Bet With a Purpose

"Every action has an equal and opposite reaction."

Sorry Senior Newton, but your third law of poker needed some tweaking.

One thing I've been working on is thinking ahead.  Something I try to answer during each phase of a hand is what exactly do I want to have happen?

Do I want to play heads up?  Do I want to hide my hand?  Do I want to keep the pot small?  Do I want to go to the flop with a large number of players?  Do I have to win this hand?

Knowing what you want should help you make a decision when it's your turn to act.  The other half of the equation is knowing HOW to achieve what you want.  Here's a recent example.

Player under the gun raises to $7.  Call, call, call, call, call, call, call, big blind raise to $15.  WTF?!?!?

So of course it goes call x 8 players.  Family pot for $15.  Flop 772.  BB Bets $50 one caller.  BB bets turn one caller.  BB bets river, one caller.  BB with AA losses to player with 97 suited.  He can't figure out how he lost.  How could a hand like 97 call a raise to $15?

I assume he knew what he wanted, which was to take down a nice pre-flop pot, or play heads up.  So how the heck could a player with these intentions take the whole table to the flop?

He failed to understand what reaction would come from his action (an almost min raise)

Second example.  Flop.  First to act bets $10.  Next player pushes $10 in is left hand then comes back with the right with $50.  A classic string bet.  Dealer says "sorry sir, that's a call" player is disappointed but understands.  Third player calls, fourth player raises to $20.  Back to the first guy who calls, second player says "RAISE" and makes it $120.  Fold from the third guy, and dude number four folds!!!  Are you serious?!? The MIN raiser folds.  Fold fold fold fold.

Did that really just happen?  This is the sort of thing you see at 1/2 from time to time.

The whole table watches a guy try to raise.  He can't...discount baby!  Then a player raises, opening it back up to the guy who loves his hand.

Clearly the min raiser was missing at least half of the equation.  Either he didn't know what he wanted, or he didn't know how to act in order to achieve the reaction that he wanted.

Lets look at it from a different angle.  We flop the nuts.

Action and reaction.

The reaction we want is a huge pot, lots of players, lots of money.

What action will help us achieve this?  Lets give the man who we know loves his hand, who we know wants to raise an opportunity to do it correctly this time.

We min raise.  He makes it $120.  Cha-Ching.

We knew what we wanted to have happen, we acted accordingly in order to maximize the opportunity to achieve it.  Count your money.

Continue to think ahead.  Make sure you look to the left and right before you act.  It's nice knowing what the guy behind you (so to speak) wants to do before you have to act.  Oh, and be flexible.  Your discounted call could turn into a waste/fold when the next guy misplays his hand.

Patience Is Profit

Music Selection: Jay-Z's Magna Carta Holy Grail
Beverage: A&W Root Beer in a mug

My cash game of choice is 1/2 NLH.  There are tons of pros and few cons when it comes to this game.  The best part is that I consider myself a top three player at any nine handed table.

"Oh no he didn't!"

Yes that sounds like a cocky statement but it's really not.  I'm not a great poker player.  I'm not in the top third of all poker players.  What I am is more experienced then 69% of your average 1/2 players.

Lets look at 1/2.  It's the cheapest no limit game offered at most casinos.  I play on weekends.  Weekend evenings are the party nights.  Walk into a poker room on a Friday night, and you'll find a group of players who are there to have fun, party, gamble, and play the most popular poker game in the world.

At this low level, experience is everything.  Reading your opponent.  Putting your opponent on hands.  Correct checking, betting, raising, folding all come with experience.

This is the advantage I have over most 1/2 players, this is why I play 1/2.

So, I have a small advantage over a lot of the people you'll find at a 1/2 game.  So what?

Well, this group of players have wallets too.  They can buy in for as much as any other player at the table.  The most profit comes from these guys.  The inexperienced.

Sometimes, this knowledge hurts me.  I feel rushed.  I know they're bad, so giving them credit for a hand is tough.  Seeing bad plays makes me want to open up.  Now I'm making calls with top pair Aces with that shitty ten ish kicker.  Sometimes I find myself giving chips away in hands I'd never normally play due to the lack of respect.  When this happens, I come back to one word.

Patience.

Let them play bad, let them keep scooping small/medium size pots.  Eventually, the discipline will pay off.  My over pair, two pair or set destroys these players.  They can't fold top pair.  They can't fold a flush draw, they can't fold an open ended (or sometimes gut shot) straight draw.  Cool.  Welcome to value town, population your and me.

