Instead of complaining. I'll ask your opinion.

[AQheartbreak]

I was playing 5-10 hold 'em. The game was loose, many players seeing the flop. I played 3 hands before picking up and leaving.... My buy- in was 140, and i lost it all to three rounds of blinds, folds on the flop, and these hands. I know i bought in cheap, but did i do anything wrong beacuse i only played for a total of three rounds.


Hand #1.
I had folded all of my hands, before this, i get AA in middle position. I raise, only the blinds call. The flop is K5J, sb checks, bb bets, i raise, sb calls cold, bb re-raises, I re-raise, both call. The turn and river both blanks, with me betting, and them calling. I lose to K5 by the BB. sb mucked.

Was it right for me to four-bet because i thought the sb was on flush draw, even though I was pretty sure i was beat, I thought bb had KJ, but was tryin to isolate, and i took the lead. I probably should've checked the river..

Hand #2.
In the sb, i pick up J8 suited. there are about 6 players on the flop. It comes J46. I bet out, it gets raised, and we're heads up. THe turn is 6 (which gives me four flush). I bet out, and get called. The river is a 2, i bet and get called. I lose to JQ.
Was the bet on the turn correct, even though i was probably beat? I picked up the four-flush, since i was in the sb, i represented three 6's, i have top pair, and could've possibly won the pot right there. no?

Hand #3
I have KQ clubs in the Cutoff. There's a raise from middle position, I, the button and the blinds all call. The flop has 4-5 players, and comes king high, two hearts. the bb bets out, the preflop raiser calls, I call. The turn is a 5, the bb bets again, the preflop raiser raises, I fold. The river is a blank. The bb had KQs (hearts), and the preflop raiser had a set of 5's. Now even though i still would've lost, was the fold correct? Should I have called the raise preflop to begin with. I thought it was okay.

I know these all sound like bad luck, or whatever. But being educated, i know there's no thing as bad luck, only bad play, so was i wrong in these situations?

Wasn't my play tight-aggressive, like its supposed to be???
It seems as though my moves are good, but never turn out for me.
Dazed and Confused.

[Clarkmeister]

Hand #1 I would check the river

Hand #2 If you want to represent three 6's then checkraise.

Hand #3 I would fold preflop here. If I was playing, I would 3 bet and do so only if the raiser had very loose preflop raising standards.

[Dr.Kimble]

1) 4 bet wrong
2) bet Flop wrong
3) Preflop fold

[Homer]

First of all, just because you lost your buy-in, it doesn't automatically mean that you played badly. You can play badly sometimes and win big and play "perfectly" other times and lose a ton. To lose 14 BB's is nothing uncommon. Is it possible that you were playing at too high a limit? A 14 BB loss shouldn't shake you up too much.

As for your play:

Hand 1 - I think you played it fine.

Hand 2 - I would have checked, with the intention of folding, unless the button bet, in which case I would consider check-raising to clear the fold. I would fold even in this case, though, if I thought my raise could not clear the fold, or that the button would not bet without a better hand than mine.

Hand 3 - I think your preflop call is fine if you think there will be multiway action. I would even consider raising to isolate a loose-raising opponent. When I read that the BB bet out on the flop, the first thought I had was flush draw. As a rule of thumb, anytime an EP player bets into a large field on the flop when there was a preflop raiser (and he was not the raiser), I think flush draw. When the preflop raiser just calls, he either has KK and is slowplaying, or has a hand with which the K on the flop scared him (a smaller pocket pair, AQ, or AJ). I believe you should have raised the flop here, as you are almost certainly ahead. Given that you just called the flop, I think your fold on the turn was correct, although you left yourself in a difficult position. You would have provided yourself with much easier decisions the rest of the way had you raised the flop.

So, in summary, I think Hand 3 should have been played more aggressively, Hand 2 should have been played less aggressively, and Hand 1 was played well.

-- Homer

[Ed Miller]

I don't like the way you played any of these three hands.

In hand 1, when the BB 3-bets you (I'm going to assume that your opponent is a typical low limit opponent) then he can beat AK. Once you know that... then you have to figure out how to proceed with the hand.

If you put the SB on a flush draw, but the BB on two pair... then why would you 4-bet the flop and bet the turn and river unimproved? You aren't leading... and your draw isn't as good as the SB's... you are the one paying off the good draw and the person out in front.

In hand 2, I would have checked this flop with five opponents, but I don't think betting is too bad because your top pair is very vulnerable to overcards. Once you get raised, though, you have to strongly consider that you are up against top pair/better kicker. When the board pairs on the turn, giving you a flush draw... it's not at all a bad time to try a bluff (as long as your opponent is capable of laying down the hand that he had... if he isn't, you should just check-call)... because you now probably have 12 outs if behind. But I would semibluff checkraise here instead of betting out... most people who picked up trips on the turn would checkraise, not bet out... and you have enough outs to back it up. I don't understand why you bet the river here... you haven't improved and it looks like your hand is no good. Your opponent probably hasn't improved either, and may weakly give you a free showdown.

In hand 3, first to act after an open-raiser, you have a raise or fold. If your raiser friend is a loose raiser (which it looks like he might have been given his hand) then you should 3-bet. Against a standard raiser, you should probably just muck. Your hand is too often dominated. You correctly mucked on the turn.

