No Limit Live Game Hand

[crockpot]

i'm not even going to try to figure out your call preflop with Q2s out of position. apparently the money was pretty deep, but you can only like maybe 2-3% of flops, there is no guarantee you'll win a lot if you do get a nice flop, you can easily go broke if you flop a flush draw that misses or trips that aren't good, etc. etc.

on your A4o, not a bad flop play against someone capable of folding. besides, he could easily be on a draw on this board and you are winning anyway. the problem with the queen is that it helped any straight draw he holds, so now you are only betting in the hopes that a pair of jacks folds, or to charge a flush draw. i think $80 is a lot to bet for that purpose. you have only three clean outs, so that consideration doesn't really apply here.

on your AQ, looks fine to me.

on the A8, what the hell are you doing checking and calling on the flop with this? this is terrible poker. the same goes for the turn. if you're going to put money in the pot voluntarily, bet and hope to take it. if he raises you, you don't have enough outs to care about folding. i do like the river play against someone capable of somehow giving you credit for a big pair or a 7.

[ML4L]

[ QUOTE ]
This game is loose and terrible (and yet I am playing looser and terribler?).

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, you were.

I went through the same type of phase in the NL home game that I play in. Fairly loose game, fairly mediocre play. Lots of guys who will let you run them over if the flop misses them. So, I decided to start raising. A lot. With hands such as Qxs in LP, etc. I'd get one caller, he'd check, I'd bet, he'd fold. This worked for a while. Chalked up a couple of big wins. But, then, I had a big loss one night (similar to yours). Kept trying to push people off hands, etc. After that night, I took a month off from poker and tried to reevaluate my game...

Here are my thoughts. Basically, when you employ such a strategy, you are called ONLY when you have the worst of it. No player will call with a hand worse than that A4o that you raised with. On the flop, when you miss and bet again, you are again ONLY called when you are (badly) beaten.

Before, my feeling was that, "I can outplay them after the flop and I have position. Other players might not be able to get away with it, but I can because I'm 'better' than them." But, that's just not true (at least not in most games, including mine). It doesn't do a player any good to know more about the game if he/she is not going to apply that knowledge properly. Reading books and posting on 2+2 in and of itself does not increase one's win rate. When you do things such as play Q2s for a raise and raise with A4o and then try to push with it when the other player CLEARLY has a hand, you are no better than they are. And it will show in your results.

A better way is to become more selectively aggressive. Don't try to force a big laydown; bluff when the other player is WEAK. Why bluff when he is strong? If you want to play a lot of hands, limp with them instead of raising. But the better plan is to just throw them away.

Is it going to be as much fun to play 50% less hands and bluff 50% as much? Nope. But I guarantee that you win more on average and with less volatility. You seem to be a talented player. Act like it...

Best of luck,
ML4L

[limon]

[Shaun]

I only lost 150 the first night, and while this was my worst loss in a while, the second best player in the game lost 500 on my big night. I know Q2s is bad. It's really bad! And playing A4 this way was... unconventional?

But this hand I was actually ahead on the flop and on the turn, well, he doesn't have to have k9c. I actually had him on a flush draw, but of course realized he could have a pair or something to go with it. I wasn't too concerned about K9- the question is- if the river comes a 2d, do I fire the third bet and lose a really embarrassing amount of money? I find this question more compelling than whether or not this is an optimum strategy!
Thank goodness the ace of clubs hit the river.

Anyway, I do not feel like I am entitled to win pots. I was very fortunate in 2 huge situations the second night- a muppet would have won a lot of money. Maybe I got a little extra because of image, but it certainly doesn't justify bad play. To be honest, I highlighted a few loose plays here- when in fact much of the night I was folding, making abstract art with my stacks of chips, and talking about how stuck I was. This is a pattern with me in live games, and it usually seems to work. When I have a few beats or I lose a few second best hands, I try to give the impression that I am on tilt, but I am not. I am not chasing. I am not *calling* huge bets with mediocre hands. I essentially switch gears. I try and manufacture wins. I want people thinking that I am trying to bully them because I am on tilt. Then I pick up a hand, and it won't matter what I bet, I will get called.

As for the A8 hand- come on?! Terrible poker? OK to each his own. Truth is it was against a player that, as I said, I read very well. I didn't think he had anything that he was too proud of. Maybe even just a flush draw. I called him for the specific purpose of bluffing him on the end if anything other than a Jack or a club fell. On the turn I picked up a draw and was pretty sure I had outs to an ace as well. That left me 11 outs, plus the added equity of all the cards I will bluff at. Is this something I do normally? No. But it is something I do when the cards are cold.

