Easing back in
So here's how my life is different than your average guy. For one thing, my work week is offset from the usual, in that my days off are generally Monday and Tuesday, with Sunday frequently being in there. This gives me a weird conception of "weekend," as well as giving me strange blocks of free time for poker, so there's that. Also this unusual version of "weekend" gives me an unusual version of "week." The other thing that's weird is working nights, which, while better suited to my sleeping habits and, generally, overall lazy lifestyle, gives me a lot less useful time than one might think.

In any case, the reason I bring this up is because, now that I've settled back into something of a poker-playing rhythm, I'm now also trying to work out what to do about the poker-blogging rhythm. The way things usually go is that, on my days off, I get up, take my time puttering around at home and taking care of business before I head off to start goofing around at poker. Then, once I hit the games, I generally keep at that until I'm tired, and I head home. When I get home, my brain has turned to goo, and I'm too beat to think about blogging anything. I think to myself, "Eh...I'll get to that after some sleep." But by the time I'm waking up and getting some coffee in me the next "morning" (and by that I mean afternoon), the vividness of my session memories are faded and grainy, and I'm not even sure I remember everything I wanted to talk about. It's usually best to blog when things are fresh in your mind, and that doesn't mean after a night of sleep.

So I figure I have a couple ways to go on this. I could try and put in the extra effort of writing before I hit the sack, while things are still fresh in my mind. What that will most likely mean, though, is maybe cutting the session a bit short, so I still have the time and brainpower to get that done in some kind of coherent fashion before I pass out. I could also go back to trying to take notes actually during the session, just so I have something to go back to later. This often has the side-effect of taking frequent breaks at the table, which I'm not a big fan of, or else looking like a complete nerd and actually taking notes right there at the table, which I'm even less a fan of. We'll see. In any case, something's gotta give, because if today is any example, I'm not going to have a lot of blogging success by going to bed right after a session. :) I put in a pretty significant stay at the tables last night, and I know that when I got home, I was brimming with things to talk about. Now that it's the next day, though, and I'm sitting here at my computer actually typing, I can't think of too much. :)

One other side-effect of my weird sleeping schedule is what it does to the kinds of games I end up in. What happens is...as a late riser, I tend not to make it to the card room until pretty late in the day. This isn't so bad, really, as I basically get there about time for the normal evening/after-work crowd, which I think is good opposition to have. That's when people drop by the card room after a hard day's work and blow a bit of their wages taking a shot at playing poker. Those are the kinds of games I like. That's just a few hours of prime time, though. Once the working stiffs start to head out (generally to the refrain of "well, gotta work tomorrow" or "gotta get back to the wife"), they're then replaced by other oddballs like myself. The texture of the game tends go through a few changes at that point. :)

I'm being vague, I guess. Think of it this way: it's the off-season in Atlantic City, so the tourist population is pretty low at this point. Imagine the kind of person you'd find in a card room at, say seven in the evening. Fine, right? Now imagine the kind of person you'd find in a card room at 3 o' clock in the morning on a Wednesday. :) Which of those two types do you want in your opposition lineup at the poker table? :)

Last night, though, was quite the exception. When I first got to the poker room, things were about as I expected; mostly people were there just to splash around and have a good time. That table broke after not too long, though, and I ended up facing a surprisingly solid lineup. Not only that, but they'd apparently been working for a while and had already built up some pretty healthy stacks, while I was just coming in fresh with my max buy-in that made me look like a short stack. The fishy money was already on its way out by that point. Gonna be a rough day. :) A few hours of that, though, and things made a total turnaround. Over the course of, well, I'd say less than an hour, we had a full 50% turnover at the table, with several big stacked tough opponents leaving and being replaced by some genuine article recreational action players. Dig it! I'm serious...we went from routine $10 or $20 pots being taken down with flop bets to more like $50 or $100 pots pre-flop seeing multiway action all the way down. Action!

I didn't get in there and mix it up too much, frankly. I was already starting to feel tired, and I knew I wasn't completely sharp. Still...a lot of ABC poker can go a long way in those situations. Since getting comfortable with no-limit, I've settled into a lot of betting patterns that make sense for me, so I don't have to think too much about every little nuance. If I'm up against weak opposition, I can do well enough just keeping tight pre-flop and pretty much playing by the book. There's not a lot new to be learned from those kinds of experiences, but sometimes it's nice to just take a break from thinking too hard and let the cards pull in a few pots. :)

In any case, that's just all a bunch of fluff. Let's get into something crunchy. I don't know why this is, but I've found that in no-limit, much moreso than limit, I find a lot more to be learned from when I make mistakes than when I do things right. So I have a feeling that this blog will come to be a lot more about where I go wrong than where I go right. I hope this doesn't give the impression that I'm a terrible player. :) It's just that...well, playing right is generally a well-covered area. When you do it, it's sort of unremarkable. That's what you're supposed to do. :) Playing wrong, though...well, hell, I figure there's a lot of territory that falls under that heading. :) Plus, and this is a big thing, it hurts you. Soul and bankroll. It's been said by people a lot smarter than me: poker is a game of mistakes; you just have to make less of them than the other guy.

