An interesting game last night. As has been the trend for me the last few Fridays, I went down in chips early on, the reloaded, found my rhythm and scored a decent profit. Perhaps my biggest mistake last night was to try an ill-timed, multi-barrel bluff against Marc, who can be a bit of a calling station.
However, since I knew Marc's strategy was to take a lot of small shots (nearly every hand, he raised preflop and bet the flop), I knew a lot of the time he'd be in there with total air. I managed to make a big call on the river against him with nothing but an ace-jack high, which turned out to be the best hand. This pot definitely helped restore my confidence and set my game back on track.
Also, I stacked Andrew no less than three times in the game, and though he was using a short buy-in strategy, the pots added up nicely. I flopped a set of eights against his aces, hit a straight against his top-pair-top-kicker AK, and picked off a preflop all-in bluff with two sevens (he had the nine-deuce offsuit!!).
Marc, maybe by sheer virtue of being in almost every pot, was hitting a lot of boards hard for the first half of the night. He was getting especially lucky against John, putting him on tilt. In one pot, John held pocket kings and flopped top trips, only to have Marc hit a four-outer straight on the turn against him. However, he made much of the money back when he and Marc both held top pair of queens on the flop and improved to trips on the river. John's AQ outkicked Marc's KQ, and he raked in a nice pot.
Last Monday's tournament had some interesting pots as well. The key hand in the early stages of the tournament came for me when a three-way all-in pot happened between Lori (queen-high), Justin (KK), and me (AA). This pot gave me the chip stack I needed to make my way to the endgame and therefore the points and money. Eric, who ended up winning the tournament, got his early chip lead when he made a tough all-in call on the river against Andrew on a dangerous board with a lot of possible straights holding only top pair with a weak kicker.
It got down to three-handed play, and Eric had the decisive chip lead. Eric folded the button, and Justin called in the small blind (we were at $0.75/$1.50). I looked down at QT of clubs and raised it $9 on top. Justin called after a lot of deliberation, leaving himself $12.25 in chips, which he promptly shipped into the pot on the flop, which came jack-ten-nine. Having hit too much of the board to possibly fold even if I knew he had the jack, I called and he showed down two fours. My hand held up and we went into two-handed play. Despite this pick-up, I went into heads-up at about a 4:1 chip disadvantage, and eventually the final hand occurred. Eric raised from the button and I reraised all-in with the ace-ten. He thought about it for a while and called with two deuces. The board bricked out, and my tournament was over.
Fortunately, my second-place finish allowed me a further extension of my first-place points on the leader board. With August coming to a close, I'm excited to go into the final third of the year with a fairly solid lead over the rest of the field. Still, placing outside of the points on any given night when there are a lot of players playing could allow players like Chip to gain ground. Barring any cosmic mishaps, though, that won't happen.
Saturday, August 30, 2008
Thursday, August 21, 2008
lesson four: stack size and pot size dictate the right play
A lot of times, what decision you should make on a given betting round is determined by how many chips you or your opponents have in their stacks. This principle is true in cash games, of course, but magnified in tournament situations when you can't rebuy and the blinds continually go up. This is true not just in relation to whether to bet in a given situation, but also how to size a bet you might make.
A pot that played out during the Monday night game this week illustrates this principle quite well:
It was the $0.25/0.50 blinds level, which is the first level after the rebuy period. Eric was second to act with $12.25 in his stack, and looked down at pocket eights after a fold from Marc under the gun. There were seven players at the table at this point, and he elected to limp. I like limping or raising here, but given Eric's chips, it didn't cost him too much to limp into the hand and adopt a wait-and-see approach to the hand. If he raised to something like $2, he could potentially have trouble getting away from the hand and end up playing for all of his chips in a "coinflip at best" situation.
He elected to just call. Chip called in middle position with pocket sixes, and it folded to me in the small blind. I looked down at the pocket fives. There was no way I was going to fold here. With a pocket pair, and $1.75 in the pot, it cost me only $0.25 to see the flop if Chris checked in the big blind (which he was likely to do). I had about $35 or $40 in chips at the time, so I could have raised and then gotten away from the hand without doing serious damage, but there wasn't any real reason to do so: I'd be building a big pot out of position in which I pretty much needed to spike a five on the flop to stay around, plus, I didn't want to be confronted by a reraise from the other players. Specifically, if Eric shoved all of his chips in, I'd have a tough decision. Interestingly, if I had raised, Eric would most likely have been forced to go all-in against me. I'd be most likely making it $2.50 or so to go, so if he just called, the pot would be $6 and his stack would be $9.75. With a hand like a pair of eights, which is likely to be best preflop, it'd be much better for him to shove than to see a flop and possibly have to fold for that much of his stack when overcards hit the board (even though they may have missed his opponent). Therefore, I completed the blind, and Chris checked. The board came five of spades, seven of spades, five of hearts.
