Advanced play or nonsens?

[iago]

Regarding the discussion of advanced plays, BluffThis! wrote in another thread:

[ QUOTE ]


The reason this most likely wouldn't work on a short stack on the higher limit tables is that everyone there including them are more aggressive, which includes betting and checkraising even with very weak draws.

[/ QUOTE ]

Regarding betting and raising with weak draws, I've recently seen some plays on the 2k tables that just baffels me, and I was wondering about them. Anyone care to take a stab at it? I'll give an example from the Stars 2k game.

Players are Darwinism and Spräg....spr...a guy from Helsinki.

Preflop: D in EP raises, three to the flop. Pot is 240.
Flop: J96, two spades.
D fires 200 into the pot, other guy folds.
S (virtual button) raises the max, D sets them both all in. S calls.
Turn/River: Turn T, river a 5 that completes the flush.
Showdown: D has JJQT (no spades), S holds the magnificent hand of 234T and reraised on a T-high flushdraw, and wins with the flush.

Now, I might understand the possible steal attempt (reraise), and the trap by underbetting the pot. But I've seen tons of plays like this when I railbird the 2k tables, and I really don't understand WHY they might be +EV in the long run. It just seems like gambling to me. Is there some sort of metagame going on here (putting the other player on tilt, trying to get a big stack so you can push the other players around)?

These plays go against every book I've read. They are the most interesting ones for me (reraises with a weak flushdraw, bottom two, openended str8 draw on a twoflush board), and I don't understand them at all.

I am just as baffled. Assuming both had roughly $2000 stacks, S's call was around 1100 into a 2400 pot so he's getting 2 to 1 odds here, barely enough for a nut flush draw in holdem, much less 10 high in Omaha. Furthermore, it's hard to come up with a hand that S has even a 50-50 chance against. Even against a purely random hand he's a 2:3 dog.

So unless D's all-in was relatively small (say 600 or less) the only justification for the call is "i don't think he has any spades", and even then it's borderline. And he better not because he's a 9:1 dog against a naked higher flush draw (no matter how bad you try to make the side cards).

Edit: It's interesting to note that heads up the naked flush draw is enough to justify a call here against almost any hand D has that does not contain a flush draw and that 80% of all hands would not have any flush draw here. It is especially likely that D has no flush draw if S can put him on a set of jacks (assuming the board J is a spade). The problem of course is that you need to have an excellent read on your opponent here and even then it's still a borderline call. Obviously, S is either a great or terrible player. Not much middle ground here.

(BTW, using twodimes and assuming the suits are maximumly favourable to S this is a 70-30 flop in favour of D)

On second thought it doesn't have to be an "excellent read". D has to be insane to re-raise here without top set or wrap/flush draw combo and the former is more likely than the latter (i think).

Last stab cuz it's long past my bedtime.

Say S is thinking like this before he re-raised:

If I re-raise he will fold if he has less than trips and re-raise me all-in if he has them (or a flush/wrap draw). There are about 10000 ways he could have JJxx and only 600 (crude estimate) he could have the flush/wrap draw. To keep it simple and conservative say they split 90-10 for JJxx.

If he as a hand and I call, 10% of the time I'm a 9:1 dog and will lose an average of about $1400 from my curernt position (.9*-2000 + .1*2000), the other 90% of the time i will lose an average of $800 for an average loss of $860 (note this is damn close to ignoring the deadly flush/wrap possability).

say he as an X% chance of having a strong hand. Assuming I call the re-raise I will win $440 (1-X)% of the time and lose $860 X% of the time. In order to break even he must have JJxx or better less than 440/(440+860) or 33% of the time.

So the question becomes what is the probability here that D has a very strong hand and that of course depends on S's read of D's playing style.

Of course I actually assume he's worked this scenario out previously.

Man, the more i think about this the more i fear moving up to 2K PLO.

[BluffTHIS!]

You should read Dr. Alan Schoomaker's, The Psychology of Poker, or Poker, Sex and Dying by Juel Anderson if you want to understand loose aggressive players. You are questioning the strategic basis of certain plays that often have their true basis in psychology. However, being aggressive is definitely necessary to be winning poker player, and that is one thing LAGs have in abundance.

[Big Dave D]

The underbet is fairly standard for meta game reasons - alsothere is no compulsion to always bet the pot. sprägäri is not a lag but a lap and always plays the big games one step away from being clinically insane. The beauty of PLO is that these players last longer.

gl

dd

[Bartholow]

Just to put it clearly: the raise with T high flush draw is just plain bad here.

I find trying to understand these plays and commenting on them very educational so forgive my noobiness if what I'm saying seems too obvious.

Of course it's also possible that S is buying an image here with a raise/call bluff that looks far worse on the surface than it actually is. I'm sure that a lot of players will be thinking "WTF" when they see this playout. Assuming this is a full table his investment is in all the players on the table plus any observers on the waiting list.

Oh and I assume that we all agree that this is a terrible play if this is a tournament (post-rebuy/no-rebuy), correct?

[iago]

OT: I found a fun handhistory with Darwinism involved a while back. He's taken the long route to the 2k tables [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

http://groups.google.com/group/rec.g...0a27f5bf3af1cf

[Big Dave D]

I am almost certain he wasnt playing there seriously. I do know he rebuilt his bankroll from scratch on Stars, but mid-2004 he was certainly playing in bigger games. Although there is maybe a 1% chance this was the start of his roll.

gl

Dave