Trying to help a fellow player - feedback please!
 

I'll get right to the point...

I have a good friend who has the potential to be a very skillful poker player. He has been playing the game for a couple years, and to the best of my knowledge has read HEPFAP and a few other S&M books. How well he's fully absorbed the content remains to be seen. I'd like to forward this post to him after I get some feedback from hopefully some of the heavyweights here (if he doesn't find it himself), so I would appreciate anyones candid comments.

In short, I think he has some real fundamental misunderstandings of how to play in certain games - particularly low limit party poker games. In a conversation we had earlier today I think I've somewhat brought him back from the dark side - but not entirely sure. I am hoping that some good feedback here will provide him with some information that he can use to continue to improve his game.

Just a bit of background:

He and I and another friend have recently started playing a little for fun online. We've all been playing awhile - a couple of us probably a bit more than him in the last year or so. With a 4 month old son, I don't get a chance to play much now - and when I do, it's mostly tournaments on Party which fortunately have been fairly lucrative for me.

Last night we all get on Party and get into the same game. Mind you, we are not colluding - we absolutely do not discuss the hand while someone is involved. We will comment on each others play and some of the antics that go on at the table but we absolutely do not discuss live hands or reveal hole cards.

We get into a .5/1 game that's pretty loose until we've played a couple of rounds and then it tightens up slightly but we are all still getting plenty of action. The following hand comes up which creates quite a bit of controversy and we continue to discuss it all night. Today, this particular hand was the root of our discussion - but we veered into other poker related topics as well.

I wish I had a hand history as I'm not 100% sure as to the how the action went - but basically our hero is in LP with 89o. 6 players limp and the player to our hero's right raises. Our hero cold-calls 2 and the rest of the table calls, of course. The raiser was our other friend who held KK. Not sure of the board and action (it doesn't matter anyway) but our hero ends up winning the pot. Obviously, we have quite a bit of discussion about cold-calling raises with marginal hands, etc...

In our conversation today, we discussed this hand and others and he readily agreed (after some emailing today with some math on how hosed he was and how he absolutely should not have been in that pot) that this was a very loose call and a long term -EV play. This particular session, he saw 40+% of the flops and attempted several bluffs against calling stations. Granted, this was his first time to play real money micro limits on Party - but he knew that the players were very loose and many were textbook calling stations. At our first table he lost his entire buy-in ($25) in less than an hour and a bit of his rebuy before we all ended up changing tables where he made a little of it back catching on those 'lucky' hands.

In our conversation his philosophy in playing the low limit games online was that he should be seeing a lot more flops (said in the 30% range on average) and getting himself in position to outplay his opponents post-flop. While fundamentally I can't disagree with this philosophy there are many other things that factor into this equation.

I think the crux of his problem was the he felt like he was getting good odds to cold call a bet here and that his implied odds were good because if he hits his hand all the calling stations will pay him off. While I certainly don't disagree that if he hits his hand some monkey will pay him off - that still is no reason to piss away money cold-calling with unsuited connectors hoping that you catch a straight draw. Of course, this biggest issue here is that if you continue to make bad calls like this you WILL NOT make your hand enough times and/or get paid off when you do to make this a +EV play.

He also mentioned that he doesn't think that it's correct to play 'textbook' poker in the low limit games because "Your missing out on a lot of money". Clearly, a very fundamental thinking error there. We had a pretty heated discussion on this. I made it very clear to him that in low limit games it is absolutely essential to play textbook poker. Often times you are simply playing how the math tells you to play. It can be as boring as watching paint dry but the plain and simple truth is - when you are playing at these lower limits you HAVE to make a hand to win. Your not going to be able to do much in the way of 'fancy play' and work your opponents out of the pot. You play it 'tight and right' and get money in with your good hands and let the calling stations pay you off when you hit hand. I told him to save his 'fancy play' for when he moves up to $20/40 and is playing against opponents that are actually capable of folding what is likely the best hand. For some reason that I don't understand - he had a difficult time agreeing with that philosophy and continues to think that he's losing money if he doesn't see more flops.

I also mentioned to him that it's easy to get busted up limping with crap. I used an example of coming in with J8s with a near family pot. The flop comes Jack high and you go crazy check raising and what not but can't shake one of the calling stations who tables AJo on the river to scoop. The problem with the low limits is that people often limp with hands that have you dominated and in many cases these players won't save you any money because they never let you know that you are probably beat. In the end, you limp with cheese and flop the worst case scenario for you and lose money on a hand you should have never been involved with in the first place.

