I feel like I have just entered the TWILIGHT ZONE

[youngladyfriend]

So... I'm playing a $10 re-buy 8/b PL tourney on PP right now... and I am just not sure of what is going on
Raise.. Re raise... re raise.. re raise.. ALL IN. ALL IN. ALL IN. ALL IN. Are we still pre-flop here.. or are things happening that my eyes just can not see?? I admit.. I am not the best omaha player - possibly too tight - for I feel I have thrown away the 2nd best hand a few times tonight.. a 10high flush...an AKsxx pre-flop (after feebly attempting to raise these jokers... only to be raised, and re-raised all in) and then see a flop of AAK. Of course the player who raised me all in had a great drawing hand.. JQQQ. YIKES! (oh.. and the other guy had A2xx.. valid.. ehh.. [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img] )
But damnit.. these hands that I've read about in books that are second best, garbage hands... would have won! Time and time again tonight! And I kept on throwing them away. And I'm not talking about pre-flop garbage here that would have luckily made a boat or trips or something.. but low flushes, sucker ends of straights, top and bottom pair.. even top two when there was a possible straight on the board (pocket aces took that one home) Ugh! And these people kept pressuring me for all of my chips.. where are my balls? Or am I making the right play regardless of the result??
So.. I just needed to vent, and remind myself that I should be paitent because that type of aggressive crazy no-nonsense play should pay my tight ass off eventually... right, RIGHT?

Well.. I don't know what you may think, but at least you got through my entire post. All I really wanted was someome to listen. And since it is 4:30 am where I am at... I can't just call my neighbour. I have no bad beat.. no sorry tale... I am just perplexed at this oddity they call omaha. Is 10 6 4 2 off really a hand to go all in with pre-flop? Or have I entered the twilight zone????

[img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] Az

P.S.
Does anyone know any really good books on Omaha 8/b strategy? I've read the one by Skalansky/Malmuth (8/b for advanced players...) And I'm looking for something different.........

P.P.S.
and just as i wrote my last sentence.. a player just took down a nice pot with AAAK. (and no.. there were not trips on the board) [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

[Buzz]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm playing a $10 re-buy 8/b PL tourney on PP right now... and I am just not sure of what is going on
Raise.. Re raise... re raise.. re raise.. ALL IN. ALL IN. ALL IN. ALL IN. Are we still pre-flop here.. or are things happening that my eyes just can not see??

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It's called gambling.

Many of these opponents don't really know very much about how to use card reading or other poker skills to win. If you have more poker skill and are able to out-play them after the flop, they might be doing as well as possible to level your advantage by going nuts with the betting before the flop.

It's often difficult to play in these games, even when you have more playing skill than your opponents. If you came to play cards instead of to win money, it's often not much fun to play in a disciplined way in these frenzied melees. I think you have to wait for a good starting hand and then join in the frenzy. The problem is there often comes to be so much in the pot early than you tend to get stuck in the pot whenever you decide to participate in the action.

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But damnit.. these hands that I've read about in books that are second best, garbage hands... would have won!

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I'm not sure what you're writing about. Obviously, second best hands are a nightmare. By definition, you do not win with the second best hand. (You always lose to the best hand, by definition).

I think you might be confusing second best hands with second nut hands. Second-nut hands in Omaha-8 are not necessarily garbage hands. You have to sort them according to type.

For example:
(case 1) kings full of sevens, with a pair of sevens and one king on the board, is the second-nut high hand - but it is usually (over 95%) the best hand at the table. (Quad sevens would be the nuts here).
(case 2) When the final board is 6789T and you hold A3KK (second-nut low, bad high), in a full ten player game you're going to bump into an opponent who has the nut low (ace-deuce-X-Y) roughly slightly more than half the time.

So in the first case above, the second nut hand is a probable winner and in the second case the second nut hand is a probable loser (and playing for only half the pot).

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And these people kept pressuring me for all of my chips.. where are my balls? Or am I making the right play regardless of the result??

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I don't know. I suspect you're making the "correct" play some of the time and not playing as well as you might at other times.

[ QUOTE ]
So.. I just needed to vent, and remind myself that I should be paitent because that type of aggressive crazy no-nonsense play should pay my tight ass off eventually... right, RIGHT?

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I don't know. Doesn't sound like you're enjoying yourself very much. Maybe you should avoid low-cost re-buy pot-limit tournaments. Since you're in this one, I'd say maybe avoid re-buying yourself and try to out-wait the chip burners. All Omaha-8 opponents are not pre-flop nutso gambling freaks.

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Is 10 6 4 2 off really a hand to go all in with pre-flop?

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Here are some results straight from my nine-handed non-folding sims file:

hand.....high.....low.....scoop....whole wins
246Td.....264.....546.....363.....1173
246Tn.....174.....570.....347.....1091

1111 should be average in the whole wins column. I wouldn't rate either the double suited hand or the rainbow hand as very playable. But neither of them is outrageously poor as a starting hand. Would I go all-in before the flop with either of them? No. I wouldn't. But, rightly or wrongly, I might see the flop with either of them under certain conditions. (I'm not advising you, or anybody to do that).

It certainly doesn't seem twilight zonish to encounter an opponent who likes to play "chicken" before the flop and who thinks any 246T hand will do for that purpose - especially in a low-cost pot-limit re-buy tournament.

In a ring game, I think you have to stand your ground against these opponents and not be intimidated by them.

In a tournament, maybe you do better by trying to out-wait them. (The problem is the limits keep going up in these tournaments so that you can't afford to play too tightly or you'll be posting your entire stack when it's your blind).

Win or lose, it's not much fun for me to play like that (stand my ground against someone who seems to want to play "chicken") - although it's some consolation that these chip burners are usually losers.

Buzz

[youngladyfriend]

Thank you for your reply to my omaha post. I was certianly in a frenzy last night (this morning) when I wrote it.. I have played a fair amount of omaha 8/b ring games - but this was my first tourney. I failed to remember that it was 4 in the morning and certainly people were drunk and stupid playing online poker. But darnit... I've been playing poker for about 5 years now (not terribly long.. but long enough) and i had never freaking seen 3 or more people all in PF in several hands in succession. My brain hurt and thus I wrote.
I really appreciated the distinction between the second best hand and the second nut. I've just been stuck on the fact that if I don't have the nuts I don't have a winning hand... giving too much credit to my opponenets, or not trusting my own hand enough. Either way I still have a bit to learn about omaha.
Alas.. the tourney ended up unsuccesful about a half hour after the rebuy period ended... I played their all in "chicken" games with a respectable AK24. AKs. Got beat by something or other.. and by the end of it I gave up being frustrated and came to the conclusion that we were all playing scratch off lottery tickets and my odds weren't very good cause i had only scratched off about 5 of the 100 hands i was dealt. Anyway... cheers. Thanks again. Happy Holidays

Az