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onthebutton
02-21-2005, 06:35 PM
Last week, playing in early stages of a tournament. Blinds are 10/20 and I'm at about 600 chips. 10 people playing. I'm in late position, and dealt A /images/graemlins/heart.gifK /images/graemlins/heart.gif.
Another player, we'll call him the Devil, raises to 40. I reraise to 120, it folds around to the Devil, and he comes over the top of me, making it 200 total. We play together every week, and I know he's aggressive, so I don't necessarily think "bullets" as I normally would. Flop comes out 2 /images/graemlins/heart.gif4 /images/graemlins/club.gifQ /images/graemlins/heart.gif.

He thinks, bets 100. I think "Pot is 530, I'm getting 5.3 to 1 on my money here. 9 cards make the nuts for me out of 47 left, which is about 5 to 1 (actually 5.2). Implied pot odds are even higher." (One thing here, do I multiply my odds by 2 here, since I have two chances to hit the nuts?) So, I call. Turn comes 3 /images/graemlins/spade.gif.

So now, I've got the nut flush draw and a straight draw. He fires another 100, and I know that with the added outs (9 hearts + 4 5's = 13 outs in 46 cards = 3.5 to 1 vs. 100 to a pot of 730) I have to call. I call, and the turn comes K /images/graemlins/diamond.gif.

He checks the river, and I check also, fearing a check raise.

So, analysis? Opinions? General insults? I'll post the results later.

Mez
02-21-2005, 06:57 PM
I raise the flop for 2 reasons. First, your hand is very strong. You're 50%+ if both of your overs are live outs. Second, if you get called, you can check to get your river card.

Is it me or when an opponent underbets the pot (100 into a 430 pot) on the flop and does it again on the turn (now a severe underbet), I always think its a bluff/blocking bet?

Did you both showdown AK?

trainslayer
02-21-2005, 06:58 PM
I hate to be the first to reply as your not getting much expertise from me, but here goes. I don't see much wrong with your play as it looks like how I'd probably(sp.) play it. My only problem is with the way you counted your outs. Don't know what kind of read you have on the Devil other than "aggressive" and what his/her position was, but if he/she'd make a reraise w/24s or Q4s heads up then you lose the 4h out and if he/she's got A5 one of the 5's are gone. And since I'm at work and don't have my handy dandy outs/odds cheatsheet in front of me I can't say that it makes much difference. My point is I try to avoid counting full outs when they ain't really there.

onthebutton
02-21-2005, 07:02 PM
The only time when his aggressive nature really impacted my decision was:

1: Pre-flop, I knew that just because it was a re-reraise, it didn't mean he had AA.
2: At the river, I thought he was trying to check raise me.


I don't really understand what you are saying about counting outs that aren't there. You have no way of knowing if they are live outs or not---so you have to count them.

Mez
02-21-2005, 07:07 PM
[ QUOTE ]
My only problem is with the way you counted your outs. Don't know what kind of read you have on the Devil other than "aggressive" and what his/her position was, but if he/she'd make a reraise w/24s or Q4s heads up then you lose the 4h out and if he/she's got A5 one of the 5's are gone.

[/ QUOTE ]

I disagree, this is scared poker. (And why you have to raise the flop.) If 'devil' caught a set, then you have one less out *and* your overs are not live. You'll find out when you raise. Putting 'devil' on Q4 or 24 or Q2 doesn't make sense. The only hand I can put him on that really hit the flop is QQ - raised and re-raised your initial raise. AA and KK would bet out stronger on a flop with the flush draw that they're not holding. So its likely QQ and AQ if you think you're behind OR AK,JJ,TT (maybe too aggressive w TT) where you have ALL of our outs clean.

I would think the way the hand was played that it was AK or JJ.

trainslayer
02-21-2005, 07:30 PM
Allow me to dig myself a deeper hole. /images/graemlins/grin.gif My only point was they're not full outs. SSHE says it much better than I could hope to. And it's possible that I don't understand it as well as I should. (I'll reread it agin tonite.) But maybe the 4h and one of the 5's should be counted as half outs or so for a total of 1. Just my .02 worth. (By the way my first thought was Devil had QQ)

onthebutton
02-21-2005, 07:36 PM
I haven't read SSHE, so I can't directly comment on the "half outs" idea. Maybe I should be more clear--I said this player is aggressive, but he is also very solid. He's not a maniac. There is no way I could possibly see him making it 20xBB out of position with a hand containing any 4 or 5. There's no way to tell if he has hearts, so I don't see any way that you can't count all the outs I stated as full outs.

I said I wasn't going to directly comment, but it seems I did anyhow.

trainslayer
02-21-2005, 07:45 PM
[ QUOTE ]
I haven't read SSHE, so I can't directly comment on the "half outs" idea. Maybe I should be more clear--I said this player is aggressive, but he is also very solid. He's not a maniac. There is no way I could possibly see him making it 20xBB out of position with a hand containing any 4 or 5. There's no way to tell if he has hearts, so I don't see any way that you can't count all the outs I stated as full outs.

