Day 1, the bathroom cometh (eventually)

[peterbirks]

No time to proof read this, I fear. I’m late.

So, it’s the first day of being bathroomless. A quick shave and bodywash in the sink in the spare bedroom (seemed less vulgar than the kitchen sink), and already everything seemed to be out of sync. I’ve forgotten to brush my teeth. I also forgot to make my sandwiches (which I normally do while running my bath – and whatever happened to the phrase ‘drawing my bath’?). I’ve amended the latter, and I shall amend the former in a moment.

Yesterday qualified as the worst day of the year at the tables, at any site. It was also the single worst session. Minus $410 for the day and minus $430 for the session. I should have quit 45 minutes earlier than I did (that would have saved me a hundred bucks). If I’d been playing my ‘A’ game (or if I’d had a suck-out or two) I reckon that I could have restricted my losses to about $280. As it was, nothing went right.

I actually managed to lose two buy-ins in two hands. The first was to a two-outer, with all the money going in on the flop and his pair hitting a set on the turn. The second saw an almost identical situation pre-flop (I’m in the blind with a group one hand) and an identical reraise, but this time I ballsed it up. Understandable, perhaps, after the previous hand. It’s a hard talent to learn to think perfectly immediately after suffering a suck-out, and the speed of the hands doesn’t give you time to click “sit out” before you see that you’ve been dealt QQ.
In this hand, CO raised to $6 (blinds 50c-$1) and button, a very loose player. Called on the button. I reraised to $21, (I now have $79 behind) and original raiser calls (he has about $250 behind). Button calls (he has about $70 behind). Pot is $61.

Flop comes JT8 two hearts. I can shove here. I can bet the pot. I can bet part of the pot and fold to a reraise. I can bet part of the pot and call a reraise. I can bet part of the pot and shove to a mini-raise. Against these opponents, there’s an argument for all of these. But my initial “big” raise was partially predicated on a “fuck it, I’m going for it”. So I shoved. Button called rather quickly with his Q9 of hearts. So it goes.

I should probably have put in an even bigger reraise preflop -- perhaps $30 rather than $21. That might take down the hand pre-flop, but a $12 gain is a 12% RoE, not unreasonable. If it fails to take down the pot preflop, at least I have the comfort of knowing that my EV on the hand was higher than if I had raised it to $21. It also makes the shove more automatic post-flop.

+++++++++++++++++++++++

I'll ignore yesterday’s hands, none of which contain much of interest apart from “I was really unlucky here” or “this is the effect that several hours of bad cards can do to your play”. So, here’s a couple from the day before.

(A few minutes later)

Christ, I’ve run this macro four times and ballsed it up each time. Wrong hands, wrong name substitutions. Etc. Usually I put the players in the right order (Party consistently fucks this up), but now I’m running out of time. Excuse brief commentary.


I took until the last second before I decided to call in the first hand. I felt that I was losing, but I also had a feeling that this opponent was capable of bullshitting me. I can’t explain that hunch, because he had not been at the table for a great deal of time.


$100 USD NL Texas Hold'em
Table Table 125859 (No DP) (Real Money)
Seat 2 is the button
Total number of players : 10
Seat 2: Snickers421 ( $244.28 USD )
Seat 7: peimai7 ( $97.35 USD )
Seat 10: Aat1985 ( $97.32 USD )
Seat 5: Hero ( $99 USD )
Seat 1: inagira ( $17 USD )
Seat 4: montecarlo07 ( $56.43 USD )
Seat 3: Midnite_Fox ( $70.28 USD )
Seat 6: VILLAIN ( $100.99 USD )
Seat 9: a2676 ( $43.78 USD )
Seat 8: Dodo0508 ( $20 USD )

Midnite_Fox posts small blind [$0.50 USD].
Hero posts big blind [$1 USD].

