Nothing wrong with being a calling station sometimes

I wanted to post an example of where 3betting is sub optimal. and where you should always try to make a strategy for how you want to play the hand, based on reads and situation. So here we wake up with QQ from BB versus a TAG player on the tight/nit side of things. Now I guess the vast majority of regs 3bet here. Personally I think they do this for 2 reasons, a) they can't hand read very well, and they know it and b) they have read everywhere that you cannot play out of position without the lead.

So with QQ here, the mouse hovers over the 3bet pot button (if it exists) in auto mode. But we really need to think. Villain is 18/14 and raising 3bb from cutoff. He has a 100%cbet. He's 4betting AK, AA-KK for sure which, as a range, crushes us, and MAYBE flatting JJ-TT but he might even fold these. All other hands he is folding. Why on earth therefore would you want to 3bet him therefore???

$0.50/$1 No Limit Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
Poker Tools by Stoxpoker - Hand Details
MP: $124.90 (124.9 bb)
CO: $140.90 (140.9 bb)
BTN: $34.50 (34.5 bb)
SB: $50.35 (50.4 bb)
Hero (BB): $101.50 (101.5 bb)
UTG: $66.50 (66.5 bb)

Pre-Flop: Hero is BB with Q Q
2 folds, CO raises to $3, 2 folds, Hero calls $2

We make a decision at the start of the hand how we want to play it (extracting max value through opponents mistakes after concealing our strength), and we stick to that throughout the hand without info to suggest we should be beat.

Flop: ($6.50) 6 5 J (2 players)
Hero checks, CO bets $4, Hero calls $4

Plan is to check call all streets, as villain spazzes once he is in the pot, as previously mentioned with cbet. If he checks the turn, we bet all cards on the river no matter what. (I would even bet if an A rivers, but I leave that to you to decide why I would do that)

Turn: ($14.50) 7 (2 players)
Hero checks, CO bets $10, Hero calls $10

Keeping to the plan. 8-9 beats us now, as do the sets, and absolutely no reason on Gods earth to raise therefore.

River: ($34.50) 8 (2 players)
Hero checks, CO bets $42, Hero calls $42

Whoops..........
So the mother of all scare cards comes, and he overbets the pot. Would YOU bet like that if you made the straight? Or would you value bet to get a call from a weaker hand such as 2pair? 9-10 is the nuts, and if he does have this, then it's a very, very advanced play. I don't often see a tighty raising mid connecting cards from the cut-off, and he is always checking those on the river to such a draw/set heavy board, if by chance he has indeed made 2 pair. Meanwhile our plan was to check call to extract max value using his spazzy betting, and nothing indicates that we should deviate from that. We beat 22-44, 8-9, 99,TT, all broadway and any Ax hand, as well factoring in our suspicion on his overbet, so I have to carry on with the hand.

Results: $118.50 pot ($3 rake)
Final Board: 6 5 J 7 8
CO showed K T (high card King) and lost (-$59 net)
Hero showed Q Q (a pair of Queens) and won $115.50 ($56.50 net)

Sure sometimes they draw out on you, and sometimes you need to re-evaluate post flop, but you will not learn to play cards and start to become able to hand read if you cannot stop auto-3betting and learning post flop strategy. And so you'll never move up.

The EV Graph-Line, Losers, Whiners and Winners

Hi there
I really never understand people posting their boring whines about running below EV. The EV line in tracking software such as PT and HEM indicates when you get your money in good, as a favourite. It’s like posting all your AA hands that were crushed by KK all-in pre-flop. Yawn…....

Anyone that whines about being unlucky has "loser" written all over them in my mind, and who probably persuades themselves eventually into seeing monsters under the bed, gorging on their bad-beat-jackpot stories and continuing their boring downward spiralling vicious circle and compounding their bad luck.

Lets just think about it for a second…….

Conversely, of course you can only run above EV when you consistently get your money in bad....makes sense no? getting your money in bad is baaaaad. Getting your money in good (ie at least 51%, but usually at least 68% upwards) means you can only be sucked out on. You can’t give the bad beat.

If you want to whine about running below EV you should see my graph, it is mouth-watering how much I should have won, a healthy 4-figure sum over the past 50k hands at my little micro limits. But I am still winning. And I still consistently get my money in good.

That’s poker is it not? And I am happy with it that way. Because I think I have an edge in poker, and that horrid EV line proves it, as does the upward winnings line over a healthy hand sample.

And you should be happy too.

I have no problems saying I think I am an excellent player, who can progress far in the game by the way. Because I believe that. And if I didn’t, I wouldn’t be playing No-Limit. Especially No-Limit, self-belief is everything, as you can’t hide behind the maths as much as you can in Limit (unless you short-stack, and you know my thoughts on that fucked-up strategy). In order to beat the psychology of the game, knowing you have an edge on even the better players is part of avoiding fear and instead making them fear you. I aspire to become better at No-limit because I honestly believe it makes me a better, stronger person.

