Poker

[INFaMaS]

^^^

As to the above, I think Sklansky hit the nail on the head:

In loose games, want to stop bluffing and semi-bluffing so much, since they will probably call. You can relax your starting hand requirements and play more drawing hands since you'll know your opponents will pay you off if you hit something.

In tight games, bluffing and semi-bluffing become more important, since your opponents are more likely to fold. Your legitimate hands, however, aren't worth nearly as much since everyone is going to be playing a good hand.

 

[Infinite Jest]

I'm loving this thread guys

Can I get some feedback on a sequence of hands?

90-seat tournament, down to 24. 18 get paid, but 10-18 pay less than double the buy-in. I'm in 8th place on a tight table. I have plenty of chips relative to the blinds. Lots of blinds are being stolen - I've folded all my blinds for the past 2 or 3 circuits.

#1: I get QT and raise 4xBB on a semi-steal. BB puts in a pot sized re-raise. I call. Flop comes AAJ. He goes all-in. I fold and he shows me AK, so I would have been drawing to three outs. Correct fold, but was the steal and the pre-flop call correct?

#2: short-stack raises from button. I'm in BB with 89 suited. I call, she has 66 and they hold up. I ran this hand on an odds calculator, and I was a miniscule favourite, so mathematically it was correct....but I lost half my stack on a coinflip.

#3. Next hand I have 33. I now have about 10xBB left. I go all-in hoping to take the blinds or get a call from AQ or something where I can double up. I run into AJ suited and QQ and they both beat me.

I go from 8th to out in 23rd in three hands.

Any thoughts?

 

[thizzSantaCruz]

Sim0n I am not a big SNG player but I will give you my 2 cents for what its worth.

#1: I get QT and raise 4xBB on a semi-steal. BB puts in a pot sized re-raise. I call. Flop comes AAJ. He goes all-in. I fold and he shows me AK, so I would have been drawing to three outs. Correct fold, but was the steal and the pre-flop call correct?

The fold is definantly correct and the steal seems like a good idea. If you think you had a good chance to steal the blinds I do not see why you would not want to. QT is marginal but definantly worth stealing blinds on.

#2: short-stack raises from button. I'm in BB with 89 suited. I call, she has 66 and they hold up. I ran this hand on an odds calculator, and I was a miniscule favourite, so mathematically it was correct....but I lost half my stack on a coinflip.

Once again this call is mostly about how the opponenet has been playing. Has she been attempting to steal a lot of blinds? How small was her stack? If it was small enough you have the correct odds to call with any 2 cards. Also how big was your stack? If you still had a relatively small stack I do not think I would make this call, but only if the discount you get from you big blind was neligible.

#3. Next hand I have 33. I now have about 10xBB left. I go all-in hoping to take the blinds or get a call from AQ or something where I can double up. I run into AJ suited and QQ and they both beat me.

This is the correct play in my mind. With 10x the blind I am shoving with anything marginal. As the shortstack people will be gunning for you so a quick double up is key.

All in all I think I probably would have done the same thing for each hand in the same situation. Its not a bad sequence of hands just an unfortunate one.

 

[huntmich]

I just learned this and thought it was quite useful:

A way to determine your pot odds: After the flop, take the number of "outs" you have. These are the number of cards in the deck that will give you the best hand. Take this number, multiply by four. Round up, and this is your percentage of winning the hand. For example, if you have Q10, and the flop comes AJ2. You have 4 outs to the nuts, the four remaining kings in the deck (this is assuming no one has any kings, and you have to take that into account). Therefore, your odds of winning are around 17-18%. Like I said, you round up a couple of percentage points to take into account runner runner hands. Therefore, you have approximately a 1/6 chance of having the nuts. If you plan on chasing and not semi-bluffing, it is economical to call any bet that is 1/6 or less of the pot.

After the turn, you take your number of outs and multiply by 2, rounding up. Therefore, if the turn in the above situation came a 3 (board playing AJ23), you still have 4 outs. Your percentage of hitting a four outer on the river is approximately 9-10%.

 

[glowbug]

I'm loving this thread guys

Can I get some feedback on a sequence of hands?

90-seat tournament, down to 24. 18 get paid, but 10-18 pay less than double the buy-in. I'm in 8th place on a tight table. I have plenty of chips relative to the blinds. Lots of blinds are being stolen - I've folded all my blinds for the past 2 or 3 circuits.

