Silly Hand

guesswest

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Sep 1, 2005
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Malta
Have posted on the casino forums for a bit, have noticed the poker forum is always quiet so thought I'd share this hand. Is a bad beat for sure, but not posting it to bitch, was just so amazed when he turned his cards over thought someone else might get a laugh out of it too.

Was in a $1/$2 NL Holdem game yesterday. Everyone folds to me in late position and I raise $10 with A10 offsuit. The SB calls, BB folds. Flop comes A107, all hearts. I bet $30, other guy calls. Turn is 6d, I figure whatever he has this is a blank. I've been at this table for a while, I don't think this player would play a made flush this way, I think I'm ahead but this guy has been chasing everything, theres a few draws on the board, so I push all in for $160, hoping to take the pot down. I also figure he might call me with AK etc, and I'm ok with that too. This guy, who has roughly the same stack as me, calls instantly. The river comes Queen of hearts. He turns over.......Jack of clubs, 4 of hearts. What the hell is that? :eek2:
 
guesswest said:
Have posted on the casino forums for a bit, have noticed the poker forum is always quiet so thought I'd share this hand. Is a bad beat for sure, but not posting it to bitch, was just so amazed when he turned his cards over thought someone else might get a laugh out of it too.

Was in a $1/$2 NL Holdem game yesterday. Everyone folds to me in late position and I raise $10 with A10 offsuit. The SB calls, BB folds. Flop comes A107, all hearts. I bet $30, other guy calls. Turn is 6d, I figure whatever he has this is a blank. I've been at this table for a while, I don't think this player would play a made flush this way, I think I'm ahead but this guy has been chasing everything, theres a few draws on the board, so I push all in for $160, hoping to take the pot down. I also figure he might call me with AK etc, and I'm ok with that too. This guy, who has roughly the same stack as me, calls instantly. The river comes Queen of hearts. He turns over.......Jack of clubs, 4 of hearts. What the hell is that? :eek2:


Internet poker at its best :rolleyes:
 
I had a hand like that a couple of moths ago on Crypto NL $25.
2 limpers and me on the SB with 44 and BB checks. The flop comes AJ4. 1st player bets $5 into a $2 pot. 2nd player raises to $10. I re-raised all in for $45 and BB calls, as do the the other 2 players. Everyone ends up all in on the flop and our hole cards show. A4, AJ, JJ :eek: and my 44. Turn and river both small clubs putting 4 clubs on the board. I had the only club out of all 4 players :D :D I couldnt believe it :lolup:
 
guesswest said:
Have posted on the casino forums for a bit, have noticed the poker forum is always quiet so thought I'd share this hand. Is a bad beat for sure, but not posting it to bitch, was just so amazed when he turned his cards over thought someone else might get a laugh out of it too.

Was in a $1/$2 NL Holdem game yesterday. Everyone folds to me in late position and I raise $10 with A10 offsuit. The SB calls, BB folds. Flop comes A107, all hearts. I bet $30, other guy calls. Turn is 6d, I figure whatever he has this is a blank. I've been at this table for a while, I don't think this player would play a made flush this way, I think I'm ahead but this guy has been chasing everything, theres a few draws on the board, so I push all in for $160, hoping to take the pot down. I also figure he might call me with AK etc, and I'm ok with that too. This guy, who has roughly the same stack as me, calls instantly. The river comes Queen of hearts. He turns over.......Jack of clubs, 4 of hearts. What the hell is that? :eek2:
... that is the guy's 4-year old son playing with the 'puter when daddy went for a wee-wee... :D
 
guesswest said:
Have posted on the casino forums for a bit, have noticed the poker forum is always quiet so thought I'd share this hand. Is a bad beat for sure, but not posting it to bitch, was just so amazed when he turned his cards over thought someone else might get a laugh out of it too.

Was in a $1/$2 NL Holdem game yesterday. Everyone folds to me in late position and I raise $10 with A10 offsuit. The SB calls, BB folds. Flop comes A107, all hearts. I bet $30, other guy calls. Turn is 6d, I figure whatever he has this is a blank. I've been at this table for a while, I don't think this player would play a made flush this way, I think I'm ahead but this guy has been chasing everything, theres a few draws on the board, so I push all in for $160, hoping to take the pot down. I also figure he might call me with AK etc, and I'm ok with that too. This guy, who has roughly the same stack as me, calls instantly. The river comes Queen of hearts. He turns over.......Jack of clubs, 4 of hearts. What the hell is that? :eek2:

Someone once told me that most bad beats are actually self-induced, since you allow the other player to suck out.

Not sure what your betting style was previous to the hand, but perhaps he had you figured (wrongly) on a bluff. If that was the case, then from his perspective he was merely calling you on the bluff.

You had already alluded to his play as a maniac, but instead of tightening your play, you played rather fast and loose with your two pair. Granted, you had paired both over cards on the flop, but you'd likely want to play a higher ranking hand when playing with a maniac, if not the nuts themselves. He could easily have been holding a set after the flop, or low connectors and be on straight draw.
 
OK, I'm the first person to acknowledge faults with my own game, and I encourage people to point out the ones I miss - there are many. I play full time, I spend about an hour every morning going through game logs picking my play apart from the previous day. In this particular hand tho, what you said just doesn't fly.