Here's some top-pair, top-kicker stories. This all takes place at 1/2 NLHE.

In one hand, I hold AQo and limp in late position after a bunch of other limpers. The pre-flop limp was pretty calculated. At a weak-tight kinda table, I'd raise for sure. At this particular table, this is what happens: a bunch of people limp. Somebody then makes a significant raise. Then every limper calls. Seriously. And a giant, multiway pot is pretty much exactly what you don't want with AQo, so I limp. :) The flop comes Q92, two-suited. Excellent. It's checked to an EP guy, who bets $7 into a pot of like $12 or $14. It folds around to me, and I call.

This right here is textbook stupid.

I limped pre-flop with a hand that really needs isolation. I lucked out by hitting the flop. I've got a strong hand, I'm very vulnerable, and I have the perfect chance to isolate. And I don't. I've been playing against this opponent all day, plus he's a regular to boot. He does not open the betting without reason. Somehow, the only thing I can really say I was thinking was that I was sure he had a Q, but that I had him outkicked, and I was just going to let him bet it. This guy also will put in plenty of money to lose a kicker war, though, and the best strategy is for me to take the lead. But I don't. I'm dumb.

The turn is a brick. He bets $30.

What the...it's like a $20 pot! This is the turn! Every alarm in my head is going off. Everything about this situation is screaming that I'm beat. Not by the stats of the situation, but by the feel of it. That bet is ridiculous. It's way out of character for this guy, except he's got a made hand. It was a two-suited flop; he's really scared of the flush draw. But not only that...I know he's got a monster. I just know it. The thing is...I couldn't figure out what it was. I actually sat and thought about it. I took a long time on the turn just sort of staring off. Eventually I called.

This is the next chapter of the textbook, which is entitled "Even More Stupid."

Calling when you should raise is one thing. Calling when you should fold, especially for a significantly more expensive bet, is another thing entirely.

The river brings a red king. He bets $45.

Jesus Christ. Now I'm cooked. From everything that's happened, the weakest hand I've given this guy is KQ, the only hand I can possibly imagine him having that I could beat. And now...I can't beat it any more. And the river bet is mad pricey. At this point I can beat him only if he's bluffing or severely aggressively overplaying. Which is an important point to consider, granted. Here's another important point to consider: This guy doesn't bluff. At least not like this, not with three barrels. He also doesn't aggressively overplay. Passively, yes...he will sometimes call down in precarious situations. But he does not bet out in precarious situations, especially out of position. Everything I know about this player, this situation, this hand, tells me that I absolutely, positively, should. Not. Call.

I call.

This is like the epilogue of the textbook, entitled "Now Take This Book and Beat Yourself About the Head, You Idiot."

He has 92 for a flopped two pair. I show my AQ and look like the world's biggest moron.

I played this hand wrong from beginning to end. I should have raised the flop for sure, for value, isolation, and protection. I mean, seriously...when do I ever flat call TPTK with a flush draw on board?! In this particular case, this raise would actually not have been for value, but I had no way of knowing that. Here's the thing...raising would have let me know. Because I never raised this guy, I never really knew where I was at. I never let him know I had a hand, so for all I knew, he thought his top-pair, whatever-kicker was good and he was defending against the flush draw. If that's the only hand he could have had, then my strategy was great. Since he had many other hands that would want to protect against a flush draw (not the least of which was a set), then my strategy sucked ass. Granted, I never, ever would have put him on 92, but that's hardly the point. The point was that that little misplay cost be plenty.

Imagine I raise on the flop, and he re-pops me. I'm out of there in a second. Maybe I raise the flop and he bets out on the turn. I don't know if I insta-fold, but I have to at least think about it. If I raise the flop and he check-raises the turn, I probably fold. And even if none of that comes to pass...if I raise the flop and he just calls the turn...I still check behind on the river. What I'm getting at here is that by raising the flop, even though I'm destined to lose this hand, I'm still going to save myself money. What I did was relinquish control of the betting. He ended up betting unreasonable amounts, and I unreasonably called them. If I had been making the bets, I would have put far less money into the pot. I was in position; I had no reason not to take control of that pot. But, after having made that one crucial error, I made another: I not only went against my read, but did so in spectacularly expensive fashion. I knew I was beat. I knew it when he bet the turn. The fact that I couldn't put him on the particular hand shouldn't have factored into it. Not in such a high-risk, low-reward situation. Sure, if he bet $10 on the turn, who cares, really. But $30 to win $50? I really don't need to know that bad how I'm beat. It's enough to know I'm beat. Let it go, wait for another hand. Life goes on.

