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You often don't know when you are ahead
Mar. 11th, 2005 06:12 amAnother PLO oddity. I thought that I was making a really loose play here, but, apparrently not.
Birks is at seat 0 with $50.
Shortstack is at seat 1 with $19.50.
Foe is at seat 7 with $50.
The button is at seat 8.
Birks posts the big blind of $.50.
Foe posts out of turn for $.50.
Just to make it entertaining, both the major protagonists in this hand have only just sat down. However, I am "fresh" from losing $140 in a $100 buy-in PLO game on Betfair, so perhaps I wasn't in the best of moods.
Birks gets 5h 8s 6h 9s
A nice double-suited hand. I'm prepared to call a pot raise with this. But I'm not yet fast enough to consider raising with it myself. Perhaps I should.
Shortstack calls.
Foe raises to $2.
Birks re-raises to $3.50.
Shortstack calls.
Foe re-raises to $14.25.
Birks calls.
Shortstack calls.
What was I saying about not being prepared to raise with it? Cancel that statement. Basically I want to knock out ropey flush hands that might be better than my ropey flush potential! This is a bit like the Hold 'em situation where a hand like 88 that has raised pre-flop can bet out on a board of KQ5 rainbow, because you might well get a queen to fold.
The reraise from the Foe seems to make it likely he has Aces (well, at this level that would be the default assumption).
Flop (board: 2s Jh 7h):
Birks checks. Shortstack checks. Foe goes all-in for $35.75. Birks goes all-in for $35.75.
Shortstack goes all-in for $5.25.
I thought about this call for a long time (in online terms). Assuming that Foe is AA, I reckon I am getting pot odds with my flush draw and gutshot (with other runner-runner possibilities) so long as he doesn't have Ax of hearts or something that counterfeits me in the straight territory. But I'm not happy.
Turn (board: 2s Jh 7h Th): Well, that's my flush. Let's pray.
River (board: 2s Jh 7h Th 9c): Good, no paired board.
Showdown:
Foe shows Ac As 3s 5c for a pair of aces.
Birks shows 5h 8s 6h 9s for a flush, jack high.
Shortstack shows Kh Kc Qs Ad for a straight, king high.
Birks wins the main pot $55.85 with flush, jack high.
Birks wins the side pot $60.90 with flush, jack high.
The odd thing was the numbers that turned up when I ran this through pokercalc. It turns out that I am not only getting pot odds, but that I am a heads-up 55/45 favourite against the pair of Aces (and that's without knowing about the short-stack hand). Throw the short-stack into the mix and I am 51% to scoop the pot (short-stack is 9% and Foe is 40%). I am still aghast at this. I knew that Omaha was a drawing game, but I can't for the life of me see how a flush draw and a gutshot can be favourites. Then I realised that I had two cards to come and that the Aces basically had no redraws if I hit — the one exception that leaps out being the two of hearts.
A small aside about the bigger Betfair game. There were a significantly greater number of raises pre-flop here, which left me floundering a bit. I also got some poor cards and found myself making calls on the flo (and once or twice on the turn) when I was getting absolute pot odds to the nuts (rather than merely implied odds) but I knew that I was behind. None of them came in, and the money basically frittered away.
This is obviously a danger as I move up the levels and BDD's comment about "play tighter pre-flop" becomes clearer. If you get more raises pre-flop, one has to assume that you will get fewer players post-flop. As in Hold 'em, this means that the average quality of the winning hands will go down.
I was a bit worried looking at my stats for Ultimate that I was often the "loosest" player at the table, seeing about 45% of flops. My thoughts were roughly that, if I could get in for a single bet, there weren't many hands that I wanted to throw away. I seem to have got myself $100 up on Ultimate, so things are working at the moment.
But once I am at a higher level, hand selection pre-flop will obviously be more important, because I am likely to be putting in more money before I see a flop. Now, since I know the importance of hands being suited in Hold 'em, why have I not realized this in PLO? Well, partly because the stakes have been so low, and the implied odds so good, that most of my plays have been post-flop rather than pre-flop. But most of my good wins have come from the "flush" part of my hand, even when that is just the back-up position.
Memo to self - double-suited hands are good, even without aces. Hands that look good but which are rainbow are bad, even with Aces.
OK, it's a generalisation. But we're still feeling our way here!
And I'm writing about all these pots I'm taking down, but I'm still in negative territory for the week. Partly, I admit, this is because Betfair looks to have rocked up in Limit Hold 'em. The ABC multi-tablers have swooped in droves at the lower levels and have turned it into a "wait for the fish" expedition. I suspect I might have to move up a level or two. At $5-$10 these multi-tablers do not have the competence or the bankroll to play, which means that the mugs that do turn up are not bored to death by being the only players looking for action!
Pokerstars have got a 20% bonus running and, unlike Party, these don't have time limits. I'll plop $600 in there at the weekend and burn it off when I get back from Vegas at the beginning of April.