I said I wasn't going to directly comment, but it seems I did anyhow.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think you should. But you might want to start w/Theory of Poker first. I'm having a hard time grasping SSHE so I got TOP and am reading it now. Hopefully it'll make SSHE a little easier. (I bought SSHE first cause it was less expensive. Seems it should've been more expensive cause it seems to go "deeper.")

And if we can keep this up we'll both no longer be strangers. /images/graemlins/wink.gif

onthebutton
02-21-2005, 07:54 PM
I'm working through ToP right now, as it seems to be the basis for all the other Sklansky books. I'm mainly trying to detemine with this thread if my interpretation of ToP was correct on this hand.

onthebutton
02-22-2005, 01:06 PM
I hope it isn't bad form to bump my own thread. I'd really like some analysis and advice here from those who are more experienced.

Phil Van Sexton
02-22-2005, 01:38 PM
[ QUOTE ]
He thinks, bets 100. I think "Pot is 530, I'm getting 5.3 to 1 on my money here. 9 cards make the nuts for me out of 47 left, which is about 5 to 1 (actually 5.2). Implied pot odds are even higher."

[/ QUOTE ]

Some confusion here. Flush draws are so common that you should have these odds memorized. You also expressed them wrong. See this page (http://www.texasholdem-poker.com/odds.php) and the links to the charts at the bottom.

A quick explanation: the odds of making a flush on the turn is 4.22 to 1, not 5.22-to-1. It's standard to substract 1 in order express as odds. In English, 4.22-1 means: "you will miss 4.22 times for every 1 time you make the flush".

So, you are getting 5.3-to-1 on your call, and the odds are 4.22-to-1. Easy call (or raise).

[ QUOTE ]
(One thing here, do I multiply my odds by 2 here, since I have two chances to hit the nuts?)

[/ QUOTE ]

No. Unless one of you are allin, you will likely face a bet again on the turn. Calling for 100 only lets you see 1 more card, so you shouldn't consider the river yet.

If you were allin, you could count the odds for turn and river. However, you don't just multiple by 2. If the turn is a non-heart, the river is 9/46, not 9/47. Also, have to subtract the case where you get a heart on turn AND river (standard statistics here).

Anyway, according to the chart, it's 1.86:1 or 35% that you will get a heart on the turn and/or river. If you just "multiplied by 2", it would've been 38%. Multiplying by 2 is a decent approximation and usually good enough, but be aware it is not correct.

Phil Van Sexton
02-22-2005, 01:42 PM
I almost forgot the hand in question.

You have only 400 left on the flop. He bets 100. You must move allin here. Anything else is very wrong.

RobGW
02-22-2005, 02:17 PM
You have the right idea but imo you are taking it too far. Who would raise in EP with 24s or Q4s or even A5? I would count my flush and st8 outs as full outs here. Now the overcard outs may be suspect if he has AQ or KQ which are more likely given the EP raise. I might discount those outs to 4.
To the original poster, you don't have enough $$ to call all your chips down. Push all in on the flop. You have a good chance of winning this pot and he might even fold. His flop bet was weak. On the river though, you only have $200 left, might as well push it in there. What hand are you afraid of? What could he check raise with? I just don't see anything to be afraid of. His bets were weak on the flop and turn. He checked on the river meaning he was either bluffing the whole time, is afraid of the K, or he is inducing a bluff from you. I think the majority of times you are ahead here.

nokona13
02-22-2005, 02:46 PM
I know this has been posted here before, but FWIW, and for the convenience of the OP:

As Phil says, the odds of making a flush from a 4 card flush draw on the turn is 4.22:1 (9 out of 47). Since, as Phil also said, you only have 400 left here post-flop and thus need to either push or fold with a pot of 520 and a 100 bet, to get the exact odds of making a flush once you're all in post-flop, you multiply the probability of not making it on each card (you mulitiply the probability of two independent things happening to get the prob of them both happening). Your chance of not getting it on the turn is 1 - (9/47). Your chance of not making it on the river is 1 - (9/46). You can calculate it exactly, but it comes out to about .63, which is equivalent to about 1.7:1 against. That's probably one you should just memorize, along with ~2.125:1 against making an OESD with a push post-flop. So you're getting odds just on your flush (400 into 820 pot if he calls). Obviously that's not exact since he could pair the board if he's got a set already, but the chances that he has JJ or AK (or KK) or AQ if he's really that aggressive, making one or both of your overcards live, seems greater than the odds of him already having QQ and pairing the board despite your making the flush.