In the first instance, I hadn't played a hand in about an hour, I was a rock on that table, precisely because it was a loose table. I was waiting for an opportunity to extract chips on a favourable bet, it came and I feel I played it right. I'm a tight aggressive player, and that's absolutely the winningest type of play in a NL game. And I was willing to take the risk, very much in my favour based on his previous play, and laws of probability, that he hadn't flopped a set. I knew this guy was dumb enough to be calling on a 4 card flush or inside straight and I was going to make him pay way above and beyond pot odds for the privelege. And let's not forget, had I known the guy was holding jx4h, I'd have WANTED him to call, because in the long-term that's a hugely profitable bet to get called - so him calling is a good result, not a bad one.

Which is another thing, I'd have been 'allowing' the player to suck me out if I slowed down betting, not the other way around. Putting him all in at the turn is doing everything that's humanly possible to shut out a draw, it's the exact opposite of what you're talking about. In fact, if I can see a valid criticism of how I played the hand, it's that I should have bet less precisely because i WANT him to call with draw, provided I'm not giving him pot odds.

But that's all irrelevant anyway, he can't 'call my bluff' with nothing. He didn't have a pair, he didn't have a high card. Whether I'm bluffing or not he still has to beat me, he wouldn't beat me on average with two randomly dealt cards, nevermind considering my pre-flop raise, and esp factoring me betting into him. His chances of being ahead, even against a stone cold bluff, on that board, are miniscule.

I'm going with the 4 year old theory :D I hope he invests his winnings wisely, rather than fluttering them away on toys and candy
 
guesswest said:
OK, I'm the first person to acknowledge faults with my own game, and I encourage people to point out the ones I miss - there are many. I play full time, I spend about an hour every morning going through game logs picking my play apart from the previous day. In this particular hand tho, what you said just doesn't fly.

In the first instance, I hadn't played a hand in about an hour, I was a rock on that table, precisely because it was a loose table. I was waiting for an opportunity to extract chips on a favourable bet, it came and I feel I played it right. I'm a tight aggressive player, and that's absolutely the winningest type of play in a NL game. And I was willing to take the risk, very much in my favour based on his previous play, and laws of probability, that he hadn't flopped a set. I knew this guy was dumb enough to be calling on a 4 card flush or inside straight and I was going to make him pay way above and beyond pot odds for the privelege. And let's not forget, had I known the guy was holding jx4h, I'd have WANTED him to call, because in the long-term that's a hugely profitable bet to get called - so him calling is a good result, not a bad one.

Which is another thing, I'd have been 'allowing' the player to suck me out if I slowed down betting, not the other way around. Putting him all in at the turn is doing everything that's humanly possible to shut out a draw, it's the exact opposite of what you're talking about. In fact, if I can see a valid criticism of how I played the hand, it's that I should have bet less precisely because i WANT him to call with draw, provided I'm not giving him pot odds.

But that's all irrelevant anyway, he can't 'call my bluff' with nothing. He didn't have a pair, he didn't have a high card. Whether I'm bluffing or not he still has to beat me, he wouldn't beat me on average with two randomly dealt cards, nevermind considering my pre-flop raise, and esp factoring me betting into him. His chances of being ahead, even against a stone cold bluff, on that board, are miniscule.

I'm going with the 4 year old theory :D I hope he invests his winnings wisely, rather than fluttering them away on toys and candy

Ok..let's take a look from another perspective. As the SB, his call pre-flop merely costs him $9. No biggie. So he calls your raise - which IS slightly aggressive, since you'd be in a race against any wired hand that the blinds may have, and you have nothing but A10 off suit.

Flop comes out all hearts. He now has the turn and the river to complete his flush. You have top two pair - but if he's holding hearts, you need the Ace or 10 to fill you up to win. I'd check - basically theorizing that if he was chasing another heart, he wouldn't hesitate to call my bet, and if he's already flushed, my chances of catching an A or 10 are around 10%. If you represented a flush on your bet - and your $30 bet did not - he'd likely fold, since his 4 hearts are unlikely to be the nuts regardless of what he drew.

True, your all-in bet wouldn't have represented pot odds for him (I figure he had a 20% to catch the flush on the river, and you were better than a 7-1 favorite with your possibility of still filling up on fifth street), but he likely wasn't even calculating pot odds. Any component could have been in play for him - he felt "lucky", he was tired and had no problem in committing money on the 20% chance of catching a heart, he was just fooling around - but we'd honestly never know. But you still have to figure than 15% of the time you'd lose in that same situation. In short, the hand was just one of those times a seven rolled around on a craps table.

You mentioned that you'd want him to call on a draw. I'm more cautious - he may not have flopped a set, but he might have flopped a flush. And if he had suddenly shifted gears on you and represented a draw, the tables are suddenly turned, and YOU are doing precisely what HE wanted you to do. True, the odds are in your favor, but I tend to play more conservatively with loose players, and not let that one in 7 chance of me losing affect my chips too greatly.

Personally, I play tight with loose players. I'd be wary of large bets with anything less than the nuts, and certainly not on a draw. Switching gears doesn't always work with these ADHD-afflicted internet players, since some don't even take the time to notice.
 
This is getting interesting, good to see a conversation about a poker hand on here, nice change from all the 'Playtech stole my first-born child' threads :D

Will take what you said point by point:

dickens1298 said:
Ok..let's take a look from another perspective. As the SB, his call pre-flop merely costs him $9. No biggie. So he calls your raise - which IS slightly aggressive, since you'd be in a race against any wired hand that the blinds may have, and you have nothing but A10 off suit.

