I’m thinking about hitting the $1100/$1M guaranteed at Commerce today. If anyone’s there I’ll be the ginger beard wearing a Morrison CO volunteer firefighter shirt (my brother in law).
Starting hand question
1/2 there’s 1 limp by an old guy then button (competent player) makes it 10. Sb folds I’m in the bb with 66. I think old limper will fold. Do you guys just call here to set mine? Would folding be too weak tight?
When I use to be a poker player I’d consider just folding as I was more nitty then. Now as a weekend warrior I’m taking a flop because I only play a handful times a year and want some action. I think the correct action is to call the $10 though (in my 1/2 games the standard raise is 12-18 so I’d throw in two red birds).
There’s always the 3bet! option because it was a button raise that you may be able to exploit. One rule I always tried to live by though was don’t go broke in the blinds. Once I learned that many years ago, my profitability went way up.
I think I saw Barry Greenstein.
Yeah pretty clear call pre. You might not have odds to pure set-mine though so you’ll have to check/call and play poker on some marginal boards occasionally.
A million prize pool guaranteed? It doesn’t get 1K players does it?
If you’re 100 bigs you have to call every time. Sets are one thing but unless the raiser is really strong they’re just not going to put you in a lot of bad spots. You’re hoping to call 1 bet post flop and win against AX.
The 66 should be a call but it’s fine to just fold if you’d prefer. Those sort of marginal spots are basically irrelevant to your bottom line at 1/2, if rake is high combined with the small opportunity cost of not just immediately getting dealt another hand, it might not even be profitable.
It did - maybe 1100, 6 day ones
3 hands from my $1100 at Commerce:
#1 - blinds 300/500/500a calling station limps utg, almost everyone calls, hero is down to about 12 BBs, completes SB with 7h3d, BB checks.
Flop Kh8d6h, everyone checks
Turn 5h, giving hero open ended and probably not good flush. BB leads for 1k, calling station lady tries to raise to 5k, but it gets ruled as a call because she didn’t announce.
Hero? Just fold even though I’m closing the action?
Hero does call, river 9d giving hero a straight. Checks to calling station who bets 5k for most of hero’s remaining stack. Is hero ever good here?
#2 - blinds 200/400/400a - hero opens to 1200 with 88 from the CO, button and blinds call
Flop Th3d2h - checks to hero who bets 2/3 pot, calling station lady calls, TAGish guy who likes to discuss hands and I had snapped off a river bluff from, shoves for about 13k, for about 1/3 of hero’s remaining stack. Calling station lady has hero covered. Hero?
#3 - blinds 300/600/600a - hero has about 22 BBs. Reg chick who ran a dumb bluff earlier but otherwise seems solid opens from HJ for 1400. Tight guy who’s very proud of ‘not chasing’ calls. I call from button with Q9hh because I feel she could have ATC based on previous action. Blinds amazingly both fold.
Flop Th6hTd - checks to hero. Bet or check? Hero checks
Turn 5h - checks to hero who bets 5k. Reg chick folds, tight guy thinks forever then calls.
River Jh. Tight guy checks. Hero? Seems pretty thin for value, but I also think he leads a FH or Ah?
1: fold pre, fold turn, fold river
2: fold
3: fold pre, bet flop,
Edit didn’t realize hand 3 river makes 4 hearts. I’m fine with river check
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I’m not folding pre getting 20-1 and knowing the BB is super passive
On #2 what do you put TAGish guy on bombing 5x pot? A 10 felt unlikely to me in real time. I feel like he just calls that.
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Super trivial turn fold, you’re like a million ways, don’t draw to non-nut hands against a huge crowd. The fact that most of them have now folded doesn’t matter, the hands which remain are the stronger ones. For all you know you’re drawing dead to calling station lady. Like on the river you hit your draw and now (correctly) want to fold, so don’t draw. Calling pre is whatever, doesn’t really matter, but you want to avoid getting involved postflop without a seriously good hand.
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Fold, the problem with these sort of hands is that you don’t solidly beat anything. For example, if he has a range of just 33, 22, suited Ax hearts up to A9 and suited H connectors up to QJ, your equity there is only 37%. That’s going rapidly south if you start adding tens in - for example if you just add any JT and any QT you’re down to 21% - and you also might run into a T from calling station lady. Your range of outcomes is perhaps small +$EV if all the variables work out in your favor through to large -$EV if they don’t.
Also how is that anything like 5x pot? Maybe do the maths because I think you’ve messed something up. In fact with both blinds calling his raise is so much less than pot that it might be a call (but probably not)
- Probably checking flop but depends on what reg chick is like. Check river, he probably can’t call and you’re at serious risk of running into him trapping with a full.
Yeah I butchered those pretty bad.
#1 I folded river and she proudly flipped up her set of kings. I don’t even think she noticed 4 cards to a straight on the board. That one tilted me for a while. But I think she plays a flush the exact same.
#2 - I talked myself into him having a FD, so I shoved over him. I think calling station lady folded a T. He had 32o. Very bad play on my part as I’m just praying for a flush draw and crushed by everything else. I think I screwed up the blind amounts - his bomb might have been 3-4x pot as well.