** Dealing down cards **

Dealt to Hero [ 5♣ 5♠ ]
VILLAIN calls [$1 USD]
peimai7 folds.
a2676 folds.
Aat1985 folds.
inagira did not respond in time
inagira folds.
Snickers421 folds.
Midnite_Fox calls [$0.50 USD]
Hero checks.

** Dealing Flop ** [ T♠, 5◊, 8◊ ]

Gives me bottom set

Midnite_Fox checks.
Hero bets [$1.50 USD]
VILLAIN calls [$1.50 USD]
Midnite_Fox folds.

** Dealing Turn ** [ K◊ ]

Puts diamond flush possibility on board

Hero bets [$3 USD]
VILLAIN raises [$6 USD]

I'd really expect a slightly bigger raise on the turn if he had hit his flush. Mini-raises are for the flop, because their cumulative effect on the pot size is twice as great. My hunch was that it might be a feeler raise with a draw. I thought about repopping him, but decided not to.

Hero calls [$3 USD]

** Dealing River ** [ 4♣ ]
Hero checks.
VILLAIN bets [$18 USD]

Ugh. A pot bet here is nearly always a good hand. But, this guy, and that raise on the turn. Bleeaagghhh...... Hero waits until “you have one second to act...”

Hero calls [$18 USD]
VILLAIN shows [ J◊, T◊ ]a flush, King high.
Hero doesn't show [ 5♣, 5♠ ]three of a kind, Fives.
VILLAIN wins $51.30 USD from the main pot with a flush, King high.



Fortunately, my instincts proved correct about 15 minutes later. Same villain; different table.


$100 USD NL Texas Hold'em
Table Table 127224 (Real Money)
Seat 3 is the button
Total number of players : 10
Seat 6: Sea_Pigeon ( $94.50 USD )
Seat 9: Feiglingchen ( $97.50 USD )
Seat 7: Hero ( $114.60 USD )
Seat 2: Aurenj ( $125.04 USD )
Seat 1: bajanbandit ( $114.46 USD )
Seat 4: sallytop ( $92.40 USD )
Seat 10: kophta4ever ( $98.61 USD )
Seat 5: tctomi ( $139.13 USD )
Seat 8: Macinas ( $17.50 USD )
Seat 3: VILLAIN ( $71.79 USD )
sallytop posts small blind [$0.50 USD].
tctomi posts big blind [$1 USD].

** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to Hero [ A♡ A◊ ]
Sea_Pigeon folds.
Hero raises [$3.50 USD]
Macinas folds.
Feiglingchen folds.
kophta4ever folds.
bajanbandit folds.
Aurenj folds.
VILLAIN calls [$3.50 USD]
sallytop calls [$3 USD]
tctomi folds.

** Dealing Flop ** [ 2♡, 5◊, Q♡ ]
sallytop checks.
Hero bets [$10 USD]
VILLAIN calls [$10 USD]
sallytop folds.

** Dealing Turn ** [ T♠ ]
Hero bets [$30 USD]
VILLAIN is all-In.
Hero calls [$28.29 USD]

Insta-call.


** Dealing River ** [ 5♡ ]

Hero shows [ A♡, A◊ ]two pairs, Aces and Fives.
VILLAIN doesn't show [ Q♣, 9♣ ]two pairs, Queens and Fives.
Hero wins $145.08 USD from the main pot with two pairs, Aces and Fives.

+++++++++++++++

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

"I can shove here. I can bet the pot. I can bet part of the pot and fold to a reraise. I can bet part of the pot and call a reraise. I can bet part of the pot and shove to a mini-raise."

You cannot bet part of the pot and fold to a reraise with QQ on a JT8 flop!!! This is the most bizarre comment imaginable. The pot is already roughly the same size as your remaining chips so you're getting roughly 2-1 on your money against one caller. If you bet half the pot and got raised allin you'd be getting roughly 5-1 on your last chips. With an overpair. You seemed to be playing great of late then you make this utterly out of line comment that you can fold here. You need much much deeper stacks to fold an overpair on the flop. On a such a draw-heavy board the only correct size bet can be a pot-sized one and when the pot is so large to your stack you must try the utmost to take it down. Therefore the allin shove here is the only correct play. Making the pot so big pre-flop with a premium hand is fine but it means you can only fold under exceptional circumstances and flopping an overpair isnt one of them!

matt

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

I'm saying what I can do, not what I would do. Sorry for the ambiguity. As you can see, I shoved.

