Live mutlis, poor players, deviation, taking chances

[McMelchior]

[ QUOTE ]
I think that not raising with AK or something at a bunch of limpers from CO or button is a really bad play

[/ QUOTE ]I used to agree with you - AK and AQ suited or not should have a superior chance of winning (over the crap people like to play) and thereby of making you a bunch of chips in the long run, and not raising PF was giving up a lot of those chips. But I'm not all that sure today - when it comes to low buy-in tournaments at the early levels.

The problem is the typical scenario: 4 players limp to you for t50 each, you make a close to pot sized raise from the button for t350, and with t1,825 in the pot you, the BB and 3 of the limpers see a flop of A85 rainbow. Holding AK of course you're exhilarated, but before the action makes it to you UTG has put in t1,000 and the CO has moved all-in over the top for his remaining t2,900. You look at your remaining t3,300 and ...

Building big pots preflop with big Aces makes for really unweildy hands after the flop, when everybody is eager to "see the future" even for a substantial part of their chip stack.

So when I - in this kind of tournament and at this point in the tournament - advocate limping the big Aces, it's to make the post flop play more manageable. When you hit for real you know it (QJT boards etc.), but you're probably not going to get much action (actually AQ is much better here, since fewer people will put you on a str8 on a KJT board).

A substantial part of big slick's strengh comes from the folding equity of pushing all-in over the top of a LP raise. If that FE doesn't exist the hand is pretty much a dog until a flop has proved differently.

At these buy-ins and at these early levels small pair and suited connectors are worth gold, simply because reading the hands of a bunch of wild and crazy gamblers on a raggedy flop calls for very advanced skills. When you hit the flop with these hands it's almost always a no-brainer. Compared hereto big aces are tough to play. And I like to keep my investment in tough hands down, and my decissions simple.

Best,

McMelchior (Johan)

[betgo]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I think that not raising with AK or something at a bunch of limpers from CO or button is a really bad play

[/ QUOTE ]I used to agree with you - AK and AQ suited or not should have a superior chance of winning (over the crap people like to play) and thereby of making you a bunch of chips in the long run, and not raising PF was giving up a lot of those chips. But I'm not all that sure today - when it comes to low buy-in tournaments at the early levels.

The problem is the typical scenario: 4 players limp to you for t50 each, you make a close to pot sized raise from the button for t350, and with t1,825 in the pot you, the BB and 3 of the limpers see a flop of A85 rainbow. Holding AK of course you're exhilarated, but before the action makes it to you UTG has put in t1,000 and the CO has moved all-in over the top for his remaining t2,900. You look at your remaining t3,300 and ...

Building big pots preflop with big Aces makes for really unweildy hands after the flop, when everybody is eager to "see the future" even for a substantial part of their chip stack.

So when I - in this kind of tournament and at this point in the tournament - advocate limping the big Aces, it's to make the post flop play more manageable. When you hit for real you know it (QJT boards etc.), but you're probably not going to get much action (actually AQ is much better here, since fewer people will put you on a str8 on a KJT board).

A substantial part of big slick's strengh comes from the folding equity of pushing all-in over the top of a LP raise. If that FE doesn't exist the hand is pretty much a dog until a flop has proved differently.

At these buy-ins and at these early levels small pair and suited connectors are worth gold, simply because reading the hands of a bunch of wild and crazy gamblers on a raggedy flop calls for very advanced skills. When you hit the flop with these hands it's almost always a no-brainer. Compared hereto big aces are tough to play. And I like to keep my investment in tough hands down, and my decissions simple.

Best,

McMelchior (Johan)

[/ QUOTE ]

I like playing speculative hands against loose fish with deep money too.

However, I think a late position raise with AK/AQ is a good play. A lot of times people will pay you off big with a Ax/Kx. Also, with position and initiative, you can sometimes take the pot when you miss. Sure you can lose a big pot against two pair or a set of something. It is trickier to play than limping with a small pair or something, but if you play well postflop, I think it is very EV+.

[betgo]

[ QUOTE ]
I play a lot of multi table tournements. I knew I was a better player than 90% of the field. This didn't say much because they were all terrible. I found myself constantly getting knocked out with the best hand over, and over, and over.

"How the hell do these idiots last so long only to knock me out when I am ahead?"

"How can I win all the races in a tournament when these idiots call me every single time I push?"

Well then I sat down and reanalyzed everything. I started asking players "Why did you call my all in?" I started doing some math on my chances. I started understanding the deviation of chip stacks in relation to the types of players in the tournament. Well I believe I finally found the errors of my ways. I wanted to share this to get your opinion.

I started realizing that to succeed in these tournaments I needs to understand the math and the psychology of my weak opponents in order to beat them.

