44 on the floor.

[MAxx]

Table is loose, donkishly so. I'd say avg aggression. Nutthin special on the reads:


Party Poker 5/10 Hold'em (6 max, 6 handed) converter (http://www.selachian.com/tools/bisonconverter/hhconverter.cgi)

Preflop: Hero is CO with 4/images/graemlins/club.gif, 4/images/graemlins/diamond.gif.
<font color="#CC3333">UTG raises</font>, MP calls, Hero calls, <font color="#666666">1 fold</font>, SB calls, BB calls.

<font color="blue"> ColdCalling... its an ugly affair.... </font>

Flop: (10 SB) T/images/graemlins/diamond.gif, A/images/graemlins/heart.gif, T/images/graemlins/spade.gif <font color="#0000FF">(5 players)</font>
SB checks, BB checks, UTG checks, MP checks, Hero checks.

<font color="blue"> Well that is not the prettiest flop Ive gotten tonite... thanks for nuthin on the freebie fellas...</font>

<font color="blue">wait, and den... </font>
Turn: (5 BB) 4/images/graemlins/heart.gif <font color="#0000FF">(5 players)</font>
SB checks, BB checks, UTG checks, <font color="#CC3333">MP bets</font>, <font color="#CC3333">Hero ....?.....

Decisions..... what do you do here and why?

[Alobar]

fold preflop

on the turn, I just call, its obvious no one has a ten (or at least they horribly misplayed it), so dont raise and shut out 3 people who may hopefully potentially call with a weak ace, or a draw or something, maybe ull get lucky and one of them will check raise

[MAxx]

[ QUOTE ]
fold preflop


[/ QUOTE ]

First I will ask you if you make this call from the button if UTG raises, MP Coldcalls, CO Coldcalls, and den you expect at least one of the blinds to play along?

If no, I am not sure why. If yes, well I agree with that.
If you said yes, do you feel like it is substancially different than my action from CO if my table read was that I expected roughly the same amount of people seeing the flop?

Anyway that is my rationale for my occasional pp coldcall from the CO. What do peeps think of that? Good, bad, or ugly?

I will circle back to the turn decision at a later time, perhaps after some more responses. Thanks for your thoughts.

[balkii]

so dont raise and shut out 3 people who may hopefully potentially call with a weak ace, or a draw or something

is anyone really folding top pair or a draw here? i really doubt it.

[danng721]

[ QUOTE ]
is anyone really folding top pair or a draw here? i really doubt it.

[/ QUOTE ]

No, but you are so ahead and the pot is so small that raising here is a mistake. It can be possible that over 4BB are lost here because of a raise.

[MAxx]

well, my handreading here realtime wasnt exactly up to snuff... as I did not rule out a T. I was thinking it could still be possible that one of these jokers was slowplaying a T, and in that case I would like to get his action/ charge him for a river fillup. Turn checks after flop checked through, makes it pretty unlikely anyone is holding a T.

I also saw some draws. And the turned 4 doesnt look that threatening. I figured the draws would likely pay 2 here and evenmore if they hit on river. If they don't hit on river, then I would be glad they paid on turn.

i thought a donkey Ace would likely continue as well.

anywho- i raised turn... which is my default when i am not real sure what to do in these situations

[MAxx]

also, nobody else like/dislike pf coldcall?

[Grisgra]

I vote raise the turn. SB, BB, UTG clearly hate their hands if they checked the flop AND the turn. I expect them to fold either way, so it's time to get as much money as I can as soon as I can. If MP picked up a heart draw, make him pay now -- if he misses on the river you can't rely on him to do anything except check/fold.

[Bill Smith]

I'm not a fan of the preflop call.

Close call on the turn. You'd hate to miss some loose calls from KQ/KJ/QJ (especially if they hit on the river) and weak aces, but you get 1-2 bets from a heart draw. I vote call, but it's definitely close.

[Grisgra]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm not a fan of the preflop call.

