a bunch of 20-40 errors

[mike l.]

i made $3100 last night playing 20-40 but i left at least $600 behind. thought id share.

1. i have Ac8c on the button. we're 5 handed. bad player utg openraises, he's not too sharp, he's loose and chases/calls like crazy postflop. i 3 bet on the button. bb fish calls, utg calls. the flop is KK7 two spades. checked to me and i bet, bb calls, utg calls. turn is an 8. checked to me and i bet, bb folds, utg checkraises, i call. 4s on river, i call his river bet, he has KhQh. $200 in the toilet.

2. i have 76s in the bb. c/o decent but on tilt openraises, button very good but somewhat tilted as well 3 bets, folded to me and i call in the bb. 3 way pot. flop completely missed K high and i check-fold. should i have saved $40? probably yes.

3. 43d in the sb. one limper fish, i complete, bb checks. 3 way pot. flop is KhKdQd. i bet and limper calls. turn is 8s. i bet and am called. river is Jc. i bet, he raises, i fold. how bad was this hand?

4. 8h6h in the cutoff. limper fish, good player raises, fish cold calls, another fish (me) cold calls, button calls, bb and limper call. 6 way action. flop QhJh2d. checked to raiser who bets, fish calls, i call, someone else calls. the turn is blank spade. raiser bets, fish calls, i call. the river blanks. raiser bets, fold, fold. raiser shows AsAc. fish caller shows Ah5h. so i was drawing dead. i love drawing dead. $100 donation to a good player. smart poker.

5. here's a real zinger. i have AJs in mp. i openraise. button cold calls, sb and bb call. bb normally plays decent but is stuck on tilt and playing loose. flop is J42 rainbow. checked to me and i bet, button and sb fold, bb checkraises, i 3 bet, he 4 bets, i call. the turn is K. he bets, i call. the river is J. he bets, warning signals are sceaming at me to flat call, but i figure screw it and raise, he reraises immediately and i pay off like a stupid monkey slot machine and he shows J2o. so $280 on that one. golly im good.

anyone else still make mistakes like this as regularly as i do? what the hell is wrong with me? im tired of sucking at hold em, i could be making so much more if i didnt bleed chips like this.

[Diplomat]

[ QUOTE ]
i made $3100 last night playing 20-40 but i left at least $600 behind. thought id share.


[/ QUOTE ]

I stopped reading here for a second. What is it that you are complaining about? /images/graemlins/laugh.gif

I might fold hand 1 pre-flop but I think you played it fine otherwise. Generally, I don't like suited aces with a medium/small kicker against an aggressor, even short handed. But if you are going to play it, I like the raise.

I'm going to group hands 2 and 4 together. Bad. Enough said.

Hand 3 I'd fold as well. I kinda like the call because 1. you play well 2. they do not 3. you might be able to bluff them off a hand 4. they might pay you off if you hit your hand. That said, 34s does not play well against many other hands, besides 23 and 24. So I'd probably save the small bet and fold. Given that you called, I'd probably give up when the limper called the flop.

Hand 5 kinda sucks but you cannot do much. If he plays well most of the time, even though he's on tilt, at best you've got a crying call on the river. He did you a favour on the flop and turn by pumping his hand. He more or less said AJ or any overpair is no good. Just call the river.

-Diplomat

[mikelow]

Hand one--fold the turn.
Hand two--yes you should fold preflop.
Hand three--check the turn and forget about bluffing on the river.
Hand four--I thought you would never call cold preflop with 86s.
Hand five--the storm warnings were out. Just call on the river.

Other than that, you're the best!

[Billy LTL]

Hi Mike.

1. Ac8c. I check behind on the turn, even though the turn card hit my hand. Well, kind of hit my hand. Weak play? Maybe, but I always seem to get checkraised at some point when I take control of hands like this. You bet out on the flop and got two callers. Damage control time.

2. 76s in the bb for two bets? I fold. I'm not good enough in the blinds to make money here. What I hate about such hands is that when I do call two cold preflop and then fold on the flop I imagine a sign appears above my head reading "Hunting season on Billy's blinds opens today. Take your shot."

3. 43s in the small blind? I reckon you're a lot more comfortable playing it when the flop partially hits so I don't know if calling is a mistake for you but it would be for me.