Since I had flopped four fives, a basically unbeatable hand, I elected to check. I didn't want to bet yet and force out the possible flush and straight draws that could be out against me. Chris checked, and Eric went all-in for $11.75. Chip thought for a long time, and eventually folded. When he did this, Chris folded without waiting for me to act. I said "wait a minute, it's on me. I call - quads." and showed down my hand, eliminating Eric when my quads held up (he would have needed both of the remaining eights on the turn and river).
The biggest mistake made in the hand, in my view, is Eric's all-in bet on the flop. Since it wasn't raised preflop, there are several things wrong with raising here. First of all, since it was limped around, the pot was small. There was $2 in the pot when he bet $11.75. If he had bet a lesser amount, say something in the $1.75-$2.50 range, he could find out if his hand was best, and maybe fold his hand to a raise. Given his stack, it didn't make sense to make that bet. It's true he was short-stacked, but he's risking way too much to win too little in that spot.
Think about it. The pot is two dollars, and your opponent bets $11.75 and is all-in. With a board of 5 7 5, what hands would you be willing to call that bet with? In my opinion, nearly all of the hands that can call that bet can beat pocket eights. The only hand that can call maybe and be behind the eights is ace-seven. Any five calls, and overpairs may call too (and they all beat eights). Therefore, he's putting himself in a situation where there are only two outcomes possible: either he takes down the $2 in the pot because no one has anything (which would've happened if he'd bet a smaller amount, anyway), or a hand that beats him makes the call and he gets eliminated.
Here's another approach that could've been taken - raising rather than limping preflop. Eric still would've been stacked in the hand, but his decisions would have been much easier. Assuming he makes it $2 preflop and Chip calls, I'm probably calling too, not to get Eric's stack, but to get at Chip's (he had me covered). Getting a great price, Chris probably calls here too and we see a flop four-handed still. This time, however, the pot would be $8 and Eric's stack would be $10. He would have to move at that pot with the overpair. He'd still get called by better hands, but he might also get called by flush or straight draws, and definitely the ace-seven. More importantly, though, the times when his eights are best, and no one else has anything, he's taking down $8, rather than $2. This represents almost a 50% increase in his stack. The odds no one has anything make it a common sense play against three opponents in a tournament, especially when you're on a shortish stack. You just have to consider the risk-to-reward ratio. Is it worth risking X for a shot at Y? How likely are my opponents to fold, etc.? This is how good poker decisions are made.
As a last note, if Eric had begun the hand with $6 rather than $12, limping becomes entirely too speculative, as he is risking too big a portion of his stack to just see a flop. Again, it is just too likely a bad flop will come off and he will have let players with overcards come into the pot and beat him. Therefore he'll either have to fold, or commit the rest of his chips with only a 9% or so shot of winning the pot and staying alive in the tournament. With a stack that small, and a hand that is likely to be best preflop, it's much better to go ahead and shove the chips in. If everyone folds, he picks up the blinds, increasing his stack by more than 10%, and is thus enabled to wait another round for a hand to move all-in with.
A pot that played out during the Monday night game this week illustrates this principle quite well:
It was the $0.25/0.50 blinds level, which is the first level after the rebuy period. Eric was second to act with $12.25 in his stack, and looked down at pocket eights after a fold from Marc under the gun. There were seven players at the table at this point, and he elected to limp. I like limping or raising here, but given Eric's chips, it didn't cost him too much to limp into the hand and adopt a wait-and-see approach to the hand. If he raised to something like $2, he could potentially have trouble getting away from the hand and end up playing for all of his chips in a "coinflip at best" situation.
He elected to just call. Chip called in middle position with pocket sixes, and it folded to me in the small blind. I looked down at the pocket fives. There was no way I was going to fold here. With a pocket pair, and $1.75 in the pot, it cost me only $0.25 to see the flop if Chris checked in the big blind (which he was likely to do). I had about $35 or $40 in chips at the time, so I could have raised and then gotten away from the hand without doing serious damage, but there wasn't any real reason to do so: I'd be building a big pot out of position in which I pretty much needed to spike a five on the flop to stay around, plus, I didn't want to be confronted by a reraise from the other players. Specifically, if Eric shoved all of his chips in, I'd have a tough decision. Interestingly, if I had raised, Eric would most likely have been forced to go all-in against me. I'd be most likely making it $2.50 or so to go, so if he just called, the pot would be $6 and his stack would be $9.75. With a hand like a pair of eights, which is likely to be best preflop, it'd be much better for him to shove than to see a flop and possibly have to fold for that much of his stack when overcards hit the board (even though they may have missed his opponent). Therefore, I completed the blind, and Chris checked. The board came five of spades, seven of spades, five of hearts.