#1: I get QT and raise 4xBB on a semi-steal. BB puts in a pot sized re-raise. I call. Flop comes AAJ. He goes all-in. I fold and he shows me AK, so I would have been drawing to three outs. Correct fold, but was the steal and the pre-flop call correct?

#2: short-stack raises from button. I'm in BB with 89 suited. I call, she has 66 and they hold up. I ran this hand on an odds calculator, and I was a miniscule favourite, so mathematically it was correct....but I lost half my stack on a coinflip.

#3. Next hand I have 33. I now have about 10xBB left. I go all-in hoping to take the blinds or get a call from AQ or something where I can double up. I run into AJ suited and QQ and they both beat me.

I go from 8th to out in 23rd in three hands.

Any thoughts?

#1 - I doubt I'd have called the reraise unless my QT was suited. With that size reraise from OOP BB I'd assume he either had A-high kicker or high pockets, raising the possibility that one of my cards was essentially counterfeited in either situation. Of course it might also depend on how loosely I had observed him playing at that point, but most likely I'd have folded without a suit.

#2 - Depends on the size of the raise and her prior play. Imo most non-pro folks tend to play tightly from SS in tournament near-end situations and you mentioned the table was tight, so I'd have assumed she was playing pockets and I'd have probably backed off, but since the pot odds were in your favor you really can't feel bad about a call there.

Only problem is, imo you know you've absolutely got to hit the flop with at least the draw in that situation because you can't really afford to chase hitting a mid-pair to the turn after your stack just took a beating...that's why I'd have probably laid down, because hoping for a mid-pair hit on the flop against a decent raise just after taking a beating would be out of the question for me, so for me the only playable option would be for the draw. And that wouldn't be enough for me in that situation.

#3 - I assume you were SB w/ 33, is that correct, or am I reading "next hand" wrong? Did neither of those other hands raise pre-flop? If they didn't it's an okay gamble I suppose, but if they gave an indication of a hand I think at most I would have called and then bailed with no set on the flop...undoubtedly one of them would have pushed then even if you checked up.

If nobody raised up to you, I'd still look at how many people limped in...if 3 or more limped in I'd suspect someone was softpedaling, hoping for a raise to hammer, or at least playing higher mid-pairs. In that situation I might have opted for a semi-steal raise to take a shot at taking it down...but once the other two called, from SB you're still essentially having to hit on the flop or get out imo. 33 from SB just isn't a pleasant view imo, particularly when you've got another full circuit coming to you to hold off for something better.

That's just me though, I don't subscribe to the theory that you've always got to push low pairs hard to play them at all.

Also, I play on the tight side of tight-aggressive, so take my .02 for exactly what it's worth.

 

[thizzSantaCruz]

4 outer on river is actually 8.7% basically make it a rule of thumb not to chase gut shot draws. *this was ment for hunt mich*

On glowbugs theory of #3... it depends on your position, if it is folded to me I think you have to push in that situation. The blinds alone increase your stack by 15%. 33 is decent I would not mind getting called by overs here. What you want to avoid is getting called by a coule of big stacks and have them check it down against you just to get you out of the tournament. You are saying you lay down 33 and wait for a better hand? At this point your stack is reduced to 8.5x the big blind and opponenets are even more likely to call you with any 2 cards because they are getting odds on you. Plus in another orbit there is a pretty fair chance you are not going to see a better hand than a small pocket pair.

Only way I lay this down is if there is a raise infront of me.

I agree with #1, do not call that re-raise. When I first read that I did not catch that.

For #2, if opponenet is playing tight it is more conceivable to put them on high overs than a pocket pair. You can call with your 89s and chase a draw if given the oppurtunity or you can shove your stack if you hit an 8 or a 9. Putting an opponenet on pocket pairs without there being a 3-bet preflop is a good way to play timid.

 

[fozzy nutz]

its hard to say without knowing what the blinds were at, the size of the chip stacks and how the people were playing. i'll set the blinds at 100 -200 for calculation sake.....all right my take on it


#1: I get QT and raise 4xBB on a semi-steal. BB puts in a pot sized re-raise. I call. Flop comes AAJ. He goes all-in. I fold and he shows me AK, so I would have been drawing to three outs. Correct fold, but was the steal and the pre-flop call correct?

the steal was not a bad play Q-10 is favored against about 60% of random hands. once he called your 800 chip bet there was 1700 chips in the pot lets say he re-raised you 1200 there was 2900 in the pot you were getting over 2/1 return on your call. Q/10 against A/K is a 65/35 right call. Q/10 against A/A or K/K is a 80/20 so it was still the correct call if you believe in pot odds. my big question is why in the hell would he go all in thats the time to slow play. Think about the only hand that has you beat is J/J or A/A call everyone else folds thats the spot you slow play.