Close call on the turn. You'd hate to miss some loose calls from KQ/KJ/QJ (especially if they hit on the river) and weak aces, but you get 1-2 bets from a heart draw. I vote call, but it's definitely close.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think that after the flop check-through, there's a reasonable chance that an inside-straight-draw bets out on the flop, i.e., if UTG had KJ I think he bets it here. And hell, he might call two back to him anyway -- many of these guys have little to no concept of pot-odds.

I've slowplayed hands like this in the past and my recollection is that they usually go check/fold on the river, or check/call. I think you probably get an extra bet here by raising.

[MAxx]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm not a fan of the preflop call.

[/ QUOTE ]

See, I here you and I hear others thinking the same thing. But I dont really hear any reasoning behind it.

If you get the table read that I give, IMO I am showing you another profitable coldcalling situation. I don't recall this situation discussed before, but I would be surprised if it hadn't before. I would be equally pleased if someone could convincingly show me it was wrong.

[danng721]

The preflop call is fine. Great position, excellent implied odds, and you WANT to play more hands against shitty players. Especially hands that can win you big pots.

I'm interested in the result - I think a call here is way more profitable than a raise.

[Derek in NYC]

[ QUOTE ]
also, nobody else like/dislike pf coldcall?

[/ QUOTE ]

I also dislike it. You have position, but you're most likely going to take this flop 3-4 handed. A small pair will be a huge dog after the flop, or a tiny favorite that has to dodge a million cards to survive. The only play with 44 against a raise is to reraise or fold, I think. Reraise works if (a) you can get heads up against the raiser, and (b) you can take a shot on the flop by betting/raising a scare card. Still, I think reraising is a pretty high vol play, and I'd much rather fold it. The only hand worth coldcalling is one that can hit a flop w/out taking negative implied odds, and a small pair cant do it. I'd much rather coldcall with a hand like QJ.

[Derek in NYC]

You dont have the implied odds to hit a set.

[MAxx]

What I am trying to say, and is at the heart of my reasoning, is that under these table conditions, is that I have estimated that I have implied odds to hit a set on the flop. I was very confident that there would be 5 taking the flop, and thus having the implied odds to hit the set. If there was a flop bet here, I fold.

I was very close to being as confident of this as I typically would be by makeing the cold call from the button and expecting at least one of the blinds to come along.

Now you could argue that my reasoning is flawed in some way, and if so I would like would welcome the opinion. I am basically asking if other people here think there is meritt to my decision as I plan on to continue to do this if I feel the conditions are right.

Change of topic-Results:

Hero raises turn and 3 folds follow. MP calls my raise. Hero is checked to on river, hero bets, MP calls.

MP shows down A3s.

It's possible that I got an extra bet from MP by not flat calling his turn lead. I may or may not have missed several bets from the others, don't know.

Edit: PS- I wouldnt dream of calling QJ here.

[juggernaut]

Hey MAxx. I’m glad I stumbled across this post....

I just finished playing my first 40K hands of short-handed poker. Over the past couple days I’ve been analyzing a few things using pokertracker. I was playing Party 1/2 – I’m sure you play at higher limits, but I think you’ll find that some of my discoveries relate to your topic.

Based on your post, I’ve been approaching baby pairs the same way you have: I play them for set value. I’ve been cold-calling with them from any position without a second thought. If I miss on the flop, I fold (barring unique circumstances).

Below are my results for baby pairs from these 40K hands of Party 1/2. I know it’s not an ideal sample size, but I think it’s adequate to give a general idea of a hand’s “success”. These numbers have been filtered so pokertracker only shows me hands where I voluntarily put money in pot:


Hand Times Win% Net BB/hand

55 145 25.52 (-144.50) (-.50)
44 138 24.64 (-11.75) (-.04)
33 160 19.38 (-93.62) (-.29)
22 148 19.59 36.00 .12

I was shocked when I saw these numbers, so I watched the hands in the pokertracker replayer and discovered a few things:

1) I underestimated how often my sets lose. I think I saw a post the other day that suggested sets lose approximately 25% of the time. Not sure about that, but looking at my results, I believe it. And when sets lose, it’s expensive.

