Party $25 NL Holdem hand help

[Eihli]

I'm ($24.50) UTG+1 and get AhJc. UTG calls, I raise to 2.50, EMP calls, MP($43.50) calls, LP calls.
Flop: 7d 9s Jd
I bet 6, MP calls.
Turn: 5d
I bet 4, MP raises to 8, I call
River: 6s
I check, MP bets 8, I call all-in




Second hand I'm($85) in EP and get dealt AdQc, I open for 2 and get 2 callers, MP and BB($38)
Flop: Ac 3d 9s
BB checks, I bet 3, BB raises to 9, I call
Turn: Js
BB bets 15, I go all-in

[AeonBlues]

I think you over played your hands. I recomend that you read a book about big bet poker, because if you don't understand why you over played your hands, then you must be missing many more basic concepts in your game. I don't meen to sound condesending, but knowing not to raise with AJs in EP is like catching a ball with 2 hands. It is a fundamental part of the game. Now if you are playing against advanced players, and your trying to disguise your raise values, then sure.....

AeonBlues

[1800GAMBLER]

[ QUOTE ]
but knowing not to raise with AJs in EP is like catching a ball with 2 hands.
AeonBlues


[/ QUOTE ]

If i was in EP after 1 limper i'd raise AJs as high as 60% of the time, with intentions of only the limper calling.

[Eihli]

What book do you suggest?

[1800GAMBLER]

I don't think you over played it. You just held on too long and missed aggression on the flop. You should overbet this flop unless you are in a tricky game with a deep stack and would fold to a raise. Check out the post asking for Ray Zee

You need to charge more on the flop, you also need to be done with your hand at least by the river. Soon as you get played back on with TPTK you need to start thinking fold.

Hand 2 i don't understand why you played it like this. Was the flop call a smooth call? Or was the turn a bluff?

Myself i would have reraised the flop if he comes back again i'm done and he has A9 or a fast played set (unlikely). Your turn play is awful, that jack is an awful card for you, assuming he has the ace as well giving him some standards there is now only AT you can beat.

[1800GAMBLER]

Super System for the beginner, it covers everything. Ciaffone for the level after that.

[AeonBlues]

Yah, but you play with the patients of of a wound up 4 year old, on captain crunch. There's a concept in NL, that you can wait for a even better bet, then you increase your over all EV.

AeonBlues

[AeonBlues]

My faveorate NL book is 'Championship No-Limit & Pot Limit Hold'em' by T.J.Cloutier. He specializes in the "Not going broke all the time" school of poker, which is nice on us players that work off of a tight bankroll.

I own Reuben & Ciaffone's book "Pot-Limit and No-Limit Poker", and it's good too.

Just to point out both authers agree that AQ is a bad hand to play from early position. Cloutier says he chucks AQ under the gun, even when it's suited, like that does any good. But like I said, he's in the not going broke school of poker.

AeonBlues

AeonBlues

[1800GAMBLER]

How does waiting for a better place to bet increase your overall EV!? It doesn't.

These other hands are EV and can be played to gain a bigger EV. Meanwhile the advertising of being aggressive with these hands will get you even more EV on the hands you sit and wait for. While anyone with any sense in your game will throw most hands when you finally finish waiting.

[1800GAMBLER]

I agree that in his games he should throw AQ in early position. Due to position matters a lot more in his games, he'll have players who can take shots at him with draws and lesser hands on the flop and he is capable of folding AQ top pair.

He also wont want to get deep with this hand a lot; even though preflop he knows he has the best hand 75% of the time; EP he doesn't have much say in that.

I'm wondering why he doesn't include AK.

However, up to 10/20 NL i'm yet to find this game.

[Guy McSucker]

However, up to 10/20 NL i'm yet to find this game

This is really quite amazing. I have played in plenty of games where people will make my life hard when I am out of position and I have to fold AQ with an A on board on the turn because I don't want to put all my money in on the river with one pair. There are (or used to be) quite a few online games of that nature, and I have never played stakes bigger than $2-4.

I don't consider these particularly tough games, just poker games. When the stacks are >100 BB you need to be able to make these laydowns I think.

Jay, maybe you get away with this a bit more because you are so aggressive: if your opponents believe you're likely to shove it all in at any time, perhaps they are less likely to make plays at you. Or perhaps there's just a higher %age of clueless muppets playing online these days, who pay off with weaker hands enough to make up for the times you're caught with a weak hand yourself, and then some... and so perhaps I need to change my strategy somewhat.

Still, in my live games, if you raise AJ regularly in EP and get excited when an ace falls, you are going broke very quickly.

Guy.

[1800GAMBLER]

[ QUOTE ]


Still, in my live games, if you raise AJ regularly in EP and get excited when an ace falls, you are going broke very quickly.

Guy.


[/ QUOTE ]

I don't understand that. Why would you be going broke? Due to overplaying the hand? Then if so, any game would be the same.