PJ

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

What I was doing was recounting what goes through my head in the six seconds or so that I have to bet (kind of, an attempt at catching 'the feeling of the moment). I consider many lines that I later reject. Reporting them does not mean that I think they are viable alternatives when reflected upon over cold tea.... (or whatever the phrase is). Niether do I think that reporting them is bizarre. It's a valid attempt to try to put over the feel of the situation at the time. Too often people who recount hands do so with the benefit of hindsight analysis, rather than recounting the things that they actually consider and reject in the briefest instants ('cos this makes them look wiser thanthey really are). Does that make sense?

Pete

[(Anonymous)]

OK what goes through my head there - and this is underpinned by mathematical intuition - is big pot ... overpair!!! and gutshot!!! All-in baby!!!

I wish you'd stop even seeing the possibility of a terrible laydown. Chess masters don't see more moves than patzers - in fact they see far fewer. They subconsciously filter out all the blunders and just examine the few promising lines.

matt

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

Actually, I was going to cover just this point, because I think that it's an, extremely understandable, hole in your thinking. Not as a player, but as an empathizer.

Two analogies sprung to my mind when I was in the gym (because, believe it or not, I was anticipating this comment). One was, it's a bit like saying "don't think of elephants" or "get that Kylie Minogue tune 'I should Be So Lucky' out of your head". So, absolutely. I agree with you. I want to be able to subconsciously filter out poor lines.

But I think that a lot of players who recount hands fail to admit that these poor lines go through their heads before they discard them, particularly in situations that do not occur that often. I think it is far better (and far more honest) to let other players know that these thoughts are going through my head, rather than 'pretending' that I am a 'poker master' and that such poor lines would never even occur to me.

The second analogy I thought of was a hypothetical example. I've often said that in an hour I could teach a novice to play limit hold'em to a level better than many players found in the low-limit Las Vegas games. However, I then thought to myself, how would I cope if the player said "now is the king higher than the queen, or is it the other way round?" Or if they kept confusing K's with J's.

Clearly, I would suffer the same syndrome as you; I would be saying "look, these things need to be automatic. I didn't realize that you didn't know the rank of cards". I don't have to say to myself at the beginning of the hand "now, are the Kings better than the Jacks?" It doesn't even cross my mind.

Similar things do not go through your mind that are still going through mine. But it's no use saying "stop thinking of bad lines". That's an ability that comes with practice and experience. So, yes, I wish that I would stop considering self-evidently bad plays when considered in the cold light of day (indeed, even this time, I came to the right decision on the flop -- I just didn't raise enough pre-flop). But that's not the same as pretending to the readers that I don't.

PJ

[(Anonymous)]

OK point taken but here you're already off and running on another wild goose chase. Your pre-flop re-raise to $21 was not wrong. It was perfect. $30 is clearly wrong given your stack size of $100 as it's virtually 1/3 of your chips so you can't possibly play correctly post-flop anyway. If the 3 of you had $200 instead of $100 then $30 may have been better to get one caller rather than two. In general 25% of my stack is the absolute maximum I want to put in pre-flop without just going allin - unless it's part of some specific trap. So $21 out of $100 seems just about right with QQ. You can still play post-flop and even get away if you think you're beaten. You can even get away pre-flop in exceptional cases.

matt

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

Just to show that I don't dogmatically stick to my guns just to spite you, Matt, I will say that I agree with you here. My $30-thought was based on at least a couple of incorrect predicates. I like your 'general' limit of 25% of your stack without going all-in. That makes a hell of a lot of sense. Your final two sentences are the clincher here.