During my last session, I'd usually raise to about $10 in good position.  It just so happend that I some loose players to my left and a player of interest 3ish seats to my right.  Three of my pre-flop raises in a row, he re-raised all-in.  I'm looking at decent hands, but they weren't $100+ hands.  Fold.  Fold.  Fold.

Finally I'm dealt JJ.  Raise to the same $10.  Call, Call, Call, All-in $120 ish, I insta-call.  We're heads up.  8 hi flop.  Blank Blank.  I say I have a pair, he mucks.  There's a $150 win.

Patience.

Let them make the mistake, they'll pay you I promise.

Newton said Force = Mass x Acceleration.

Einstein said E=M x C^2.

Rhino says Patience = Profit.

Betcha my breakthrough makes you more money ;)

Note:  Patient + Aggressive to maximize profitable situations.  Sometimes you have to be willing to call All-Ins with a slight edge (JJ vs AK suited is 54 to 46).  1/2 is cheap enough where you can take some risks and win in the long run without risking an arm and a leg.

My Arch Nemesis

I recommend reading the post below to give yourself a little background.

So I made the mistake of being a compassionate human being and giving this woman the benefit of the doubt.  Not good.  Let's call it half an hour later, she has about one stack ($100) in front of her.  She's in seat 9, I'm in seat 3, so I have position on her 67% of the time.  She raises to $15 in early position.

Sidebar: a $15 raise in 1/2 (at least where I play) is a a significant raise.  The standard bets are usually $7-12.  I'm sitting with about 5 stacks, so I can afford to loosen up and see some flops, especially against players who I feel I can outplay.  Her reaction to the $15 mentioned in the previous post did give me some valuable information.  I learned that the money is important to her.  I'm not trying to sound like an asshole, but you know what I mean.  I don't think she's going to bet with nothing, and piss it away.  This means that if she checks the flop first, I can bet and she'll fold a large percent of the time (whiffing)

Back to the story, I have K9 of clubs.  Not a good hand, but I have position and sense weakness, so what the hell.  The flop is 9 blank blank, two clubs.  This is one of those flops that can get people into trouble.  I know that she bet $15, so she could easily have an over pair.  I'm not trying to lose $100 in an attempt to win $15.

She checks.  I bet $25.

This is where it gets interesting.  She takes 90% of her stack into her hand, reaches over the betting line (which is enforced) drops the $25 without saying anything, and brings the rest of the stack back with her.  The dealer informs her that all the chips in her hand need to stay out there.  Her reaction is obviously much worse then when she heard she owed $15.  This will cost her about $75.  She starts to argue, saying she didn't know the rules, that she's never played here, blah, blah blah.  The floor is called.

Here's what's going though my head.  I really didn't want to have to call a check raise all in, but this isn't that. Her reaction is telling me that she does not have a $75 hand.  Second, one thing I've learned is that these situations can give you away.  I sat there, and didn't say a word.  The dealer and the floor can work it out.  My getting passionate about it (either way) isn't going to help, and will give my hand away.  I think my 9's are good (right now) but don't really know what she has.  I have the K high flush draw and a decent kicker with the 9s, but who knows...I certainly didn't.

The floor's decision makes me a bit mad.  He warned her, let her call, and take her chips back.  Whatever.

The turn is a K.  I have top two pair with the second nut flush draw.  Ok, now I'm good.  She checks.  I bet $50.  She calls.  She has about $20 behind.  The river pairs the board, but it doesn't matter. I bet the rest, she folds, showing AQ of clubs (nut flush draw).

I win the pot, but it doesn't feel good.  Should I have demanded the money stay in?  Should I have even been in the hand?  Did I play it right?

By my calculations, this woman now owes me $35.

Arch Nemesis

She starts talking.  She goes on and on about how she plays so much poker, and has never heard of a place that enforces the line.  She says the line should have a "bet line" label so people would know.  Blah, blah, blah.  The dealer warned her, the floor warned her, I warned her, and she somehow saved herself her whole stack.  You'd think this would be enough to teach someone right? Wrong.

About five hands later, she's in the hand, I'm not, and neither is the one seat.  The same exact thing happens (new dealer).  She puts her whole stack across (doubled up twice) to make a small call.  I look at the guy in seat one who sees it as well.  We don't say anything.  Etiquette says let the players in the hand/dealer handle it.  Which is exactly what we did.

