Am I a Total Rock?

[Skip Brutale]

We are 5 handed in the last hand of 25/50, me and 2 other players are even at about 700 chips, and the two big stacks are equal. They are also both idiots who I expect to continue to play stupid into 50/100.

I'm in the bb with A6 and this moron in the sb who has a big stack completes. I see no fold equity and check. Flop is A74 diamonds and I have no D. The guy comes out for 175. He has been overbetting all game, since he's a moron afterall, so I'm not sure what to make of this. If I re-raise all-in I know he's calling with a diamond, or he could possibly do some other ruthless draw out.

I had this strange feeling like I knew my hand was probably better right now, but if I just folded I could handle short-stacked at 50/100 better than the other 2 players at my level and make the money more often than risking this guy hitting a diamond. So I folded.

I wound up finishing 3rd as expected. Was my play here just stupid? It's possible he could have me outkicked, two pair, whatever, but I didn't want him to call with his diamond. Am I starting to develop a Helmuth type of syndrom?

Lately my gap is incredibly high. I just don't want any confrontations or showdowns. Am I taking it too far?

[Skip Brutale]

I know this is a great post full of strategic concepts to debate over that was just somehow missed so I'm bringing it back to the top.

[Runner Runner]

I see nothing wrong with waiting for a better spot. If you believe that it is extremely likely that you are best on the flop and that he is drawing, a better option would be to call the flop and push on a non diamond turn.

[danng721]

With that flop, where you are either way behind or only slightly ahead of many hands, it's a good fold. Also, with your read, you have no folding equity. If you're confident that you're better than the other players, you want to avoid putting your money in marginal situations.

[Big Limpin']

Yeah, i like your play. And how you rationalized it.

I think you DID have the best hand.
I think you had better than a 2:1 chance of winning the pot.

But if you are outkicked/2 pr/flushed etc, you are losing it all.
And if he has a diamiond, you lose 1 time in 3.

Doubling only puts you at 1400. THats good for hanging in for the money, but you are still a long way from winning.

Whereas folding, you are 100% still in it.

I guess the question is: in the next 10 to 20 (?) hands, will you find a better place to put you money in?

[codewarrior]

Well played, for all of your stated reasons.

[Irieguy]

[ QUOTE ]

I'm in the bb with A6 and this moron in the sb who has a big stack completes. I see no fold equity and check.

[/ QUOTE ]

If you see no folding equity here, you are either blind or you don't understand what folding equity is. Folding equity is the amount of money in the pot multiplied by the probability that you opponent(s) will fold. There are 100 chips in the pot, and if you push he will fold most of the time. How often, exactly, he will fold is not worth debating... but it is often. You have more than 50 chips of folding equity here for sure, probably closer to 90. A 90% chance to increase you stack by more than 10% sounds a lot like one of those risk/benefit ratios that the smart poker theorists talk about.

Your play after the flop was miserable, too, in my opinion... but there is something more valuable to be gained from this thread:

[ QUOTE ]
since he's a moron afterall, so I'm not sure what to make of this.

[/ QUOTE ]

This type of thinking will hurt you more than just about any leak you can imagine. First of all, it's not nice to consider someone a moron just because they play poker a certain way. Second of all, assuming that somebody plays the way that they do because they are unpredictably stupid is moronic. Most players play in highly predictable ways. That's why good players can beat bad players. Bad players are particularly predictable. Most players who think they are good, but are really just ABC tight and quite lousy, think that bad players are unpredictable and difficult to beat. They are half right. These players ARE difficult to beat for the ABC weaklings because they are incapable of identifying the "bad players'" poor, predictable play.

You (not you, Skip, just a general statemen) have SERIOUS problems if you believe any of the following are true:

1. You are unlucky
2. Most people are morons
3. Bad players are difficult to play against

You cannot win consistently until you understand that:

1. You, and everybody else, are precisely as lucky or unlucky as you can expect to be according to relatively straightforward probabilities.

2. Most people are of average intelligence, +/- 1 SD, and can be expected to behave as others of similar intelligence would.

3. Bad poker players are easy to beat, thank goodness, and there are about 60,000 of them playing poker online right now.

I would say that if you are a good poker player, the ratio between the number of times you get called a moron (idiot, stupid, whatever) and the number of times you call somebody a moron should approach infinity. You need to work on your ratio.


[ QUOTE ]

Am I starting to develop a Helmuth type of syndrom?


[/ QUOTE ]

Since Helmuth has 9 hold'em bracelets, I would imagine that a syndrome named after him would have to include as a symptom: winning.

Irieguy

[AA suited]

yep, at 25/50, this would have been an auto fold. no need to risk your stack to fight for 100 chips on a dangerous board.

but if this was 50/100, i would have went all-in preflop w/700 chips. i'm not going to let the sb just limp in when i have A6.

of course if the sb folds and then limps in again a few hands later, BE CAREFUL! [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[spentrent]

[ QUOTE ]
If you see no folding equity here, you are either blind or you don't understand what folding equity is. Folding equity is the amount of money in the pot multiplied by the probability that you opponent(s) will fold.

[/ QUOTE ]

Catty! You should be on Queer Eye for the Straight Guy.

I get the impression from his read that he considers the opponent's fold probability to be approaching zero... am I missing something, or am I blind and stupid too?

[Voltron87]

nice post irie.