Where Is This Player's Money Going?

[pudley4]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Bad analogy. Name one good player who advises consistently going all-in with only a marginal advantage preflop.

There are none.

[/ QUOTE ]

What about the classic race? PP versus AK.

Happens all the time - and good players do it too. Of course, they usually don't really want to be called...

[/ QUOTE ]

Right, but that's only one specific situation. This poster is suggesting always limping preflop, and then comes up with a poor (and flawed) analogy to justify his claims.

[Dov]

[ QUOTE ]
Right, but that's only one specific situation. This poster is suggesting always limping preflop, and then comes up with a poor (and flawed) analogy to justify his claims.

[/ QUOTE ]

I wasn't saying that OP is correct. I got the impression that the race situation was not something that had been considered in the discussion, so far.

It was an example of how good players can get a lot of money in the pot with only a slight advantage or a slight disadvantage preflop, in response to your challenge to name a good player who routinely does this.

It is a specific situation, but one that does routinely come up. I guess I misunderstood your post, and that what you were trying to do was get OP to name a single good player who employs the strategy that he suggested.

It wasn't meant to be anything more than an example of a basically neutral EV play with large metagame consequences that routinely gets used by good players.

[Leonardo]

I want the boring equations. As for giving a rigorous proof, you didnt give any proof, let alone a rigorous one. Again, you are coming up with a bunch of qualitative arguments which may or may not be correct. Ill wait for the equations.
As for the big pot thing, Ill give an example that will make it crystal clear. If there is a billion dollars in the pot and you reach say the turn, where each of you have a thousand dollars, it makes no difference what your position is. If the pot is one dollar the position is worth a lot.

[PokrLikeItsProse]

[ QUOTE ]
I want the boring equations. As for giving a rigorous proof, you didnt give any proof, let alone a rigorous one. Again, you are coming up with a bunch of qualitative arguments which may or may not be correct. Ill wait for the equations.
As for the big pot thing, Ill give an example that will make it crystal clear. If there is a billion dollars in the pot and you reach say the turn, where each of you have a thousand dollars, it makes no difference what your position is. If the pot is one dollar the position is worth a lot.

[/ QUOTE ]

That's a pretty pointless example. When are you going to have a billion dollars in the pot in a limit hold em game when the bet size is a thousand dollars or less?

Here's one example. You have JdJs in the CO, button has Ad5c, SB has Qc2c, BB has Kh4d. If it is folded to you and you just limp and all call, and you will have a 34.62% chance of winning a pot that contains four small bets. If you raise and the Ad5c calls, you will have a 69.82% chance of winning a pot containing 5.5 small bets. If you raise and both the button and BB call, you have a 50.05% chance of winning a pot containing 6.5 small bets. And of course, there is a chance that everyone might fold to you and you pick up the blinds, which is not so bad a hand like JJ that is vulnerable to overcards.

Raising clearly increases your expected value in the hand than if you merely limp in. In the first case, on average you expect to win back 1.38 small bets when you limp in for a small bet. In the second case, you expect to win back 3.84 small bets for the price of putting in two small bets before the flop. In the third case, you expect to win back 3.25 small bets for every two small bets you put in. In the last case, you win the 1.5 small bets in the blinds.

In the unlikely event that you raise and get three callers, you expect to win back 2.77 small bets for every two bets you put in. Notice that you are +.38 if you just limp in but +.77 if you raise and everyone calls. You gain in value if you raise with the best hand and you also gain value by getting hands that could outdraw you to fold.

[JJRed0]

[ QUOTE ]
Without any evidence whatsoever, I dont think he is losing money, especially if he is playing at the mid-low limits. My thinking is this. If you never raise preflop you are keeping the pot smaller. In limit poker a smaller pot makes skillful play more rewarded. On the flop much tighter/selective play is required due to the small pot. If you raise preflop and have say 4 callers, it is almost impossible for them to make a mistake from there on because the large pot dictates calling a lot-which social players love to do. I have a lot of work to do in the coming days, but in about a week I will repost and try to come up with specific examples. I think that sometime in the next few years people will realise that raising preflop is not as good as once thought and that yes, this guy has come across a strategy that is very counter intuitive but may have some merit.

