malfaire says what?
01 February 2008
Last night I had the pleasure of being railed by malfaire (damn right it's a pleasure, he makes you feel so good). Overall, the session turned out well -- couldn't catch hands or hit flops for my life, but ended up +2BI. Over 400 hands I showed up with AA, QQ, and JJ a grand total of 0 times, KK 1 time, and any incarnation of AK (suited or offsuit) 1 time. Fun for me! However, since everyone at Absolute Poker is ridiculously terrible, I didn't need good hands to get paid off. (Side note: If you do not play on AP, please stop reading and go sign up there now. In my month of playing there I have never sat with at a table with a combined table VPIP less than 30 or at a table with a combined table PFR over 10. It's like Party Poker reincarnate, at least at 50nl and 100nl.) Anyway, the tables I was sitting at this session led to me playing tons of hands in position for cheap in multiway pots. Alas, I just couldn't seem to hit a goddamn thing. I also tried to take some creative lines against these ridiculous donks in order to force them into making large mistakes... so creative (or dumb) in fact that on several occasions malfaire was reduced to "what the hell are you doing? e'splain yourself!"
40BB Losers:
Isolation Gone Wrong
Simple hand of me trying to isolate the initial bettor for his 25BB with a mid pocket pair. Put him on small PP or 2 overs, so I liked my chances. Unfortunately, I don't know how to read stack sizes correctly and my bet size got all messed up. I'm still fine getting it all in here with the stack sizes as they were. I think weaktight is messing up the hand results, but original bettor had 44 and the other guy AA(h). I like drawing to 1 out... it's +ev.
Just Believe...
Villain here was playing 29/9/1.5 and I was going for some thin value on the river. I actually think I approached the river absolutely the wrong way given the range I had the villain on. I would prefer a check call here, since I don't think I'm getting called by anything that I'm beating and the only way to get a random J, K, or busted Q straight draw to give me chips is to let them bluff the river. A flush is obviously raising me here, and a straight is at least calling. Bad decision to bet the river + terrible call of his minraise = -32BB for me. (Note to self... don't play large pots in unraised hands without the nuts when every possible draw hits!)
40BB Winners:
Malfaire says what?
Villain is playing 42/12/1.1 (however, his turn/river AF are ridiculously high compared to overall AF). I went for a completely non-standard line here on the turn strictly to vary my play. Admittedly, I had no idea if this would work, but I remember both reading about similar play and observing an example or two in a recent videos and decided to take a shot with it. Given villain's stats here, his range is ridiculously wide... he could have any pair on the flop, random 2pr, straight draw, overs. His check/call doesn't really give us any information due to the nature his passive play, so on to the turn. The K hits and he checks again. Now we certainly aren't going to check this behind because straight draws can still catch up with a free card, so it's either make a standard second barrel or do something unexpected. I think if we fire out a standard 2/3 pot bet here of $10.5 we're likely to fold out all air a small pieces of the flop because it shows that we aren't afraid of that K hitting. By overbetting this turn I'm polarizing my range, telling my opponent that I either have a monster or I'm really afraid of that board and want him to fold out right now. At this limit I think that the players just simply don't want to ever give you credit and are more willing to make a terrible mistake in bluffing big. Villain obviously obliges and makes an absolutely horrendous c/raise bluff with a gutshot. I certainly don't think I get him all in if I make a standard c-bet here, but what does everyone else think?
Malfaire also brought up a good point during the session review as well: "Do you make the same play if the turn bricks?" I think the answer is no, since I'm no longer ahead of random 2pair/set that will surely be check/raising me. A c-bet of $10.5 here would still allow me to fold to a CRAI, but at $16 I think I'd be dangerously close to commitment with only an overpair.
Combo Draws are Fun
As mentioned previously I was trying to see as many multiway flops as possible from late position, which is why I think I'm okay limp/calling a hand like A7hh from the button in these games. Board obviously comes extremely nice for me and I'm getting it in here on the flop if need be. My reraise size is a little small here, since I want to commit myself to a turn bet by Villain, but I was timing down and just threw something out there to beat the clock (AP time runs down quick IMO). Malfaire and I went back and forth on the turn as to whether or not I should take a free card, but in the end I think we made the right decision. Good river, and went for some value... shame he didn't call. Oh wells.
Valuetown
Pretty standard play. If Villain has AQ or Q9, more power to him. If not, I'll take your money in small chunks... kthxbye.
Overall Session Stats:
Posted byM0NIKER at 11:38 AM
Is there a reason why you are 3-betting a UTG raiser with 77? Just curious.
Definitely a valid point. It's certainly not an automatic 3bet by any means, but I think that you need to be varying up your play with medium pocket pairs both in and out of position. 3betting here in position allows me to play a multitude of flops aggressively rather than just folding when I miss my set. It also has the added bonus of making it easier for me to get all the chips in when I do hit a 7, as evidenced by this hand.
Calling the UTG raiser with your mid pocket pairs is an easy way to go set mining, but it leaves very little room for creativity on the flop. I'd recommend trying to incorporate some 3bets with them, but by no means am I advocating doing this 100% of the time. This is an occasion when it worked out for me... the 88 hand obviously went the other way.
Thanks. I will try to incorporate that when it seems like a good spot to do so.
re: the hand w/ KK.
I <3 that line against a LAG player, mostly because they're so read-dependent.
Been in lots of situations lately where LAG limp/calls in, assess your bet, and acts according to his read. in this situation, you bet both the flop and the turn hard.
to him evidently: 'i'm scared of the straight!! i'm not slowplaying it!!' so he shoves, representing it himself.
I guess I should try overbetting when I'm strong against one of the many like him at UB. good assessment of the fold when you miss.