The concept of Winning the Pot when it is Big

[Jezebel]

Bisonbison's post on the set of Jacks got me thinking about the concept of winning the pot when it is big.

It appears that the main conflict among the two camps on this issue is whether to try and win the pot now, or try and maximize the number of bets going into the pot.

Okay, here is my take on the whole "win the pot when it's big" concept. I'm no author and I'm probably terrible with analogies, but I'm going to give a shot at explaining my interpretation of this concept.

Lets imagine that we are having a pie baking party with 9 of our friends. Each friend is going to bring ingredients (chips) for this pie (pot) and they all expect to get more than their fair share of slices (pos EV) of the pie when it is cooked. Our goal is to get the most amount of pie at the end. It does not matter whether we get a small piece of a huge pie, or a large piece of a small pie, we want to be eating the most pie regardless of its shape.

Now our friends come in different varieties. Some will bring ingredients and not get one crumb from the pie (drawing dead). We don't want to piss these friends off. We are more than happy to have them come to the party. They are everyones best friend. No reason to chase them from the party 'cause they are subsidizing the rest of us. Very few of our friends will fall into this category especially when we are making a huge pie.

Other friends are going to bring ingedients but they are only going to get a tiny piece of pie not nearly the size they believe is their fair share (neg EV). We don't mind these friends at the party either. Sure they get a piece of pie, but they make our slice bigger than our fair share, so we don't mind these guys hanging out with us either.

Then there are the friends that are the freeloaders like us. They show up at the party with like one egg and expect half of the damn pie! (Pos EV) We don't like these guys because they are moving in on our gig. Sometimes there is nothing we can do about having them at the party, but occasionally we can make them bring more ingedients if they plan to stick around (making them draw incorrectly by raising).

Now for obvious reasons we would like to be the only freeloader at the party. Too many freeloaders means less pie for us relative to the ingredients that we brought.

The problem is when we make a very large pie many of our friends that are still at the party have accidentally become freeloaders because of all the ingredients that our good friends left behind (dead money). Now the question is do we want to share the pie with these freeloaders even though we are going to get more than our fair share? There seems to be plenty to go around, but remember we want the most pie period. Obviously it is in our best interest if we can get the freeloaders to leave. There is a good chance that these freeloaders are not going to leave the party until the pie is cooked, but there is a chance that we can convince them that the pie will taste like sh!t when its done and maybe they will leave the party. If they are street smart they will realize what we are trying to do and stick around, but If we can dupe them into leaving the party early we end up with a slightly smaller pie overall, but we get a much bigger piece and end up with more pie overall.

In my opinion this is what S&M mean when they say win the pot when it is big. Sure you will occassionally knock out someone who is drawing dead, but when the pot is huge most of the people contesting it are freeloaders....and nobody likes a freeloader.

[Quackpot]

Gee Thanks,

Now I'm hungry. It's bed time and nothings open. [img]/images/graemlins/crazy.gif[/img] My take on it is, if they want to have a chance at the pie they better prove it by putting in some extra ingredients. When it's done I'm hoping to see a gift from allstate (the good hands people) [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

[J.R.]

Now the question is do we want to share the pie with these freeloaders even though we are going to get more than our fair share? There seems to be plenty to go around, but remember we want the most pie period. Obviously it is in our best interest if we can get the freeloaders to leave.

Not always, as I think its in your best interest to bake a bigger pie with top set, cause you are a big tough guy who's packing heat and isn't gonna let those puny freeloaders get they grimy mits on your pie very often. Most freeloaders like to loiter and hang around too long to see what things slide their way, so they are far more likely to make the mistake of staying to long than leaving too early. Exploit this, especially when you're rollin' deep and welcome the fight.

[Chris Daddy Cool]

Pies, freeloading, poker.... I'm so confused... [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

[img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

[sthief09]

I like the analogy.

But the question is which is more important: getting rid of the people drawing live or sucking in the people drawing thin. I think getting rid of people drawing live is more important. By sucking people in you may make 3 extra BB. But if you inadvertently suck in someone who's drawing live, then you could lose 18 BB by losing a pot you otherwise would've won.

I guess technically you'd have to lose the pot 1 in 7 times to a hand that "should've" folded if you raise for it to be EV-neutral in this situation. 6 times u are +3 BB and 1 time you are -18 BB. This doesn't make sense to me. If I'm considering this situation, I'd generally think that the most important thing to do is chase out the gut shot draws.

However, in bisonbison's situation, I think (after numerous people pointing this out to me) that you can accomplish both. You'll probably get more money in the point by raising the flop, and you'll get backdoor flush draws to be incorrect to call. If you can make the A [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] correctly fold, that's more important than waiting to raise to chase out gut shots, which probably aren't as likely.