#2: short-stack raises from button. I'm in BB with 89 suited. I call, she has 66 and they hold up. I ran this hand on an odds calculator, and I was a miniscule favourite, so mathematically it was correct....but I lost half my stack on a coinflip.

personally i wouldn't have made the call. why? because you were geting 1/1 return on your call and the situation that happened was (8/9 suited vs small pair) is the only time your favorite all the other potential hands you a dog.


#3. Next hand I have 33. I now have about 10xBB left. I go all-in hoping to take the blinds or get a call from AQ or something where I can double up. I run into AJ suited and QQ and they both beat me.

i'm presuming you were the small blind....as been said any time your less then 10 times the blind you push


hopefully that was clear its a little easier to explain then write it out

 

[glowbug]

On glowbugs theory of #3... it depends on your position, if it is folded to me I think you have to push in that situation. The blinds alone increase your stack by 15%. 33 is decent I would not mind getting called by overs here. What you want to avoid is getting called by a coule of big stacks and have them check it down against you just to get you out of the tournament. You are saying you lay down 33 and wait for a better hand? At this point your stack is reduced to 8.5x the big blind and opponenets are even more likely to call you with any 2 cards because they are getting odds on you. Plus in another orbit there is a pretty fair chance you are not going to see a better hand than a small pocket pair.

Only way I lay this down is if there is a raise infront of me.

That was exactly what I premised my comment on, Simon being in SB position and knowing that at least 1 of the 2 players (at least the QQ player, if the AJ player was in later position and called the raise you got two decent hands you're facing against which you're probably a dog, since you're a dog to even higher suited connectors) had thrown down a healthy raise.

No way the QQ player doesn't throw down a hefty raise to smoke out the A or K-rag, so if I'm looking at that w/ 33 from SB I'm going to call at best since I don't have the opportunity of being first firer with the all-in to pressure them.

 

[Infinite Jest]

Thanks all. I think I agree about not calling the re-raise in #1. I figured I was behind, but my logic at the time was to stay in and at least see a flop, and get out if it missed me. Partly, I didn't want to look weak - I figured I'd been folding a lot in the blinds (I had junk, but they didn't know that) so I didn't want to look like I'd back down against any agression.

With #3: The QQ was in the BB so he acted after me, and the AJ must have limped. I don't remember exactly but he was in mid position. He had us both covered. The QQ had about the same number of chips as me - e.g. he was shortstacked.

My bad luck. The table had been very weak up till then. The guy with AJ had been folding his blinds a lot - every time he was in a blind, the tourney shortstack would go all-in (he only had about 3-4xBB), and this guy would fold, even though he was about 2:1 to call, with the blinds and antes in the pot).

 

[alasdairm]

hopefully that was clear its a little easier to explain then write it out

perhaps people could start using pictures instead of descriptions - it's much easier to see what's going on. i found a whole pack of cards at:

http://holdemhandanalysis.tripod.com/images/kingofdiamonds.gif

which gives:

just change the name appropriately.

alasdair

 

[thizzSantaCruz]

Ok I have a quick poker question for you guys. I want to see what you think kof this.

I am on the CO (I act one spot before the button). Table is 9 handed, .25/.50 blinds. I have a stack of 50 dollars. The hand is folded to me and I raise to 2 dollars with QQ. The button calls and then the big blind pushes the bet up to 6 dollars. I call (this might be my mistake right here). The button folds. The flop comes 4c As 5c. Villain leads out into me with a bet of 5 dollars into a pot of 14. What do you do here? He has 24 dollars remaining in his stack.

 

[glowbug]

Ok I have a quick poker question for you guys. I want to see what you think kof this.

I am on the CO (I act one spot before the button). Table is 9 handed, .25/.50 blinds. I have a stack of 50 dollars. The hand is folded to me and I raise to 2 dollars with QQ. The button calls and then the big blind pushes the bet up to 6 dollars. I call (this might be my mistake right here). The button folds. The flop comes 4c As 5c. Villain leads out into me with a bet of 5 dollars into a pot of 14. What do you do here? He has 24 dollars remaining in his stack.

All these scenarios depend on observations of prior play in the game, it seems.