2) I filtered to see how often I was cold-calling with a pair: not as much as I thought. Maybe ten times each in the above sample. But there was a disparity between that number and what I was seeing in pokertracker. I don’t know if there’s a way to filter this, but I was surprised to see how often my limp was raised behind, and this is at 1/2. At higher limits, I’m sure it’s even more frequent. Those raises that you have to call add up.

3) My assumption (given this extremely loose Party 1/2 game) that I will always have implied odds to hit a set is questionable. Sure, I’ll occasionally drag a monster, but looking at my results, I’m surprised how often my set wins 5-6 BB pots. Combine this with the occasional 2-3 BB pot and I wouldn’t be surprised if my average is below 5 BBs.

(Side note: I got curious and added up the net gain from every time I hit a set of fours: I’m not going to list the numbers because the sample size is minuscule -- I hit a set of fours 18 times for a net gain of $113.75 -- but you should take a look at your net gain from hitting sets and see what it averages out to....I think you’ll be surprised. Even writing this has made me rethink my approach to implied odds. I was using the logic “If I coldcall this raise I’ll need to drag a ~9BB pot when it does hit. No problem.” without taking into consideration how much of that 9BB came from me. Wait a minute, do my future bets count? Implied odds....getting....confused)

Anyway, the point of all this is....my baby pairs are losing bigtime. And I’ll be making a few adjustments before moving on. It sounds like you’ve been playing them in a similar manner, so I would take a look at your stats in pokertracker. If you have a decent sample size, click on a hand and look at the bottom window where it lists each time you were dealt the hand - it seems to be a good place to start figuring out if and when you’re spewing chips.

Good luck man....

[MAxx]

Good post, sparked some interest in looking at my own stats. I will say that I think I am much more selective about my coldcalls then it sounds like you are but anyway... if you are curious:

Out of 81,623 hands of 5/10short, I have coldcolded preflop 77 times... that’s it. 54 of those cold calls were from the Button. 21 were from Cutt-Off. 2 were from MP.

Here is the breakdown (all 4 to 6 handed):

AA once 2.5BB/Hand
Aqs twice 7.15BB/Hand
Aqo twice 3.5 BB/Hand
Ajs 8 times 2.44BB/Hand
A5s once -1BB/Hand
A3s once -1.5BB/Hand
KK once 1.6.BB/Hand
Kqs 9 times -.13BB/Hand
Kjs 5 times -2.6BB/Hand
Qjs once 6BB/Hand
Qts once -4BB/Hand
Jts twice 3.65BB/Hand
TT 4 times -1.25/Hand
T9s once -1BB/Hand
99 4 times .75BB/Hand
88 5 times -1.3BB/Hand
77 twice -1.5BB/Hand
66 twice .3BB/Hand
55 eleven times -.27BB/Hand
44 six times 2.18BB/Hand
33 5 times 1.66BB/Hand

Total= +.58BB/ Hand

Please note that on many of said hands, I would have openraised , 3bet a good bit, or folded a good bit of the time....depending on the hand or situation.


Pocket Pair results from all positions:
Rank/BBperHand
A/2.31
K/2.07
Q/1.42
J/.9
T/.8
N/.75
E/.43
Se/.58
Si/.39
Fi/.19
Fo/-.1
Th/-.07
Tw/-.03

Also, I don’t know if it matters much...but I am noting that approx 1/3 of the time these hands were played from the Blinds... as is the nature of 6handed play.

[juggernaut]

Interesting. Concerning your results for pocket pairs...it looks to be a slow trickle down to zero. I've been working under the assumption that all pocket pairs should be profitable, but maybe that's a little overzealous. Do you have a number you're working towards, or any evidence that babies are profitable short-handed?

Coming from full ring games, I was assuming so....but given the aggressive nature of short-handed, I would defer to someone with more experience than me....