Of course we discussed odds and what not and I tried to explain to him that when you enter a pot against a raise with hands that are all long term losers you will never get paid off enough on the ones that you win to compensate for all the weak limps and cold-calls you sacrificed trying to hit those in the first place.

My basic advice in these games was to play a solid game - just because it's LL doesn't mean that you do what all the other monkeys do and piss your money away with crap hands out of position prelfop and then try to bully them around later in the hand. Save your money and get money in the pot with good hands. Ram and jam when you have strong draws and in general just play a solid game. Sure, a lot of what you'll read in some of the 'books' isn't going to apply to some of these games. You should see a few more flops than you would in a tighter game for certain but good post flop play usually means folding top pair with a crap kicker when you bet it early get called in 4 places then someone raises.

Anyway, I hope this provides enough information so that some of you might comment and give some additional advice. I'm not trying to hammer on this guy as he is a very good friend of mine. I just want him to know that he's making some very fundamental errors here and know that with a little push in the right direction he can make a little money in these games.

I've reiterated to him several times a couple gems that I've read here over the years:

I know Mason and several others have said the following:

"You should be cold calling so infrequently that you can't even remember the last time that you did so".

And a Clarkmeister gem:

"Coldcalling raises with medium and small suited connectors is the fast track to the poorhouse. Yes, even with 3 others in the pot."

Thanks to all of you who actually made it through this post.

I\'m too tired to go into all of this now
 

I'll try to come back to this tomorrow.

However, one thing that jumped out: "I wish I had a hand history as I'm not 100% sure as to the how the action went - but basically our hero is in LP with 89o. 6 players limp and the player to our hero's right raises. Our hero cold-calls 2 and the rest of the table calls, of course"
and then you laid into him for what you saw as a hugely -EV play.

I'm not so sure about that. 89s would be preferred here, but the 6 limpers "and the rest of the table calls, of course" may make this a reasonable, if high variance, play.
If you would call 2 bets with 89o if 7 others were all already in, then cold-calling when you evidently expected the remaining 6 limpers to call isn't THAT much different IMO, especially if you expect many of them to play badly post-flop.

While I definately agree that tighter, more "textbook" play is the best way to go when starting out in low-limit no-foldem games, playing a hand that isn't as likely to be dominated directly (by someone else matching your cards with a better kicker) may not be as bad as playing J8 or J9 or higher, where AJ and others will be in.

Anyway, more to come later. Just wanted to kick this off.

Re: I\'m too tired to go into all of this now
 

Thanks Easy.

The focus of the post isn't neccesarily to nitpick that hand. It's one example that I thought would shed some light on the subject and allow you to attempt, albeit, with very limited knowledge to dissect this player based on that line of thinking.

As for the 89o hand.

When he actually calls - he's getting a mere 3.5 to 1 on this call. While not probable, all players may not call to give him the 7-1 he was thinking of - or even worse, a limp-reraise could show up possibly driving out a few players reducing any implied odds he may have had on this hand. In addition, these 2 players may get into a raising war with him stuck in the middle making it expensive for him to draw should he flop one. I just don't see enough positives to outweight the negatives here. IMHO, it's just pissing money away - but I'd be willing to hear any arguments debunking that.

The point is and I don't think anyone is going to disagree much on this - the 89o is a bad call - especially to cold call 2. 89s really isn't even much better, imho. With 89o you are wanting to flop the straight draw. By my calculations you can expect to see that ~9% of the time. No way I'm cold calling here...ever.

Anyway, I'd prefer that we not focus too much on the 89o hand. He recognizes that this is a very marginal call. I'd like to talk more about some of the other topics I discussed, particularly his 'monkey see monkey do' see more flops then try to outplay a bunch of calling stations in LL games theory.

Re: Trying to help a fellow player - feedback please!
 

I kind of skimmed the post. But it does sound like your friend has an attitude that will get him in big trouble.

I'd guess that 80% of the profit in poker comes from the best 20% of your playable hands. That is, AA-99, the big suited cards, and AK probably account for 80% of your profit in any full (i.e. not shorthanded) limit holdem game. In a game full of loose-passive players, you could certainly play just those hands and make a very nice profit.

Adding some hands beyond that will increase your earn. But the more marignal the hand, the less that hand will give you even in the most ideal circumstances. Hands like 98o and J8s, when played in the absolutely perfect spot, might give you a hair of +EV (like a few hundreths of a bet). Playing these hands in the wrong spot will certainly be unprofitable, though. Playing 98o in the wrong spot once can lose you the money that playing it correctly ten times made you.

