Mask to Playing Correctly

A hand I botched recently went like this:

Hero in small blind with KsJc.

Three limpers, button raises.

Hero calls, three limpers call.

Five players, 5 big bets.

Flop Qd-Js-9d

Hero checks, limpers check, button bets.

Hero check-raises.

Limpers fold.

Button calls.

Two players, 7 big bets.

Turn 2h

Hero bets.

Button raises.

Hero folds.

Let’s see… where to start in this hand where the wheels came off so badly.  Can you spot the worst error?  Cold calling in the small blind with a hand that is dangerously vulnerable to domination is a good place to start.  Even on the button, this would probably be a fold but a 3-bet would be worth considering.  But, cold calling, with a player left to act (who could 3-bet) and first to act after the flop, this is pretty terrible play.

How about the check-raise with the overcard, flush draw and straight draw on board.  Check-raising with 2^nd pair when heads up into the preflop raiser is a good play on a dry board.  Most of the value in a play like that comes from fold equity on the turn.  But, with so many draws out there and two big cards on board there is very little chance of anyone folding.  The floating play (just calling the check-raise and then raising my bet on the turn) my opponent made on me is very standard with top pair strong kicker.  I was toast from the get go.

Well, as bad as these two plays were they don’t hold a candle to my fold on the turn.  Let’s say my opponent has AA and for some reason after her turn raise she exposed her hand.  It would STILL be a terrible play to fold.  My outs at this point include 2 Jacks (for trips), any of the four 10’s (for a straight) and 3 K’s (for two pair).  Nine outs total.  That’s about 5:1 to make my hand on the river.  I am faced with 10 big bets in the pot with my opponent’s raise being asked to call 1 and I’ll probably have to call one more on the river as my opponent is likely to bet when I check, all in all about 6:1 implied odds.  I am getting odds and MUST call the turn raise and river bet.  Failing to do so, in the long run, will ruin my chances of being a winning player.

I was pretty embarrassed after this hand and anxious to get some help with it afterword.  It’s pretty easy to know you’ve played badly when you are so thoroughly shellacked in a hand like this.  But, what about hands that win?  Winning a big pot can often mask bad play that can bleed your bankroll dry over the long haul.  Winning is, after all, the ultimate yardstick we use to determine success, right?  How can you judge the quality of play in a hand regardless of the immediate outcome?  Here’s an example:

Hero on button with Ah-3h

Limped pot, 5 players, 2.5 bb

Flop 5h-2c-10s

UTG +2 bets

Highjack raises

Hero cold calls

UTG +2 calls

Turn 6h

UTG +2 checks

Highjack bets

Hero raises

UTG +2 folds

Highjack calls

River 4h

I won a big pot with this hand.  My play probably looked like genius to the rest of the table but was it really?  Two players limped in front of me establishing they have weak hands that will most likely miss the flop and fold on the turn or river.  I have position on the limpers and I have an opportunity to fold out the small blind and force the big blind to define his hand.  I have a hand with some showdown value that is more likely than not (compared to my opponent’s ranges) ahead.  I need to get more money in the pot when I have an edge and I failed to do so.  A fold would have been a good alternative to a raise; instead I picked the weakest of my three options, limping.

My second mistake was cold calling the raise on the flop.  With such a small pot I’m simply not getting odds to call.  Folding the flop is the preferable play with an alternative being to raise with the intent of getting to the river for one extra small bet.

Finally, the raise on the turn was pretty bad.  I’m only hitting my hand a little less than 20% of the time.  I need better than 33% with three players in the hand to raise.  Worse still is forcing the UTG +2 player to fold who might have called one bet and compelled to call the river (given the size of the pot) and paying me off when my hand hit.

Having the insight into when I misplayed a hand, even when I win the pot, is a skill in itself.  If there is any consolation in these two messy hands, I’m at least beginning to get a feel for what’s going wrong.

Update

I crossed the 400 hour mark last night and should be able to make 500 by the end of the year.  The good news is I am holding steady at about 1 big bet per hour win rate.  Barring some catastrophic downswing, I should be able to make my goal of sustaining my win rate past the 500 hour mark.  I think it’s safe to say the meteoric rise of my win rate in the early stages of my tracking, (around March and April) was probably due to variance.  The passive, rockish style I was playing shouldn’t have yielded the 1.5 bbph I was enjoying.  Now that I’ve improved my game and probability has caught up with me I’ve settled in to a more sustainable figure.  Also, I think it’s safe to say that if I subtracted out the disastrous misadventures I’ve taken into higher limits, my win rate trend would be even more encouraging.