4. 8h6h. I fold preflop here. I don't like it when good player's open raise and I hold suited trash. Unless I feel my cards are good enough warrant a raise.

5. AJ? Yes, you probably should have seen it coming and just called one river bet. Your opponent was certainly trying to tell you what he had. Worth noting that this is a great "armchair quarterback" hand ie I'll bet a lot of people here say something similar to what I'm saying but a lot of those same people, including me, would probably have played it like you did.

Billy

[andyfox]

"i made $3100 last night playing 20-40 v. . ."

Holy crumb, man, don't you ever lose?

Hey, serously, that's a helluva nice score in a 20-40.

"but i left at least $600 behind. thought id share."

You've already shared the best part. If we really want to be better players, the $3100 win should be irrelevant except if it should have been $3700 or $2500.

"anyone else still make like mistakes like this as regularly as i do?"

Yes, we all do, all the time. But hopefully we also do many more things right than we do wrong. And hopefully we're doing more things right as we continue to play better, and do less things wrong. The important question is how much you feel you would have left behind 6 months ago. If it was more than $600, then you're making progress.

My thoughts on the specific hands:

1) Not unreasonable. Shorthanded and all with the spade draw on board. I'd probably have checked the turn and called the river, but that's risky with only a pair of 8s.

2) Seven high should be folded to two raises, don't you think? Probably yes.

3) Look at the first card only, when it's a 4 or a 3, fold without looking at the second card. I used to only do this with deuces, I've now raised my standards up to 4s. I expect to be up to 6s by 2005.

4) Feh.

5) Yeah, he pretty much told you he could beat A-J on the flop.

I'm much more interested in the good plays you made because I'm sure there are many more of them, and we who play a different game than you, can benefit.

[Billy LTL]

[ QUOTE ]
Look at the first card only, when it's a 4 or a 3, fold without looking at the second card. I used to only do this with deuces, I've now raised my standards up to 4s. I expect to be up to 6s by 2005.


[/ QUOTE ]

In Killer Poker Vorhaus says something interesting about this "look at one card and fold" strategy. I'm typing it out directly from the book. Apologies to John or 2+2 if I'm breaking the rules. I'm not sure about copyright policies.

""Sometimes you'll see an opponent look at his first card and then muck his hand (or mentally muck, a decision betrayed by body language) without even looking at his second card. Here you can be sure this is a player who understands the danger of little poison. He knows that if his first card is small, then he's not going to play the hand even if the second card is a suited ace or a pair card. Well! This is valuable information no doubt. It tells you that if this player is in a hand, he's in there with the top half of the deck. That's a hell of an edge for you.""

For what it's worth Andy.

[andyfox]

I'd rather have them know I'm in there with the top half of the deck than play out of position with the bottom half of the deck.

However . . .

I once went over to say hello to a fellow 2+2er who plays extremely well, better than I do. He wanted to talk to me but had already received his first card UTG. It was an 8. He said wait one second. He then got his second card. It too was an 8. He then folded and we talked.

[Mason Malmuth]

Hi Mike:

Let me address your #2. With a hand like 76s you are looking either for good implied odds or want to play (out of the blind) against a raiser who may possibly hold a weak hand. Once it goes to three bets it looks like both of these are violated even though you describe the three bettor as being somewhat tilted.

Best wishes,
Mason

[nykenny]

1. u sucked on the turn
2. u sucked btf
3. u sucked btf
4. u sucked btf
5. u sucked on the river

who did u win 3100 from? me? /images/graemlins/grin.gif

just kidding (semi-kidding). i always like your situational style of poker (hold'em). but these mistakes hurt! my advice as a friend who you have never met: stay out of trouble.

Keep winning! CA casinos are free money!

Kenny

[Michael J. Sykes]

[ QUOTE ]
i have Ac8c on the button. we're 5 handed. bad player utg openraises, he's not too sharp, he's loose and chases/calls like crazy postflop. i 3 bet on the button.

[/ QUOTE ]

I am surprised nobody has taken issue with this preflop play. Unless your calling station opponent also raises with a lot of junk, this seems like a fold to me.