This is kind of contradictory as you're saying it's 'no biggie' to call 5x the BB, but also saying my raise is aggressive. I agree with the latter, I raise most hands I play about the same amount, I'd have raised suited connectors this way in a different situation. Obviously I'm thinking on this particular occasion it's likely I'll just take the blinds, especially bearing in mind my history of tight play. Since I have a marginal hand like A10 I'm fine with that. But if not, if I'm called, I do have a hand I can play. The purpose of the 5xBB raise is to get people pot committed. I have some amount of confidence in my own play, both in terms of getting chips in the middle when I hit, and getting away from flops when I miss or they're not buyable. Also, the pre-flop raise makes it easier (in theory) to put my opponents on hands when the table cards get interesting. This hand was a good case in point re: pot building, the pot was already worth playing for when the flop came, that is I'm sure the only reason this guy chased his flush draw at all. Maybe he's simply bad enough that he'd have called the flop bet even to a nothing pot, but most players aren't. Now, if a loose aggressive genius like Phil Ivey had called me with J4off here I'd maybe entertain the possibility that he had some sneaky plan to take the pot from me. But that's clearly not the case, the guy just plain and simple made a dumbass call with a trash hand, and 5x the BB IS a sizeable raise. He called 9x what he'd put in the pot already.


dickens1298 said:
Flop comes out all hearts. He now has the turn and the river to complete his flush. You have top two pair - but if he's holding hearts, you need the Ace or 10 to fill you up to win

Let's not forget he's drawing to a flush from the 4 here. He has nothing like good odds on calling a bet to make his flush even with a draw to the nuts, but if he does hit it the chances are great with the info he has that it's not even winning. With the odds of hitting coupled with the odds of him being on top, I'm not even convinced he is drawing in his mind, I think he's just hitting the call button out of boredom, or whatever.

dickens1298 said:
I'd check - basically theorizing that if he was chasing another heart, he wouldn't hesitate to call my bet, and if he's already flushed, my chances of catching an A or 10 are around 10%. If you represented a flush on your bet - and your $30 bet did not - he'd likely fold, since his 4 hearts are unlikely to be the nuts regardless of what he drew.

Checking here is a horrible play IMO. If he wouldn't hesitate to call a bet on the flush draw, that's all the more reason to make one. If I bet into him and he's calling on a draw I'm favourite to take down the pot. If I can get another player to call my bets in any situation at all where I'm mathematical favourite in a cash game, I'll do so, since in the long-term it's profitable play. As to my bet representing the flush - I probably would have played a made flush against this particular player in a pretty similar way it turns out. It'd be a good flush to bet at as it'd look like a scared bet, which would keep all the draws in play. And regardless, theres no good reason to slowplay a hand when your bets are getting called, you just risk not winning as much as you should - it also gives you more ability to trap later when it is the right play. And just a correction on your math, my chances of making a boat from that flop are actually much better than 10% - about 25% (27% assuming he has neither A/10, 25% a good rounder for practical purposes, factoring that people play pairs).

dickens1298 said:
True, your all-in bet wouldn't have represented pot odds for him (I figure he had a 20% to catch the flush on the river, and you were better than a 7-1 favorite with your possibility of still filling up on fifth street), but he likely wasn't even calculating pot odds. Any component could have been in play for him - he felt "lucky", he was tired and had no problem in committing money on the 20% chance of catching a heart, he was just fooling around - but we'd honestly never know.


It didn't represent anything CLOSE to pot odds, and even if he hits he's far from guaranteed to be ahead. My chances of the riverboat aren't actually a factor, because the A10h are already out. But yes, I get 7-1ish too, and yes, I can only assume he was feeling lucky or bored or something - because clearly it's a horrendous call.


dickens1298 said:
But you still have to figure than 15% of the time you'd lose in that same situation. In short, the hand was just one of those times a seven rolled around on a craps table.

As I said in the original thread i didn't post the hand to bitch about a bad beat, I laughed out loud when he turned his cards over, and thought someone else might share my amusement. The result was the best result I could possibly hope for, which is why I don't feel bad about how I played the hand - I managed to get my whole stack in on a bet I was 7-1 favourite to win. That's a very profitable play over time, and as many people wiser than I have pointed out, you don't get paid for winning pots in poker, you get paid for making correct decisions.


dickens1298 said:
You mentioned that you'd want him to call on a draw. I'm more cautious - he may not have flopped a set, but he might have flopped a flush. And if he had suddenly shifted gears on you and represented a draw, the tables are suddenly turned, and YOU are doing precisely what HE wanted you to do. True, the odds are in your favor, but I tend to play more conservatively with loose players, and not let that one in 7 chance of me losing affect my chips too greatly.


Like I said, I'd been sitting with this player a while and made a judgement that he wouldn't play a made flush this way. Of course I could be wrong, but I made a decision with imperfect information, like you have to do, and as it turns out I was right this time.


dickens1298 said:
Personally, I play tight with loose players. I'd be wary of large bets with anything less than the nuts, and certainly not on a draw. Switching gears doesn't always work with these ADHD-afflicted internet players, since some don't even take the time to notice.