Since I had flopped four fives, a basically unbeatable hand, I elected to check. I didn't want to bet yet and force out the possible flush and straight draws that could be out against me. Chris checked, and Eric went all-in for $11.75. Chip thought for a long time, and eventually folded. When he did this, Chris folded without waiting for me to act. I said "wait a minute, it's on me. I call - quads." and showed down my hand, eliminating Eric when my quads held up (he would have needed both of the remaining eights on the turn and river).
The biggest mistake made in the hand, in my view, is Eric's all-in bet on the flop. Since it wasn't raised preflop, there are several things wrong with raising here. First of all, since it was limped around, the pot was small. There was $2 in the pot when he bet $11.75. If he had bet a lesser amount, say something in the $1.75-$2.50 range, he could find out if his hand was best, and maybe fold his hand to a raise. Given his stack, it didn't make sense to make that bet. It's true he was short-stacked, but he's risking way too much to win too little in that spot.
Think about it. The pot is two dollars, and your opponent bets $11.75 and is all-in. With a board of 5 7 5, what hands would you be willing to call that bet with? In my opinion, nearly all of the hands that can call that bet can beat pocket eights. The only hand that can call maybe and be behind the eights is ace-seven. Any five calls, and overpairs may call too (and they all beat eights). Therefore, he's putting himself in a situation where there are only two outcomes possible: either he takes down the $2 in the pot because no one has anything (which would've happened if he'd bet a smaller amount, anyway), or a hand that beats him makes the call and he gets eliminated.
Here's another approach that could've been taken - raising rather than limping preflop. Eric still would've been stacked in the hand, but his decisions would have been much easier. Assuming he makes it $2 preflop and Chip calls, I'm probably calling too, not to get Eric's stack, but to get at Chip's (he had me covered). Getting a great price, Chris probably calls here too and we see a flop four-handed still. This time, however, the pot would be $8 and Eric's stack would be $10. He would have to move at that pot with the overpair. He'd still get called by better hands, but he might also get called by flush or straight draws, and definitely the ace-seven. More importantly, though, the times when his eights are best, and no one else has anything, he's taking down $8, rather than $2. This represents almost a 50% increase in his stack. The odds no one has anything make it a common sense play against three opponents in a tournament, especially when you're on a shortish stack. You just have to consider the risk-to-reward ratio. Is it worth risking X for a shot at Y? How likely are my opponents to fold, etc.? This is how good poker decisions are made.
As a last note, if Eric had begun the hand with $6 rather than $12, limping becomes entirely too speculative, as he is risking too big a portion of his stack to just see a flop. Again, it is just too likely a bad flop will come off and he will have let players with overcards come into the pot and beat him. Therefore he'll either have to fold, or commit the rest of his chips with only a 9% or so shot of winning the pot and staying alive in the tournament. With a stack that small, and a hand that is likely to be best preflop, it's much better to go ahead and shove the chips in. If everyone folds, he picks up the blinds, increasing his stack by more than 10%, and is thus enabled to wait another round for a hand to move all-in with.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
read 'em and weep
Unfortunately, the first August post comes late in the month, as things have been rather hectic the past couple of weeks. After winning several weeks ago in the Monday night game, I had a couple of tough exits, placing out of the points for two weeks in a row. One time, Chip also placed outside of the points, which was good for me, but a week ago, he won it (bastard!). Last night though, I rallied and took one down after playing Chip heads-up for over an hour.
In fact, all told, the tournament lasted about nine hours, which is pretty grueling since the rebuy period ended 2 hours 15 minutes into the game. I'd say that the three-handed and heads-up portion of the game took up about that much time when put together. All in all, though, I was totally satisfied. The prize pool was decent considering there had been about eight or so total rebuys from the players in the game (not bad, that's almost one per person). This, plus hitting my must-win bet with Dale again, padded my win nicely.
Currently, the points break down like this:
Me - 158 pts.
Chip - 125 pts.
Lee - 121 pts.
Chris - 120 pts.
Marc - 107 pts.
Jake - 92 pts.
Eric - 83 pts.
Dale - 82 pts.
Andrew - 66 pts.
Lori - 62 pts.
In fact, all told, the tournament lasted about nine hours, which is pretty grueling since the rebuy period ended 2 hours 15 minutes into the game. I'd say that the three-handed and heads-up portion of the game took up about that much time when put together. All in all, though, I was totally satisfied. The prize pool was decent considering there had been about eight or so total rebuys from the players in the game (not bad, that's almost one per person). This, plus hitting my must-win bet with Dale again, padded my win nicely.
Currently, the points break down like this:
Me - 158 pts.
Chip - 125 pts.
Lee - 121 pts.
Chris - 120 pts.
Marc - 107 pts.
Jake - 92 pts.
Eric - 83 pts.
Dale - 82 pts.
Andrew - 66 pts.
Lori - 62 pts.
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