Since you seemed to be having a little trouble with odds vs. probability, this is how I calculate it. Get the decimal probability of something (say 9/47 for making the flush on the turn =~ .1915). Let that equal X. Then Y = 1 - X is the probability of X not happening. The odds are then (1 / X) * Y : 1 against X happening. Here X = .1915 and Y = .8085. 1 / .1915 = 5.22. 5.22 * .8085 = 4.22. Your odds are 4.22:1 against making the flush on the turn card.

Hope this wasn't too long and useles....

onthebutton
02-22-2005, 03:25 PM
[ QUOTE ]

If you were allin, you could count the odds for turn and river. However, you don't just multiple by 2. If the turn is a non-heart, the river is 9/46, not 9/47. Also, have to subtract the case where you get a heart on turn AND river (standard statistics here).

Anyway, according to the chart, it's 1.86:1 or 35% that you will get a heart on the turn and/or river. If you just "multiplied by 2", it would've been 38%. Multiplying by 2 is a decent approximation and usually good enough, but be aware it is not correct.

[/ QUOTE ]

So, all in after the flop gives me a 38.7% ((9/47)+(9/46)) chance of making my flush if I push all in? I understand the power of making the all-in move....but I'm having trouble on justifying that move in relations to pot odds. Can you explain more of the thinking of the decision to push all-in vs. just calling?

nokona13
02-22-2005, 03:35 PM
Remember if he calls there will be 820 in the pot for the 400 you had to push in, giving you 2.1:1 pot odds.

onthebutton
02-22-2005, 04:25 PM
To those who were interested, I realized I never told the outcome of the hand. He showed KK, to take down a huge pot early. Damn Devil.

Phil Van Sexton
02-22-2005, 04:50 PM
[ QUOTE ]
So, all in after the flop gives me a 38.7% ((9/47)+(9/46)) chance of making my flush if I push all in?

[/ QUOTE ]

It's 35%. I believe the full formula is
((9/47)+(9/46)) - ((9/47)*(8/46))

ie. Subtract the case where they are both hearts, otherwise you double count that case.

[ QUOTE ]
I understand the power of making the all-in move....but I'm having trouble on justifying that move in relations to pot odds. Can you explain more of the thinking of the decision to push all-in vs. just calling?

[/ QUOTE ]

I see this mistake all the time in NL. People put themselves into positions where they have to call, then say "oh well, I had the odds so I had no choice but to call the river." That's true, but if they'd thought ahead, they would have pushed or folded earlier in the hand before they became a slave to the pot odds on a later street.

You have 400 left. To call on the flop, you have to put 25% of you stack in and leaves you 300. Your chances of hitting the flush on the turn are less than 20%. If you miss, you are screwed. He's going to bet the turn, and pot odds will dictate that you call again. Now you've called all your money off with only a 20% of hitting the river.

Basically, if you hit one of your outs, you win. If you don't, you are doomed.

Now, if you move allin, you now have 2 ways to win. In addition to your outs, there's a chance he will fold. This is referred to as "folding equity".

Let's say he'll fold 50% of the time, and when he calls, you can only win with a flush (to simplify my life).

50% of the time he'll fold and you win the 530 pot.

When he calls, you will win 35% of the time. You will win a 830 pot (530 + 300 more that you can raise his 100 bet).

If you lose, you lose your 400 chips.

So the equation looks like....
(.50 * 530) + (.50 * ((830 * .35) - (400 * .65))) = 280.25

The allin has an EV of +280 chips. Note that the fold equity produced +265 of the 280 EV (ie .50 * 530).

What if he folds only 10% of the time?

(0.1 * 530) + (0.9 * ((830 * 0.35) - (400 * 0.65))) = 80.45

It's still +EV.

Note, I talk about EV in terms of chips. You could go the extra step and use an ICM calculator to see the tournament prize money impact of this play. This is referred to as $EV.

If the EV was +3, this might be a bad play in terms of $EV since going broke is bad in a tournament. However, when it's +280 or +80 and you only have 400 left, it's not close and therefore I don't bother to compute the $EV.

curtains
02-22-2005, 05:03 PM
One thing thats for sure is that Im pushing on the flop. Id also move allin on the river, as the chance of having the best hand is just too high, and because your stack is so small, they will often call with weak hands.

onthebutton
02-22-2005, 05:04 PM
All very helpful, thanks a lot to all. Especially Phil.

trainslayer
02-22-2005, 07:52 PM
[ QUOTE ]
You have the right idea but imo you are taking it too far. Who would raise in EP with 24s or Q4s or even A5?

[/ QUOTE ]

I completely agree other than the OP doesn't say what position Devil is in and he also doesn't say what the buy in was. I play mainly $5.50 sng's on stars and you can see lots of that kind of crap there. But, my point was simply be sure to correctly count your outs (not that it made much difference in this case.)

Besides, as I pointed out, my opinion is far from expertise. I'm on the low end of the learning curve yet. I also thank everyone for their insight on this hand.