The only question I'd raise here is, does this still stand in the case of AA? (Or indeed, a hand we discussed earlier, where I had KK). I can't recall the exact situation, but I think that I re-reraised to $35 of my stack which constituted about 40% of what I had in front of me. You seemed to think that this was an OK play, and I feel ok with it too, because I am shoving on any flop.

And with Aces, suppose you have $100 and put in a standard raise (let's say, $3.50), get reraised to 12 bucks on the button (who has you covered), and the big blind (who has, say, $75) calls. I'd be tempted to reraise to between $45 and $50 and then shove any flop. These both seem to be a similar situation where you have raised and have been reraised to about 12% of the pot. A push preflop might have less EV than a re-reraise, I think.
Would you advocate as preference a mini re-reraise, pushing you to the 25% level?


But in a situation where you are the original reraiser, getting to about 20% of your stack sounds nice, because you can get away from the hand in a couple of sports where you could not get away from it if you had raised to 30% of your stack.

PJ

[(Anonymous)]

I think the best line is to have a set of "third raise" hands in mind which can be adapted slightly to the circumstances. Basically AA, KK and AK although you could drop AKo or add QQ according to taste and/or the aggressiveness of the table and your position. If you have one of these hands then make the third raise. I don't like having special lines for AA or KK.

What about this hand I witnessed early in a $200 tourney on Stars (starting stack was 10,000). Blinds 100/200 folded to the button (~8000) who makes it 600. Small blind (~9000) - a WSOP bracelet winner - makes it 1500 and gets a call. Flop comes down something like A 9 4 rainbow and small blind fires out a huge over-bet of about 4000. Button tanks for a while then folds claiming AJ ... small blind has KK. Meh.

Does that line with KK make sense? Well if people are prepared to fold AJ [believably] then it does. Of course if I'd had the AJ I'dve called. I wouldn't have been happy but the pot is just too big and I have a very reasonable chance of having the best hand. Thats the way I think. Against many players calling might be wrong although I'd actually be more suspicious of a pro making a move. At lower stakes or against weaker players the KK line might be wrong, the pro is to some extent relying on people not wanting to bust early in a $200 tourney to an "obvious" AK.

matt

[jaybee66.livejournal.com]

What's wrong with real work? I replaced my bathroom in Wimbledon and updated the one in the Barbican all by myself. Plumbing and tiling is easy and you don't have any Cockney types stomping around your home.

Oh and if I may be so bold.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=190157162249&ssPageName=STRK:MESE:IT&ih=009

JayBee.

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

James,

Putting up shelves is as far as I would go in the manual labour department.

I abhor your inverted snobbery about manual work being 'real' work and thinking work being somewhat less noble. I thought that kind of attitude went out with Old Labour.

Haven't gone to the ebay site thing yet.

PJ

Re: What's wrong with real work?

[real-aardvark.livejournal.com]

Ricardo, that's what.

Although, if I remember correctly, he based his axiom on the crop yields of various farms. (I hate to interject here, because I'm basically interrupting myself, but very few people understand the relationship between the 18th century agrarian revolution and the 18th century industrial revolution. The two went hand-in-hand. Feedback, bwana.)

I take a family exception to the Cockney thing, because my father was a Cockney. Should that be Capitalized? Probably not.

Leave it to yer local Pole, mate. Go dahn the old Bull and Bear -- no doubt, these days, re-branded as the "New Bear" -- and sink a couple of Nelsons.

μηδὲν ἄγαν. I know Birks has been waiting for the other shoe to fall, and this is that shoe. Nothing in excess. γνώθε σεαυτόν translates as "Know yourself."

Basically, the two axioms by which literate Athenians in the 5th century BC lived their lives (obviously, between rock concerts), and I would modestly suggest that they apply even today.

Next time, hire a Pole.