I discovered that most of the poorer players tend to call all ins because... "I thought you had a small pair" when they have overs or "I thought you had overs" when they have a small pair. They always seem to think an all in player is trying to pull a fast one so I guess inside their heads they get upset or annoyed and think they are busting some big bluffer with their hand. I have seen players call all ins with hands like A8s, K9s, ATo just because they put you on a small pair. Your ahead right?!

Now I looked at the next section. Well how much ahead are you? At best 75%-80% depending on your hand. So I did a little math... how often will you win 4 75% chances to beat your opponent? The answer is 1 in 3 or 31% of the time.

Next I took an analysis of the 90% poor players, in these specific live tournaments. The general notion is that the better players will either rise slowly in chips or lose slowly in chips. Players that gamble will lose a lot or win a lot quickly. Now because the ratio of good to poor players is 9:1, in the tournaments I play, you will still have a bunch of loose players that got lucky and massed a giant chip stack compared to the number of good players in the tournament. So lets say a tournament of 100 player you have 90 poor players and 10 good ones. At the end of 3 rounds lets say 80% of the players are left.

8 good players, 72 bad players.

Lets say 15% of the bad players have big stacks or ~11
Lets say 15% of the bad players have small stacks or ~11
The rest are in between.

Of our good players most will have medium stacks that are healthy and above average.

But looking at this you still have more poor players with larger stacks than good players with good stacks. So the poor players can bust them at anytime. Even a good portion of the poor players have decent stacks that can cripple a good player's stack.

I was getting all my chips with the best hand in 97% of the time preflop or on the flop. But eventually I lost to some nugget that said "what the hell I call". How the hell do I beat this opposition that just keeps calling and outnumber me so much? Even though so many nuggets lose they still outnumber guys like us because of the sheer numbers, its like fighting the Chinese army.

I changed tactics. I played sneaky. Now I altered my raises, modified the amounts at different times. I gave the illusion of trying to lure a sucker into a trap "I see that a mile away he won't get me, I fold". I stole blinds more with sneakier raising standards.

Blinds 50/100 well sometimes I raised 300, 250, 325, 400. I changed it up 1/2 of the time from the standard 3x. I started raising 2x to 2.5x UTG to risk less. I took my time thinking also. I remained still not giving them a tell or an excuse to call. Mike Caro say players LOOK for tells to have a reason to call, they want action. Common players don't want to fold, fold, fold, they want to play. Once in a while I showed a hand when I felt they were losing confidence in my tightness. I showed folded BB crap hands to let them know I am folding crap and when I reraise I mean business. I took my time on the flop and gave credit to nuggets when they pushed after probing them. I protected my stack.

Results were this:
I played more hands in the rear (almost always stealing) and risked little. I won many small pots and an occasional large one. But I won them 100% of the time. Instead of risking my stack 4x in a row on a 75% chance to win all in. I noticed an improvement in how deep I penetrated each tournament. I started cashing BIG.

I found by the altering to smaller preflop raises and having a calm disposition taking my time I made the fish fear me and become preditable. I made them not react out of emotion or carelessness. I made them think they avoided the large trap. I basically let them eliminate themselves. Its not my job to do so.

So I feel its better to win 20 small pots 100% of the time then try and win 4 large pots 75% of the time each.

As for risks? Sure there were times I had to get it all in but now it was far fewer than before. I only had to win once or twice all in which was much more attractive than 4-5 times in a row.

Opinions and thoughts?

[/ QUOTE ]


I think manipulating opponents with bet sizes and so on is a good tactic. However, there is a fine line between effective manipulation and a tell, as in the example we discussed where you raised with a flourish when you wanted to take down the pot and your opponent limpraised you allin.

[AceofSpades]

[ QUOTE ]
I play a lot of multi table tournements. I knew I was a better player than 90% of the field. This didn't say much because they were all terrible. I found myself constantly getting knocked out with the best hand over, and over, and over.

"How the hell do these idiots last so long only to knock me out when I am ahead?"

"How can I win all the races in a tournament when these idiots call me every single time I push?"


[/ QUOTE ]

I think you greatly underestimate the skill of your opponents. Some opponents may put you on a range of hands preflop, and that range may be too wide for you but they don't know your playing style well enough to make an accurate range. Also pot odds may compensate for the all-in call.

an aggressive style of raising may cause some correct calls of an all-in with a weaker hand.

but postflop play is where you can gain the greatest edge on your opponents.

And if you are getting it all in preflop before the later stages of the tournament on a regular basis, you may have some leaks in your postflop play

Joseph

[winky51]

Yup. Lately I've been rereading Mike Caro's book. Players are just looking for any excuse to call. He says, and I agree, that if you want a call behave in the normal quite manner you always should and then do a slight movement after maybe a question is asked. For example fold your arms or respond with an "maybe" and shrug your shoulders. Something very subtle and natural.