I play tight with loose players too, which is why I hadn't played a hand in a long time, but I play tight aggressive. I flopped a genuine big hand, and heads up was more than prepared to take the risk that I was on top. I'll lose that wager sometimes, but win it more times than I lose it, and assuming you can bankroll the rebuy, that represents positive expectation, which you should always take in any cash game. If I can think of a valid criticism of how I played, it's that I bet too high on the turn, because the risk was that I didn't get called. Getting called was a great result not a poor one. It's in a sense irrelevant that he sucked me out, what's important is that I got my whole stack called down in a situation with huge positive expectation, and in terms of the part of the game I have control over, that's the best possible outcome I can hope for.
 
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can we say......

Moron!!! lol Wow hope it was his 4 year old... :lolup:

I play poker a lot. And have seen it all. But here are a few that recently boggled my mind...Both good and bad....

Heads up tourney first hand for 50 dollars we both start with 1500 in chips. I get dealt an A J. I raise from 30 to 90 chips right off the bat. He calls. Flop comes A A A!!! Holly crap!!! :eek: I of course slow play and check. He shocks the hell out of me by going all in!!! GOLD!!! I got 4 of a kind he's done...I call and he flips over 10 6???? I fell out of my chair :lolup:

I'm in a tourney of 84 people. Buy in 5 bucks we all start with 1500 in chips. It's down to 25 people. I got about 20k in chips. I get dealt an A K and player at the table before me goes all in with 15K in chips...Shit! I got A K I figure he's got a pocket pair I got to call. I call and he flips over K K. I'm like NO!!! I need and Ace...Flop comes 10 9 K!!! Oh man I'm screwed :eek: Fourth street comes A! And then the River A!!! "He was like WTF!!!! We both couldn't believe it. That did it for me, I was able to hang around and finish 3rd after that... Couldn't believe it....

Ok now the bad beat. Probably the worst I have ever seen for me. Heads up tourney I get dealt K K first hand. We both start with 1500 in chips. Player against me raises from 30 chips to 120! I re-raise to 300 in chips! He goes all in! I think for a minute could he possibly have pocket Aces??? No way!! I call he turns over 2 4!!! YES!!! He is so done!!! flop comes 2 4 4!!!! WHAT THE HELL??? :eek: Couldn't believe my eyes...Oh and this was a 50 dollar heads up tourney...OUCH!!! THAT ONE STUNG!!!

Poker fun but torture at the same time!!! :eek:
 
Some points of clarification:

(1) Your raise pre-flop is "no biggie" to the SB player, since it represents only $9 additional, but IS aggressive relative to the strength of your hand. I realize you were trying to steal the blinds, but with an aggressive player at the SB, the likelihood of a steal is minimal. My comment that your raise is "no biggie" yet "aggressive" may seem contradictory, but merely represents the subjectivity of any wager in poker.

(2) The critical play, in my opinion, was the decision after the flop. The good news was that you caught top two pair; the bad news is that a potential flush threatens. In my opinion, two approaches are feasible:

(a) Check, and potentially fold depending upon his raise (if any). He may not raise if you check, since he might assume that you either caught the flush or are on a flush draw as well.

(b) Raise all-in, representing a flush or at least a flush draw. With the former, he has to pray for another heart to hit the board to even stand a chance. With the latter, he's pretty much done since his heart is a 4. With that sort of raise, he'd likely fold.

My thought here is simple - you're holding two pair with a potential flush hitting the board. You think you might be ahead - but you're not 100% positive, and the outcome of this hand is still in doubt. Your $30 bet was the correct bet from the standpoint that you may have been trying to trap him into giving you more chips, but I liken that philosophy to pocket aces, which can easily get cracked if you play too cute. With a very aggressive player - as I mentioned before - I tend to tighten up. In short, your $30 raise was enough for him to stay in the hand and subsequently outdraw you.

An argument may be that the difference in this hand between the $30 wager at the flop and the subsequent all-in bet at the turn was basically irrelevant, since the turn card helped neither hand, and actually hurt the SB's chances. I'd disagree - psychologically, the $30 wager allowed him to stay in the hand and perhaps convinced him that you did NOT have the flush. The subsequent all-in call at fourth street MAY have been made since he felt that he was relatively pot-committed, or perhaps felt that his flush draw had a chance to beat your holding.

Finally, another argument may be that either decision does not allow you to grow the pot significantly. With an all-in bet at the flop, for example, the hope would be that he would fold, since a call brings you to the same result. But since this was a blind steal, you actually made out well, since you induced the SB to call your raise pre-flop. From an odds perspective, IF you knew his hand, I'd prefer to have a stronger holding than the 1 in 7 chance that you may lose all your chips. Since you had imperfect information, but knew that you didn't hold the nut flush (and could not draw to it either) or a full house to beat any flush out there, those odds likely reduce to 1 in 3. As an aggressive player, you may like those odds - as a conservative player, I'd prefer to wait for the nuts the next time.
 
dickens1298 said:
Some points of clarification:

(1) Your raise pre-flop is "no biggie" to the SB player, since it represents only $9 additional, but IS aggressive relative to the strength of your hand. I realize you were trying to steal the blinds, but with an aggressive player at the SB, the likelihood of a steal is minimal. My comment that your raise is "no biggie" yet "aggressive" may seem contradictory, but merely represents the subjectivity of any wager in poker.