Queens

[(Anonymous)]

Hi Peter,

In the QQ hand being discussed here, let me first just say that usually against more solid players you wouldn't necessarily want to reraise in the blinds like that because you might get run off by AA or KK when otherwise you might flop a set and bust them. But since you were going by a read that the raiser was laggy and not necessarily raising on solid values, and since the tag-along on the button likely didn't have anything terrific, I would reraise as you did. However despite what the poster above said about your $21 raise size being "perfect", I don't believe it was and that you in fact should have made it $30 to go. What you really are looking for here is just to take down the pot right there and not have to play QQ out of position multiway when you usually aren't going to flop a set and you won't like it the 37% of the time an A or K flops. QQ isn't AA and thus isn't a hand to try to milk pre generally. And you will have a hard time extracting when you are ahead with only an overpair to the board usually, and you will never know if an A or K on later streets helped the opponent (in situations where the remaining stack sizes are greater unlike here). As played pre you played it right by open shoving as that was all you should do with your remaining stack.

An important point regarding my recommendation for a larger raise size is also that the original raiser was immediately to your left. Which means he usually is just going to call which will entice the other guy to as well, and then you have to hope your hand holds up against two hands. Although the 3rd wheel isn't as likely to call in NL as in PL games, it still can be the case in loose games.

The other aspect is that even if you do reraise to $30, was what were you going to do if he then shoved? Given his proclivities you were likely going to have to call and hope you were just against AK or JJ and could dodge it come the river.

BluffTHIS!

Re: Queens

[(Anonymous)]

So you think raising to $30 is optimal? If they have AA/KK they will put you allin and you're calling. If they have AK they will call and be able to play the flop perfectly, and if they have JJ they can probably get away.

Congratulations, I think you've discovered the holy grail of donkness: the most -EV line possible against all eventualities. Way to go, champ!

matt

Re: Queens

[(Anonymous)]

matt,

Pete's stack size is the effective one here as the laggy villain covered. Getting villain to call to $30, which is almost 40% of that effective stack *insures* that he isn't getting away w/JJ on a rag board, and maybe not even AK. Thus the higher reraise is what will result in not his playing perfectly, but in making postflop mistakes. And what will more often result in a headsup pot instead of multi-way which is good. But when one calls as happens here, that larger preflop reraise is what will tie them in for the rest of their stack.

Before you respond to this post, I suggest you think about this a while and work out the math and pot odds/stack-to-pot ratios for the different scenarios. And that you consider that as I play in (and win in) stakes much greater than this, that the likelihood of my being correct is higher than you think.

Bluff

Re: Queens

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

Hi Bluff:

Thanks for the comments. Always appreciated.

Far be it for me to defend Matt -- he is quite capable of doing so himself with a far greater level of vehemence, but I think that I like the $21 bet more than I do thee $30 one.

I agree with you that Matt's polemic is a bit misplaced. I think that to say that he can 'probably' get away from JJ is wrong. 'Possibly' would be a better word, and what matters is the extent of that 'possibly'.

But the problem is that, although the pre-flop reraise ties in my opponent for his stack, it ties me in for mine as well.

I think that Matt makes a valid earlier point when he says that putting in more than 25% of your stack pre-flop might as well mean that you put the lot in.

Much of the dispute here could be on opponent's range and how he would react with various hands within that range to the two reraise levels.

I like to take two extreme reactions, and then to assess how far opponent might be along the line between those two extremes.

At one extreme is the line "$30 or $21, it makes no difference to my decision".

At the other extreme is "Wow, $30 is a much bigger raise. I'm going to react just as I would to an all-in reraise. I'm outta here with anything less than Aces".

This is further complicated by the fact that there are two, slightly differently styled, opponents.

My initial reflection was that a $30 bet would be more likely to take it down (which I am happy with, given a 12% RoE) and that, if it didn't, then the stack-off I would suffer if I got sucked out on would be fine in long-term EV.

The downside to this is if original raiser has me beaten. I'm now in much bigger trouble with a $30 reraise than with one of $21, because, as Matt observed, I can still get away from the hand with only $21 in the pot and $80 behind, whereas it's much tougher to get away from the hand with $30 in and $70 behind.