If utg did have low raising standards and one or both blinds were also bad/loose players, I would be tempted to just call with A8s (and other decent multiway hands with some high card strength). I am not confident in my short-handed preflop play, however, so I would appreciate opinions on the relative value of folding, calling, or raising with a hand like A8s in this situation (assuming a very loose and somewhat aggressive early raiser).

-MJS

[Softrock]

Mike:

First of all I suspect most of us make some of these plays at times but know that we'll be skewered if we post 'em here so we don't talk about them. I have been working diligently to eliminate these plays.

Obviously you were running good given your end result - this is something nobody has commented on. When I'm running over a game I find myself calling way too much with marginal holdings and calling too many bets to the river. I actually play better when I'm running bad. We tend not to think too much about the money lost by poor play when we are running good but over time it is of course just as important as money lost when running bad or not won by playing overly cautious.

My advice - you know most of these were terrible plays - vow not to make the same mistakes again no matter how good you are running.

[nykenny]

positional isolation on a loose aggro early raiser is good short-hand play.

good luck

[cero_z]

Hi mike,
Yes, you played many of these hands very badly. But, you must've been doing some things right.
Hand 1: Reasonable until the river. I think when he checkraises the turn, he's got trips (or better) or a draw. Many draws (spades, straight) hit the river. He bet into the spades, a possible hand for you, so I say he's strong. Just because he "chases/calls" in a crazy manner doesn't mean that he bluffs constantly (though he might).
The 76s and 86s hands were the worst played, IMO. Bad pre-flop mistakes. The 43s river bluff should not be tried by you (loose image) against a fish. The AJ hand was not too bad. Tilting BB could have AA, or counterfeited 2 pair.
Props for another interesting, honest post.

[cero_z]

Hi andy,
[ QUOTE ]
He then folded [88 UTG] and we talked.

[/ QUOTE ]
I'm curious as to what you meant by your post. I assume you consider this fold extremely tight. I don't consider myself to be particularly tight, but when I'm playing in a game with several good players, I auto-muck 88 and down UTG, unless there's a lot of limping allowed at the table (not usually the case in a mid-limit game). In such a game, I fold AJo every time. How do your standards compare? What's the biggest hand you'll lay down UTG?

[andyfox]

Billy LTL was telling me that I'm giving away information by folding without looking at my second card. I responded that (basically) I don't care.

But a player who plays better than I do had no intention of playing UTG when he saw his first card was an 8. [This was an 80-160 game.] Despite the fact that he needed to talk to me about an important non-poker issue, he still waited to look at his second card, so that the other players could see him look at his second card. No doubt it's a better policy than mine.

[nykenny]

good policy indeed. but if i have to fold 88 utg (or am uncomfortable playing 88 utg), that's tough game!

kenny

[Coilean]

I wouldn't get too hung up on the preflop play in hands 2 and 4; as long as you are playing less than 30% of your hands and not routinely cold calling raises and reraises in short handed pots, preflop mistakes are generally small ones that are easily avoided. I would be more concerned with hands 1 3 and 5. Anyway here's my thoughts:

Hand 1: Calling the check raise on the turn is probably not a good play against a loose postflop chaser, unless he's aggressive enough to play a flush draw this way. Calling on the river after the flush gets there is probably just burning money; only maniacs should have anything besides a flush or a K here.

Hand 2: Yeah, at 3.75:1 the preflop call is probably a little too loose; 5:1 is my nominal cutoff for calling with a small suited connector when it's starting to look like someone may have a big pair. But we're talking about maybe a $5 mistake, not a $40 one. From twodimes:
[ QUOTE ]
Holdem Hi: 1370754 enumerated boards
cards win %win lose %lose tie %tie EV
7s 6s 308763 22.53 1059891 77.32 2100 0.15 0.226
Ac Ad 817457 59.64 551197 40.21 2100 0.15 0.597
Kh Qh 242434 17.69 1126220 82.16 2100 0.15 0.177

[/ QUOTE ]

Hand 3: Check folding seems the most prudent play since even a JT should call on the river now. Probably the only hand you can get to drop is another flush draw, which seems too thin for a river bluff.

