you’re guaranteed to have extracted the maximum from your opponent. If you check and they check (i.e., call your bet of $0) then you definitely haven’t gotten the maximum. Likewise, if you bet for value and they call, you’re always unsure if you could have gotten just a little bit more from them.

Despite this benefit, very few players would put in all their chips on the river with such a strong hand. They want to make a bet that would get called. But let’s look a little closer at the hands our solid opponent could have, and how she would respond to a push on the river.

A bad player that had been bluffing all along might bet into us if we check to her, but a solid player is less likely to do so. So a solid player that has been bluffing to this point will probably surrender if checked to, and certainly won’t call a value bet with rags.

Hands like A-Q or K-Q might have checked the river if we checked to them, giving up trying to take it down by betting and just hoping to show down the best hand. They also might fold if we bet for value, depending on the pot odds and their read on us. So we’re probably not going to get much from single pairs by either checking the river or betting it for value.

Hands that are two pair or better, however, are the hands that we might be able to get some action from by either checking or betting for value. These are stronger hands, and our opponent is looking to get value from her good hands just like we are. However, I would like to propose that the same hands that might call a value bet on the river might also call your all-in bet in the same situation.

Consider checking to a hand like a set of 6’s, hoping to trap her. She will make a value bet on the river, and you can check-raise her all-in. Will this solid opponent call your check-raise? Possibly, but from her point of view calling a check-raise is starting to seem negative EV. You have check-called her on the flop and the turn, and now you are check-raising her? It’s beginning to look like you’ve been trapping her instead of the other way around, and if she’s good enough there’s a chance that she might just talk herself into laying down her small set.

If you bet for value into her set, she will similarly slow down a bit. She’s probably not going to fold her set to a value bet, but she’s less likely to raise you than you might hope. After you’ve checked-called her twice, and then decide to bet into her on the river, a solid player may decide that it’s best to just call your bet with her strong (but non-nut) hand.

But what if you move all-in? This bet looks really suspicious, given the way the hand has been played thus far. You have check-called twice, representing that you are on a draw or trapping with a monster. For you to push all-in out of position looks a lot like you’re trying to buy the pot with a busted draw. If you had a monster hand, wouldn’t you just make a value bet and hope to get paid off? Furthermore, it’s less likely for you to have two pair or a set if she has two pair or a set herself, just because some of the cards you would need are accounted for. So while she still might fold hands like A-Q, she might be more inclined to call with stronger hands due to your deception. And since she might not have called your value bet with a single pair anyway, you’re not really sacrificing that many bets if she folds. The hands that she will call a value bet with are pretty much the same hands that she would call all in with. Your move on the river just looks too much like a steal. She’s more likely to call with anything decent.

One last thing before I go. Even if our opponent does correctly fold, it’s not the worst thing that could happen. Chances are we wouldn’t have won much more anyway. And furthermore, we get to pick up the pot without showing down the hand. Any time you are able to do this, it’s a bonus for your table image. Your opponent, and indeed everyone else at the table will have to ponder whether or not you were bluffing. The all-in move on the river just generally looks like a bluff. And if you occasionally do it when you have the goods, some of those times you’re going to get someone to call.

This is a realization I came to while working through Harrington on Hold’Em Vol. III, but I don’t pretend to believe my example was written as eloquently as his. Still, I hope that this analysis will help your post-flop play as much as it helped mine.


** For simplicity's sake, I have narrowed the number of options under the gun from a nearly infinite number down to three. I have essentially categorized all bets up to 100% the size of the pot as "Value Bets" and bets greater than than the size of the pot as "All-In Bets." I recognize that this is imprecise; however, I consider said imprecision to be immaterial to the argument as a whole.

Ugh.

What a downswing.

It's just not fun any more.

Every draw is getting there.

Getting outflopped or outturned all over the place.

I'm done, going back on hiatus.

I hate poker.

A Hand from Poker After Dark

I was watching Monday night’s episode of Poker After Dark on DVR last night with Billy and my girlfriend Debbie. Debbie and I have had issues over poker in the past, but now that she’s playing in our home game, I’ve sort of taken her on as my protege. As part of her training, we were discussing the hands on the show as they were being played.

(Side note: DVR is freaking awesome! It really makes me wonder how much better TiVo is … anyone know? I was completely sold on digital recording within the first five minutes of playing around with it.)

Poker After Dark is a really great format for this kind of instruction, because they show so many hands and you get to listen to a lot of the table talk. The WSOP and WPT on TV generally only show the hands that have major impact, and the announcers often overshadow the talk of the players with their commentary. Poker After Dark and High Stakes Poker are much better in both regards, because you get to see how tight and loose the players are being, you get a better sense of what their table image is when they make certain plays, and you get to hear more of their thought processes when they’re faced with decisions. You get to see how they respond to more marginal situations than you would on other shows, instead of always just Jacks versus Ace-King all in preflop. Finally, you get to see what the players are puting each other on when they aren't in the hands, as they talk things over away from the action with Shana Hiatt.

For those unfamiliar, the format of Poker After Dark is as follows: It is an invitational Sit-n-Go with six players each buying in for $20,000 worth of chips. The winner takes everything. The blinds start low and increase fairly slowly at first, giving the players plenty of time to play a lot of deep-stack poker. After a few rounds however, the blinds increase more rapidly, and the field gets eliminated at a much faster rate.


A hand jumped out at me last night that turned out to be an excellent teaching example with Debbie, so I thought I would share it on the blog. The action went like this …

Action:

The blinds were $100 and $200, fairly early on in the tournament. Gabe Kaplan is the chip leader with about $24,000 in chips, Mike Sexton is down a bit, and everyone else is pretty much around the $20,000 that they started with. Gabe limps in with a suited King, as does Mike Sexton with a suited 9. Michael Konik folds, Phil Gordon limps on the button with a suited Ace-5. Howard Lederer also only calls with pocket 10’s in the small blind. Chad Brown, in the big blind with King-Queen of spades, starts counting out chips for a raise.