[winky51]

I have a friend of mine who has player for over 20 years. He never picked up a book but just because of experience he is really good. He doesnt multi table online, he plays lots of SNGs and wins. He plays the live multis. He says he prefers limping in the AK and trapping weak players that can't possibly conceive of what he has. This guy is pretty good and hard to read. We played a cash NL game for months. It took me about 8 sessions to pick up on some of his tells. It was the toughest NL cash game in Fort Lauderdale. We had 4 good players (not including me I suck) and the rest were fishies.

Not sure if I like limping with AK vs loose players. Its like having aces. the old "they dont know I have TP TK because I limped". I like making the small 2.5x raises in EP and playing there.

[winky51]

Nope. Thats why I stopped pushing early in the tournament. And yes they suck that bad. I'm basing 90% on what I have seen. When I get to the final tables of these events there are probably 1-2 players that I feel are better than me. The others are slightly under (they dont think deep enough) or they got there on luck.

You gotta remember this is the indian casino in Fort Lauderdale. I have maybe met 5 good players at the 1/2 in the last 2 years of playing the 1/2 in these places. So many times I just get a table full of fish in these tournaments. about 60% of the time I have 1-2 decent players and 1-2 good players around my skills, maybe higher or lower. Hey I didn't say I was the best or real real good. I just know I am better than most where I play. I had to adjust to them and I am still learning a lot but man these guys are goofy. I am always watching every hand even when I am not in the hand to see if I can analyze the play. Many times what seems obvious to me is oblivious to these players (like when they are beat and still shove their chips in).

Let me put it to you this way. If all you guys in this post played in these tournaments I KNOW you all would cash constantly and you all are better than I am. Its a pretty juicy tournament.

[winky51]

yea yea that was when I was stupid. I didnt think back then about my actions and how others would react. My realizations came probably 6 tournaments ago.

#1 lost but played well 35 of 130 got no hands
#2 I placed 3rd
#3 lost but played well
#4 I placed 5th, had a table with some good players too
#5 lost but played well, got crippled to a 4 out bad beat on the river.
#6 lost and played like an idiot. Was cold and sick from all the damn smoke.


So not too shabby. Before I spilt top 3 for $5k and then proceeded to lose 8 tournaments in a row. Each to ugly bad beats. Thats when I started reanalyzing my play. Couldnt see how I was losing to so many rediculous bad beats. Then it hit me its because I was risking my stack too early, too many times in a row and eventually I would lose.

[Brad F.]

I don't know exactly what it is, but the tone of your post really doesn't convince me that you are better than your opponents. It sounds like you have a little Phil Hellmuth in you in that whenever someone wins a race with AQ versus your JJ you think they got lucks, and when 77 pushes into your UTG raise and beats your AK, they played poorly and is an 'idiot'.

Calling other players idiots in -EV in my opinion. Calling them loose, passive, simple or maybe even poor makes sense to me. But calling others idiots based on not playing the same way you would is not really fair to your opponenets, and I think that not giving credit to opponenets can be a dangerous thing.

You ask "How the hell can I win all the races when the players call every time I push?" You answered this question, but losing races is poker. Avoiding races is the key for you I guess, and you did address this.

But you also said you thought it was a bad thing to get your money in a 75% favorite 4 times in a row. It's not. If you are consistently in for all of your money, maybe you need to work on your in-between play. We all lose an 80% all-in pot in tournies. You just have to hope that you do it when you are a much larger stack than your opponent.

When you get busted on the 2nd hand of a tourney with AA versus 10-9 suited all-in preflop, do you think "How can I avoid this next time?" No. You want your money in here every time.

Brad

[winky51]

I don't have PH in me concerning races. One weakness is that I have contempt for my opponents so I underestimate what they are capable of doing, right or wrong. So yea I am not giving credit where its due. But I have seen some idiots out there. I have also seen weak players that think on one level. I call how it is.

Most players in these tournaments are:

loose 1 level thinkers that will toss their chips in with a medium pair, over 80% of the field is like this. They think about their hands only and if your bluffing or not. They either throw their hands in disgust when they face a higher pair or say "I knew you were bluffing" in a race AQ vs 88. Some are idiots, most are just loose and careless with their chips.

10% play well but dont go beyond level 2 thinking. They think about pot odds, their hand, your hand. Not position, the opponent's style, not how much was bet usually. They don't take into account risk analysis for their play and their opponents.

10% are smart. They play the player, the odds, their hands, your hands, bet appropriately, and some are LAGs and damn good. Not sure about their player reading abilities.

Hey maybe in other poker rooms the competition is tougher, I don't know. I heard of places where even the 36 live cash games was tough and other places where 10/20 was soft. I just know what I know about Florida.