If the guy hadn't been playing tight before, I think I'd reraise him 2.5X his bet there to see if he was bluffing. He bet less than 1/2 the pot, which would suggest to me that he was either a) bluffing with nothing at all or trying to buy another card on a draw, b) he paired one of the unders or c) he's playing non-A pockets.

If it had been me playing his hand with pockets and I had hit the set, I would have played a pot-sized raise to try to take the pot at that point because of the draws, and all the better if my opponent had simply paired the A because he'd be likely to call and follow me all the way down the hand.

So from that reasoning I wouldn't think he was betting a set. And I don't think he paired A...I think the better bet in that case would have been to represent it more strongly in light of the draws on the board.

Imo by reraising him there you either take him down on the bluff or buy scenario because of his stack size...with your stack at that point you could afford to try to take him down with a reraise. If he's on a draw and still decides to chase, probably the most he does is call to the turn and hopefully the turn doesn't help him so he'd probably check up in light of your reraise...you could decide then if you wanna push him again at that point.

Otoh, if he reraised you, you'd have a tough call to make eh...could be playing the A or a draw and willing to chase at any cost. Again, it would depend on his prior play...I might lay down at that point. But if he's bluffing or trying to buy the turn card you probably take him down on the reraise, so imo it'd be worth the shot at that cost.

If the guy had been playing tight before, I might be inclined to believe he'd hit the A, and lay down to his bet.

 

[alasdairm]

^ i agree with glowbug's first statement - it depends.

based only on what you wrote, he caught his ace or he has a decent flush draw (perhaps he's holding QcKc or maybe Ac and an irrelevant kicker).

there are two bets here: fold or all-in

if i'm feeling cagey (depending...) i might see if a club hits on the turn. if not, i'm all-in

alasdair

 

[thizzSantaCruz]

I had no reads on the hand, I had just sat down at the table. The re-raise had me questioning myself, at 50 max ring games reraises pre-flop usually are insanely strong. Not enough people widen up the range of their game in a controlled manner.

In retrospect I probably should have 4-bet into him preflop and see how he reacted. Most likely I have to lay this hand down but I got kind of antsy and pushed 17 at him which is not neccesarily a bad move because I am theoretically putting him all in but not risking as much money. He has to know the remaining 11 dollars in his stack are going in if the turn drops, only bad thing is he pushed his whole stack at me. Who knows the guy could have been a hyper-aggressive donk but I had to fold.

Poker....I either love it or detest it.

 

[thizzSantaCruz]

o and if anyone wants to get on some cash games at stars im on right now

i disabled the search function so get at me on aim skte1ement or PM me.

 

[donkeyPUNCH]

poke 'er?! i barely know'er!!

 

[fozzy nutz]

All these scenarios depend on observations of prior play in the game, it seems.

If it had been me playing his hand with pockets and I had hit the set, I would have played a pot-sized raise to try to take the pot at that point because of the draws, and all the better if my opponent had simply paired the A because he'd be likely to call and follow me all the way down the hand.

So from that reasoning I wouldn't think he was betting a set. And I don't think he paired A...I think the better bet in that case would have been to represent it more strongly in light of the draws on the board.


If the guy had been playing tight before, I might be inclined to believe he'd hit the A, and lay down to his bet.

my take on it would have been he's playing big slick. why because i've sat at those 50 max ring games and he re-raised and to me that means a/a, a/k, or k/k to me. he hits top set he's not going to lead out, a/k his bet is logical, k/k he's trying to represtent big slick and buy you off a weak ace.


if i were playing that hand and hit a set i would have slow played em trying to get all my money in the pot. i know draws are on the board but which of them would he have re-raised with? the only possibility is a/k of clubs and even then
i'm a 70/30 favorite

 

[Mehm]

thizz: I would have called the re-raise on the pre-flop, then folded when the A droped on the flop. I lose alot though so....

 

[Mehm]

here is another scenerio. I'm in small blind on a 9 handed .5/.10 NL ring game. I have 9 4 suited and pay .05 to see the flop. Bam, 2 pair. I'm raised .25 and push my whole $5 stack (all in) back. He calls with top pair and catches another pair on the river.

Not calling pre-flop with air is probably the best decision I guess.

any thoughts?

 

[alasdairm]

94 is my nemesis. i almost never play it unless i get to check it in the big blind and see a flop for free or prevailing conditions suggest otherwise.

regarding the scenario above, some hands you're just going to lose...

alasdair