The players at the table see this, and collectively try to forestall Chad from raising it up. Other than Lederer, they all have suited rags and would like to see the flop cheaply. Phil Gordon especially whines about the imminent raise (can’t stand that guy, but I don’t have time to get into why at the moment. Maybe I’ll write a post about it some day). As a group, they pretty much give away that they aren’t all that strong, giving Chad even more incentive to pop it up on them. He makes a huge over-raise making it $1,600 to go, and watches as the table reluctantly folds back to Lederer.

Howard goes into the tank, which is understandable in his position. It’s fairly obvious that he’s not going to just lay down such a big pair, but Chad’s raise was so large that it gives Howard pause. He eventually decides to re-raise and make it $5,600 to go. Chad barely even thinks before coming back over the top all-in, and after a few moments of deliberation, Howard lays down his hand.

Analysis:

A)

Howard Lederer, a long-time professional poker player, played this hand horribly. He made a mistake (or at least a questionable move) each of the three times it was his turn to act.

The first and most obvious error was not raising initially with the 10’s. He should not have limped in that spot, not against four other players. There aren’t a lot of flops that are good for your hand with 10’s in a multi-way pot. He should raise here just to thin out the field a bit, and to get a better sense of where his opponents are at. This is just basic strategy.

(There is an argument for a more conservative approach, which would render his call acceptable. If the big blind checks and the flop is bad for you, you can get away cheaply and not face any tough decisions. You’ve kept the pot small, so it’s easier to fold and pick a better spot. I don’t like that route, but it’s one way to go. It is defensible enough that I would consider Lederer’s limp to merely be a questionable rather than an outright horrible play. But his play on the hand as a whole was unquestionably bad.)

B)

His second mistake happened after Chad’s raise, when the table folded back to him. He correctly decided to come back over the top – so I have no problem with that. But I think the size of his bet was incorrect for two key reasons.

1. 
   Lederer’s bet is so large that it pot-commits him. He has made it so that if Chad calls and they see a flop, it’s really difficult for Lederer to get away from his 10’s due to the pot size.


2. Lederer’s bet also makes it easier for the hands that he has dominated (like 9’s or 8’s) to fold. A smaller raise might get those hands to stick around, but the raise to $5,600 makes it so that only overcards or a bigger pair can stay in with him. Thus, he will likely only get action from hands that are a coinflip to win the pot, or hands that have him crushed.

C)

But ok, he makes the raise to $5,600, and Chad goes insane and decides that pushing all in with King-Queen suited is the right thing to do. Here, Howard drops the ball yet again. He made a mistake by putting in a raise that pot-committed him, but here he compounds that error by not staying committed to the pot! In order to take down a winner-take-all Sit-n-Go, you have to get in there and gamble a little bit. You can not do things like raising for a quarter of your stack without following through on it.

Howard Lederer is a legend, and he has earned his reputation by playing with some of the best poker players in the world. But even he is not immune to making significant mistakes at the table from time to time.

I guess what they say is true … there’s a little donkey in all of us.

Home Game Happenings

Poker this past Monday was awesome. It was a very competitive game, in which control of the table shifted many times among several solid players. As usual, there were some big bluffs and some brutal beats, some laughs and some curses, some tension and some fun. We played Texas Hold’em for four hours straight, and then played some short-handed Dealer’s Choice for another three. I needed to have a long session like that, just to restore my sense of balance. I’ve been poker-deprived for a while.

So far, I’ve spent over $400 of my own money to get this game operational and running smoothly. I waited a long time for it to happen, and to this point it’s been everything that I’d hoped it would. Already, there are some great stories circling around, with old rivalries re-awakening as well as new ones being forged. And I think our game is garnering a great reputation. My ultimate goal is to make this the best low-limit home game in town. Naturally, that’s an impossible task; even if it is the best game there’s no way for me to really know that. But having that goal keeps me motivated to constantly try and improve things where I can. But so far, I think word of mouth has generally been kind to us.

I’m also glad that we’re playing weekly now rather than bi-weekly. The waits were just killing me back then, especially since I’m not really making the rounds any more these days. I wish I could play enough at the casino that it wouldn't be an issue. But I simply cannot do that right now, for financial and temporal reasons. Eventually I’ll get back to where things were, but for the time being, home games are going to be pretty much it.

Unfortunately, we’re going to lose Dan -- one of our regulars -- in about a month as he moves on to grad school on the East Coast. I’m glad I got the chance to bluff him out of a huge pot before that happens. Hopefully our game will keep growing and will continue for a while … it’s a lot of fun and it gives me a chance to keep my skills sharp until I can fully return.

An even greater reason that I want the game to continute is that I haven’t yet recouped my $400 investment. But if I can steal a few more huge pots off Dan, and if Billy would kindly stop sucking out on me, maybe I can get there soon. :)
_ _

P.S. Still can't believe you called my all in with top pair, 8 kicker, Billy. You really give me no credit at all.

P.P.S. Though, in all fairness, I wouldn't have complained if you didn't hit the three-outer. Naturally.

Short-Handed and Short-Stacked

The following is an example of why playing the short stack in a No Limit Hold’em ring game is usually less than optimal for good players.
_ _

No Limit Hold'em Cash Game - $0.10/$0.25 Blinds - 5 Players

SB: $16.35
BB: $38.80
UTG: $44.50
CO: $25.10
Hero (Button): $12.30

Preflop: Hero is dealt Jd 9h (5 Players)

UTG folds, CO calls $0.25, Hero calls $0.25, SB calls $0.15, BB checks.

Flop: ($1) Tc-8h-3s (4 Players)

SB bets $1, BB folds, CO calls $1, Hero calls $1.

Turn: ($4) Qc (3 Players)

SB bets $3, CO calls $3, Hero raises all-in to $11.05, SB folds, CO folds.

Okay, a few additional pieces of information. The player in the SB is a novice player, who typically only bets with solid hands, and doesn’t chase much. The player in the cutoff is a solid player, whose play can alternate between loose and tight, who knows pot odds and implied odds.