Birks is at seat 0 with $50.
Shortstack is at seat 1 with $19.50.
Foe is at seat 7 with $50.
The button is at seat 8.
Birks posts the big blind of $.50.
Foe posts out of turn for $.50.
Just to make it entertaining, both the major protagonists in this hand have only just sat down. However, I am "fresh" from losing $140 in a $100 buy-in PLO game on Betfair, so perhaps I wasn't in the best of moods.
Birks gets 5h 8s 6h 9s
A nice double-suited hand. I'm prepared to call a pot raise with this. But I'm not yet fast enough to consider raising with it myself. Perhaps I should.
Shortstack calls.
Foe raises to $2.
Birks re-raises to $3.50.
Shortstack calls.
Foe re-raises to $14.25.
Birks calls.
Shortstack calls.
What was I saying about not being prepared to raise with it? Cancel that statement. Basically I want to knock out ropey flush hands that might be better than my ropey flush potential! This is a bit like the Hold 'em situation where a hand like 88 that has raised pre-flop can bet out on a board of KQ5 rainbow, because you might well get a queen to fold.
The reraise from the Foe seems to make it likely he has Aces (well, at this level that would be the default assumption).
Flop (board: 2s Jh 7h):
Birks checks. Shortstack checks. Foe goes all-in for $35.75. Birks goes all-in for $35.75.
Shortstack goes all-in for $5.25.
I thought about this call for a long time (in online terms). Assuming that Foe is AA, I reckon I am getting pot odds with my flush draw and gutshot (with other runner-runner possibilities) so long as he doesn't have Ax of hearts or something that counterfeits me in the straight territory. But I'm not happy.
Turn (board: 2s Jh 7h Th): Well, that's my flush. Let's pray.
River (board: 2s Jh 7h Th 9c): Good, no paired board.
Showdown:
Foe shows Ac As 3s 5c for a pair of aces.
Birks shows 5h 8s 6h 9s for a flush, jack high.
Shortstack shows Kh Kc Qs Ad for a straight, king high.
Birks wins the main pot $55.85 with flush, jack high.
Birks wins the side pot $60.90 with flush, jack high.
The odd thing was the numbers that turned up when I ran this through pokercalc. It turns out that I am not only getting pot odds, but that I am a heads-up 55/45 favourite against the pair of Aces (and that's without knowing about the short-stack hand). Throw the short-stack into the mix and I am 51% to scoop the pot (short-stack is 9% and Foe is 40%). I am still aghast at this. I knew that Omaha was a drawing game, but I can't for the life of me see how a flush draw and a gutshot can be favourites. Then I realised that I had two cards to come and that the Aces basically had no redraws if I hit — the one exception that leaps out being the two of hearts.
A small aside about the bigger Betfair game. There were a significantly greater number of raises pre-flop here, which left me floundering a bit. I also got some poor cards and found myself making calls on the flo (and once or twice on the turn) when I was getting absolute pot odds to the nuts (rather than merely implied odds) but I knew that I was behind. None of them came in, and the money basically frittered away.
This is obviously a danger as I move up the levels and BDD's comment about "play tighter pre-flop" becomes clearer. If you get more raises pre-flop, one has to assume that you will get fewer players post-flop. As in Hold 'em, this means that the average quality of the winning hands will go down.
I was a bit worried looking at my stats for Ultimate that I was often the "loosest" player at the table, seeing about 45% of flops. My thoughts were roughly that, if I could get in for a single bet, there weren't many hands that I wanted to throw away. I seem to have got myself $100 up on Ultimate, so things are working at the moment.
But once I am at a higher level, hand selection pre-flop will obviously be more important, because I am likely to be putting in more money before I see a flop. Now, since I know the importance of hands being suited in Hold 'em, why have I not realized this in PLO? Well, partly because the stakes have been so low, and the implied odds so good, that most of my plays have been post-flop rather than pre-flop. But most of my good wins have come from the "flush" part of my hand, even when that is just the back-up position.
Memo to self - double-suited hands are good, even without aces. Hands that look good but which are rainbow are bad, even with Aces.
OK, it's a generalisation. But we're still feeling our way here!
And I'm writing about all these pots I'm taking down, but I'm still in negative territory for the week. Partly, I admit, this is because Betfair looks to have rocked up in Limit Hold 'em. The ABC multi-tablers have swooped in droves at the lower levels and have turned it into a "wait for the fish" expedition. I suspect I might have to move up a level or two. At $5-$10 these multi-tablers do not have the competence or the bankroll to play, which means that the mugs that do turn up are not bored to death by being the only players looking for action!
Pokerstars have got a 20% bonus running and, unlike Party, these don't have time limits. I'll plop $600 in there at the weekend and burn it off when I get back from Vegas at the beginning of April.