(2) The critical play, in my opinion, was the decision after the flop. The good news was that you caught top two pair; the bad news is that a potential flush threatens. In my opinion, two approaches are feasible:

(a) Check, and potentially fold depending upon his raise (if any). He may not raise if you check, since he might assume that you either caught the flush or are on a flush draw as well.

(b) Raise all-in, representing a flush or at least a flush draw. With the former, he has to pray for another heart to hit the board to even stand a chance. With the latter, he's pretty much done since his heart is a 4. With that sort of raise, he'd likely fold.

My thought here is simple - you're holding two pair with a potential flush hitting the board. You think you might be ahead - but you're not 100% positive, and the outcome of this hand is still in doubt. Your $30 bet was the correct bet from the standpoint that you may have been trying to trap him into giving you more chips, but I liken that philosophy to pocket aces, which can easily get cracked if you play too cute. With a very aggressive player - as I mentioned before - I tend to tighten up. In short, your $30 raise was enough for him to stay in the hand and subsequently outdraw you.

An argument may be that the difference in this hand between the $30 wager at the flop and the subsequent all-in bet at the turn was basically irrelevant, since the turn card helped neither hand, and actually hurt the SB's chances. I'd disagree - psychologically, the $30 wager allowed him to stay in the hand and perhaps convinced him that you did NOT have the flush. The subsequent all-in call at fourth street MAY have been made since he felt that he was relatively pot-committed, or perhaps felt that his flush draw had a chance to beat your holding.

Finally, another argument may be that either decision does not allow you to grow the pot significantly. With an all-in bet at the flop, for example, the hope would be that he would fold, since a call brings you to the same result. But since this was a blind steal, you actually made out well, since you induced the SB to call your raise pre-flop. From an odds perspective, IF you knew his hand, I'd prefer to have a stronger holding than the 1 in 7 chance that you may lose all your chips. Since you had imperfect information, but knew that you didn't hold the nut flush (and could not draw to it either) or a full house to beat any flush out there, those odds likely reduce to 1 in 3. As an aggressive player, you may like those odds - as a conservative player, I'd prefer to wait for the nuts the next time.


Thanks for sharing your thoughts :)

Firstly, the pre-flop raise wasn't a steal. I just said that I half expected a fold based on my previous play and position. I was ok with the fold if it happened, but I raised the hand because in that position, I had a strong hand. I was happy to get the call, as it came from a very loose passive player, who was likely to be calling me with worse cards.

$10 is a sizeable raise on a 1/2 table, 2x the BB is common, 3x is considered 'normal'. Not that it's all that relevant, he had a trash hand, J4 off is about one of the ugliest hands I can think of, he had no business calling any raise unless he had a plan, which he evidently didn't.

Again, a $30 bet on the flop in a 1/2 game is a big bet, it's not a soft bet at all. It is not in any way cheap to call. And for that matter, I don't think he took it as an indication of weakness, I just think he was a passive caller with little clue what he was doing. It's certainly not a bet size that gave him anything approaching odds on calling a draw, even if he had a nuts draw, which he didn't.

I'd never dream of checking the flop in this situation. One reason is, he'll likely bet at me, and the power balance will change completely. Also my position in the betting order will become a lot weaker. Secondly, I have a big hand on a drawing board and the last thing I want to do is give the guy free cards. Giving away free cards is exactly what you originally referred to, 'allowing' the suckout. I want him to draw, but I want to take away his pot odds so it's a PE situation for me if he chooses to chase.

Raising all in is both a bad play and an irrational play IMO. A bad play because it's only callable with a better hand. Furthermore a bad play because I don't get to ask him any questions. I was persuaded he didn't have the made flush when he flat called my flop bet, I had no thoughts on his hand until he did this. Its takes away my opportunity to ask him what he had, to get more information. A scared play because I've flopped a big hand I should extract with, on a board which statistically is way in my favour. I'm heads up here don't forget. You definitely lose a few more hands when you play them without a knee-jerk shutout bet, but you win a lot more money on those that don't bust, and it's about long term results. I also tend to slowplay aces on non-threatening boards, they bust a few more times, but there's more equity in not panicing with them in a cash game.

You're right that both those decisions don't let me grow the pot, that's why I took neither :) I can't imagine why anyone wouldn't take a bet in a cash game which they're 7-1 favourite to win, regardless of what kind of player they are. I'm not sure where the 3-1 comes from, but even if so, same applies. By that math, you wouldn't call 27off all in against your aces either. If you're playing cash poker for the long haul, you should take even the slimmest possible positive expectation when it arises, nevermind huge PE like that, and get as much in the pot as you can while taking it - doing anything else is just doing yourself a disservice. That's one of the only universals in poker, it's basic maths to say doing so guarantees the greatest long-term profit. PE considerations in tournament play are a different matter entirely. Refusing PE in a cash game is a losing play, whether you're tight/loose, passive/aggressive. And for what it's worth, I did buy back into this game and bust this guy :D
 
Excellent points, but you didn't know that you were a 7-1 favorite. If he had indeed flopped a flush, you'd be entering the turn a decided dog. It's the potential flush that would be a red flag to me, especially with me sans a heart.

The beauty of poker is that there are many ways to skin the cat, and approach the game. Personally, with a two pair holding facing a potential flush holding, I'm either going to represent a flush of my own with an all-in bet or check - and possibly fold - so as to not risk any more chips. There ARE times, after all, when folding pocket aces is actually the RIGHT play.