So forget about the EV line. And Instead........?

Hate them, kill them off. And you’ll win. No friends at the tables.

Key to success at micros: part 2

I spoke about the importance at microstakes of winning the maximum from your strong hands by value betting (discussed in part 1 here), but the other essential thing for a winning player at 100nl and below is losing the minimum with your second best (yet still strong) hands. Of course these concepts are relevant at all stakes, but simply being aware of these 2 ideas alone will shoot up your winrate massively, even if you ignore everything else, at microstakes.

Of course we are talking about reading the board texture v your opponents range when facing a raise with our premium pair/TPTK type holding on a wet flop, and that has been discussed to death elsewhere. Instead I would discuss situations where getting it all in when you have the nuts, or near to it, would hold little value as you simply fold out hands that you crush. But when you have a very very strong yet non nut hand when facing action, yes you are going to lose some money sometimes, it's inevitable, but hand reading and common sense can at least save you losing your whole stack.

As usual an example to discuss: Villain is 18/14 straightforward tagnit with unbernit tendencies.
$0.50/$1 No Limit Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
Poker Tools by Stoxpoker - Hand Details

UTG: $100 (100 bb)
MP: $109.90 (109.9 bb)
Hero (CO): $100 (100 bb)
BTN: $36.10 (36.1 bb)
SB: $100 (100 bb)
BB: $194.30 (194.3 bb)

Pre-Flop: Hero is CO with J T
UTG folds, MP raises to $3.50, Hero calls $3.50, 3 folds
Silly to 3bet here, as the only hands that call have me beat, as do those that 4bet. His range is skewed toward AK AQ and big pairs, which JTs does well against.

Flop: ($8.50) Q 2 9 (2 players)
MP bets $6.50, Hero calls $6.50
We flop the draw. Based on his range, he could have TPTK, air (with AK) or a set. If a K flops and he has AK we are stacking him, with his ubernit tendencies. So I figure I have the odds to call.

Turn: ($21.50) 8 (2 players)
MP bets $14, Hero calls $14
We hit, and he keeps betting. Here is where we really need to re-examine what he could actually have here. Figures to be a combo draw with the FD, one of the other JT hands, or even naked AQ. A raise here on the turn would be correct, except this type of player stacks off lightly I think. So as he is likely to fire a final barrel, he will have to call my min raise on the river.

River: ($49.50) 2 (2 players)
MP bets $42, Hero calls $42
And here is where the point of the post really kicks in. A bad river card and a big bet from him looks like its either a set filled up or a flush. So our raising the river turns into a call.

Results: $133.50 pot ($3 rake)
Final Board: Q 2 9 8 2
MP showed J T (a flush, Queen high) and won $130.50 ($64.50 net)
Hero mucked J T (a straight, Eight to Queen) and lost (-$66 net)

Although he had the same hand as me, I saved myself 30bb by not shoving the nuts (folding out his weaker hands and losing value) on the flop, instead with a view to getting it all in by the river, based on his betting patterns. When the unlikely flush/fullhouse card came, if we raise on the river, we only get called by hands that beat us, so we call, and lose the minimum. You can see by his stupid river bet that he was definitely going broke, had I had a set which had filled up, which was entirely possible. I should also consider a fold here, but I think it was more than 30% likely that he could have just an overpair.TP hand. I agree that a fold should be argued here and I could have found it. My real excuse was that I only noticed the backdoor flush card, and not the board pairing as well, A truly terrible card.

Finally, I would not have played a set like this. I would certainly have raised his flop cont bet to get the money in as an 75% favourite v his range, as I am more vulnerable and there are more scare cards for him too on such a wet board with 2 cards to come.

October results

Only 12k hands this month and that wasn't enough to even out the variance. A truly awful single day over 2 sessions saw me losing 14buyins. Every horror under the sun hit me that day, and it was truly amazing just how bad you can run sometimes. I got it back to 3buyins below even over the next 8k hands playing nitty (em.....read minimise-tilt) poker before another 2 bad sessions at the weekend left me 8buyins down for the end of the month. Add back rakeback and some weird (but welcome) bonuses that FT ran and I guess I am 4buyins down for the month.

There is no point in posting the graph, its too few hands and its just one massive vertical down line followed by a steady upward and then a small downer at the end. I have been very busy with work projects and next few months is going to be as busy. I need to be getting +30k hands per month minimum to start to get a true reflection of win rate (or loss rate) or start aiming for 3month reviews instead of monthly ones if I only manage circa 10k. God, though, I really want at least 25k to get at least some momentum....