[tewall]

Your comments on hand 3 are interesting. KQ suited is a pretty good hand and plays well multiway. If MP had the same raising standards you have, you think KQs would lose money if it called in this situation? Why would you prefer raising over calling?

[Homer]

Everywhere I wrote "clear the fold", it should say "clear the field".

-- Homer

[Louie Landale]

[1] Nobody is going to fold the flush draw, and rightfully so. Trying to raise him out is pretty hopeless. Save this sort of play when the player [1] doesn't have many outs, and [2] has more outs than he thinks. However, trying to raise out the gut draw and then take a free turn card (since you "knew" you were beat) seems pretty reasonable.

[2] Lets look at this from the opponent's perspective. The tight blind bets out and you raise with QJ, and he calls. The board pairs and he bets out!!?? Well, if he really HAD a 6 he'd probably check-raise, hehehe. Calling, then betting out really looks like a "reasonable but not good enough to 2-bet hand"; and in fact that what it is.

Even if you put doubt in his mind, he's still going to call, and rightfully so.

Check-raising would be a LOT more believable, and really only costs one bet since your hand is clearly worth a call.

[3] Trouble hands are routine folds when someone reasonable raises. However, your big suited hand gains some value multi-way, and so the pre-flop call seems OK unless the raiser is sure to have a big pair.

You are probably in some trouble had the pre-flop raiser bet, but you are clearly slow-playing when the BB bets. Any particular reason you didn't raise the flop? Anyway, on the turn you've got a pretty easy fold, especially since the pre-flop raiser appears to have slow-played.

[] Your problem right now is not your play; its your attitude. [A] Even in YOUR life-time of playing cards, you can probably be able to measure how much "good" or "bad" luck you had over-all. In the course of an evening, luck dominates ALL skill. Yes, you had bad luck that night; but that has nothing to do with the evaluation of your play. [B] Its a fact of poker that the "correct" play will sometimes lose in situations where the "incorrect" play would have worked: certainly you would have done better had you made the "incorrect" play of folding your AA. [C] You are doomed if you really think [C1] you are supposed to win every time you make a good play, or [C2] you are supposed to win everyday.

- Louie

[Bob T.]

There was an open raise in mid position, and then it was folded to you. At this point, you are the second player into the pot. If the raiser has tight raising standards, do you think that you are ahead or behind more hands. Do you really want to take your hand against AK or AQ headsup?

On the other hand, if he will open raise as an early steal from that position, your hand may well win unimproved, especially if he doesn't improve on the flop. You three bet, he calls, and then you bet the flop and he folds. In this case, you don't really want to invite more players into the hand, so a three bet is the best way to play the hand.

Good Luck,
Play Well,

Bob T.

[AQheartbreak]

Just want to say thanks to those who responded... well not everyone. Those who gave explainations, i thank. THe others, who agree/disagree with me, w/o explainations, you have simply wasted my time. I had to say that, because i see too many of those types of posts, and they simply do not help me, or anyone reading.

[MD_]

"i know there's no thing as bad luck, only bad play"

Totally wrong, there's tons of luck - both good and bad - in poker. A good player just tries to minimize the amount he loses when he gets bad luck and maximize winnings with good luck.

-MD

[tewall]

Certainly it would depend on what hands the person is likely to open-raise with, but I would think most players would open-raise MP with something like any pairs from AA to JJ, AJ suited or better, AQ off or better, KQ suited or better and perhaps a couple more as a change of pace. Even without a couple more as a change of pace, KQ will be a slight favorite if a King or Queen flops against the above assortment of hands, plus there are a lot of draws that can be flopped. I think most players are likely to have looser standards for open-raising rather than tighter than what I listed, so KQ suited would be even more playable. So I think against most players you would want to play KQ suited. So the advice would be, play KQ suited unless the open raiser is tight, rather than don't play it unless the open raiser is loose.

The second part of the question is whether it would be better to re-raise or call. I don't know the answer to this. I can see arguments both ways.

[Kurn, son of Mogh]

The way I look at it, if I haven't put a dime in the pot and there's an open-raise in front of me, it's a raise-fold decision 99% of the time (and that's only because I never say never). Adopting this strategy was the first demonstrable improvement I made in my game.

[tewall]

If you're playing in a game where it's very likely that if you call from 4 to 6 players will see the flop, and you have a hand that will play well in that situation, it seems to me that calling is a valid option. It's hard for me to believe that this hand, in a typical low limit game, in the situation outlined, against a typical MP raiser, would lose money by calling. The question would be if it could make more money by raising. I think it might want to come in more cheaply and see the flop multiway.

[Kurn, son of Mogh]

I'd call if there was no raise in front of me. Now that I've been shown strength, I'd rather buy the button, take control, and get a better read on the raiser's hand. On the flip side, if I'm convinced he'd only raise with a big pair or AK, AQ, I'm happy to fold here.

[tewall]

I did some looking around on the RGP archives, and it appears I'm not the only one who is unsure what is the best action. There seemed to be equal numbers weighing in on calling vs. raising, including differing opinions among authors.

[Kurn, son of Mogh]

No doubt. It's differences of opinion that make horse races.