On the Edge Part VII

[StellarWind]

Some pretty extreme things being said about this article. I'd like to repeat the very first thing I wrote about it.

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I liked your article and while several of your decisions are close, all of them seem reasonable. Nice hand.

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I stand by this assessment. It's a nice hand and an interesting article.

Originally I thought reraising and coldcalling preflop were roughly equal. After much thought and a PokerStove analysis I now believe that calling is better. That doesn't make the article or the hand bad. Quite the opposite, I improve the most when I analyze tough hands. Barron gave me something worthwhile to work on. Thank you.

[BarronVangorToth]

Thanks, SW.

If you saved the PokerStove analysis and wouldn't mind taking the time to post it (or link to it) that would be terrific as I'm interested in seeing how you ran it.

And this definitely has drawn lots of commentary. A few things in replies that are all not directed at you:

1) Regarding Mason's comment, yes, I think that there was enough bad play going on that I thought SSH applied. In higher games, I start using more and more HEPFAP lessons, but, even there, given the current game conditions we have at Foxwoods, SSH applies far beyond what is traditionally the "small stakes" and is being used very effectively by me in the higher-small stakes.

2) Mason is likewise correct that the reason to raise isn't to give me the correct odds later, and I should've made this more clear in my article, as the raise is because I believe it to be the +EV move, and a benefit of doing it is that I get the odds later on. I was talking with two guys about poker last night - one is a winning $20-$40 player like me; the other is a higher stakes winning player - and neither would fold but they talked about why you would call rather than raise. The call is obviously a debatable point over the raise ... I think anyone who folds a Group 2 hand in that spot is probably suffering from what I suffered from up to a year ago:

being very weak-tight. Sure, I made my whopping BB/hour at the casino and had almost no variance at all, but it all averaged out to that aforementioned BB, which is terrible given the current metagame.

That is an aspect I did also want to avoid talking about in the article as it is a bit of a cop-out, even if applicable, that being getting people to give you action because they see you play things that may seem non-traditional on the surface, which then gets you to lose some street credit in their mind, ergo earning you monies you wouldn't get otherwise. That is always a factor moreso when I play live vs. online (especially when online everyone has everyone stats and the facts are the facts and you know who is 2+2'ing it up online as the numbers are slapping you in the face).

However, even if that does add to the decision, I certainly would still do it WITHOUT that consideration.

As Mason said, we all make plenty of money off the slam dunks and these types of hands (hopefully, in my mind) can help us push those small edges to increase our win-rate even more. Regardless, as SW says above, (hopefully, again, for everyone) the thinking involved with REALLY analyzing this type of hand will help stimulate you about thinking maybe a little different about other tricky situations.

While I talk about exploring far boundaries of poker literature, as we have seen, even when I make a play that I believe is "textbook," many people do not concur, which means that they are not playing it the same way - and I find that amazing.

Is the difference with a lot of people getting most of their $10-$20 experience online? I don't know...

Is it due to the fact that I have a good hunch that I don't have the best hand? I don't know...

Is it prejudice against this particular Group 2 hand? I don't know...

And, as I said, while I do believe I played this hand correctly (especially as I knew I could extract everything on the river doing my best impression of a calling station), there is a chance that this type of thinking is taking a fraction of a BB off my winrate, which wouldn't be good, which hopefully will be revealed as we continue to discuss this hand--

--at least until On the Edge p.8 comes out in 4 weeks when it's me vs. a 2+2'er and people can criticize me further then. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Barron Vangor Toth
BarronVangorToth.com

[PokerHorse]

all good points,and if your purpose in publishing these hands is to spur debate, then well done, you have succeeded.
I just dont see a long run positive expectation from reraising a tight raiser with loose callers in this type of spot.i want to re-raise a tight player especially if he/she plays too tight after the flop and will go down easy or to thin the field. Neither of these situations apply here.
My general outlook is too find spots where I can take control of a hand as best as possible and come in when I have an edge.It just appears to me that in this particular hand there was no edge in re-raising since he knew this player only played very tight in early posistion so where does he get control etc. Its a straight speculative gamble here.Even though KQs is a good hand, the early raiser has the edge here and its going to be tough to take it away, so for me its a boarderline call at best. Once he built the pot, he was forced to keep playing since now the pot had grown so big. Like you said,putting in extra bets to justify chasing later is not winning poker.

[StellarWind]

My PokerStove post.