I'd guess that an expert player can boost his total winrate by 5-10% (at most) by adding "marginal" starting hands in the appropriate spots. A decent, winning player can cut his winrate by 50% or more by adding these same hands in the wrong spots. Calling two cold with 98o is, to be sure, very much the wrong spot.

In other words, your friend is looking in the wrong places to help himself beat holdem games. Adding marginal hands will never make the difference between winning and losing. He needs to concentrate on learning to play a small set of starting hands well after the flop.

This is really good advice.
 

He needs to concentrate on learning to play a small set of starting hands well after the flop.

Once you learn how to handle overpair, top pair, set, and nut flush draw, after the flop, then you are ready to try and work in some of the other situations.

Re: This is really good advice.
 

This guy is actually not a bad player. I used a couple examples to indicate his line of thinking on a few things but overall he really does have some skills and can play a good game.

My focus on this post, as I mentioned previously, is to pass along some solid advice on how to play at the lower limit games. I just think that his line of thinking was a little skewed on this one and wanted to pass along some good information for him from some other solid players as he seemed to not agree with me on some of the issues I discussed previously.

I appreciate the good comments though.

Agree with everything but \"textbook poker\"
 

At the extreme low limits, such as the $.50/$1 limit you guys were playing, "textbook poker" strategy must be modified heavily. In particular, hands that aim to build top pair good kicker, such as AK and AQ, shouldn't be raised with preflop. These sorts of one-pair hands seldom win against a horde of loose callers--it's Morton's Theorem to the max. You're better off limping big offsuit cards and playing them opportunistically--that is, only proceeding post-flop when you either hit a big flop or when the texture and your position allow you to put in a check-raise or raise. That way you can drop a few players you couldn't have if you had you raised preflop and they checked to you. Beyond that, quality drawing hands pick up a lot of value--as you say, you're playing odds poker, not position/knockout poker.

I certainly agree that 98o and hands like it should be routinely mucked at any limit up to $4/$8, except in the blinds. These sorts of hands don't have enough ways to win in a limit structure. For one bet with volume, I'd rather have suited trash like J8s than 98o.

Re: Agree with everything but \"textbook poker\"
 

Limping in with AKo or AQo routinely is giving up some serious EV. First off, you invite multiway action, which is something you want to avoid with big offsuit cards. One of the biggest reason to raise with these hands is to drive players out of the pot and get it short-handed. It's the same reason I muck KJo after 4 limpers: I don't want a multiway pot with big offsuit cards. Secondly, your hand is much easier to play post-flop when you raise preflop. Your choices are a lot easier to make when your opponents are on their heels and you have control of the hand. Thirdly, making my opponents pay to see the flop when I have a superior hand is almost always going to be in my best interest.

I realize that at micro-limits, raises don't defer opponents from seeing the flop as much, but I still don't see how limping in from EP with AKo could be a better strategy than raising. You'd just be giving up too much NOT to raise IMO.

Re: Agree with everything but \"textbook poker\"
 

It's not a matter of "inviting" multiway action by limping AQ or AK--at a typical .50/$1 table, you're going to get multiway action regardless of whether you raise preflop or not.

If you've read the loose games section in HPFAP, the $.50/$1 games fit right into what they're talking about, only more so. I'd also suggest trolling the Web to look for discussion of Morton's Theorem, if you haven't checked it out yet.

Re: Agree with everything but \"textbook poker\"
 

The times you raise and get paid of by inferior hands will more than make up for the times you miss and wisely get away from the hand as cheaply as possible.

If some yutz wants to call my A-Q with A-5 or Q-10 he's more than welcome to do so, but he's not going to get to do it cheaply. I want him putting money in when he is a big underdog.

Re: Agree with everything but \"textbook poker\"
 

Exactly. I think that playing weak preflop, probably cost more than getting sucked out on. I would raise those hands, not only to eliminate players behind me, but also just for value, I am going to win more than my fair share with those hands, so lets jack it up!

Re: Trying to help a fellow player - feedback please!
 

I think the 89o coldcall is just terrible, but its also the kind of thing that happens all the time.