Quick question - what would you have done if he had check-raised you all in at the flop?
 
dickens1298 said:
Quick question - what would you have done if he had check-raised you all in at the flop?

If he'd raised me on the flop by doubling, it'd be an easy fold. That's how he'd played every big flop on the table, and why I was persuaded he didn't have the made flush when he flat called me. If he'd raised me all-in, that'd be trickier, I'd have read that as a bet on a strong ace, or trips, or perhaps even a semi-bluff on a draw. I wouldn't expect him to be a good enough player to mix it up by double bluffing. He is after all going to be calculating (at least if he wasn't the doofus he turned out to be :D ) that an all heart flop will be hard for me to call an all-in reraise with. I'd fancy myself ahead probably a bit more often than not in that situation, but it's a lot of gray area, so I'd have to make some kind of judgement on that one and it's hard to retroactively put myself in that position. But I may have called the raise if it was all in. My logic in doing so would be that he wouldn't be trying to shut me out with a made flush, he'd be pot building instead, so he's either trying to protect a weaker but decent hand or is putting in a bluff/semibluff to take down the pot. Really, my fear based on that kind of reraise is that he's flopped a set. Perhaps AK with a heart something, like that. It's the smaller reraise that would have immediately scared me off, if he'd done that I'd have layed it down no question.
 
$200 lesson learned

Analyzing this to death will never point to anything but you and the "fish" were merely gambling on this hand. Do you gamble full time or do you play poker full time? In the long run this type of play will have a negative return.

Luck is when skill and knowledge are presented with an opportunity and we try to take advantage of the opprotunity.
Neither player here showed much skill or knowledge.

For a "serious" player of the game, I think we all acknowledge your play was to loose in trying to extract money from a player such as this. With flush possibilities facing you at every turn and you betting two pair like it is a nut is interesting, granted he was coming from the SB. We can't have the nut to win all pots, but usually it silences the player waiting for the river draw.


So in the end you sat at this table for 1 hour and determined this was a fish ripe for the taking and you lost your gamble.

Patience usually prevails in almost all games of chance, if your bankroll can withstand the learning curve.

For my info what site were you on?

Good luck

Buck
 
buck said:
Analyzing this to death will never point to anything but you and the "fish" were merely gambling on this hand. Do you gamble full time or do you play poker full time? In the long run this type of play will have a negative return.

Luck is when skill and knowledge are presented with an opportunity and we try to take advantage of the opprotunity.
Neither player here showed much skill or knowledge.

For a "serious" player of the game, I think we all acknowledge your play was to loose in trying to extract money from a player such as this. With flush possibilities facing you at every turn and you betting two pair like it is a nut is interesting, granted he was coming from the SB. We can't have the nut to win all pots, but usually it silences the player waiting for the river draw.


So in the end you sat at this table for 1 hour and determined this was a fish ripe for the taking and you lost your gamble.

Patience usually prevails in almost all games of chance, if your bankroll can withstand the learning curve.

For my info what site were you on?

Good luck

Buck


Thanks for your words of wisdom. What you're missing is I got a great result from this hand, I managed to get all my chips called on a 7-1 proposition. So I play this hand 8 times, i win $200 7 times and lose $200 1 time. Sure it's a gamble, but it's a disciplined gamble based on positive expectation and math, not a gamble for the hell of it. I'm happy with the result of the hand because the suckout is irrelevant, the outcome was the best outcome I could hope for. To say that kind of behaviour eventually produces a negative outcome is just factually wrong, and shows little understanding of the game - it's basic math that taking gambles with PE produces long term profit, and anyone who plays poker for a living will tell you exactly the same thing. And I was on Pacific.
 
As dickens points out and I agree: "Excellent points, but you didn't know that you were a 7-1 favorite". This is not TV.

You have the benefit of hindsight to know this was a great opprotunity. To many outs for the other player and not enough for you. My take is with the flush showing you bluffed and got caught.

Playing this hand against random cards in the other players hand will not give you the pay back that you calculate. But holdem is not all about odds and stats. You did not have that information until later, but you analyzed your decision based on the future kown facts.

I agree the SB should not have continued his play given his facts, but you expected him to wild play and he did. Though your odds were greatly lower
This is your style of play so be it. Since you play full time it must work.


Buck.
 
Bad players point of view

Hi there i play a lot of poker and see playes like this quite often so ill try put across how the said fish played the hand. You raise the the blind 5 times the bb the fish clicks call by mistake as he was playing two tables. The fact he was sitting with about $200 dollars on a 1 2 table with you for over an hour you say doesent seem like a fish to me so id be inclined to think his call was a mistake which is easy to do online. You then bet out 30 dollars into the 30 pot he thinks maybe my flush is gonna be good if it hits and as hes sat for an hour with you he decides this is gonna be a good pot to take as youve been playing tight for an hour with him an he now has a good read on you the bb is out the pot and the 6d comes down no help to either. You then try to shut him out on the turn which as he has a read on you and anyone who can play even half a game of poker now knows you do not have a heart and want the pot stopped there and then so he does his quick pot odda calculation and comes out with the figure that most would that he has a 1 in 4 chance of hitting his flush ( i know this is not the correct odds but this is what most people think) he add it up and decided that he has to put in 160 to get 410 back and decides he feels like a gamble and these odds arent all that bad and then gets lucky. This is my opinion as to what is more likely to have happened he decided his flush was gonna be good and decided to take the gamble we all do it from time to time even if we know the odds arent good enough. My only comment about your play is betting so much on the turn you showed you didnt want the last heart to come which is not good as you gave the information to the opponent personally i would have bet less on turn which would have either let you represent on the river if you thought they would fold to your bluff or to fold yourself on the river if you thought they had then hit. By going all in onn the turn you then took all your options away and i prefer to leave myself options but at the end of the day you got some bad luck like we all do and this player is very likely to have got lucky by pressingn the call by mistake. What sites do you play on by the way.
 