Oh, look, another hand. :)

I open with a UTG raise to $12 with AcJc. Now...let me just say, this is not something you want to be doing on a regular basis. This is a "once in a very great while" move. In fact...you probably shouldn't be doing this at all. :) Under normal circumstances, AJ is a super amount of trouble, especially out of position. I did it under very special game circumstances, in that I'd been having some success with the "early pre-flop raise, one caller, take it down with a flop bet" kind of move, and it had been a while since I'd done that, and I had a pretty good read on most of the people at the table. I get two callers: one is a horrendous calling station, and the other is sharp and tough. This is not at all the lineup I want. I already know I'll be abandoning this hand.

The flop comes 678 rainbow, one club. Wow, what a crap flop for me. I'm totally check-folding. Remember that I did not play this hand for value, really. On some other flop, against some other opponents, I'm totally betting this out. But not here, not now, not like this. If the calling station has any pair or even a glimmer of a draw, I am never, ever, getting him out of this pot (he's short-stacked to boot). I figure Tough Guy probably missed and will drop out whatever else happens. I check, and then everybody checks. Whatever. I can fold later.

Turn is a J. Hrm. I bet out $20. Calling Station calls (naturally). Tough Guy raises to $60. Oh, DAMN.

So the wheels start turning. I don't know what to make of all this. I know the J didn't make his hand. The only straight the jack helps is with T9, and that was made on the flop. I think about his pre-flop move...overcalling a UTG raise. The overcall was after a calling station, though, and I'm pretty sure this guy knows it. Plus...it's really weird that he checked the flop down when he was in position: I figure any made hand has to bet there, since the board is so straight-ish. Unless...unless the made hand is a monster? I guess if he /did/ have T9, flopping the nuts would certainly warrant a check-behind. He'd have raised any turn bet regardless of what card slid off. I don't give him the overpair, really, because at this point it would have to be queens or better (since he's not scared of the jack), which I'm sure he would have re-raised pre-flop. I've got to give him middle cards, either connectors or a pair. I guess he could have a set. Jacks is totally unlikely, but a flopped set is right in his range. I would have expected a flop bet on that board, but hey, people do weird things. Even connectors like 87 make two pair. T9 is a nightmare for me. What I want him to be holding is JT, and he's raising a pair+draw. KJ is possible. Really, though, I don't want to give him a jack, and all in all, the whole thing stunk. I decided to let this one go. I fold. Calling Station calls, using the majority of his short stack to do so.

River is another 8, pairing the board. Calling station moves all-in for the rest of his stack, which is under $30. Tough guy is suddenly in super despair. He starts talking crazy, and from all that, I suddenly glean what has happened.

Tough guy was bluffing! God /damn/ I screwed that one up. :) As this realization dawns on me, the rest of the hand plays out. Tough guy ends up calling and losing to the calling station's 7-junk, which was middle pair on the flop. Tough guy says he had a suited ten. (Wtf! Suited ten, and couldn't beat a 7?! So much for me knowing his calling range. But that's not the point of this story.)

Here's the point. There are two key things I didn't think about what I was wondering about Tough Guy's hand. One, I never even considered that he was making a move. Mostly this is because I would never, ever make a move against a calling station. What the fuck, man! But two, I didn't think about what hand I had been representing. The whole time I was thinking about Tough Guy, I always assumed that he knew I had a jack. But to him, it looks like I'm bluffing!

Think about it. UTG raise, but check on a dangerous flop. That doesn't say overpair, that says AK! The flop is checked all around, paint hits the board, and UTG bets. That totally stinks. He thought I was on a bluff. In his mind, he's running a squeeze play, and with a semi-bluff, to boot.

Here's the squeeze play: A player bets out (or raises pre-flop), preferably one who you think does not hold something strong. Another player calls. It's to you. You can raise with a wide range of hands here and execute a squeeze play. Basically you want one or both of those players to fold, because your raise, made against an aggressor and a caller, looks strong. If the first player had a weak holding, he'll probably fold, because he's up against two opponents, and out of position, too. The player in the middle is looking pretty mediocre, too, because he only called the original aggressor and didn't raise. When it works, it's a pretty profitable move. Here's the thing: It's not worth shit against a calling station. But, whatever, man, I give him credit for making the move. Against a different opponent, it would have worked.