As for your friend's defense of making these kinds of plays it is also pretty common as well. He's convincing himself that these poor starting hands go up in value at these tables both because he'll get paid off when he hits and because maybe he can trick and bluff some of the players out of the pot. He can't have it both ways. You always want to play more hands because playing good poker on these tables is pretty boring, and you end up trying to justify your poor plays with faulty arguments like this. If you can get your friend to recognize this type of thinking then you can help him stop it.

You\'re missing my point
 

It's not the one yutz you're worried about in a super-loose game, it's the crowd of yutzes who will not only call your raise preflop, but call your flop bet with middle or bottom pair, a gutshot, or a backdoor, and call your turn bet ditto. Against just one yutz, you're a favorite. Against many yutzes, your one-pair hand (which is what AQ or AK will usually build) is a dog.

PLEASE read Morton's Theorem, then come back and post again when you've thought it through. I believe if you search the Web you'll find not only the original theorem, but discussions of it by Mike Caro and others.

Re: You\'re missing my point
 

I think the point is, although you are an underdog, against the pack of yutzes, you are still a money favorite, because your share of the pot is larger than any of the yutzes, so you still go ahead and raise.

I've read Mike Caro's thoughts on this, and I think that he misses the point here.

Re: Trying to help a fellow player - feedback please!
 

The John Biggs and GuyOnTilt responses are on the right track, even if I doubt they've quite got the technique down. The big key in these games isn't "textbook poker"...it's maximing the payoff on your big hands and minimizing the amount you're paying off someone else's big hands. The reason this is so important is that with the increased number of players seeing flop, big hands are more likely to be out there--no matter how unlikely they look. And both John Biggs and GuyOnTilt are right...AKo, AQo, and KJo type hands quite often turn into the hands with which you are paying off.

So in this context, how should your friend look upon that hand with the 98o? If the preflop raiser is on his direct right, quite often on the flop everyone will check to the raiser and the raiser will bet. Now if the 98o flopped a gutshot or a weak top-pair hand, what can he do with it? There are so many players left to act that he is often stuck in raise or fold situations with a marginal hand. In other words, he can neither minimize the amount he pays off nor maximize the amount he will get paid off. This is an artifact of his position relative to the raiser. He would rather there be several players in between himself and the raiser whom he can just call with a marginal hand, or raise with a big hand/big draw without driving players out. And this is the way that you have to think about almost every decision at the low limit tables.

Re: Trying to help a fellow player - feedback please!
 

The big key in these games isn't "textbook poker"...it's maximing the payoff on your big hands and minimizing the amount you're paying off someone else's big hands.

Uh, isn't that pretty much the definition of 'textbook poker'? Granted, maybe not verbatim out of HEPFAP - but when I say 'textbook' I mean playing smart and not take the 'monkey see monkey do' approach I discussed earlier.

Re: You\'re missing my point
 

Against many yutzes, your one-pair hand (which is what AQ or AK will usually build) is a dog.

This is where you are mistaken. Yes, you are correct. In a 3-way pot where you hold the boss made hand, there are two draws against you, one solid and one weak, there is a range of pot sizes where the weak draw loses money by calling... and so do you.

Your problem is that you are vastly overestimating this effect. The made hand virtually never becomes a dog (at least a money dog) to the draws.

Let me show you the leap of logic you have made. Your claim is that sometimes weak draws cost you money after the flop by calling. That is certainly true. You therefore conclude that you should keep the pot small preflop with offsuit hands. But the information that weak draws cost you money after the flop is not enough to draw that conclusion. You also have to take into account how much money you lose preflop by failing to raise.

For instance, say we played a headsup no limit holdem game. We both have $1000 in front of us. I have AA and make it $999 to go before the flop and you call (you don't have AA). Then the flop comes and I bet my last dollar. I lost money (a lot of money, actually) from you calling. I would prefer that you fold. But that does not mean that my preflop raise was bad. In fact, it was good. If I know you will call my $999 bet before the flop, then it is simply wrong to bet anything less. The reason is that I am granting reverse implied odds after the flop. That is, I am going to put my money in after the flop no matter what, but you (as the drawing hand) have a choice. So I make the most money if I get as much money as possible in before the flop.

In other words, simply because weak drawing hands can cost you money after the flop by calling does not mean that it is wrong to raise preflop. There is a tradeoff, and to draw an informed conclusion you need to balance the tradeoff. Unfortunately, it is difficult to do that (which is why this debate still rages) as poker is a pretty complex game. The bigger your edge preflop (the poorer the hands that your opponents will enter the pot with) then the more correct it is to raise preflop. The smaller your edge preflop, then the more correct it is to keep the pot small. The edges preflop, however, are usually pretty big in these very loose games. The "schooling" effect that people love to talk about, however, is often not particularly big, even when there are several draws against you. This is because it is difficult to improve to the best hand in holdem. Most draws are quite weak. You are usually much more desperate to knock people out in 7 card stud if you have a hand like Kings on 5th street in a multiway pot than you are to knock people out with a top pair of Kings on the flop in holdem.