So, analyzing the hand. I’m the Hero, and I’ve stacked off several chips but decided not to reload to the maximum of $25. I make a fairly reasonable limp preflop on the button, short-handed with my holding. I flop an open-ended straight draw on a rainbow board, and call a bet when the pot is offering me 3:1 odds. Nothing out of the ordinary here.

On the turn, I make the nuts and I am bet into, with a caller in between. If I call the bet, I will have a stack of $8.05 remaining to try and get in on the river. So I consider just calling the bet of $3. However, the turn that gave me the nuts has also created a flush draw, putting a second club out there. A third club on the river could be disastrous to my hand. Similarly, my two opponents could be "trapping" with two pair or a set, and could make their full houses on the river. Hence, I have a very strong, but still somewhat vulnerable, hand.

I choose to protect it.

I decide to put in a raise, forcing weaker hands to pay a good amount in order to draw out on me. How much to raise? Well, my typical raise would be 3-4x the initial bet. However, since the bet was $3 and my stack is $11.05 at this point, such a raise means putting myself all in. Thus, my two options are to fold or push. I choose to push.

My two opponents thought and thought about their actions, but eventually they correctly folded. The SB’s fold was to be expected (it turned out that she was holding pocket Jacks). The CO’s fold was more of a surprise, once I saw his hole cards. He had 10-9, giving him second pair and a double belly-buster straight draw. From his point of view, he probably had a lot of outs to call with. So what caused him to fold?

This was an aware player – one familiar with the concepts of pot odds and implied odds. While he only had to call another $8.05 in order to see the river, he elected to lay down his hand. He told me later that he would have called a smaller bet, or if the SB called. But in my position, I couldn’t really make a smaller bet. Being short-stacked did not allow me to do so. If I’d had another $10 behind (starting out with $22.30 instead of $12.30), I could have made a smaller raise, to say $6 or $7. This means he would only have to call another $3-4 in order to see the river.

Alternatively, I could have still made a healthy raise (say to $9 or $10) and he would have been more likely to call me if I’d had more money behind. As a player aware of implied odds, he realized that if he called my bet of $11.05, that was the most that he could win if he hit his hand. However, if I had raised to $9 and still had another $12 for him to win on the river, he would have had an easier time calling. Make sense? When I'm all in for $11.06, he's risking his chips in order to win a certain-sized pot. However, if I bet $9, and still have another $12 after that, he can call the $9 and hope to win even more money if he hits on the river.

Given the situation, I did not make any errors. I played the hand in a straightforward manner, and I won a decent-sized pot. Nothing wrong with that.

However, I likely cost myself money by playing with a short stack. Even though I had played the hand flawlessly with my short stack, I could have put myself in a situation to win more money if I had rebought to the maximum before the flop. For a bad player, playing a short stack is not the worst strategy because you limit the amount that you can possibly lose. For a good player, on the other hand, playing the short stack often means limiting the amount that you can possibly win.

And money not won is essentially the same as money lost.

Looking to Your Left

We have all heard that position in Texas Hold’Em (indeed, in all forms of poker) is one of the most important aspects of the game. Intuitively, it just makes sense; being able to act after other the players allows you to make a more informed decision.

As a poker session progresses, the players to your left will have position on you in the majority of hands. They will have the best chances to take pots away from you with aggression, and to get out of the way when you're the one showing strength. As a result, it is generally optimal to play the hands in which you have as few players on your left between you and button as possible.

But we don’t always get to play under optimal conditions, do we? Most everyone can figure out what to do when the pot is folded to you and you’re holding A-J on the button. I don’t think many players have a problem folding 7-2 offsuit under the gun before the flop. It gets a bit tricker, however, when you’re dealt something like A-8 of spades and are second to act preflop. You don’t want to get caught in a tough situation later in the hand, which is what a holding like this will often do to you. At the same time, there’s a chance it might be the best hand at this point in the action. You don’t necessarily want to automatically throw it away, even though you’re out of position.

This is why I think it is important to get into the habit of looking to your left at the poker table. I played in a home game recently where they observed a house policy called “Karen Rules.” The way it worked was that if the pot was unraised before the flop, the small blind could ask the big blind whether or not he intended to raise before calling the big blind. The big blind was then obligated to give a truthful answer, and the small blind could then call, raise, or fold based upon that answer.

Unfortunately, in the vast majority of the poker games out there, the players after you are not going to tell you what they intend to do. At least not verbally. But quite often, players will subconsciously give off information about how strong their hands are. The tells that I’m about to list are not that deep or complicated, nor do they require a lot of practice to spot. A glance at the players to your left will often reveal some basic things about how they are planning to act. What does this do? It effectively gives you position on those players, because you know, with pretty good reliability, what their coming action will be.

Ready to Muck
One of the most common of these tells is the player that has examined his hole cards, decided not to play them, and is holding them in his hands, ready to toss them in the muck. This player is typically the impatient type, and wants to get on to the next hand. Thus, they hold their cards ready because the faster they can fold, the sooner the next hand can be dealt. It is typically safe to bet out against these players.

Reaching for Chips
Similar to the last tell, this one is another sign of an impatient player. It is generally an indicator that the player likes his cards, and plans to make a bet or raise. Oftentimes, a player will actually have the chips ready in his hand that he plans to raise with. He is just waiting for the action to get to him so he can pop it up. Typically, the correct move here is to fold, limp in or check. If you have a weak hand, you don’t want to make a raise only to get re-raised by this guy. And if you have a strong hand, you can get more value from it by acting weakly, allowing the guy to go ahead and bet, and then coming over the top for a raise.

Suddenly Paying Attention
If a player on your left has been casual most of the game, watching television or whatever, and suddenly perks up after looking at his cards, it means he likes what he saw! All of a sudden he’ll be looking around at the other players, paying attention to what the action is. If he’s been slouching, he’ll often sit upright. Suddenly he’ll be very interested in what everyone else is doing.

Remains Disinterested
This tell is the flip side of the last tell. If a player is not interested in the game, checks his cards, and then resumes his disinterest, chances are these were not cards that he’s excited about and he’s probably going to fold – or at least not raise. It is often combined with the "Ready to Muck" tell.