One of the things in playing a more aggressive style has done is increased my variance.  While I’ve been able to sustain my win rate, my standard deviation has risen dramatically from the mid 9’s to now over 12.2 bbph.  I’m having fewer sessions where I’m winning or loosing around $40 or less.  When I loose, I’m loosing around $1-200.  My winning sessions are about the same.  Even though I suffered a pretty bad downswing last month, I still have ended up cashing in 12 of my last 21 sessions.  July saw me just barely creep over the winning mark for the month (by only $35).  Fortunately, August is shaping up better; solidly in winning territory so far.  I’m planning on about three or four more sessions to close out the month.  If I cash big in one session or small in at least two, I’ll be OK.

Adjusting Your Play

An important element of advanced play is being able to adjust your play, (or changing gears) to adapt to your opponents playing styles.  Many new players are often frustrated when asking about decision making in their play when the reply comes back, “it depends.”  Determining what type of opponent you are playing against and interpreting the decisions they make is one of the big factors that go into that “it depends” answer.  Some of the decisions you would make against a “standard” opponent would be the absolute wrong choice against an unusually aggressive villain.  Here’s an example:

My usual live 4/8 cash game.  Normally, my opponents are very loose-passive but occasionally get some overly aggressive players.

Hero in cutoff with 10d-10c
Highjack limps
Hero raises
Button 3-bets
Blinds fold
Highjack calls
Hero caps
Button calls, Highjack calls
3 players, 6.75 big bets
Flop 10s-7h-7c
Highjack checks
Hero bets
Button calls, Highjack folds
Two players 7.75 big bets
Turn Qh
Hero bets
Button calls

Button is a classic loose-aggressive player. I’ve seen him constantly play hands like unsuited connectors and A-x. There was some metagame going with this fellow and myself. He ran me down with fourth pair beating my overcards, with at least two paint cards on board and a smug little grin. I’ve seen him play very aggressively early in hands but slow down a lot on later streets.  Including a few pretty bad river folds.  Highjack is a very well known loose-passive regular who takes this line all the time, calling four bets to see a flop and folding if not connecting.

With highjack’s limp, I’m very sure I’m ahead of him preflop but am I ahead of the button? Against a “normal” player in the spot, a capped preflop bet would probably have been a mistake.  My usual loose-passive opponents are probably not 3-betting anything worse than pocket Q’s or AK.  A better choice would have been to flat call the 3-bet and look to check raise a safe looking flop like J-8-2 and bet down praying I’m up against AK. 

 

However, the opponent in my example I’ve seen open raise very light.  The 3-bet means he really has something of value but because he is loose-aggressive he could have an A down to a suited 9, K down to a suited J and maybe 9’s 8’s or 7’s. That’s a lot of combos compared to the wired pairs that are crushing me. Also, with the metagame stuff, he may have just been trying to isolate which would really open up his range, maybe down to J-9 and any pocket pair.  All this made me fairly confident I had an edge preflop and to include pocket 10’s in the bottom of my own capping range against this specific opponent.

Another read specific decision in the hand was to bet down in this hand.  A different but fairly common player I find in my games are weak-tight players who give way too much credit to their opponents and make terrible lay downs in the face of the mildest of aggression.  A bet on a flop like this to a player like that would clearly look like what it truly is.  A monster hand!  He might even fold a hand as strong as pocket J’s.  In a situation like that using what’s called a “value check” on the flop might induce a weak-tight opponent to call on later streets.  In other words, I’m sacrificing some immediate value for the chance of bigger value later in the hand.

In the example, however, my opponent’s style and his pre-flop three bet make it a pretty close to a slam dunk that he’s calling down.  A check through on the flop would be a disaster in that case and my betting to him could clearly look like another overcard bet down like the one he caught me on earlier.
 

Understanding and classifying your opponents and adjusting your decision making accordingly is a vital skill in advancing your poker prowess.