Re: Trying to help a fellow player - feedback please!
 

Two thing, first a true story.

There is a boy in my extended family who at eight years old could beat anyone who played him at chess. He learned chess moves by watching the Ninja Turtles on TV he used to say. When things got tough he would say out loud, "What would the Ninja Turtle do?" His game wasn't textbook, but he knew what had to happen on the end and he did it.

Of course many of the adults he beat started explaining to him about the bad plays he made against them and insisted he modify his playing style. Now this boy is 14, and can barely beat a beginning child player. There are some things to be said about developing your own game style and making mistakes along the way.

Secondly, I understand he is your friend, but it is his money, and maybe he plays for different reasons than yourself? What is more important to you, your friendship or his poker?

Another guy who can\'t be bothered to read Morton\'s Theorem...
 

Go re-read the loose games section in HPFAP. Think about why they would say it's better not to raise in a loose game with AQ after many limpers have already come in. Now think about if you have that AQ early, but you know that raising won't narrow the field and you'll get that same number of limpers. Do you still want to raise? Do you still think that's giving you your best expectation?

And I'm not talking about "schooling" when I bring up Morton's Theorem. Have you read it yet?

How about Sklansky and Malmuth?
 

They have agreed that this effect exists, only they call it the "horse race phenomenon" or some such. If you don't like Caro's reasoning, would you listen to S/M?

Besides, I assume you know that S/M in HPFAP advise that in a very loose game, you shouldn't raise with AQ after four loose limpers. If that's the case, why would you raise with this same hand in early position if you know you'll get four or more callers after you?

Please, class, repeat after me: The point of raising with an offsuit hand is to NARROW THE FIELD. If you can't do that, you are better off not raising. Anyone who doesn't understand this doesn't understand hold'em.

Here\'s Lou Krieger\'s article about Morton\'s Theorem
 

Anyone still listening should read this if they haven't already:

http://www.loukrieger.com/articles/morton.htm

Re: Trying to help a fellow player - feedback please!
 

What is more important to you, your friendship or his poker?

I know you can't begin to know what type of relationship I have with this individual, and I don't expect you too. Let it be said that he and I are very good friends and no disagreement about how he should play poker would ever infringe on that. Period.

Re: You\'re missing my point
 

I haven't read Morton's theorom, but let me quote you Ropeys Theorem...

I'm not sure what you mean when you say 'dog'...if you are using it like i think you are, than Pocket AA's are a 'dog' with a field of 10...but even if you don't win but 30% of the time, you are still the favorite to win the hand.

When you are ahead on the flop with AK or AQ with your top pair, even though you will lose more frequently the more players that are in the pot...you are still the favorite...not a 'dog'.

-ropey

Re: Trying to help a fellow player - feedback please!
 

[ QUOTE ]
I'll get right to the point...

I have a good friend who has the potential to be a very skillful poker player. He has been playing the game for a couple years, and to the best of my knowledge has read HEPFAP and a few other S&M books. How well he's fully absorbed the content remains to be seen. I'd like to forward this post to him after I get some feedback from hopefully some of the heavyweights here (if he doesn't find it himself), so I would appreciate anyones candid comments.

In short, I think he has some real fundamental misunderstandings of how to play in certain games - particularly low limit party poker games. In a conversation we had earlier today I think I've somewhat brought him back from the dark side - but not entirely sure. I am hoping that some good feedback here will provide him with some information that he can use to continue to improve his game.

Just a bit of background:

He and I and another friend have recently started playing a little for fun online. We've all been playing awhile - a couple of us probably a bit more than him in the last year or so. With a 4 month old son, I don't get a chance to play much now - and when I do, it's mostly tournaments on Party which fortunately have been fairly lucrative for me.

Last night we all get on Party and get into the same game. Mind you, we are not colluding - we absolutely do not discuss the hand while someone is involved. We will comment on each others play and some of the antics that go on at the table but we absolutely do not discuss live hands or reveal hole cards.