[ QUOTE ]


maybe you get away with this a bit more because you are so aggressive: if your opponents believe you're likely to shove it all in at any time, perhaps they are less likely to make plays at you



[/ QUOTE ]

Super System has this logic and i don't really like it, before the next happned. I started losing a few hands were after i ran over the table people came back and me and i believed they were merely playing back, everytime they weren't. Most people don't, they just wait, i stopped believing they were playing back at me and just give them credit.

I'd say as little as 10% of players could playback at a player being aggressive.

[Guy McSucker]

Why would you be going broke? Due to overplaying the hand?

That's exactly what I am saying. Raising AJ in early position is overplaying.

Let's consider a simple example. You make your raise and get one caller behind. Flop comes A-9-4, rainbow. You bet the pot and get called. You have one pot-bet left. Turn is a 7.

What do you do?

Guy.

[fireman664]

AQ is the original Brunson.....because he NEVER plays it, suited or not. Found that interesting, and it makes sense to me more and more as my big bet poker understanding grows.

[1800GAMBLER]

Hands that will be seeing the turn: AK AQ AJ AT A9 A8 99. Removed KK QQ JJ because it's doubtful they'll limp after limpers and then see the turn too.

AK should be discredited by 90% and AQ 60% due to frequency they'd raise.

Hands that are still here on that board:

AK AQ A9 99
AJ
AT A8

(0.1*6 + 0.4*6 + 6 + 3):(8 + 8)

12:16

3:4. discount the percentage of tight players that don't play A8 and now we are close, to breakeven on this bet.

The problem with this hand comes when the board has a lot of undercards to the jack and people don't realise it's realistic you are only leading against one hand now, so they can't get away from the hand and a lot more money goes in when they have the worst of it compared to the money they put in with the best of it, on the turn that is.

However preflop the ratio of calling hands you lead against to hands that dominate you and don't raise is a lot bigger, but this hand does have NL problems of money ratios. Again though on the flop there are a lot of calling hands that you are beating compared to not. Notice we analysed a drawless board. With a lot of draws on the board by the turn i would - correctly - bet.

So even having NL troubles the pot bet on the flop doesn't have trouble, the time this hand does have trouble is the rare case of these conditions:

1. Hugely passive game.
2. Lots of tight players.
3. Cards like T 9 on the board by the turn.

I think it's also very rare that after a preflop raise and flop bet we see the turn.

I can't see any way that the check preflop would help us on the turn in this situation, players once limped don't usually have big changes in standards that they will call a raise with; and that's the only way the preflop check could help us.

I'd check this turn and if he has the balls with AT to throw me off my hand so be it. This play would have already paid for itself in the times the players make mistakes preflop/flop.

After no raise preflop to us i don't see why his hand can't be seen has AK apart from the advantage of dominating KQ as compared to KJ - AQ vs JQ.

[Eihli]

The first hand I lose to AQd
Second hand I lose to A3o

[Guy McSucker]

Good analysis as usual, and it does bring out the key difference between the games I learned to play in and what's going on in these online games nowadays; that difference being what weaker aces will call your raise.

If you are regularly getting called by AT-A8, presumably these guys are also going to put money in on an ace-high flop too, so a raise with AJ is a money making prospect, just on card value.

See, where I learned to play, almost nobody would play AT offsuit for a raise, and A8 might not even call the blind. These aren't what I would call tough or tight plays, just standard ones. In that situation, raising with AJ is pretty suicidal on card value: you knock out the hand most likely to pay you off when you make your most common hit of one pair. (I am not including the other advantages of raising for deception, to set up the flop steal etc., since they apply to any hand.) In an unraised pot with an ace-high flop, AT might put in some $$$, but in a raised pot, AT is gone. This is where my qualms over raising AJ come from.

I am getting the impression that there is a huge difference between profitable play in the current online climate and the best strategy in other games, such as live games or even the online games of a few years ago.
Jay seems to be the man to reveal this to me, since he's learnt to play over the last 12 months in online games.

Endlessly fascinated by this game,

Guy.

[1800GAMBLER]

For the games to not be calling raising with lesser hands these raises would be going uncalled,

1 - [ [1 - (6 + 6 + 6 + 6 + 12 + 12)/ 50C2] ^ 9 ] = 0.28.

Roughly 1 in 3 times of everytime you raise. That's an awful game. In my games it's unusual to not see 2 coldcallers.

In your games if you raised (4BBs) from the BB after these limpers would you honestly be taking this pot down 2 out of 3 times?

Now that model assume i raised UTG. This hand knows the players haven't raised. Which would make our only worry JJ AQ.

If i were in the game which i would only be called by hands better than me when i'm on the BB and they haven't raised i'd raise this 100% the time and be done with it on the flop.

[Guy McSucker]

In your games if you raised (4BBs) from the BB after these limpers would you honestly be taking this pot down 2 out of 3 times?

No, but the people who call me are not holding dominated hands, because that's no way to play poker. They have pairs, or hands I can't read, like 5-3 suited (you know who you are) etc, the net result being that I don't know where I am after the flop and I hate having to act first.

Guy.