What to take from it? 14 buyins? Looking through the HHs of the session, I just not sure if I would have done much different. I dont want this blog to turn into the typical micro-whine=bad beat-i-run-sooo-bad-blog. Prob need some second opinion from a friendly patient soul. And...well, I have few losing sessions, but I occasionally have a big losing sessions followed by lots of smaller winning ones. I never have massive (ie +5buyin type) winning sessions.

My second losing month at poker since starting this heavenly game. Yuk.

Notes on The Red Line

Today was my first day playing poker for 10 days as I have been out of the country. It's gonna be a low volume month, which is crap.

Anyway I thought I would mention the red line graph on HEM since I have seen it discussed on numerous micro blogs.

Frankly, I couldn't care less about it. I rarely look at the showdown/nonshowdown winnings graph, because I only look at things that can help me, and that can't help me.

Why? Paying too much attention to a balanced red line will fuck with your head and make you play sub-optimally. One of the main aspects the a "good" redline demonstrates is an understanding of fold equity. If you are reading this blog, you are likely playing at stakes on or under 100nl, and if so, its showdown winnings and blind stealing that are the order of the day. I would say the adjustment in fold equity between 25nl-100nl is relatively small, whereas the adjustment between 100nl to 200 and on to 400nl is massive comparatively.

Playing your opponents cards, value betting with the best hand and folding with the worst of it is the way of it 100nl and below, not trying to push top pair lovers off their "marginal" holding.

Playing a 32/25/10%3bet style will get tons of folds and a nice red line, but I have yet to see a big winner playing these stats at 100nl. You will win lots of small pots, but lose a significant amount of big pots, which combine to make a losing player.

I like to summarise with a hand as usual, and here we bust a top-pair-loving opponent by playing optimally against his stupid overvalue-top-pair style.

$0.50/$1 No Limit Hold'em Cash Game, 5 Players
Poker Tools by Stoxpoker - Hand Details
MP: $84.90 (84.9 bb)
CO: $211.35 (211.4 bb)
BTN: $120.45 (120.5 bb)
Hero (SB): $100 (100 bb)
BB: $108.65 (108.7 bb)

Pre-Flop: Hero is SB with 4 A

MP calls $1, 2 folds, Hero completes, BB checks
Flop: ($3) 2 9 5 (3 players)
Hero bets $2, BB folds, MP raises to $6, Hero calls $4

We lead out the flop with a semi-bluff with a combo draw, to build the pot.When it's raised, we can guess what he has. Most likely the overpair or TP. Many players (redline lovers) will 3bet-shove here with the combo draw, but against this typical 100nl station's range, we are flipping, when you factor in the unlikely sets. He is never ever laying down an overpair, or top pair. There is no fold equity. So why flip?

Turn: ($15) 3 (2 players)
Hero checks, MP bets $10, Hero raises to $45, MP calls $35
We just call the flop 3bet and chase our draw, which we hit and he will still pay us off when we hit, which he duly does here, as we check raise him, although I am surprised to see just how lightly he calls.

River: ($105) Q (2 players)
Hero bets $48 and is all-in, MP calls $32.90 and is all-in

Results: $170.80 pot ($3 rake)
Final Board: 2 9 5 3 Q
MP mucked 9 J (a pair of Nines) and lost (-$84.90 net)
Hero showed 4 A (a straight, Ace to Five) and won $167.80 ($82.90 net)

We risk an additional 4bb on the flop (and possibly another check call 8bb on the turn if it bricks) to get exactly the same result as if we risked 90bb by shoving on 50% equity.

Forget about the red line. Seriously, there is too much else out there to master at these limits. Once you do master them, it's move up time to optimize your win rate, and THEN start looking at fold equity. But if you can get players to lay down decent hands at 100nl, your throwing money away. Because you should have moved up at that point......your crushing.

Full tilt v shortstackers

As you may know if you follow my blog, I have little patience for the shortstacking community. I have noticed that the game slows when they sit, and the fact is, it remains a very difficult strategy to play against. I think it actually discourages people from playing more at the poker sites.

There's no real point in trying to get a ss to "change" into a 50bb+ player. From his point of view, why should he? If that's where they get their return, no amount of argument in the name of "respect to the game" or "deep stack skill" will make the slightest difference to them.

But I have an idea. If Fulltilt made it that each player can only buy in for 1 20bb at a time, and any other table he buys into has to be 50bb, 2 things would happen.

1. We would all enjoy playing a little turn and river poker a little more often
2. All the players from other sites (who don't shortstack as a strategy) would positively FLOCK to Full tilt. Because, quite simply, shortstackers ruin it for everyone else, and who wants to have players around who do that at a site.

In fact, I have heard that Fulltilt are seriously considering this. I doubt it has anything to do with their "love" of "proper" poker (ie point 1 above) and more to do with the commercial aspects of point 2.

