NL suckouts galore

[TomCollins]

You don't lose 1200 at NL $100 at party without:
1) Sucking horribly
2) Tilting
3) Both

Maybe you should examine your own play before blaming lady luck. I'm sure the bad beats happened, but I'm also pretty sure you tilted away a lot after that. Otherwise you wouldn't have posted.

Don't tilt.

[tripdad]

[ QUOTE ]
The point, I think, was that we remember when we get drawn out on, but ignore the times we draw out on someone else or our hand holds up.

[/ QUOTE ]

ding ding ding! we have a winner. why Loki didn't get this, i have no clue.

cheers!

[CrisBrown]

Hi Al,

I agree. And at NL, a lot of the variance of outdraws can be minimized in the way you play your hand. Too many NL players ascribe to the "all you can do is get your money in with the best of it" philosophy, without understanding what that means. Getting your money in with the best of it is not simply about making a positive equity (+EV) decision. It's about making the decision that has the greatest equity.

A common example is an overpair vs. a naked draw on the flop. (By "naked draw," I mean a four-flush or open-end straight draw, with no pair and no overcards.) Assume you are certain that the player with the draw will call if you push at the flop, and you have roughly equal stacks. Is pushing in the best play?

Well, it's +EV. You're ahead in the hand right now, and you'll get his entire stack about six times in ten. The other four times, he'll make his draw, trips, or two pair, and you'll lose your entire stack. The better play is to bet smaller at the flop -- but enough that he's not getting proper odds to call for one card only -- then make your strong move if the turn blanks. The turn will blank about 80% of the time. When it does, you can often take the pot there with a strong move, because now he has only one card with which to hit his draw. If he does call at the turn, you're getting much better equity on that call than if you had pushed and been called at the flop. If the turn makes his draw, you can get off from your hand with minimal loss.

How do the EVs for these decisions compare?

Let's say there's $25 in the pot pre-flop, and both you and your opponent have $100 behind. You have AA, and he's on a four-flush with no pair or overcards. He has 9 flush outs, plus the equivalent of another out for his backdoor two-pair or trips draws. If you push and he calls, out of 100 hands, you'll win $125 about 60 times, and lose 100 about 40 times, for a net gain of $3500 over 100 hands, or about $35/hand.

Now assume you bet the pot at the flop, and he calls, putting $75 in the pot at the turn. You plan to push if the turn blanks, and fold if the flush hits.

If he folds every time he blanks at the turn, then 78 times you win $50. About 1.5 times you win $125, when he's hit a pair at the flop, calls, and misses at the river. About 0.5 times you lose 100, when he's hit a pair at the flop, calls, and makes his draw at the river. 20 times you lose $25, when he makes his flush at the turn and you fold. Your net gain is $3537.50 over 100 hands, or $35.375 per hand.

Now assume he's loose enough that he'll call 50% of the time at the turn. Out of 100 such hands, the turn will miss the flush about 80 times. Two of those 80 times, he'll hit a pair. You'll push all 80 times and he'll call 40 times, two of which are times when he has hit a pair at the flop. You lose $25 (your flop bet) 20 times, when his flush hits at the turn. You win $50 40 times, when you push at the blank turn, and he folds. You win $125 31 times, when he calls your push at the turn and misses his draws at the river. And you lose $100 9 times, when he calls your push at the turn and outdraws you at the river. That's a net gain of $4475 over 100 hands, or $44.75 per hand.

Against a player who's going to call with a flush draw every time if you bet the flop, no matter how much you bet, the EV of pushing at the flop is $35, and you lose your stack about 40% of the time. The EV of waiting for the turn is $35.375 if he'll fold every time he misses the turn(and you lose your stack 0.5% of the time), and $54.75 if he'll call half the time when he misses the turn (and you lose your stack 9% of the time).

In this situation, "getting your money in with the best of it" means waiting to push until you see the turn card.

Cris

[CrisBrown]

Hi All,

In my reply, I had written:

[ QUOTE ]
Against a player who's going to call with a flush draw every time if you bet the flop, no matter how much you bet, the EV of pushing at the flop is $35, and you lose your stack about 40% of the time. The EV of waiting for the turn is $35.375 if he'll fold every time he misses the turn(and you lose your stack 0.5% of the time), and $54.75 if he'll call half the time when he misses the turn (and you lose your stack 9% of the time).

[/ QUOTE ]

The $54.75 figure is a typo. The correct figure is $44.75. My apologies for any confusion.

Cris

[LokiV]

[ QUOTE ]
ding ding ding! we have a winner. why Loki didn't get this, i have no clue.


[/ QUOTE ]

Because I didn't bother to read your stupid stories when you could have SAID WHAT CRIS SUMMARIZED OUTRIGHT and done with much less bother.

[paland]

[ QUOTE ]
I agree. And at NL, a lot of the variance of outdraws can be minimized in the way you play your hand. Too many NL players ascribe to the "all you can do is get your money in with the best of it" philosophy, without understanding what that means. Getting your money in with the best of it is not simply about making a positive equity (+EV) decision. It's about making the decision that has the greatest equity.

Cris

[/ QUOTE ]
Thanks Cris for bringing this up. I've been thinking about this lately and it's nice to hear it from a pro. I've found that by not "getting your money in with the best of it", when I have monster hands, I've actually staved off elimination in tournaments when the other player hits that runner-runner. This idea has consumed me in the last few days and I have only recently started to change my strategy. It's actually a big change for me as I am usually super aggressive in a tournament. I'm in a transistion phase right now and experimenting. I came in second in a tourney today (242 entrants) so I like what I'm seeing so far.

[CrisBrown]

Hi paland,

[ QUOTE ]
found that by not "getting your money in with the best of it", when I have monster hands, I've actually staved off elimination in tournaments when the other player hits that runner-runner.

[/ QUOTE ]

Be careful about this, too, however. Note that the correct play in my example was to make a pot-sized bet at the flop, to deny the opponent correct odds to call for one card, and then make the stronger move if the turn blanks, when you'll have a greater advantage and more leverage. To me, that's still an "aggressive" approach to the hand. It's just not an "I'm ahead so all-in" hyper-aggressive approach.

Remember that when you're ahead in a hand, you're "drawing to blanks." While a blank doesn't improve your hand in an absolute sense, it does improve your hand relative to your opponent's hand, because it improves your chance of winning the pot. So in many instances, it pays to take that card for as small a bet as will deny your opponent proper drawing odds.

Cris