Best case scenario, you want to be able to get a read on everyone at the table. But this is often very difficult to do. A player’s reaction to his cards might only last a for split second – so for you to get an accurate idea of each player’s intentions, while also checking your own cards in the time before you have to make a decision can be rather difficult. But if you work on making just a quick glance to your left, you can sometimes pick up information on the players that act immediately after you. The other players will either be across from you (and thus easier to read) or to your right. And you’ll generally have position on the players to your right anyway, so you should be able to pick up tells based upon the way they bet.

Another point to remember -- few things in poker are true across the board. There are certain players out there that are aware of these reaction tells, and will do one of two things to counter them. First, there are players that are aware of these tells and will do the opposite in order to fool you. For instance, if a good player knows you’re watching, he may pretend to be ready to fold his cards in order to get you to bet out. Or he may pick up chips so that you’ll think he’s betting, in order to get you to check or bet less. The problem with their acting is, these players tend to do the opposite action consistently, and it usually becomes just as reliable as if they were giving the tell they're pretending to.

Second, there are players that don’t look at their cards until the action comes to them. This is something I actually recommend, as you can use the time before you have to act to glean information on other players’ holdings, while at the same time not giving away information about your own hand.

How will you know if your opponent is giving a tell or acting? It’s not that hard. Just remember this general rule of thumb: Bad players give true information about their hands. Good players give false information. Great players don’t give any information about their hands at all, true or false.

I hope all that makes sense to you the way it made sense in my head. And I hope that it wins you some money.

Or saves you some.

Same thing, I guess.

The preceding is an expansion on a concept from Matt Lessinger’s instructional poker book, “The Book of Bluffs.

Ice Cream Mondaes

I have a lot to get off my chest, so please just bear with me today … we’re having a home game this evening and the time is freaking CRAWLING by … ahhhhhhhhh!!! I apologize in advance if my topics seem a bit sporadic ... it will all make sense in the end. Sort of.

First off, I forgot to call my dad yesterday to wish him a happy Father’s Day. I’m a horrible son, I know. But he didn’t remember my birthday, so I guess we’re about even. Besides, who wants to be reminded that they’re a father, anyway? It's basically just a huge flashing sign that you’re old and over the hill – especially when your kids don’t live with you any more. On top of that, dads get shafted when it comes to gifts. I celebrate Father’s Day in my own way … just have a beer or two to toast the fact that I DON'T have kids yet. Thank GAWD for that.

But that’s neither here nor there, I suppose … here comes the non sequitur.





Wait for it ...





wait for it ...





...now! So I go on these weird binges with fast food. Not a binge in the sense of stuffing myself one night with burgers and fries and feeling like Jabba the Hutt afterwards. More like, I’ll have something from a particular fast food restaurant at least five times a week for a month or so. A few months back, a girl I was dating got me hooked on Taco Bell for like three weeks. I ate nachos and kay-suh-dillahs for lunch and dinner every single day for the second week of that run … que loco, no? For the month after that, the same girl got me into eating a lot of Jack in the Box, which I had never really been a fan of. But they serve breakfast all day – I mean, how can you not appreciate the beauty of that!

Lately, the thing has been McDonald’s. I’ve always been partial to their Dollar Menu. The double cheeseburger is so money and it doesn’t even know it. But this most recent binge started last Monday after the PB&J home game. Billy and I were starving, so we decided to treat ourselves to some late night Mickey D’s for playing so well. Billy was up a lot; I actually lost a few bucks but had bought in three times and so was still feeling pretty good. That trip was quite the story in itself, but I don’t want to get into that tale right now. Suffice it to say that it hit the spot, and I’ve been back to that same McDonald’s four times since then.

So I’ve decided to start a tradition. Whenever I feel I have played well in a session, I am going to try and reward myself with a McDonald’s fudge sundae. This tradition might be very short-lived, but who cares. It’ll be a lot of fun while it lasts. And it might even help me to tilt less. When I start to get numb and the money loses its meaning, I’ll remember what’s waiting for me a block away if I stay solid for just a little while longer.

I don’t see any downside to this, other than perhaps getting fat. But me getting fat is bound to happen sooner or later, I’m sure. It’s just a part of getting older.

Besides, even if I am getting older, even if I am getting fatter, things could be worse.

I mean, at least I don’t have kids yet.

Number Two

And now, the next in our limited series of ladies that we might consider giving up poker for ... a shot of actress Mary Ann Jarou, a.k.a. the future Mrs. Steve Lavin (yet another reason for the young male alumni of UCLA to hate that guy!!!).

Enjoy, fellas.

"Do as I say ..." [Chapter 7]: Game Selection

Well, it’s been a while since I’ve written one of these. That's mostly because I’ve wised up a little bit and started doing the things I tell other people to do. But even I am not immune to relapses, and last night turned out to be just what I needed – a big fat hunking slice of humble pie.

Today, I’m going to talk about game selection. This is a concept I haven’t really worried too much about since I started to consistently play at Level 3 and above. I’m at the point now where I can pretty much play any style of poker. If the game is loose, I’ll be tight and aggressive – wait for the good hands and let the donkeys pay me off. If the game is fairly rocky, then I can LAG it up and make money that way. I’ve grown fairly adept at finding the correct gear in which to play in order to make the most money at a given table. So game selection hasn’t really been at the forefront of my poker mind.

My last session was an example of why game selection is a key concept of which to be mindful, even for the advanced player. I drove down to Hollywood Park (HP) after bubbling out of a Sit n Go, feeling pretty good about my game and the way I’ve been playing lately. I know that generally, HP has a reputation for housing the loosest, craziest players in town. But since I’ve mostly only played limit there, I figured the no limit game would be loose, but beatable if I played tight enough.

Once I arrived, I sat down in the $100 buy-in game and soon discovered that loose did not begin to describe this table. It was a full blown all-in festival – no exaggeration. Seven hands went by before I found anything playable, and at least one player got all his money in on each of those seven hands. I realized quickly that my only hope of winning here was playing ridiculously tight preflop and hoping that the odds held up. I strapped myself in.

