Weighty matters

[peterbirks]

I seem to have entered a period of stasis in weight-loss land. Although I am still going to the gym at least three times a week, and the cardio is improving, my weight remains stuck in the 11.5 to 11.8 sector, and has done so for two months now. I know that this is not unusual, but it remains irritating! There's still some fat to be got rid of, and it stubbornly refuses to go. Still, we must persevere.

+++++

Very few poker hands to report at the moment because we are still at the start of a month-long experiment. I am triple-tabling at low stakes on Ultimate, including one or (if I'm feeling devilish) two short-handed tables. The ring games are low-stakes "kill" games, on the grounds that these games tend to attract the more gambling types.

I suppose I could print hand histories of stubbornly awful plays, but that appears to be the love of American bloggers (if I see one more "what about this donkey's play?" post in a blog I think I shall sink into catatonia). Curiously, the oddest occurrence repeated itself in 3-6 (twin-tabling) on Party. I was in the BB, someone posted. Everyone else folded, including small blind. I raised, and poster folded. This happened twice in two days (and is an indication of the nature of the daytime game on Party these days!).

Poster is getting odds of 10-to-3 if he calls, with position. I can't think of any two cards that I would dump in this situation, with the possible exception of K-2 off (my least favouritest hand in the global land). But, weak-tight is as weak-tight does. These guys are multi-tabling. They have clicked check-fold and moved on to the next table. Easy pickings.

My 6-handed play at low stakes has met with considerable success. I was somewhat put off trying this by Simon Galloway's postings. I am not comfortable with his style, but I felt that it was a style undeniably suited to short-handed. So, I decided to try MY style, which is a kind of straight bat against the LAG (as recommended by Caro) at low-stakes 6-handed. This is working very well, at the low levels, but will clearly need adapting as and when I move up in stakes. Other people's sense of rationality seems to get thrown out of the window when there are only six players. If it is passed round to you on the button, T6 off becomes no more a raising hand in 6-handed than it does in 10-handed -- well, not in my book, it doesn't. But to some people it appears that any hand is a raising hand on the button if it is passed round. Except that, of course, most people are raising machines, so it rarely does get passed round.

One guy (from Australia) was not only a raising machine, but also a wind-up merchant. He hadn't started picking on me, but I thought that I'd get in a pre-emptive strike to his "I'm gonna take your money, boy", style. Slapping down two grand on the table at 50c-$1 seemed to quieten him down. He left 15 minutes later.

Adiosta.

Comments

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

Well, I'm only playing at the lower levels at the moment. We will have to see what happens in the higher spheres.

But Pokertracker soon tells me who is likely to be "at it" and who isn't. In a sense there are two questions here:

a) Should you be "at it" as well
b) Should you suspect all and sundry of being at it against you?

My answer to (a) is the comfort zone one. Although I "mix up" my game, nearly all my "unusual" plays are based on sound mathematical principles. If the odd "incorrect" raise goes in, it is likely to be a J9 suited or a 67 suited or something like that. As you know, my Abdul-like theory is that, if you are always going to come in for a raise, you have to vary the proportions with which you do it with your raising hands. This is the way to deceive observant opponents. For example, they may have you marked as raising with anything from JT to AA in the CO with no previous callers, and this may be true, but what they miss is that half of the JT hands are being thrown away, whereas none of the AA hands are.

(b) Stats are stats. As soon as the stats are in, I can make fairly good assumptions about a player and work out how to defend against him. Some people like to get into raising wars, but I prefer the "straight bat" approach. Once again, this doesn't give much away as to the strength of my hand. I'm prepared to slow-play marginal hands that I think are in front, as well as monsters, if I am up against a Lagger.

I fear that my natural style of play at limit is SO different from yours, Simon, that neither of us will ever understand how the other can win. Let's face it, Limit at $10-$20 and above is more about "touch" than anything else. Myriad styles can win, provided you fold losing hands early (by which I mean hands that you are going to lose with, not hands that are necessarily inferior to your opponent's) and push or call with winning ones (by which I mean hands that you are going to win with, not necessarily hands that are better than your opponent's).

I make a lot of money these days through what might be called "value calls" on the turn. I'm fairly sure that I am in front, and I think that my opponent might have five outs or worse. He is betting first. So why raise the turn? If I call, I can pick up an extra bet from him when he value bets the river. There you are. You can have that one for free.

PJ

PS: It would be nice to know what your stats actually are for 6-handed. It looks to me like my VPIP is only about 30%, of which 20% were raises. However, these were notably passive games where I was often able to "get in cheap" with good multi-wayers. I'm not sure that these stats are a good guide to how I would play at a higher level. In the live passive games in Vegas I now limp passively far more than I would dream of doing in an online game.

[simong-uk.livejournal.com]

I mailed you some stats a while back? Is your btinternet a/c not the right one?