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What's good and what's bad
May. 21st, 2008 07:39 amI played well on Monday and lost $60. I played badly last night and won $60. You can see why some people in this game go on tilt.
By "badly", I meant that I think that I made three weak-tight decisions that were probably not massively negative EV, but which I think were made for the wrong reasons.
In the first, I picked up KK in the small blind my second hand of the night. I raised a couple of limpers to 5xBB and was promptly reraised to 30xBB by the Big Blind to my left, about whom I knew absolutely nothing. Effective stack was 90BB.
The only experience I've had of this situation in the past has seen AA in the Big Blind, but I still think that my fold was more a matter of "shit, I don't want to get stacked off first hand". A random opponent might have QQ or AK here. I should bite the bullet. I can either call and shove/check-raise a non-Ace flop, or smack it in pre-flop. Both are better than folding.
As it turned out, opponent in this case had stats of 85% calls and 3% raises, so it looks to me as if these were Aces. But that's besides the point.
The final two mistakes were at that fatal time when I am preparing to leave when the BB gets round to me and I have a small win. I know that it's one long game, but when I have a small win on a site where I have lost for the previous two days (in this case, Party), I irrationally want to avoid a bad beat.
So, I limped with JJ utg+1, rather than putting in my standard raise. A 5xBB raise came from the player on my left and he got one caller before it got back to me. I called and folded when I missed the flop. Poor play by a scared player.
Finally I picked up AA under the gun and I put in something like a 6x raise. I quite like courting volatility from under the gun and I've either been throwing in 3x raises or flat calls with a rather wider range of hands than people would expect. This is a perfect hand to follow up with either a call or a 3x raise (I prefer the latter as the former is a fairly common play these days). But I just didn't fancy a "difficult" hand (which is what a 3x raise can often lead to) even though that would have a longer term higher EV.
I really must try to avoid this "protect a win" attitude. It's bad play and I know it. When I've played "properly", sure, sometimes it's gone wrong. But equally often I've turned a small win into a bigger win. I should remember those times.
+++++++++++
Twice in the past two days I've seen a $200 play at the $100 buy-in. I can't remember the exact hands, but it goes something like this.
I'm in the big blind with QQ. Button raises to 4xBB and I reraise to 11.5xBB. Button calls. 23BB in the pot. Effective stacks 100BB. 8-handed or 9-handed game.
Flop comes any one of the following: J86 rainbow. K85 rainbow, T64 two of a suit.
I continuation bet for 18BB, leaving me with about 70BB behind. Opponent raises all-in.
Me?
In the past on IP Network this would be an auto-fold against anyone but a known potential semi-bluffer or a total LAG, but I suspect that a few of the TAGs have cottonned on that this play only has to elicit a fold two times in three to be profitable (because some of the times that you get looked up, you will get lucky).
That would imply that you need to widen your calling range here to include any overpair and any TPTK.
I will keep my eye open to see if this play occurs again in the next few days. It's always possible, of course, that it's a statistical quirk and that I've come up against two players making this move with a set.
(There's a potential volatility-crushing pre-flop defence to this play, of course, but if I'm a-courting volatility, I would rather let them make the play and make the right mathematical decision in response on the flop).
__________________
By "badly", I meant that I think that I made three weak-tight decisions that were probably not massively negative EV, but which I think were made for the wrong reasons.
In the first, I picked up KK in the small blind my second hand of the night. I raised a couple of limpers to 5xBB and was promptly reraised to 30xBB by the Big Blind to my left, about whom I knew absolutely nothing. Effective stack was 90BB.
The only experience I've had of this situation in the past has seen AA in the Big Blind, but I still think that my fold was more a matter of "shit, I don't want to get stacked off first hand". A random opponent might have QQ or AK here. I should bite the bullet. I can either call and shove/check-raise a non-Ace flop, or smack it in pre-flop. Both are better than folding.
As it turned out, opponent in this case had stats of 85% calls and 3% raises, so it looks to me as if these were Aces. But that's besides the point.
The final two mistakes were at that fatal time when I am preparing to leave when the BB gets round to me and I have a small win. I know that it's one long game, but when I have a small win on a site where I have lost for the previous two days (in this case, Party), I irrationally want to avoid a bad beat.
So, I limped with JJ utg+1, rather than putting in my standard raise. A 5xBB raise came from the player on my left and he got one caller before it got back to me. I called and folded when I missed the flop. Poor play by a scared player.
Finally I picked up AA under the gun and I put in something like a 6x raise. I quite like courting volatility from under the gun and I've either been throwing in 3x raises or flat calls with a rather wider range of hands than people would expect. This is a perfect hand to follow up with either a call or a 3x raise (I prefer the latter as the former is a fairly common play these days). But I just didn't fancy a "difficult" hand (which is what a 3x raise can often lead to) even though that would have a longer term higher EV.
I really must try to avoid this "protect a win" attitude. It's bad play and I know it. When I've played "properly", sure, sometimes it's gone wrong. But equally often I've turned a small win into a bigger win. I should remember those times.
+++++++++++
Twice in the past two days I've seen a $200 play at the $100 buy-in. I can't remember the exact hands, but it goes something like this.
I'm in the big blind with QQ. Button raises to 4xBB and I reraise to 11.5xBB. Button calls. 23BB in the pot. Effective stacks 100BB. 8-handed or 9-handed game.
Flop comes any one of the following: J86 rainbow. K85 rainbow, T64 two of a suit.
I continuation bet for 18BB, leaving me with about 70BB behind. Opponent raises all-in.
Me?
In the past on IP Network this would be an auto-fold against anyone but a known potential semi-bluffer or a total LAG, but I suspect that a few of the TAGs have cottonned on that this play only has to elicit a fold two times in three to be profitable (because some of the times that you get looked up, you will get lucky).
That would imply that you need to widen your calling range here to include any overpair and any TPTK.
I will keep my eye open to see if this play occurs again in the next few days. It's always possible, of course, that it's a statistical quirk and that I've come up against two players making this move with a set.
(There's a potential volatility-crushing pre-flop defence to this play, of course, but if I'm a-courting volatility, I would rather let them make the play and make the right mathematical decision in response on the flop).
__________________