Actually that first night I did get a big pot because of a loose call to help me recoop some losses. I opened small with QJs. Tons of calls. FLop is Jc 7h 8h. I bet a little over half the pot, he raises I call. Turn is a jack. I bet into him. He calls. I river a Q. I bet huge. He calls with j9. Had I not been playing the way I did that night, this normally tight player would never have payed me off or tried to push me out with J9 here. He overplayed a bad hand because he saw how "on tilt" I was.

Anyway, I am not some "look at me I'm the man" type of guy. Bu my opponents in this game, to be straight, aren't going to get the best of it, no matter what cards I play. I may leak off money playing bad cards, bu th etruth is most of the time I am breaking someone or losing very little with a parasitic hand like Q2s. There are a few that are solid, and I am careful with them when need be. I will tell you about one of the few huge calls I have made in this game in my next post after I induced a bluff, but now it's off to grab some grub.

Anyway thanks for reading, and I agree it would not be wise to play this way on a regular basis...

[Shaun]

I had just lost a big pot when a guy rivered a flush against my set. The next hand I look down and see 56s. I open raise to 6. There are two callers. The "Why would you bet kings" guy, who had been getting very, very agressive lately, calls and another player as well. The flop is K76r. Checked to me, I bet 12. Only Mr. Kings calls. The turn is a Q. He checks, I check. The river is a J. Now he pauses for just a second and bets 50- more than the size of the pot. I am very suspicious of this bet. If he wanted a call, he'd have bet less. I could raise him, but then I would lose the wonderful feeling of seeing his hand, then showing my hand, as he would fold if he had what I thought he had, which was something like 89 or 45. I think and think. I say "50, huh? You must really want me out of this pot."

Then, a player gets up from the table and asks where the cups are, my opponent, who lives here and therefore knows where the cups are, says "They're in the cabinet above the microwave."

I notice that his voice is different when he says this than it was when he bet and his physical movements are different than when asked if he really wanted me out. He is telling the truth about the cups, he is LYING about his hand.

"I call", I say. Disgusted, he says "You win."
"Really?" I say. "Take it." he says.
"Oh OK" I say "well I DO have a monster..." and then I show my hand- bottom pair, horrendous kicker. He can't believe I called, etc etc. I never saw his hand- he hid it in the muck too fast. But I liked the way it played out anyway.
Everyone is shocked, and needless to say, he is most unhappy! This was the most satisfying hand of my poker "career".

Now we can debate the theory of this hand over and over, but the truth is I don't set out to make calls like this. This happened once. I actually decided once the river came that if he bet a reasonable amount I would raise, as I knew he was likely to bluff the river. But when he bet 50, and my stack was only about 120, I chickened out. That, and I really, really wanted to get the satisfaction of just calling with bottom pair horrendous kicker and showing down the winner.

Chastize away!

[ML4L]

Hey Shaun,

Why would anyone chastize you for this hand? You were perceptive enough to pick up a reliable tell and made a great call...

Ni han.

ML4L

[Shaun]

Thanks, but actually it could be argued that when I smell weakness here I MUST raise, just in case he has a hand like A6, or 88- something that physically, he feels is a bluff, but that in actuality beats me. Still, the effect of the showdown was worth it for me, and I think it has probably made this player take less shots at me.

[ML4L]

Hey Shaun,

Yeah, I was about to write a couple sentences on that, but I didn't want to take away from my praise of the hand... [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Basically, he won't call a raise with any hand that you beat. So, you lose an extra $70 those times that you misread him and he actually has a hand. Whereas, you win an extra $140 (was that about right?) the times that you make him fold a better hand that he "bluffed" with. It's all subjective as to what the relative probabilities are, but I feel like a call is probably best (although, I'm not as sure about that as I was when I made my last post...).

So, IMO, you made the correct play, even putting the effect of the showdown aside...

By the way, I think Ulysses or someone might have already said this, but you might be putting a little too much value/weight on playing hands in a certain manner just for the sake of forging a particular table image. As I suggested in my "Entitlement" post (which was not meant to be a shot at you, incidentally), you seem to be skilled enough that you would make more money by f***ing around less and just playing solid poker...

ML4L

[Shaun]

Thanks again for your comments ML4L. Most nights I don't mess around much at all, actually. It is just that this particular night, and a handful of others like it where the cards were being unkind, I happened to play a lot of hands that I thought made for fun conversation [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img], and I had a big audience of new players and figured a little wild play couldn't hurt too much. Most of the time I don't attempt too many big bluffs.