As you say, QQ is not a hand to "milk", especially against multiple opponents, but there are other factors in play as well. I don't know that niether opponent has Aces -- I just consider it probable that I am in front. How probable? Well, that's the tough one. I not only need to work out the chance that I am front, but also the chance that I will end up in front.

Let's say I think there is a 90% chance that I am best here.

Of that 90%, I reckon I'd be a hot favourite (up against two smaller pairs or against a smaller pair and A-x) about, what, half the time? I'd be marginally odds-on a quarter of the time and I'd be odds against (but still the favourite of the three) the other q

Re: Queens

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

quarter of the time.

So, how does a $21 reraise, a $30 reraise, and an all-in reraise, play out against my opponents (and what would their reactions be) given those scenarios?

Clearly the complexities make Matt's dogmatic statement undesirable. No way is $30 the height of donkdom or a maximisation of negative EV, except in MattLand where any play other than Matt's preferred play is clearly clinically insane.

Indeed, you can argue how opponents will react to the three reraises and come up with a better EV for either play. The only thing which I think we can say with some certainty is that the $30 raise is likely to increase the likelihood of the original raiser folding and, to a lesser extent, the likelihood of the original cold-caller folding. Now, is that desirable? As Bluff says, QQ is tough to play OOP a significant minority of the time, because an A or a K will flop. So, Bluff's line is that it's desirable to take it down pre-flop and accept the 12% ROI. If you are called, you still have a good hand as back-up.

But what if you are reraised all-in? I assume that Bluff thinks that you can still "get away" from the hand, but the fact is that you will have lost an additional $9. Therefore the percentage of the time that opponent has you beaten is significant. I've hypothesised above that this will happen 10% of the time. If you fold, you have lost an extra $9. If you call, you lose your $70 about 80% of the time (minus $56) and win $200 20% of the time (plus $40). So, folding to the reraise is better than calling the all-in reraise, unless you think opponent might reraise all-in with a worse hand.

So, 10% of the time, the $30 reraise is $9 worse in terms of EV.

What of the other scenarios? Well, this is even more complex for my small brain. How much difference will the bigger reraise make to my likelihood of taking it down when I am best? My hunch is that, in this particular situation, not a lot. The button was on a calling spree. Maybe 10% of his weaker hands.

I think that (without going deeply into this and taking more time than I have) the vital points are (a) will opponent get away from JJ (or TT, or 99)? to a $30 reraise that he would not have got away from for a $21 reraise and (b) will opponent feel tied into the hand if he calls the $30 reraise with AK and misses the flop.


My actual hunch here is that if either opponent had AK at this level, they might well have reshoved pre-flop to a $30 reraise (which means, see above, that I am forced to call the re-reraise push, even though I might be up against AA or KK).

Putting all these things together, I think I am more comfortable with the smaller raise because, although it gives my opponents more flexibility post-flop, it also gives me more flexibility, pre-flop and post-flop. If I get two callers and it comes Axx, I can check-fold to a lumpy bet. With two opponents I am happier than with one opponent in some scenarios, and one of them is the Axx flop, because players are less likely to 'represent' an Ace that they do not have against two opponents.

I'm not dogmatic on either side about this (indeed, I can imagine some non-poker players considering this argument akin to that of how many angels can you fit on a pin-head) but I'm just saying that I like, as a general matter of principle, Matt's contention that you should keep yourself to a maximum of 25% of your stack going in pre-flop in order to give yourself flexibility to play correctly post-flop. In most situations, if you are heading into the 30%-plus sector, then you might as well shove, because you will often be faced with forced decisions post-flop that you would not have made if you were less committed.

In this particular situation, Bluff, how does putting 30% of your money in look better than 40%, 50% or 100%? Presumably, because opponents' reactions will change at different levels of reraise. This seems to indicate that you are allowing at least for some post-flop "back-up" (otherwise you might as well have seven-deuce). So, we are definitely into areas of empiricism here.

PJ