We get into a .5/1 game that's pretty loose until we've played a couple of rounds and then it tightens up slightly but we are all still getting plenty of action. The following hand comes up which creates quite a bit of controversy and we continue to discuss it all night. Today, this particular hand was the root of our discussion - but we veered into other poker related topics as well.

I wish I had a hand history as I'm not 100% sure as to the how the action went - but basically our hero is in LP with 89o. 6 players limp and the player to our hero's right raises. Our hero cold-calls 2 and the rest of the table calls, of course. The raiser was our other friend who held KK. Not sure of the board and action (it doesn't matter anyway) but our hero ends up winning the pot. Obviously, we have quite a bit of discussion about cold-calling raises with marginal hands, etc...

In our conversation today, we discussed this hand and others and he readily agreed (after some emailing today with some math on how hosed he was and how he absolutely should not have been in that pot) that this was a very loose call and a long term -EV play. This particular session, he saw 40+% of the flops and attempted several bluffs against calling stations. Granted, this was his first time to play real money micro limits on Party - but he knew that the players were very loose and many were textbook calling stations. At our first table he lost his entire buy-in ($25) in less than an hour and a bit of his rebuy before we all ended up changing tables where he made a little of it back catching on those 'lucky' hands.

In our conversation his philosophy in playing the low limit games online was that he should be seeing a lot more flops (said in the 30% range on average) and getting himself in position to outplay his opponents post-flop. While fundamentally I can't disagree with this philosophy there are many other things that factor into this equation.

I think the crux of his problem was the he felt like he was getting good odds to cold call a bet here and that his implied odds were good because if he hits his hand all the calling stations will pay him off. While I certainly don't disagree that if he hits his hand some monkey will pay him off - that still is no reason to piss away money cold-calling with unsuited connectors hoping that you catch a straight draw. Of course, this biggest issue here is that if you continue to make bad calls like this you WILL NOT make your hand enough times and/or get paid off when you do to make this a +EV play.

He also mentioned that he doesn't think that it's correct to play 'textbook' poker in the low limit games because "Your missing out on a lot of money". Clearly, a very fundamental thinking error there. We had a pretty heated discussion on this. I made it very clear to him that in low limit games it is absolutely essential to play textbook poker. Often times you are simply playing how the math tells you to play. It can be as boring as watching paint dry but the plain and simple truth is - when you are playing at these lower limits you HAVE to make a hand to win. Your not going to be able to do much in the way of 'fancy play' and work your opponents out of the pot. You play it 'tight and right' and get money in with your good hands and let the calling stations pay you off when you hit hand. I told him to save his 'fancy play' for when he moves up to $20/40 and is playing against opponents that are actually capable of folding what is likely the best hand. For some reason that I don't understand - he had a difficult time agreeing with that philosophy and continues to think that he's losing money if he doesn't see more flops.

I also mentioned to him that it's easy to get busted up limping with crap. I used an example of coming in with J8s with a near family pot. The flop comes Jack high and you go crazy check raising and what not but can't shake one of the calling stations who tables AJo on the river to scoop. The problem with the low limits is that people often limp with hands that have you dominated and in many cases these players won't save you any money because they never let you know that you are probably beat. In the end, you limp with cheese and flop the worst case scenario for you and lose money on a hand you should have never been involved with in the first place.

Of course we discussed odds and what not and I tried to explain to him that when you enter a pot against a raise with hands that are all long term losers you will never get paid off enough on the ones that you win to compensate for all the weak limps and cold-calls you sacrificed trying to hit those in the first place.

My basic advice in these games was to play a solid game - just because it's LL doesn't mean that you do what all the other monkeys do and piss your money away with crap hands out of position prelfop and then try to bully them around later in the hand. Save your money and get money in the pot with good hands. Ram and jam when you have strong draws and in general just play a solid game. Sure, a lot of what you'll read in some of the 'books' isn't going to apply to some of these games. You should see a few more flops than you would in a tighter game for certain but good post flop play usually means folding top pair with a crap kicker when you bet it early get called in 4 places then someone raises.

Anyway, I hope this provides enough information so that some of you might comment and give some additional advice. I'm not trying to hammer on this guy as he is a very good friend of mine. I just want him to know that he's making some very fundamental errors here and know that with a little push in the right direction he can make a little money in these games.

I've reiterated to him several times a couple gems that I've read here over the years:

I know Mason and several others have said the following:

"You should be cold calling so infrequently that you can't even remember the last time that you did so".