My playable hand turned out to be AA in the big blind. The guy under the gun immediately pushed all in for his remaining $50. The second big stack at the table (who should have been a huge donator but was getting insanely lucky time after time) called him cold from middle position. In my head, I started doing a little victory dance. It was folded to me, and I pushed for my stack of $95. Donator called. Time to see if the bullets could work their magic.

Didn’t work out well at all. The flop was nice, but a runner-runner gave Donator the nut straight with his QJ offsuit. I rebought, steamed for another ten hands, then stacked off again when A-2 called my Queens all in preflop and spiked an Ace. At that point I realized that this wasn’t a game I could beat with my bankroll. Goodbye, Hollywood Park!

So okay, you could say that I just got severely unlucky last night. You could say that I should have made a quick $500 or $600 easily at that table. You could say it just wasn’t my night, Sklansky dollars, it wasn’t my fault what happened, whatever. You win some, you lose some, right?

I see it differently. It’s possible that I was just destined to lose my money last night, wherever I went. But still, I must take some responsibility for dropping $200 so quickly. This is supposed to be an instructional post, not just a glorified bad beat story. :-) I should have realized early on that this was not a game that I could beat, not with the big stacks at the table willing to see every hand down to the river. While I still believe that I am able to hang tough in any style of poker game by adapting my own style of play, I should have realized that this ability did not apply to the table at HP last night because we weren’t playing poker. We were simply putting all of our money in and seeing how the cards fell.

These types of games are out there, and at times can be very profitable. But this was not the type of game that I want to be playing in. Just putting it in before the flop takes away the advantages good players have over weak ones, similar to the “Kill Phil” strategies that amateurs often use in tournaments to make up for their lack of experience. Moving in preflop doesn’t allow me to bring my poker skill set to bear. I just have to hope my good hands hold up.

So as you can see, game selection is a relevant poker principle across all skill levels and poker formats. Learn to recognize when you’re in a situation or game that is not advantageous to your particular skills, and get out as early as possible. It’ll probably save you a bunch of money.

Remember, this is just advice – you can take it or leave it. But if I had taken my own advice last night, I would have saved myself a couple hundred and probably could have even made some money down the road at the Hustler.

So like always, Do as I say, not as I do …

"Folding," by Tommy Angelo

I read this article a long, long time ago, but it's only been recently that I've really applied it to my game. I think it has helped immensely. It really wasn't all that long ago that folding top pair in a short-handed game was a completely foreign concept to me. Folding an overpair? Fuhgeddaboutit! Tommy Angelo is a superb writer, and this classic article of his is definitely well worth passing on. Enjoy!

Table Talk in Las Vegas

I sit down at Bally’s (which, by the way, they should probably rename ‘the Aquarium, Hotel and Casino’) with $100 at the $1/2 NL game. I wait for about half an hour to pick up a playable hand, and eventually decide to just settle for Q-4 suited on the button. For some reason, I call some donkey’s raise with it, flop a flush draw, call all in on the turn and hit it on the river. Naturally, the donkey gets pretty upset by this …

Mr Donk: What the hell were you thinking, calling me with that garbage!? Didn’t you see me raise before the flop?
Me: Yes, I saw perfectly. But I happened to get lucky, what do you want me to do?
Mr Donk: Damn right, you got lucky!
Me: Look, I flopped a flush draw, and you weren’t betting it. So I bet it for you. By the time you check-raised me all-in, I was more-or-less pot-committed.
Mr Donk: Whatever the hell that means … look, kid, a flush draw is only, like seven outs. You have to learn how to lay those down.
Me: Seven outs? I’m pretty sure it’s nine …
Mr Donk: No, it’s seven, smart guy. How many clubs are in the deck?
Me: Uh, thirteen.
Mr Donk: Right, and how many on the board?
Me. Two! Plus two in my hand is four … leaving me with nine outs. Do the math!
Mr Donk: Thirteen … four … well sure, but how many people are at the table? Ten. You have to think about how many people are at the table, probably holding clubs. So fewer clubs that you can hit. Free lesson for you, son.

My jaw drops.

Me: Are you kidding me?
Mr Donk: No, I’m no kidding you at all. You really ought to learn to play better before you lose what little money you have.
Me: Whatever, man. Nicely played, sir.
Mr Donk: That’s right, you should call me ‘sir.’ I’ve earned it.
Me: Why, because you’re a man? Haha, I’d call any guy 'sir' if I felt like it, so don't feel special. I mean, congratulations – you were born with a penis!
Mr Donk: No, you little punk. Look at me. Look at my haircut. What the hell do you think I do for a living?

He’s sporting a crew cut.

Me: I guess ex-military, something like that?
Sgt Donk: Try current military. You should show a little more respect. Don’t you know what weekend this is?
Me: Memorial Day.
Sgt Donk: That’s right.
Me: What does that have to do with you? Are you dead? Were you killed in combat?
Sgt Donk: Do you know the meaning of the term 'veteran'? Memorial Day means you show respect for all military personnel that have been in combat, past and present.
Me: No it doesn’t! That’s Veteran’s Day, you twit! This is Memorial Day … as a military guy I would think you’d know the difference. Don’t talk to me any more, you don’t have the capacity to have an intelligent conversation with me. A flopped flush draw is nine outs, SIR. That’s the last free poker lesson I’m going to give you today.
Sgt Donk: Kid, what do you do for a living.
Me: I take stacks off dumbasses like yourself.
Sgt Donk: So you’re a professional, huh? What are you doing in such a low stakes game then?
Me: I’m in Vegas … I’m on vacation. I’m playing here for fun.
Sgt Donk: I see.

Some time passes, we trade a few more barbs here and there. He builds his stack back up as his hands hold up. I don’t play a hand for about an hour or so. Finally, I flop middle pair and an open-ended straight draw in middle position. I raise Sgt. Donk’s bet on the flop, bet the turn hard, and push all in when I miss the river. Sgt. Donk is pondering a call …

Sgt. Donk: So how much do I owe you if I call this?
Me: $130.
Sgt Donk: I see. Well, I don’t have much here, but I think I’m going to go ahead and pay you off … did you hit that King on the river? I hit the Ten on the turn …
Me: Damn it, no, I just had the 4 and the open-ender on the flop. Nice hand.
Sgt Donk: Wow, nice. So, young man – you got anything else to teach me about poker?

