Oct. 23rd, 2006

peterbirks: (Default)
An interesting observation from countingmyouts in reposnse to my previous post. He said that, although the 2+2 forum is full with people saying how you should play at $2-$4 and $3-$6, when you come to looking at the evidence, it seems unlikely that they are following their own advice.

While every one on the forum will talk about raises and reraises pre-flop, the facts are that the majority of the "winners" at these levels have stats such as 11%/4%, or 16%/4% (percentage entered pot voluntarily, percentage raises). These players cold-call your raises rather than reraise, and, sins of the fathers, they cold call a potential steal on the button from the small blind. This is probably one of the worst plays in the canon and, unlike the cold call of a raise when you have position, it has no redeeming feature whatsoever.

So, what's the deal, Neil?

My guess is that a large number of these 2+2ers are woefully undercapitalissed college kids. Every time that they get a good win, they spend it, so they have no escape from this trap. If you are sitting at a $3-$6 game with a total bankroll of $200, it's very easy to persuade yourself that a call rather than a raise is better pre-flop. The the blind sucks out on you and you let off a stream of splebetic abuse. But it's all your own fault.

You see marvellous justifications for failing to bet a hand fully, but the general theme is "I lost, and he would have called my raise anyway, so I saved myself money", which fails to note that, if the guy was calling anyway, then every other time on the turn when you failed to raise, and your opponent then failed to suck out, you have thrown away a big bet -- or, roughly, your expected profit per 100 hands.

When I am in a bad run, it's very hard to balance between being gun-shy on the river, and being overly aggressive pre-flop (these are my own two tilt-tendencies). I force myself to rock-up a bit preflop, and I force myself to be more aggressive than I feel is right on the river. This counterbalances my natural tilt tendency.

But these guys are perpetual scared money. They probably "know" what is the right thing to do, but their short bankroll makes them do something else.

The second factor is that they are attempting to maintain this bankroll while they edge towards their goal of a bonus. This entails putting as little money "at risk". Since a raise, by definition, puts more money "at risk", the players going for the bonus tend to raise less. It's a grievous error.

And thank god for that, I say.

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