[/ QUOTE ]

Agreed any body else?

[JJRed0]

[ QUOTE ]
Unless this player has hit upon some new strategy whose mathematic foundations are clearly beyond me, this player is not maximizing his profits from his good hands. If a dollar saved is a dollar earned in poker, then a dollar not won is a dollar lost. If he is losing money, the other players at the table are the beneficiaries. Is there anyway I can increase my share of this money, or is it just a given that the primary beneficiaries are looser players who are able to see more flops with worse hands without being charged big for it and I only benefit indirectly by more money being left in the hands of players who are poorer post-flop?

[/ QUOTE ]
I have begun to play more and more like this as i gain more experience. I believe the money lost preflop can be made up for on the latter rounds buy players who think to them selves "he doesnt have my KQ beat he would have reraised with AK right?" Also you can drop it cheaply when you wiff the flop which is 62% of the time. Let me know what you think.

[PokrLikeItsProse]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Unless this player has hit upon some new strategy whose mathematic foundations are clearly beyond me, this player is not maximizing his profits from his good hands. If a dollar saved is a dollar earned in poker, then a dollar not won is a dollar lost. If he is losing money, the other players at the table are the beneficiaries. Is there anyway I can increase my share of this money, or is it just a given that the primary beneficiaries are looser players who are able to see more flops with worse hands without being charged big for it and I only benefit indirectly by more money being left in the hands of players who are poorer post-flop?

[/ QUOTE ]
I have begun to play more and more like this as i gain more experience. I believe the money lost preflop can be made up for on the latter rounds buy players who think to them selves "he doesnt have my KQ beat he would have reraised with AK right?" Also you can drop it cheaply when you wiff the flop which is 62% of the time. Let me know what you think.

[/ QUOTE ]

You don't have to automatically reraise with AK, although there are some situations where it is clearly right to put in another bet. Let's take a inaccurate case that if you don't flop a pair, you never have the best hand and should fold, while if you flop a pair, you always have the best hand and will win. Let us also assume that if you raise, the pot will be size 2x, while if you merely limp in the pot will be size x. If you raise, you win 2x 38% of the time and 0 62% of the time, while if you limp, you win x 38% of the time and 0 62% of the time. If you raise, on average, you win .74x, while if you limp, you only win .38x. Of course, the case is inaccurate. If you raise, you might win the pot preflop by folding, but you also may narrow the field and protect your fair share of the pot.

Failing to raise when appropriate is sort of like failing to bet after you flop a straight with a possible flush draw out there because you want to wait and see if the flush comes before choosing to invest too much money in the pot.

[Alex/Mugaaz]

When he doesn't raise he "loses" by not taking your money with his equity edge preflop. I.E. He loses by not taking as much from other people, him not raising only increases other's wins because their losses will be less.

He also loses if him not raising gives someone odds (implied or not) to draw out on him. In this case his mistake his giving those players that much in gain, depending on what their odds are.

[Alex/Mugaaz]

The pro's would be the players with access to twodimes.

The fish would be the players who didn't have access.

[Leonardo]

But you are kind of missing the point. Preflop advantages are small most of the time. On the flop one is much more likely to be a larger favourite/underdog than preflop. You talk about giving people the odds to outdraw you, well I am talking about taking away those odds on the flop. If you keep the pot small preflop, then you are taking away peoples odds to call you on the flop, and then decisions on the flop become much more meaningful. The advantage comes because you make better flop decisions, which are more meaningful because of the smaller pot, and they make bad decisions because they are not as good as you and those decisions cost them more.
As for the bad finance analogy, I dont see how it is bad. It shows a simple case where having the option to wait and invest later with more information is valuable. In poker, limping is taking this option and waiting for the flop to bet/raise is the investing. If you can't see it then it is your lack of understanding, not mine.