I pause for a moment, and all I can think about is backhanding that sneer right off his face.

Me: Yeah, actually, I do. Poker lesson number two … is never bluff an idiot.

Play the stack, not the cards.

Well, Billy got me again. I’m not sure when I became so bluffable, but at some point it happened and it has cost me a pot or two. But the style adjustment has probably been good for my bankroll in the long run.

It was late in last Sunday’s home game, and it was now three handed between Sean, Billy, and myself. I straddled on the dealer button, Sean and Billy both called from the blinds. I looked at my hole cards and saw pocket Jacks. Fishhooks. Beautiful hand for a straddle, especially when your straddle is the button. No one will believe you have anything.

I decided to play the hand tricky and just checked my option. The flop game 10-7-6 rainbow. Sean checked, and Billy fired $1 into the pot of $1.50. I figured him for hitting top pair, so I raised it up to $3.25. Sean mucked, and Billy hardly even thought before re-popping to $10 even.

Naturally, this slowed me down a little bit. I had clawed my way to the big stack on my third buy-in. I was at about $125, and Billy had another $35 or so in front of him on top of the $10. Calling wasn’t really an option – if I did, Billy was for sure pushing on the turn. Any raise I made would pretty much pot-commit him. If I laid down my overpair, I ran the serious risk of folding the best hand. What to do?

I had gotten exactly the situation that I had wanted. Straddled to create more action, dealt myself a huge hand, and gotten my opponent to make a large re-raise into me. There was no way that Billy put me on the Jacks. I had deceived him, and he had put a good chunk of his money in because of it.

But at the same time, this is a situation you usually want to avoid with an overpair. I had to decide if Billy was playing top pair really aggressively, if he had happened to flop two pair, or even if he was holding the "Mike McDermott" 8-9 for the nut straight. My deception had caused the pressure of making a decision to be put on me.

A million thoughts were running through my head at this point. I thought about Billy as a player, and about his reputation for being extremely tight and aggressive. But I also thought about how he had been using that to his advantage, bluffing and semi-bluffing more lately than he had in the past. I thought that this was one of those interesting situations where I was either very far ahead or very far behind. I wondered if he would fold to a re-raise, or if I could possibly get away with just calling in order to get more information from him later. Were my Jacks good? Why had I opted to play them so tricky? Was Billy capable of making a bluff here? Was I capable of laying this overpair down?

Apparently, I was. I mucked my Jacks face up, and Billy showed me a Q-10. I’m not sure if he was trying to tilt me or make himself appear like a loose player to Sean. Didn’t really matter – because I felt completely happy with my fold. I had laid down the best hand, but I felt like it was a solid play nonetheless. In the end, it was the stack sizes that determined my action. I was not prepared to dump a third of my stack to a player of Billy’s caliber, especially so late in the evening. If we got it all in and I lost the hand, I would have very little opportunity to get it back. When I laid down my Jacks, I was well aware of the possibility that I was tossing the best hand. But the timing just wasn’t right. I was protecting my stack, and I was unwilling to mix it up with Billy’s stack holding less than the nuts or near nuts. Furthermore, my fold gives the table even more incentive to try and steal on me later -- preferably when I'm more comfortably ahead in the hand. This time I had decided to play the man, play the stack, play the situation …

… and I think I played it pretty well.

Play the man, not the cards.

It’s been a while since I’ve won at the Hustler $1/2 NL, and last night was shaping up to be a continuation of that saga. I was basically beating myself early on – pot-committing myself with Jacks after an Ace and a flush draw flopped. Putting a guy all in with a suited A-K vs. his Aces. I was well on my way to tilting and stacking off my Vegas bankroll (trip coming up soon). Third buy-in. Here we go …

The big stack was in complete command on the table. Name was Jim, youngish guy. One of those guys you can tell are solid players just by looking at them. He was three seats to my left, and sitting on a stack of about $360. I hadn’t tangled with him yet, and I didn’t want to at that point. There were enough fish there for the both of us, I figured.

A new guy showed up and sat directly to Jim’s left. I don’t know his name – let’s call him Mike for now. He won a few pots from people at the table, yadda yadda … got to be the second biggest stack. At some point, he rivered a bigger set than the one that Jim had flopped, and doubled through on him. Understandably, Jim started steaming aloud, vowing to take Mike down at some point in the night.

Immediately, the gears in my head started turning. I watched Jim carefully, wondering if he was going to tilt or if he was solid enough to keep playing good poker in spite of the sick beat he’d just taken. I didn't have to wait long to find out.

The very next hand, I picked up 7-6 offsuit on the button. A few people limped in, including Jim and Mike, and I decided to take a flop as well. The blinds didn’t raise, and the flop came Q-8-6, rainbow.

The blinds checked, Jim bet $10, and it was folded around to me. I was about to muck, but something told me my implied odds were amazing here. My hand was pretty weak at this point – I had bottom pair, and a backdoor straight as a redraw. I didn’t think Jim was bluffing, but it seemed pretty clear to me that if I somehow managed to outplay or bad beat him on this hand, it would be enough to tilt him for the rest of the night and he would stack off what he had left in front of him. I called, and the blinds folded.

The turn was another 6.

Jim immediately bet out $14, and I pushed for my remaining $32. He called with a Queen, and I doubled up. He went through the roof. He tried his best to play well the rest of the night, but his best turned out not to be good enough. He won and lost some pots over the next hour, and eventually I finished him off for his last $85 when he pushed on me with a flush draw. Unfortunately, he called it a night at that point and didn't rebuy, but I didn’t have too much to complain about. Jim had single-handedly taken me from a losing to a winning night. For that, I was grateful.

Last night was yet another example of a situation where the cards didn’t really matter that much. Sure, it helped a lot that I got lucky and turned that third 6. But in that spot, it was correct for me to call with the worst hand, even though my immediate pot odds were not sufficient. Not only did I have the implied odds of doubling through the guy on this hand – I was also fairly certain that making my hand would turn the second best player at the table into one of the worst. I could probably take more money off him later, as well as eliminating one of the biggest threats to my control of the table.