Hand 4: I don't think this is an awful preflop call (assuming the risk of another raise behind you isn't too high), although you're probably cutting it too thin (the absolute maximum odds you could get for your preflop call is 6:1); but at least you got da position and da skillz /images/graemlins/tongue.gif. Calling this hand a mistake postflop because you happened to be against a bigger flush draw is just being results oriented. Here's a typical EV against a field including AA from twodimes:
[ QUOTE ]
Holdem Hi: 850668 enumerated boards
cards win %win lose %lose tie %tie EV
8h 6h 169318 19.90 680698 80.02 652 0.08 0.199
As Ad 288771 33.95 559689 65.79 2208 0.26 0.341
Kd Qd 124218 14.60 725798 85.32 652 0.08 0.146
Js Ts 148312 17.43 701704 82.49 652 0.08 0.175
Ac 5c 117841 13.85 730619 85.89 2208 0.26 0.140

[/ QUOTE ]

Hand 5:The river raise is probably an error since you can't really fold to a 3-bet here against a tilter, and he could easily have you beat after the flop action. Other than that, this was just a hand you were going to lose some chips on. I probably would have smoothcalled the flop check raise here and gone for a river raise; I like to give tilters a lot of rope to hang themselves (or me /images/graemlins/wink.gif) with.

[Tommy Angelo]

"im tired of sucking at hold em"

Learn to love your own suckness because we all suck you suck I suck everybody suck suck.

I'll show my work:

75% of all limit hold'em players think they play better than the other 75%.

That makes 50% left over, divided by two (one for me, one for you) which means each of us totally sucks 25% of the time. There's no way around it. The numbers don't lie. Embrace your suckage. It's the game's fault. Not yours.

[bisonbison]

[ QUOTE ]
""Sometimes you'll see an opponent look at his first card and then muck his hand (or mentally muck, a decision betrayed by body language) without even looking at his second card. Here you can be sure this is a player who understands the danger of little poison. He knows that if his first card is small, then he's not going to play the hand even if the second card is a suited ace or a pair card. Well! This is valuable information no doubt. It tells you that if this player is in a hand, he's in there with the top half of the deck. That's a hell of an edge for you."

[/ QUOTE ]

Doesn't this just make a good case for not looking at your hole cards until the action is to you?

[JTrout]

Isn't the only possible way to win 77.5 BB in an evening to make some loose plays against inferior opponents? Is seems that just playing ABC tight/aggressive would rarely produce such a score.
So, how about all those questionable plays that pulled in big pots?

[mike l.]

"Isn't the only possible way to win 77.5 BB in an evening to make some loose plays against inferior opponents? Is seems that just playing ABC tight/aggressive would rarely produce such a score. So, how about all those questionable plays that pulled in big pots?"

good point. i thought someone would bring this up. the answer i thought up goes like this:

believe it or not i played pretty reasonably tight and normal/straightforward the rest of the session. there were some hands where i felt i was overaggressive, or overly loose (and most of those pots i lost, a couple i won), but since i was already formulating this post in my head right after the 43d hand and the A8s hand i was looking only for hands where i really clearly stunk it up.

it's because the game was particularly great this night and my playing was generally very strong and of course yes i was catching good hands and good flops that i made $3100. but even with less great hands, the field this night was a really great one and the vast majority of posters here wouldve had trouble not beating up the game for a good winning session.

ill post a couple hands above where i thought i was in marginal situations from the same session but where my play was more debatable.

[elysium]

hi mike
hand 1) usually a bad player has a continuing diminishing pile of chips that ooze a lot, so he's usually short stacked; a flash. well, these flash players usually aren't around very long because they don't bet correctly; i'm not speaking about their odds or chances, just about how they bet as it were. these players also have difficulty bluffing at times.

you say you were check-raised.....hmmmmm. that's not exactly correct. you were not check-raised because there is no such thing as a check-raise! what there is though is a check-bluff with the intention that there will be a bet to raise. that's an important distinction because you can then simply observe how your opponents deliver their check and determine whether it's a check-bluff or a real check. that's the thinking there. the other way of observing necessarily hinders your observation because if you are watching an opponent check and trying to determine whether he is checking or check-raising, you are far more inclined to decide that he is checking. why? because he definately is not check-raising. so since he is definately not check-raising (he cannot be check-raising because there is no bet yet for him to raise), if we leave out the possibility that he may be check-bluffing then the only choice left is that he is checking. and what happens? well, you lived it on this one.