:)

In response to Buck first. I certainly wasn't arguing that the way I played the hand was the only way to play it, there are all different styles of winning poker. The point was that I made a read based on the info he presented, and made a decision based on that read. I'm not claiming that I always make those reads right (I'd be living on my own private island if I did!), but on this particular occasion, I did get it right. No, I didn't know I was 7-1 up, I didn't think I was anything like that much up. But I did think I had positive expectation based on the info available and my own judgement, and with that in mind, getting my whole stack called down is the best thing that could happen. Again, I did read this hand right. If I could play it over again I'd do the same because I managed to get my whole stack called on a hugely favourable bet. And I wasn't calculating odds based on a random hand at all, I was putting a lot of thought into what he could be holding - and my conclusion based on that analysis is that I was ahead. I'm playing heads up, chances that he's flopped a flush are tiny, 119 to 1 even assuming he had two hearts in the first instance. If he's drawing (which he was) I want him to pay for it. And the flop bet was all about finding out what he was holding, so I could eliminate the made flush and move on him. I liked the answer I got so I pushed all in, and it turned out to be the right play.


Sweet - The guy had rebought several times and was playing almost every hand, and you can only play 1 table at a time on Pacific anyway. I bet out $30 into a $22 pot, which is a big bet in a 1/2 game. He doesn't have anything like pot odds on calling a flush draw, even if he's convinced it's good. But then calling the all in at the turn, he doesn't have anything even vaguely approaching the same stratosphre as odds of calling that bet, and again, even then its an assumption that his bottom flush is good should he hit. I can accept that my bets might indicate I don't have a heart, but I have no problem with revealing this. None at all, since it might encourage him to chase. I'm certainly not going to be trying to represent a hand against this guy, because he's not good enough to be bluffed. Remember, I WANT this guy to be on a draw, because there's no draw on the board he can be chasing that aren't a favourable bet for me if he calls. The central point, is the result of this hand was an awesome one for me. The fact that he sucked me out is a side point, I managed to get my whole stack called as a huge favourite, which is a long-term winning situation for sure. I play all over, Pacific quite often cos it has the worst players, but the software is terrible - Prima and Party most common after that :)
 
guesswest said:
:)

I'm playing heads up, chances that he's flopped a flush are tiny, 119 to 1 even assuming he had two hearts in the first instance. If he's drawing (which he was) I want him to pay for it. )


I get confused so I will move on after this. But after the flop with 3 suited cards and not holding any, his odds are not 119 to 1. 119 to 1 odds are pre flop. Simulating the hand 1,000,000 times after the flop you would win 65% of the time compared to his 35% approx.

But maybe our math wiz can correct me on that.


Buck
 
Yes, true those are the odds of flopping a flush vs the odds of having made a flush on a flushed board. Think it's about 25-1 factoring the flushed board, from memory so I'm not 100% sure. Point was only that it's an unlikely holding, and I still didn't take for granted that he wasn't holding it, the purpose of the flop bet was to get that information. I'd take 65% regardless, but that simulation as you say is from the flop, I'd certainly have gotten away from the hand had a heart dropped on the turn, so the real PE is much greater factoring the money in for 4th vs 5th street.
 
Hi again

Sorry for thinking u bet 30 into 30 pot i misread your post and thought the BB saw the flop as well. As you say now you bet 30 into a 22 pot overbetting it this again just confirms the fact that you didnt have a heart in your hand. You say you dont mind him knowing this so i would have to say you have a flaw in your game under no circumstances should you let an opponent know what you have whilst playing them. So from the flop onward your opponent is now thinking his flush would probably be good and on the turn you confirm it so he is now thinking if he hits he will definatley win it. I agree you want the call knowing he is chasing as you are favourite however i do not know where you get the 7 to 1 favourite to win from. I calculate it as 9 hearts can be drawn from the remaining 45 which comes out at 5 to 1 and he can draw this twice. He is then drawing on a 5 to 1 shot getting 2.5 from the pot which is not a huge bad gamble as you state. I still think though that he may have called the j4 by mistake he may have been playing 2 sites at same time or any number of reasons. Do not get me wrong i think his play was wrong and your play was correct however i can interpret his play as not as bad as initially assumed. Also you say you wish these calls as in the long run it has a positive ev but it is highly unlikely you will get to play him often enough or long enough for the maths to come into play. Ive played enough online play to relise that more often than not they will hit their draws there is just to many chasers on the net now that it is just to risky to play the odds any more.
 