The hand ends, and seat one says, "you know you did it again right?" she goes off.  She yells many things.  How it doesn't make a difference.  That we need to leave her alone, that we shouldn't say anything that she's just playing for fun.

I love bad players.  I try to keep them happy, I want them to sit down next to me (on my right) and have the most fun they've ever had losing money to that really nice kid in the Purdue hat.  But I can't stand people who run their mouth for no reason.  I'm thinking "Lady, you f'ing owe me.  It's because I allowed you to be here, that you are still here...stfu" as she continues to talk and talk and talk.  I decide that no matter what happens, I want all her chips.

Well, I don't get them.  She turned that $20 into about $150 (not through me).  Because of the $35 I let her get away with, she was able to walk away with the stack and a half.

I am the rightful owner of that $150, and I'll be waiting.

The Worst $15 I've Ever Spent

Poker players Winning poker players are the cheapest of the cheap bastards.

At any given time, you'll see players eating the free crackers that came with the salad they ordered four hours ago.  You'll see them arguing over the menu, complaining about the chicken fingers at $6.99 being a huge ripoff.  You'll see players with $1000 stacks stiffing the waitress on her $1 tip etc.

I'm playing 1/2 ($1 small blind $2 big blind) No-Limit Hold Em.  I have about $500 in front of me, and I'm going to tell you about the worst $15 I've ever spent.

Into the 9 seat comes a late twenty-something year old woman.

When someone new comes to the table, I'm checking them out.  It's crazy to think of the kinds of things I observe and pick up on these days.  First off, she's a woman, she's African American, she's wearing a t-shirt and some kind of athletic/warm-up pants.  She also buys her chips at the table, using an unknown number of $20 bills.  Oh, and I've never seen her before.

What does this tell me?  I'm willing to bet one of my stacks that she doesn't play poker regularly.  Regulars know that in this poker room (and many others), the house tries to get you to buy your chips at the window prior to sitting down at the table.  Second, regular poker players usually carry big bills.

None of this matters.  She hasn't played a hand yet.  I'm just giving an example of the kinds of things I catch running through my head.

Back to the story.

The chip runner comes over and takes her cash.  She's immediately the big blind (BB).  She has a "Money Behind" button in front of her and no chips.  I limp in, a player to my left raises to $15, she calls, I call.  To the flop we go (three of us).

Lady checks, I bet, both players fold, and the dealer pushes me my $30 pot.  A minute later, the chip runner returns with her chips.  The dealer asks for the $15 she owes me, and I see confusion.  She tells the dealer that she didn't know it was raised to $15.  That she had 7-2, and wouldn't have called $15.  The dealer informs her that she still owes the $15, that the raise was announced and she called.

Here's where Rhino (incorrectly) starts to feel bad.  I can tell that she's sincere.  This was clearly a mistake.  I tell her to keep it.  Dealer throws it to me anyway, and I toss it back to her and tell her to be careful next time.

BAD Rhino, BAD.

This turns out to be the worst decision I made all day (including the hero call that cost me $100 with top pair no kicker later that evening)

This woman would go on to become my arch nemesis.

More to come on this subject in the next post.

Intro

I am not a writer.  Five words I hear myself saying more and more at work lately.  I decided to start blogging for a few reasons. First, I think it'll help me with my writing.  Second, having a centralized location for lessons learned at the poker table will help me improve my game.  Finally, my friends know that I play poker, but they don't really know what that means.  I figure this is a good way for them to learn more about this hobby of mine.

If you're going to read any further, here are a few things you'll need to know:

1. Grammar, style, and format (maybe even spelling) will not be great here.  I don't know sentence structure, I still don't know what an "active voice" is and I'm going to throw random commas into run on sentences for no apparent reason.

2. I am not the smartest player out there.  I know enough math to make educated decisions, but do not make all poker decisions based on the numbers.  Do not hold this against me.  I will make bad calls and I will make bad folds.  I'm going to write about them, and may still be wrong.  If this bothers you, use it against me the next time we play together.

3. I'm going to be honest about my reads and impressions of players.  My intention is not to be offensive, cocky, or to sound like an asshole.

4. Some of the amounts of money mentioned here will be ridiculous.  I'm going to be honest about wins and losses.  I pay my bills, I save money, and assure you that I am making smart reasonable decisions when it comes to my discretionary funds.

5. I really only play on the weekends.  My goal is to post after every session, but this could mean days/weeks between posts.

Rhino