you've got to get into the habit of observing how your opponent checks and you must have two choices to choose from when your opponent checks, just like you do when you're deciding whether he's betting or bluffing when he bets. if those two choices are that he is either checking or check-raising, your decision will be hampered, maybe a little or maybe a lot, because he cannot possibly be check-raising because there has not yet been a bet and even if there has been a bet between him and you, he has not yet acted on it so he still hasn't check-raised.

yes, yes, of course.....' oh, you know what i mean '.....right mike i hear you. but in hand 1 your opponent was checking or check-bluffing. as it turned out he was check-bluffing, something bad players don't do very well. you should have picked up on that bluff and checked it through. someone has pounded it into your head that you need to decide whether your opponent is checking or check-raising. forget about all that. that is not what your opponent is doing. when your opponent checks, he is checking or check-bluffing and you need to watch for the bluff here just as you would if he were betting. and if when he bets you only consider whether he is betting or bluffing (you never, ever question whether he is raising when he bets), then doggonnit don't muddle the issue about what he is doing when he checks. when he checks he is either checking or bluffing just like when he bets he's betting or bluffing. this guy is a bad player who doesn't bluff very well. i'm asking myself why didn't mike pick up on that? oh right, right.....mike muddles the issue by contemplating whether this guy is checking or, or....well he's not check-raising so he must be checking. wrong, wrong, wrong. forget about including the possibility that your opponent may be check-raising when he checks. nobody in history has ever check-raised by checking. but before raising after checking many, many opponents have check-bluffed. and check-bluffs are not any easier to deliver than a regular bluff. and bad players have difficulty in this area. thus the diminishing chip pile, etc. you need to pick up on these bluffs mike. i'll tell you right now tommy would have seen this one coming. what else did you do......?

hand 2) well chit.....let's look at 3).......ok 3): look here mike, you're in the small and you can position this thing by simply checking. you check and you're the button for all intents and purposes. if you are betting to get the fold, that's great. but you knew that ahead of time. you knew that this fish folds. what are you letting in the BB for? raise or fold pre-flop. you called? pffft......

hand 4) well....5).....5)


hand 5) now this is the result of some bluff attempt on you in some prior hand that night, but it was a bluff-raise. they usually don't four bet bluff but here you think that's what's happening. bluff here means four-betting without jacks up. you have got to see the boat here mike.

[Clarkmeister]

Wow, where have you been?

[Diplomat]

back with a vengance.

-diplomat

[elysium]

hi clark
i've been on hiatus. my computer went down for a little while and whew.....i'm just now getting back into hold em. i also worked on my chess a little. eh, you know clark, what i've found out about hold em, at least in some of the games i play in, is that the opponents get angry. i'm usually the only happy at the table. that's good for me but whew.....i make friends easily but.....here's an example; i met a nice girl at the table. she had my last name tatooed on her arm. a coincidence. i hope. maybe not though, i don't know. it was pretty fresh. anyway, when she got up to leave i said, "hey, where are you going?". she said, "you busted me.", in a not nice tone. it was nothing. i was thinking about it though because of the tatoo. but that's what i'm running into a lot. i meet people and i like them, but then i bust them out and they go home. i can't be the only 2+2'er running into this. we need some format here for how to bust out the people we meet. also the poker rooms.....honest to gosh clark, whew.....do they have their ways. is it like this in vegas? is there competition out there that doesn't get angry of all things? i just don't want to go to vegas and have angrys bickering and poker rooms weaseling and so forth. here, whew.....you have to play with your hat on the table to hide your chip stack. if you're a crummy winner around here hooo boy.

[andyfox]

[andyfox]

"i thought someone would bring this up"

Hey, I brought it up first. You can read my posts even when they don't say they're exclusively for you. /images/graemlins/smile.gif

[andyfox]

"she had my last name tatooed on her arm. a coincidence. i hope."

Great writing.

[JimRivett]

Hello Mike,

$3100 is over 6 racks! I can't ever remember winning over over 6 racks in a single session. On the very rare occassions that I get to 4, I say "Good Bye", "So Long", See Ya Later" and I'm out of there.

I don't think you suck at hold'em, but I think the way you approach and play the game is different than mine.

Regards, Jim