And a Clarkmeister gem:

"Coldcalling raises with medium and small suited connectors is the fast track to the poorhouse. Yes, even with 3 others in the pot."

Thanks to all of you who actually made it through this post.


[/ QUOTE ]
I only made it half way through. I think you and your friend's poker game could use some help (not being a jerk, i also need help).

One thing i can say...When they are playing loosely you should tighten up.

Re: You\'re missing my point
 

PLEASE read Morton's Theorem, then come back and post again when you've thought it through. I believe if you search the Web you'll find not only the original theorem, but discussions of it by Mike Caro and others.

I've read it before, and I've read Caro's discussion on it as well. And I've thought it through, and the majority of the people here who have posted in this thread have too. I have read it and I agree with majorkong that the effect is overstated. And it's OK if we don't agree, really.

We've had lots of posts here before on this topic that you might want to check out. I'm sure they stretch back for years.

Re: How about Sklansky and Malmuth?
 

Please, class, repeat after me

If you expect anyone to respect what you have to say, you should avoid being condescending.

Re: Another guy who can\'t be bothered to read Morton\'s Theorem...
 

Another guy who can't be bothered to read Morton's Theorem...

And I'm not talking about "schooling" when I bring up Morton's Theorem. Have you read it yet?

*shrug*

You've ignored everything I said in my post and treated me like a two year old. What more can I say?

Re: Trying to help a fellow player - feedback please!
 

I think you and your friend's poker game could use some help (not being a jerk, i also need help).

Wow - that's some great advice. Poker players that need to work on their game. Very insightful, thanks.

When they are playing loosely you should tighten up

What? In what games do you play hands like Axs and Kxs? Are you telling me that in loose/passive games you shouldn't expand your starting hand requirents and play more speculative hands that can potentially make monsters? Thanks for the post - but your wasting people's time with that mess.

not being a jerk, i also need help

I don't think you are being a jerk - but I would certainly concur with the latter part of that statement. [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

Re: You\'re missing my point
 

but even if you don't win but 30% of the time

Against a field of 10 - 30% is about the percentage that your AA will hold up, statistically speaking, anyway (as opposed to 85+% heads up for example). That being said - it's still a higher % than any of the other hands that are in the pot with you at that particular time. Therefore you are NOT a 'dog' - at least pre-flop. When the flop comes, it's an entirely different story.

Re: You\'re missing my point
 

My point exactly.
-ropey

Sorry--but not sorry
 

Sorry, I guess. But you aggravated me especially in your posts by not bothering to look up Morton's Theorem after I had hammered on its importance several times; you dismissed it with an offhand reference to "schooling." Since you seemed to be otherwise intelligent, this negligence really bothered me. And I found your own first response to me to be extremely condescending in tone, though you may not be aware of it.

FYI, your head-up example was totally besides the point, as you'll see if you now trouble yourself to read Krieger's article (I've posted it for your convenience). In head-up situations, Morton's Theorem CAN'T apply by definition.

Thank you...
 

... for your thoughtful reply--quite a bit more thoughtful than my own rants.

I do find it strange that an assortment of 2+2'ers playing at the extreme low limits find themselves in disagreement with poker authorities possessed of immeasurably greater experience and theoretical knowledge. But as you say, there is no need to agree on these things, and everyone has their own experience to work with as first teacher. The best way to settle it would be to track EV/hour for different strategies over many hours, but who has time for that?

Re: You\'re missing my point
 

[ QUOTE ]
It's not the one yutz you're worried about in a super-loose game, it's the crowd of yutzes who will not only call your raise preflop, but call your flop bet with middle or bottom pair, a gutshot, or a backdoor, and call your turn bet ditto. Against just one yutz, you're a favorite. Against many yutzes, your one-pair hand (which is what AQ or AK will usually build) is a dog.

PLEASE read Morton's Theorem, then come back and post again when you've thought it through. I believe if you search the Web you'll find not only the original theorem, but discussions of it by Mike Caro and others.

[/ QUOTE ]

what your saying makes perfect sense from my experience, ill have to check out the mortons thing....

Re: Sorry--but not sorry
 

From Krieger's article:
[ QUOTE ]
The mathematics of Morton's Theorem shows that there is a range of pot sizes (in this particular case, between 6.25 and 8.5 big bets) when it is correct for the player holding second pair to fold, and you make more money when he plays correctly and folds than you will when he chases.