It’s important to look for those situations at the poker table that will pay big dividends later on. Find them, exploit them. Make that money.

And another one ...

Jun seems to come up with the best poker insults.


yumsupsup: one guy just got jealous
and started talking shit
and i talked back and i told him
i promise i ll sent u home
haha
i busted him
with a set of aces
he call all in with mid pair
idiot
of course i said, u are dead and are going home
he said no one sends me home
rebought a couple tiems
and then went home
lol
Jamin: hahahah

Trading Tells

Last night at the Hustler was interesting for a variety of reasons – some of them “good/interesting” and some of them “bad/interesting.” Well, here at Grind or Gamble, we like to focus on the positive. At least, that’s going to be the policy for today. ;-)

The guy directly to my right was an OK player, probably in his mid-forties, and seated next to him was his fiancé. The fiancé was in her mid-thirties or so, had a huge rack, a low-cut blouse and a nice smile. This so happened to be the night I was wearing my graphic tee which reads: “Tell your boobs to stop staring at my eyes!” Needless to say, right off the bat the guy wasn’t a huge fan of mine. We weren't exactly enemies at the table, but amigos would definitely be even more of a stretch.

The night wore on, and some hands got played, whatever. But what I wanted to mention was the tell I picked up on him. On the flop, this guy would, from time to time, pause for a moment before saying smoothly, “I’ll check …?” and then giving the next person to act kind of a sidelong glance. I’ve seen players do this so many times – say that they check like it’s a question, then give you that look that says “Careful, there.” Usually it means that they didn’t like the flop, but their tone is one of caution to a player they think is likely to bet. It’s like they're pretending to be trapping you, hoping that you’ll check behind them and give them a free card.

With this guy, the complete opposite was the case. He performed the exactly same routine I’ve seen countless times before, but when he did it, it was a dead giveaway that he had hit the flop, wanted to bet it, but decided to check hoping someone else would take that as weakness and bet. Not once did I see him do that and then fold the hand to a large bet or raise. If he went through that routine, he would be more than willing to commit all of his chips.

I was pretty satisfied when that tell proved to be reliable time after time after time. It didn’t ever pay off for me, but I saw other players at the table trap themselves again and again against him. By the time I left, the guy had built his stack from $40 up to about $400 just by check-calling and check-raising people with that. I waited to exploit that tell with a monster, but the opportunity never came.

Later on in the evening, I discovered that I wasn’t the only player that was “awake” at the table. That same guy clued me in to a tell of my own, and I couldn’t have been more embarrassed. Despite my embarrassment, I was definitely happy that he let me in on it. Here was the hand that he exposed me on.

UTG had made it $4 to go ($1/2 NL game), and there were two callers (the guy and his fiancé) before the action got to me. In late position, I made it $20 to go with A-K offsuit. The original raiser, the chick, and the dude all called me. The flop came 7-6-7, two-toned, giving me the backdoor nut flush draw and not much else. It was checked to me, and I bet $30 of my remaining $62. The two others in the hand fold, and the guy starts thinking aloud.

“Well, you made it $20 to go preflop, and you bet $30 on the flop. Something’s a little fishy here. I think when you have a made hand like a pair preflop, you bet different amounts, like $12, or $15 … or you would have re-raised my lady to $24 instead of $20. When you don’t have a hand yet, or just have big cards, you bet round numbers. Multiples of ten. I think you’re bluffing, my friend. I’ll put you all in.”

The guy was dead on.

I realized that I do indeed do that. What a huge tell! Multiples of $10 when I had nothing, and other amounts when I had it. Yikes.

I wish I’d had a chance to take advantage of his tell the way he had mine. I’ll probably never see him again. But if I do … he’d better be extremely careful before he check-raises me again!

Mass debating ...

… is definitely +EV.

My blogmate/roommate and I get into some pretty intense discussions (arguments) about poker strategy. These go down probably every other day, on average, and can really put me in a bad mood at times. But their benefits are nucking futs. The big (and probably obvious) one is learning new ways to play hands. For no limit players especially, the variety of methods of achieving profit maximization is fairly large, and having discussion with other players just gives you more weapons in your poker arsenal. This is the beauty and value of things like the Two Plus Two forums.

Sometimes, Billy and I come to an agreement on the best way to play a hand given our collective knowledge of the game. Other times, however, we are unable to come to a real resolution. Chalk it up to our style differences, or maybe just to our egos. Whatever the reason, there are times when we simply cannot come to terms.

These situations still have a lot of value for me, because they allow me insight into how another poker player thinks. Even if I consider that thinking incorrect or unreasonable, it gives me a window into the way many of my opponents may be playing their hands against me. By arguing with my poker friends and turning things over verbally, I am able to get away from the expectation that the other players will be thinking and playing their hands the same way that I am. It serves as a reminder that not everyone in the poker world (or the world in general, for that matter) sees things like I do.

I’m writing this today because we had yet another of our famous mass debates. I don’t think there was much of a conclusion, but eventually I just had to stop it because of frustration. But whether or not I think Billy was right on this one, it is an absolute certainty that I will find a way to use this information against him. =P

Game Day

It has been a long time coming, but our home game has finally returned. There will be some new faces, some new reads to make and tells to pick up on, but the core group from my old home game (read: “the addicts”) will all be present. The stakes are a teeny bit higher than we used to play back in the day, but still micro enough that we aren’t all playing scared poker against each other. It should be a really fun game.

I’ve been waiting quite a while for this. I got so excited, I bought all kinds of new poker crap. Before Billy even moved back to LA, I had already bought a poker table setup, and I recently picked up new chips, racks, cards, chairs … all that good stuff. I think I’ve spent more money setting up the game than I’m likely to make from it, but at least the experience will be as much fun as possible. I’ve been aiming for the “Casino Away from the Casino” feel, and I think it’s starting to come together. I’ve played in a lot of home games in the Los Angeles area, making the rounds, and once the ball really gets rolling on this, I can say with only just a little bias that it will likely become one of the better home games in town.