I think the interesting thing is that, according to the FTOP, bisonbison played it perfectly. If UTG+1 turned over his A [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]Ax and the other guy turned over 98 then his best play would've been to wait until the turn to raise. If he raised the flop, then the gut shot would've been getting correct odds to call. Unforutately the gutter picked up an extra 4 outs on the turn, and chasing him out became impossible. Also, had the [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] not fallen on the turn, he would've made it incorrect for AA to call the raise, drawing to only 2 outs. If he raised AA on the flop, he would be getting correct odds to call with his backdoor nut flush draw plus his 2-outer to a set. However, if a [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] did not fall, on the turn, AA would have only 2 outs, but would have likely incorrectly folded anyway, praying that his overpair would be good.

Unfortunately the turn card was one of the worst cards imaginable. It gave one opponent an extra 4 outs, and another an extra 9 (!). I'm not saying that raising the turn is right, but I think it's really interesting how your opponents' cards completely change things.

[Jezebel]

[ QUOTE ]
Not always, as I think its in your best interest to bake a bigger pie with top set, cause you are a big tough guy who's packing heat and isn't gonna let those puny freeloaders get they grimy mits on your pie very often.

[/ QUOTE ]

J.R. just because we make a bigger pot does not mean we are going to end up with the most money in the long run. If an opponent incorrectly folds out of a pot we gain more than if he correctly stays in the pot even though his staying makes the pot larger. We make money in both situations, but we make the most longterm when an opponent folds out of pot that he should have stayed in, even though the pot will be smaller.

You also mention that we are packing heat and not going to let them get their hands on our share very often. However, if we don't take measures to try and knock them out of the pot then we are doing nothing to prevent them from occassionally taking our pie. The point is if they are a freeloader we do best when they fold. Period.

[ QUOTE ]
Most freeloaders like to loiter and hang around too long to see what things slide their way, so they are far more likely to make the mistake of staying to long than leaving too early. Exploit this, especially when you're rollin' deep and welcome the fight.

[/ QUOTE ]

As long as the freeloader is in Pos EV land, he can not make a mistake by staying too long. The only way to exploit these folks is to make them leave early. Sure we still make money when they stay, but we make the most when they leave.

[J.R.]

[ QUOTE ]
As long as the freeloader is in Pos EV land, he can not make a mistake by staying too long. The only way to exploit these folks is to make them leave early. Sure we still make money when they stay, but we make the most when they leave.


[/ QUOTE ]

Sorry, when I first read this I though you were referring to everyone as a freeloader, not just those with good enough hands to continue, and this thread kinda disappeared. You are right in what you say, but might also want to pnder a few other thoughts.

A few ideas:

1) if this hand is multiway, you will not often get the freeloader(s) to make a mistake by calling your bet, but you can allow the non-freeloader(s) the chance to make a mistake by betting; (Opportunity Cost)

2) the bigger your hand, the less likely there is/are freeloader(s) against you (because they don't have outs);

3) even though the freeloader(s) is/are not making a mistake by calling, you are often making a mistake by not betting as your EV is greater betting than it is checking (if the freeloader won't make the mitake of folding).

One must consider the liklihood that a feeloader will make the mistake of folding when they should call, IMO this mistake is the most uncommon mistake, especially in big multiway pots and situations that arise in a loose 2-4 game where calling too much is the typical opponent's M.O.;

4) even if there is a shot of a freeloader folding, will it happen often enough to offset the bets you would have collected from the freeloader and all the non-freeloader(s) (s) who might have called your bet without the odds to do so ("Opportunity Cost");

5) the S&M win the big pot tactics are more pot manipulation moves designed to turn a freeloader into a non-freeloader (i.e. check the flop in positon in order to raise the turn and keep the pot smaller while confronting the field with a calling two big bets in order to deny odds to somewhat olongshot draws).

Raising with a draw and overcards to clean up you overcard outs is the only S&M move I can think of right now which may ocassionally operate to get a freeloader to fold, perhaps because its rare that a freeloader folds absent a real scare card on which you can overepresent your hand and lead your freeloading opponent into believeing they are drawing dead or too thin to continue (i.e. 4 flush on board and you bet with one pair, no flush and a small flush card or overcards to your pair with no flush draw folds / i.e. a paired turn where you bet with 2 pair and a 7 high flush draw folds).

Even on a scare card where such a fold is made, the pot is typically not that large so that the freeloader's overlay is thin and their fold does not really cost them that much/or gain you that much, in big pots where a freeloader knows they might be drawing dead there is often still such a large possible overlay that even the most weak-tight postflop players will call to peel another card.



Anyway, interetsing and original post, sorry I misunderstood it at first and took so long to get back to you. I guess my point is while I agree with what you wrote, there is often a cost in attempting to induce a mistaken fold by a freeloader (both in opportunity cost and the fact that we may often be pursuing an unattainable goal, especially so in low limit games where calling is the M.O.), and many times people have a tendancy to overestimate the abilites of the opponents, especially when playing in a low limit game where our opponents will often be (at least we hope) far less sophisticated than ourselves, so we will presume there are many more freeloaders out there than there may in fact be.

Good luck and keep the original thoughts comming, I appreciate a different prespective and relish unexpected analogies. I like pie too! [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]