#3 I for some reason talked myself into trying to get value out of a lower heart. He called with AhKh. Dude was terrified of me having a FH. I guess my image must have been nit. I was pretty card dead - and with 3 calling stations to my left there’s not much I can do w/o cards. Also that guy just played super scared unless he had the absolute nuts.
My bust out hand was pretty crazy.
I’d made friends with AhKh dude by now and told him he could double me up and not even notice. I jokingly said he should do that so they don’t but another bigstack in there to make his life hell. Which I realized after it came out sounded a little collusiony. I won’t do that again. But it’s also funny because the way he never played anything but premium, a bigstack to his left wouldn’t even phase him.
So on the bustout hand, he limps UTG, I have about 25BBs and KcQc. I called. I dunno about reraising there especially if he’s limping AKs. One other player and the two blinds came along.
Flop Kd7c4d, it checks to me with one left to act. I bet 2/3 pot.
Here’s where things get weird. Dude nudges me under the table, twice. He moved his leg forward like he was stretching it. But he had never done that in hours of play leading up to that. So I’m processing this but I’m 95% sure it means he has a monster and he’s telling me to get out of the way.
Another super douchey reg was in the hand who literally would make noises to the female reg to his left when he thought she was doing something wrong. He did it when she was about to fold to my cbet, and when a nit raised from UTG and she called. WHAT THE FUCK. Dude was talking to her the whole game under his breath - but still easily audible - making fun of everyone at the table. Like we can’t hear you. He’s literally talking about the hand with me and I chime in and he looks at me like why are you interrupting our private conversation. I wanted to punch the guy by the end. DON’T BE THAT REG.
Anyway smarmy reg calls my flop bet and my buddy calls.
Turn 4c giving me a flush draw. I know nudgy guy is trying to help me but I’m proud that I just went ahead and shoved anyway for like 2x pot or something. I made the exact play I would have w/o his BS.
Smarmy guy called and so did nudgy guy. River 6d. Smarmy guy leads his nut flush for a ton and nudgy guy finally calls with his set of 7s. Nudgy guy was pretty unhappy how it turned out.
Commerce man - weird place - den of thieves. Also some extremely terrible play for a $1100 buyin. Only smarmy guy was solid. Reg chick was ok but too much aggression and it apparently never occurred to her that running a multi-street bluff on a paired board 6-way flop might be a bad idea. Everyone else was pretty transparent postflop.
I snap-folded stuff like TPTK to one bet a few times knowing I was crushed and was proven right whenever I saw it. There were several players who would never raise or open a mutli-way pot w/o the stone cold nuts. Calling station lady was so excited about her set of kings I guess she thought it was the nuts.
After that I didn’t want to go home and think about it so I went to Hollywood Park and played a $80+$60 to cool off. People were still open limping at 4k/8k blinds with 10BBs. Poker not dead.
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Hand from the Hustler $120+$100a tournament which is really just a $5k 2 or 3-table SNG (and actually had an overlay yesterday). This tournament is generally much wilder than all the others. Lots of bluffs and players just wanting to gambooool then buying back in.
I bought in right before the cutoff for 50bbs and had played a couple orbits, so no reads on the two villains in the hand.
Blinds 600/1200/1200a - I get KsTs in UTG+2. Folding suited broadway just seems pretty lame I dunno. Limping is also totally normal in these games. I hadn’t done much yet so my image should be tight. I made it 2500 - both blinds call.
Flop JsTc4c - check, check. I was perfectly happy to check it down to the river, which happens a ton at these tourneys. Hero checks.
Turn 6c - check, check, check
River Td - SB, 45-year-old dude makes it 18k for 2.2x pot or something. BB folds. Hero?
Btw if you think fold pre is better, just assume it’s AsTs and how would you play it?
Apparently I need to go to CA and play live good lord.
You have no idea. Everyone should go play a $60-$100 buyin tourney just to see what it’s like.
I’m sitting there thinking how none of the normal poker analysis like “you should 3-bet light a little more often if…” doesn’t really hold when they play transparent post flop and call everything pre. 3-bet when you have a great hand.
Of course then when we get around the bubble, people are folding 99 face up to an LP raise and play mega-tight. Complete opposite. But still sometimes open limping then folding to a shove with 8BBs.
That’s been my big challenge and why it’s fun for me - trying to figure out what makes each bad player tick - and put them on hands.
The entire California economy is based on terrible IPOs and ever increasing home prices, prove me wrong.
Fold pre
It’s a bit iffy playing that hand at 50BB given the game conditions (if you flop Kxx and people get aggressive you won’t be loving life) but as long as there’s not much preflop threebetting going on it’s probably OK. People suck in these games so you have to get in the action whenever vaguely plausible.
I’d bet small on the turn - it’s very likely at this point that you have the best hand and against two opponents there’s no reason to allow them both to draw against you.
Call the river. He’d bet sometime before this with a flush you’d think, and he can’t really have a full because he’d definitely bet the turn with a set or two pair. As I said upthread, it’s very rare that low stakes players allow draws against their strong hands on wet boards. He probably just has a ten and thinks he has the nuts now, if he shows up with a flush or has AT that’s life but it could be QT, T9, T8 or whatever. It’s unlikely his logic goes as far as “what’s going to call me if I bet this much” it’s just “made good hand, bet lots”. He’ll occasionally just show up with a bluff as well.