sweetdenny said:
Sorry for thinking u bet 30 into 30 pot i misread your post and thought the BB saw the flop as well. As you say now you bet 30 into a 22 pot overbetting it this again just confirms the fact that you didnt have a heart in your hand. You say you dont mind him knowing this so i would have to say you have a flaw in your game under no circumstances should you let an opponent know what you have whilst playing them. So from the flop onward your opponent is now thinking his flush would probably be good and on the turn you confirm it so he is now thinking if he hits he will definatley win it. I agree you want the call knowing he is chasing as you are favourite however i do not know where you get the 7 to 1 favourite to win from. I calculate it as 9 hearts can be drawn from the remaining 45 which comes out at 5 to 1 and he can draw this twice. He is then drawing on a 5 to 1 shot getting 2.5 from the pot which is not a huge bad gamble as you state. I still think though that he may have called the j4 by mistake he may have been playing 2 sites at same time or any number of reasons. Do not get me wrong i think his play was wrong and your play was correct however i can interpret his play as not as bad as initially assumed. Also you say you wish these calls as in the long run it has a positive ev but it is highly unlikely you will get to play him often enough or long enough for the maths to come into play. Ive played enough online play to relise that more often than not they will hit their draws there is just to many chasers on the net now that it is just to risky to play the odds any more.

My 7 to 1 "guess-timate" was based on the probability of not only another player potentially possessing a heart (and thereby limited the number of available hearts to less than 9), but also inclusive of the chance of the poster actually landing a full boat from his two pair.
 
Since so much of poker is predicated on game theory - and ultimately being able to think several moves ahead - I'd still likely either check (and then potentially fold, dependent upon the size of the bet into me), or bet all-in at the flop.

The concern is not what the SB player did, but rather on what he could potentially have done. Personally, if I were the SB player, I would have reraised all-in at the flop. Not because the poster had mentioned that he would have folded under those circumstances, but rather because most players would fold if they weren't holding a heart, and the all-in bet wouldn't be a pure bluff, since there were still a number of outs, with two cards with which to draw a heart. The bet would also place pressure away from the SB player and onto the poster. The problem is that the all-in bet is a very real possibility, and can occur from a somewhat decent player making a demi-bluff and playing the board and the other players to a rank amateur who's just hoping to get lucky on the turn and the river.

Now back to me playing the poster's position....

With that potential demi-bluff facing me, and me without a heart to draw a flush to as I face a hearts flush on the felt, I would have to figure that my two pair is far from unbeatable. I'd figure that there's a very good chance that my raise would be check-raised to all-in, and that my $30 wager MIGHT be a tell that I don't have the flush (I think most of us would likely slowplay a flush). With a check, you could create the impression of a trap. With an all-in bet, you would be applying pressure to the SB player.

As another poster mentioned, the 7-1 odds are only truly applicable if you knew his holding. You allude to the fact that you "knew" he hadn't drawn a flush, but since your information is (obviously) imperfect, there's a distinct chance you'd be wrong. And since you knew that you'd fold if he went all in at the flop (by representing a flush), he would easily have picked off $40 from you if he was canny enough to make that wager.
 
Yes 7-1 isn't right, have been cogniscent of it in this thread for the last few posts but didn't bring it up, it was kinda immaterial and I thought it would just complicate things unnecessarily - is just under 5-1 (44 cards not 45) as sweet says but is still more than big enough that it represents huge PE, so it doesn't really matter. Key is that me hitting a boat is irrelevant, since the A10h are already out and don't reduce his drawing cards, both myself and dickens missed that originally.

I don't agree that it's a bad thing him thinking I don't have a heart here. Remember, him chasing a flush draw is hugely advantageous to me, and he's much more likely to chase one if he thinks it's going to be good. Why wouldn't you want to give information to another player about your hand if that information was going to make them more likely to do what you want? I want him to chase, so if I can give him information that persuades him to do so, all the better. Not that I'm convinced that this bet does that anyway, it could easily be a semibluff on a draw myself, etc. I'd probably in fact make a similar sized bet had I flopped a flush here, against this particular player. Always slowplaying big hands and fastplaying small hands is very readable. But anyways, if he reads it as a shutout bet because I don't have a heart, great. I also get what sweet is saying about implicit collusion, but it doesn't really apply here as I'm in a heads up pot, and even if it wasn't heads up, PE is still the same it just has more variance. Simply, the bets I made represented nothing close to pot odds, and 1/2 pot odds (though they were actually more like 1/3 anyway) are miles away from callable. IMO using bet size to create PE against a drawing hand when you're confident in your read is always the right play, the only exception is when a grey area is created at the river that can screw you up, but that's not applicable here as I was all-in at the turn.

The funny thing to me in this whole thread, is if this particular player was reading it, I have a suspicion he'd be looking at it like it was written in a foreign language :D - I don't honestly think he considered pot odds, what I had, what he was drawing to, any of it, at all.

And RE: dickens, I didn't say I'd fold if he went all-in, I said I'd fold if he doubled me. But yes, point taken, I was prepared to pay $30 to ask a question, in view of the rewards for being able to eliminate certain hands, and it turned out to be a profitable play to do so. My play was for sure tailored to my specific opponent, one I'd been watching for a while, it's not the same play I'd make against any random individual.

It's quite likely I won't play this particular player again it's true, but I will find myself against players just as poor, and way better, and even worse etc. I'll probably eventually play this exact same hand again. Taking PE is always profitable in the long term, that an entrenched fact, and again, the result of this hand was a good one.
 

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