But we’ll see what happens. Tonight’s inaugural session will likely feature six players, perhaps seven. Billy and I would like to see that average get up to a regular seven or eight guys. Six is a good number to start with, though. It’s a high enough number that if someone goes bust the game isn't automatically over, but low enough that everyone should get to play a decent percentage of pots.

This home game should also be good for my overall game. I was chatting with Billy the other day, and I feel pretty sure that I identified the cause of my recent poker slump. We basically agreed that I had been focusing too much on my own cards, and not using my hand-reading ability as much as I should. I was playing medium-strength hands as if they were monsters, refusing to lay down top pair, etc. Not even bothering to gauge opponents’ relative strength any more. I had just been relying on aggression and intimidation to get me paid off when I had it and to get people out when I didn’t. As you can surmise from my last post, this hasn’t been working. Tonight, I hope to change that. Since we’re adding a few players to the mix that I don’t often play with, I should get the opportunity to flex my poker muscles a bit and play more skillfully than I have been.

I couldn’t be more excited. I’m not sure if we’re going to keep stats on how well people do and all the other things Billy and I mentioned before, but a part of me doesn’t really care.

I just want to play poker.

Slump

Poker is like a roller coaster. Like a sine wave. Like the ocean. That quality of rising and falling, ups and downs, ecstasy to joy, pleasure to pain pervades the game on every level. A single hand is just like a session, which is just like a year, which is just like a career. From the flop until the river, depending on how the cards are dealt and what your opponents do, you can experience the full range of emotions – from pure joy to pure anguish within a matter of minutes. You can go from the trapper to the trapped, from shark to donk, from master to student. The same can be said for a session of poker, for a week of poker, and on and on. You can be on top of the poker world one moment and in the doldrums the next.

As you can guess by the title of this little number, I’m currently experiencing one of poker’s dreaded downswings. It’s lasted a few months. Granted, I haven’t been fully rounding since January, but when I do get the time to play, for the most part it hasn’t been pretty. I’m struggling even to win heads up matches, which has been a specialty of mine for quite a while. I can’t beat Billy in a series to save my life. I can’t even cash in Connor’s game, which I used to friggin’ dominate. It’s getting alarming, in a way. Is everyone else really getting that much better? Or is my poker game simply growing stagnant? Or both?

I’m not really sure what’s going on with me. Maybe I just haven’t worked on my game enough or something. At any rate, I find this troubling, so I’m going to rededicate myself to reading literature and keeping up with the evolutions of the various games and how they’re being played. Because right now I feel like I’m on that first drop of a huge roller coaster … only the drop keeps going, and going, and going …

It’s about time that the train swings back up a little bit. I want to hear that click-click-click as the coaster gets ready for another peak. It’s time to turn this baby around.

It’s time to win again.

Underestimating Opponents

I was playing in the $1/2 NL game at the Hustler today, up $35 on my $50 buy-in. I had been in the game for 20 minutes at this point, so being either up that much or down that much was pretty much expected. The game was pretty good, a few obvious fish, some players that are more solid. I hadn’t noticed any obvious Level 3’ers yet, so was feeling pretty at ease. I like the small game at the Hustler because I can make decent money at it without worrying too much about being outplayed. Outflopped or otherwise outdrawn, sure, but very rarely outplayed. So I typically don’t worry too much about the information I give off – I feel free to bet according to hand strength, visibly react to other players’ actions and the cards that come out, audibly mutter my observations to myself. There’s no need to be Chris Ferguson in the $1/2 NL – no one’s savvy enough to spot your tells anyway.

Right?

Two hands reminded me that there are exceptions to just about every rule. The first was kind of interesting. I raised second-to-act preflop with AT off. The guppy at the table called my raise cold from middle position, as did the big blind. Now, typically when the flop is dealt I’m looking at my opponents rather than the cards. See how they react to them, whether or not they got what they were looking for. This time I was watching the player from the big blind. I couldn’t watch both players from my seat, and the big blind was the tightest guy at the table, so his overcall concerned me. Well, I turned to him to get my read, and I was flabbergasted to find him already staring right back at me. He was doing exactly what I was doing – trying to get a read and see if I had connected with the flop. We seriously locked eyes for a good seven seconds before the dealer nudged him with a quiet “Check or bet, sir?” Finally the guy looked over at the flop and checked. It contained an ace, so I bet out. The rest of the hand wasn't that spectacular, I was just blown away because it was the first time I’d seen that at this level at the Hustler.

About a round later, another guy at the table surprised me in similar fashion. I picked up J7 offsuit in the small blind and was ready to muck it before the action even came to me. There were several callers, and I half mucked before I realized I was halfway in already. I looked at my cards again to make sure I had the suits down and tossed in the extra chip. The big blind checked.

The flop was nice, Q-J-7 and two-toned giving me bottom two pair. I bet out $7, hoping someone that someone hit the queen and hoping to make players pay to hit their flush or straight draws. In a seven-handed pot, someone had to have something. One guy called from late position, everyone else folded. Oh well. The turn was an offsuit trey – beautiful card. I figured the guy wasn’t going anywhere with a queen or a strong draw, but he also didn’t seem to have a strong enough hand to bet if I checked it, so I bet out another $15.

The guy goes into the think tank, and starts to puzzle it out. “Hmmmm, you called before the flop,” he says, “but you almost folded. What could you do that with? You almost fold from the small blind, check your cards, and then come out betting strong on the flop. You must have flopped two pair … a bad-looking hand like jack-seven. Yeah, that’s what you have, jack-seven. I fold.” He mucks his AQ face up.

All I could do was smile and show him how great a read he'd just made. His analysis sounded exactly like what I would work myself through in the opposite situation. Again, I had underestimated an opponent’s poker acumen and this time is had cost me. Shot myself in the foot.

So what’s the lesson for me? Take the pros’ advice and stop giving away information. Like shooting free throws, pick a routine and stick with it.

Awesome, another hole in my game that needs pluggin'.

That’s what makes poker fun.