I just hope it happens.

Here is an example of optimal play against a shortstacker. I play whats called a back-raise, where I float preflop to induce the squeeze from the bb shortstack donk, who duly obliges with his crappy K9o shove. He suksout and immediately leaves the table.

$0.50/$1 No Limit Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
Poker Tools by Stoxpoker - Hand Details

MP: $121.60 (121.6 bb)
CO: $157.35 (157.4 bb)
BTN: $100 (100 bb)
Hero (SB): $145.40 (145.4 bb)
BB: $20 (20 bb)
UTG: $299.75 (299.8 bb)

Pre-Flop: Hero is SB with A Q
3 folds, BTN raises to $2, Hero calls $1.50, BB raises to $20 and is all-in, BTN folds, Hero calls $18
Flop: ($42) K 6 3 (2 players, 1 is all-in)
Turn: ($42) J (2 players, 1 is all-in)
River: ($42) 3 (2 players, 1 is all-in)

Results: $42 pot ($2.10 rake)
Final Board: K 6 3 J 3
Hero showed A Q (a pair of Threes) and lost (-$20 net)
BB showed 9 K (two pairs, Kings and Threes) and won $39.90 ($19.90 net)

Words cannot express my feelings toward this monkey and his strategy, they really make me puke when I induce them to spew and they still luck out, and run. What can you do......?

Key to Success at the micros?

I don't think there is any great secret to win at 100nl and below. Actually I would say it's simply down to one thing, extracting maximum value with your key hands. Forget about the pre flop all ins, the set over set type cooler/heater, and having your aces cracked, missing with AK etc. It happens to us all, as I have said before. But your winrate will show a marked increase if you are able to get that additional 10bb or so when you know you have the best of it, and play accordingly versus the particular player type.

To illustrate this I want to post a hand that I think I played badly in this respect, where I lost value by lazy hand reading. Villain here is a 10/7 ubernit in the blinds over 42 hands, never having 3bet so far.

$0.50/$1 No Limit Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
Poker Tools by Stoxpoker - Hand Details

SB: $168.20 (168.2 bb)
BB: $172.60 (172.6 bb)
UTG: $147.70 (147.7 bb)
MP: $111.45 (111.5 bb)
CO: $100 (100 bb)
Hero (BTN): $100 (100 bb)

Pre-Flop: Hero is BTN with Q Q
3 folds, Hero raises to $3, SB folds, BB calls $2

Flop: ($6.50) Q T Q (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $3, BB calls $3
Nice to flop quads, sad to flop it against an ubernit. Nevertheless I always cont bet here, and I think many players always make the mistake of checking here. Just look at the board, one of the wettest out there. If ubernit has 22-99 I doubt he will put much more into the pot, so as well to take it down right there and move on. However, as he clearly only 3bets KK-AA, AK, we must think about what else he might have. A myriad of Broadway combinations also comes to mind, with gutshot and open-ender possibilities, as well as bottom pair ATs type hands. We want to entice these to call. But the other important reason to bet here is because I am also always going to fire a small bet with air, as well as the nuts. Ubernit times for a bit, then calls.

Turn: ($12.50) A (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $7, BB raises to $22, Hero calls $15
Ok, so here is my first mistake. When I was raised here, I was so busy licking my lips, I didn't actually narrow down his range. What would CR me here? AT? unlikely, check call more from this guy, Axclubs? possible I guess. KJ? very very likely. TT very very likely. So at this point I SHOULD have been thinking about how to extract maximum value on this hands, as AT is putting nothing more into the pot, and only Axclubs will give up on river if it misses. So a simple min raise would have done the job, where he will either call for deception (in his eyes), shove, or insta fold (the least likely).

River: ($56.50) 7 (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $34, BB calls $34
River bricks, and I make my final and most important mistake. He is either check folding his weak hand, or check calling with a boat or a straight, and the check seems more to lean toward the straight. Either way a bet close to pot would have done it, and he still would have called. And had I min-3bet-raised the turn, a 2/3 pot bet on the river would have got all the money in.

Results: $124.50 pot ($3 rake)
Final Board: Q T Q A 7
BB mucked K J (a straight, Ten to Ace) and lost (-$62 net)
Hero showed Q Q (four of a kind, Queens) and won $121.50 ($59.50 net)

So here, through lazy play sparked by the fun of flopping quads, made me lose somewhere in the reason of 30-40bbs.

This is an extreme example, which I use because I had the absolute nuts on the flop, therefore every bet was always going to be a pure value bet, but this applies equally to your tptk hands where you think you have your opponent outkicked, and of course there is far more skill to that, in terms of hand reading and self confidence, but nevertheless, that is where your win rate will be at.