[/ QUOTE ]

From my post:
This is where you are mistaken. Yes, you are correct. In a 3-way pot where you hold the boss made hand, there are two draws against you, one solid and one weak, there is a range of pot sizes where the weak draw loses money by calling... and so do you.

From Krieger's article:
[ QUOTE ]
Morton observed that the schooling phenomenon increased the variance of the player who flops top pair with A-K, and he theorized that it also increased his expectation in the long run - particularly when compared to games in which opponents correctly fold their weak draws.

[/ QUOTE ]

From my post:
The "schooling" effect that people love to talk about, however, is often not particularly big, even when there are several draws against you.

How exactly did you reach the conclusion that I didn't read the article? As a matter of fact, I've read this article, Caro's article, and the original RGP post several times before.

Here is my point again.

Morton's Theorem says that for a certain range of pot sizes, weak draws can cost both themselves and the boss made hand money by calling. The person who profits from this is someone with a stronger draw.

This is your argument, as it has been stated thus far in this thread: "You should keep the pot small preflop with AQo because of Morton's Theorem."

My point is, "Huh?" How does the fact that weak draws can cost you money by calling mean that you should keep the pot small preflop? When you fail to raise preflop, you lose money. How much money? Well, it depends on the size of your preflop edge. Yes, when the pot is big preflop, you make less money after the flop with a one pair hand. But how much less? Well, it depends on how many draws there are against you. The point is that there is a tradeoff. When you raise preflop, you make less money after the flop. When you limp preflop, you make less money before the flop. Which is better? That is not clear... and you have done absolutely nothing to reconcile this tradeoff.

The headsup example was just designed to show that, simply because you lose money after the flop doesn't mean that it is wrong to raise preflop. It obviously was not intended to capture the "Morton's Theorem" effect.

Re: Trying to help a fellow player - feedback please!
 

Your post is about telling your friend he is spending his money in the wrong way. It is something I would consider before telling a friend how to spend his money. If your friendship is solid, good for you! :-)

EV calculations might answer this one way or the other
 

I believe M's T. applies to other than three-way situations--that was just the example Krieger chose to give in his summary.

Aside from that, I know of only two ways to resolve the question: First, with historical records--in this case, using PokerTracker or PokerStat to see how AQ unraised preflop does versus how it does raised, when playing in a very loose, micro-limit game such as $.50/$1. The problem is it's hard to isolate all the variables, so you get an apples to oranges comparison. So I often prefer the second approach, which is to assume some variables and make a hypothetical calculation of EV from those assumptions. I usually use combinations when doing this, which is a huge amount of math to do by hand. Sometimes I supplement my calculations with data from Caro's Poker Probe or similar to-the-river software, even though it's a blunt instrument for the job. At the moment I am in the middle of a rush job and don't have the time to do it right, but at some point I might try. If I do I'll post my analysis (however puerile) on the forum.

Actually, a third way just occurred to me--if either PokerStat or PokerTracker allow this, it would be interesting to see how many pots are taken down by a one-pair hand (such as top pair, good kicker) at a limit like $.50/$1 versus ditto at progressively higher limits. Since drawing hands likely win a bigger percentage of the pots at low limits than at medium and high limits, a strategy shift is in order. And if preflop spending is a limited resource (and I think it is), then where do you want to put your money? In a very, very loose game, I'd rather limp my weaker offsuit hands such as AQ, since they won't do as well as at a higher limit, and save the extra chips for limping a few more drawing hands than I would in a tougher game.

Re: Trying to help a fellow player - feedback please!
 

Your post is about telling your friend he is spending his money in the wrong way.

I could care less how he 'spends' his money. The purpose of this post to discuss his theory on playing in low limit games. True, that somehow correlates with how he spends his money but that's certianly not the prevailing theme here.

Re: EV calculations might answer this one way or the other
 

Yes with a much higher percentage of players seeing the flop and staying in all the way to the showdown, the average winning hand must a higher at 1-2 online than say 15-30.

Perhaps 2-pair at 1-2 and top pair at 15-30 might be the average winning hands. Just a WAG -- wild donkey guess!!!

Re: Trying to help a fellow player - feedback please!
 

[ QUOTE ]
Your post is about telling your friend he is spending his money in the wrong way.

I could care less how he 'spends' his money. The purpose of this post to discuss his theory on playing in low limit games. True, that somehow correlates with how he spends his money but that's certianly not the prevailing theme
here.

[/ QUOTE ]

well, yeah, duh, the net effect of playing poker poorly or even just not optimately, is losing money
but getting him to play to his potential is the point here