Thursday, June 08, 2006
Taking a break
Ya so I guess I will be taking a two-week break. Has a little to do with having a losing weekend, more to do with the World Cup coming up, and even more with the fact that the sun is finally shining. I was sitting on a beach bar in Hannover last night and I suddenly remembered that there are things that I like much better than money :)
Tuesday, June 06, 2006
A weekend from hell (need help playing AA)
I guess it had to happen eventually; I just got back from a fairly annoying losing weekend. In Schenefeld I managed to lose € 600 playing 2.5/5 NL, € 210 in a tournament, and € 200 playing 10/20 Limit Hold'em. To make matters worse, I lost about $2k playing SHNL Hold'em on Ultimate Bet, mostly 5/10. The session had been going fairly poorly but I managed to climb back to being only $550 down (from over $2k), when I sat at a table with 2 other guys both of whom I had previously played with and thought they were pretty weak. I post the BB and get AA in my first hand. I HATE AA in SHNL. I really do. To the point where I consider just open shoving it preflop so that at least I will not have to deal with it. The game is so full of plays and bluffs that it's real hard to lay down Aces if the board doesn't read 8s9sTs (and even then often wrong). Anyway, since shoving is clearly not an optimal strategy, my general line for playing AA is to raise at least the pot with them preflop, overbet the pot on the flop, and shove the turn unless it's real clear that the turn helped someone. If they manage to outflop me, so be it, if they call an overbet on the flop and then hit a random two-pair or draw on the turn, so be it.
Anyway, so i raise to $45 preflop (which is slightly more than the pot) and bet $180 into the $135 pot on the KT5 rainbow board, both call. The turn is a Q, which is kind of a scary card for all sorts of 2-pair hands (remember this is a threehanded game though and the pot was unraised before me so K7 is actually much more likely than KQ), but since the pot is already $675 at this point I shove my last $775. I get called in both spots and know I'm beat but get a little hope when the river gives me an A. Didn't help though, as my opponents had K7o and J9o for top pair no kicker and gutshot on the flop, and I lose to the straight. Awesome.
I kept wondering how I could have done this better. Clearly, folding the turn after the way I played the flop is not an option. The way the hand ACTUALLY played out, overbetting the flop backfired as perhaps that's what made the top pair guy decide to call rather than raise (he was next to act behind me) - not that gutshot guy had any business being in the hand anyway, but I have some faith that if top pair guy raises the gutshot guy will fold.
Maybe if i just make my standard continuation bet of like $90, top pair guy raises, in which case gutshot guy will either fold right away or I get to reraise all-in and either get them both to fold or at least get my money in good.
Of course, I could have just bet $350 or some outrageous amount into the $135 pot on the flop,stupid as that may seem, and until I come up with something better, that will be my play for next time.
Anyway, so i raise to $45 preflop (which is slightly more than the pot) and bet $180 into the $135 pot on the KT5 rainbow board, both call. The turn is a Q, which is kind of a scary card for all sorts of 2-pair hands (remember this is a threehanded game though and the pot was unraised before me so K7 is actually much more likely than KQ), but since the pot is already $675 at this point I shove my last $775. I get called in both spots and know I'm beat but get a little hope when the river gives me an A. Didn't help though, as my opponents had K7o and J9o for top pair no kicker and gutshot on the flop, and I lose to the straight. Awesome.
I kept wondering how I could have done this better. Clearly, folding the turn after the way I played the flop is not an option. The way the hand ACTUALLY played out, overbetting the flop backfired as perhaps that's what made the top pair guy decide to call rather than raise (he was next to act behind me) - not that gutshot guy had any business being in the hand anyway, but I have some faith that if top pair guy raises the gutshot guy will fold.
Maybe if i just make my standard continuation bet of like $90, top pair guy raises, in which case gutshot guy will either fold right away or I get to reraise all-in and either get them both to fold or at least get my money in good.
Of course, I could have just bet $350 or some outrageous amount into the $135 pot on the flop,stupid as that may seem, and until I come up with something better, that will be my play for next time.
Thursday, June 01, 2006
To shove or not to shove ?
I played about two hours of SHNL on UB again last night, starting out by losing lots at 2/4 and then decided I'd rather 1-table 5/10 and play right.
At some point during the session, I had QQ utg and made a standard raise to $35. It was folded to the Small Blind, who until this point had played a fair amount of hands but I didn't remember him ever raising and certainly not reraising. SHNL is a game that has very little preflop reraising going on for some reason - I am often one of the loosest or more aggressive reraisers at the table just because i am willing to reraise AQs, JJ and sometimes 98s.
Anyway, this guy pops it to $125. I feel like call, fold, and shove are all legitimate plays.
I don't really like to raise to $300 or so since you leave yourself open to getting outplayed on the flop (what do you do if someone with 99 decides to get clever and bets out $300 on the Ace high flop etc), and you can't fold to a shove simply because you will be getting 2-1 and I HAVE seen 77 and ATo all-in preflop.
I end up playing it as weak as is humanly possible - I call $90 more basically hoping for a set, then fold to his pot-size bet of $285 on a ten-high flop. Sounds as weak now as it felt then, but I still think there's a decent chance that I escaped cheaply from giving away my stack.
I guess I need to sit down and actually analyze and try to figure it out mathematically whether or not QQ is good enough to shove preflop, or if it's at least good enough to shove on that flop.
Anyway, I ended the evening up $1100 or so, most of it coming from a hand where I had 77 against KTo on the KT7 board.
At some point during the session, I had QQ utg and made a standard raise to $35. It was folded to the Small Blind, who until this point had played a fair amount of hands but I didn't remember him ever raising and certainly not reraising. SHNL is a game that has very little preflop reraising going on for some reason - I am often one of the loosest or more aggressive reraisers at the table just because i am willing to reraise AQs, JJ and sometimes 98s.
Anyway, this guy pops it to $125. I feel like call, fold, and shove are all legitimate plays.
I don't really like to raise to $300 or so since you leave yourself open to getting outplayed on the flop (what do you do if someone with 99 decides to get clever and bets out $300 on the Ace high flop etc), and you can't fold to a shove simply because you will be getting 2-1 and I HAVE seen 77 and ATo all-in preflop.
I end up playing it as weak as is humanly possible - I call $90 more basically hoping for a set, then fold to his pot-size bet of $285 on a ten-high flop. Sounds as weak now as it felt then, but I still think there's a decent chance that I escaped cheaply from giving away my stack.
I guess I need to sit down and actually analyze and try to figure it out mathematically whether or not QQ is good enough to shove preflop, or if it's at least good enough to shove on that flop.
Anyway, I ended the evening up $1100 or so, most of it coming from a hand where I had 77 against KTo on the KT7 board.