But I'm not thinking too much about him; I'm thinking about me. In the normal course of things, I don't think too much about other people bluffing. That's kind of a slippery slope. You start to see bluffs everywhere, and then you start calling off all your chips in an effort to snap people off who, well, aren't bluffing. :) But a really good time to think about that would be when it looks like I'm bluffing. :) I play a relatively straightforward game these days; I don't do a whole hell of a lot of bluffing in the normal course of events. Because of that, I always assume other people know I'm being straightforward, and I always think they give me credit for my hands. The majority of my thought process about Tough Guy in this situation was centered on the idea that he wasn't worried about me having a jack, which in hindsight, probably wasn't the case. Knowing that he probably thinks I'm bluffing really opens up his range of raising hands.

To be completely truthful, I ignored something huge. I never even considered that he was raising with a draw. But that is a great opportunity for him to do just that, especially if he thinks I'm bluffing. I also at the time discounted what would later turn out to be a very important clue. You may recall that I briefly discarded the idea of him having a made hand on the flop because he didn't bet it out. In the original thought process, this train of thought ended when I figured that if he had a made hand, it must have been a monster: T9, or at least 65, something that wasn't too vulnerable. Any other made hand, even a strong one (overpair, two pair, set), really should be betting at that flop. So here's the other path to take on that thought: if he didn't have a made hand on the flop, maybe he also didn't have a made hand on the turn. Duh! The fact was that, had I been thinking that the situation looked to him like a bluffing situation for me, then I should have also been aware that it looked to him like a bluffing situation for him. :) I didn't give a lot of serious consideration to him having hit the jack, but even if he did, I'm still winning! I mean, I'm behind something like J8, but again, he'd have had to have hit the flop, and he never bet it. KJ, QJ, JT...I beat them all, and if he thinks I'm bluffing, he'd totally raise a jack, especially one with a draw. At the end of the day, I basically just gave him too much credit for the raise, and that was pretty much because I assumed he was giving me credit. Oh, well. :)

One last note on this hand. Another complicating factor in this hand was the interloper, the Calling Station. I was focusing on Tough Guy because I never figured Calling Station to have me beat. Also I took it as a given that he was not getting out the pot, just because he called my turn bet. There was something else to consider, though. Calling Station was short-stacked! In some situations, this can be a huge benefit, because I can re-raise Tough Guy for some retarded amount (or just go all in) and probably blow him off his hand, with the added bonus of not actually having to risk that money, because CS, who will probably call, is actually short-stacked. It's a given that CS will be in until the river, so he'll either beat me or not. If I'm going to show down, though, I'd much rather only show down against CS than both CS and TG. This isn't that really that big a thing to think about in this particular hand, though. As far as TG goes, I'm either ahead at the moment, or else woefully behind. Unless TG was completely bluffing (that is, had no pair and no draw), then yes, I can get him to lay down my jamming. However...if he's got a big draw, he may not let it go, even to an all-in from me. Add to that the number of hands that he might have that I can't beat, and jamming looks like a pretty dismal choice at this point. In this particular case, I don't think I want to tangle all that much with TG, so I'd really hesitate to make a move like that, especially because my hand, even if good, is still way vulnerable. The only river card I'm comfortable with is a complete brick or an ace. And even then, I still wouldn't know if I'm good.

So yeah...this was a precarious hand. It might have been worth the price of folding the turn just so I wouldn't have to make a hard decision on the river. Being out of position blows. If I called on the turn, CS may or may not have folded. If I called, the river's easy as long as TG plays it passive, which he will because I'm still in the hand. :) The most I pay, I think, is the rest of CS's short stack, which I'd pay in a heartbeat. If CS folded, though, and TG fired another bullet at me, I'm in a world of discomfort.

And speaking of which (both hard river decisions and worlds of discomfort), some of you might be wondering what possessed TG to call on the river with ten-high. :) Basically he figured there was a chance that CS was just bluffing a busted draw. It's...a somewhat reasonable line of thinking. Maybe not against that player in particular, but...basically he was thinking that if CS was also on a gutshot, as was TG, then unless CS also holds an overcard, TG might be chopping with ten-high, or else beating CS's nine. I mean...that's a lot of hope, I grant you. But keep in mind that at this point TG's getting something like 7 to 1 pot odds to make that river call, so...let's be honest. Odds like that can afford you a lot of hope. A lot of people were mystified by his river call. But I dunno...I can kinda see it.

Anyway, this has gone on long enough, and, horror of horrors, I have to start thinking about getting my ass to work. :) So next time...another hand with lessons on uncomfortable river decisions, and what to do with them. Peace!