Lose some, win some

The other night, playing a five-dollar tourney, I made a call, drunk, that I would not have made sober. Probably. Who knows? I've made stupid calls sober, drunk and at every point in between. It will probably be my last gasp: "Can someone please push all my chips in for me with AT?"

It probably cost me a hundred bucks. That's a pity because like anyone I need a bit of luck in a tourney and a decent win makes up for all the nearlies. It turned decent into nearly. Never mind.

So the key hand on Friday is for once a good one for me, because I didn't really have too many opportunities to do anything but fold until we were down to six and then I was short enough that I had to push it a bit.

The blinds are 150/300 and I have about 4000 chips. The mathematically inclined will see straight away that I had nearly 9x the combined blinds (this number is called M; it's a representation of how many orbits -- or rounds of the table -- you can go before being blinded out). In R's structure (20-minute doubling blinds, no antes), this is not desperately short but it's short enough to mean you need to start gaining chips sooner rather than later. D, R's wife, a terrible, loose gambling player, limps and so does J, a calling station who has been lucky up to now. I wake up with A9.

This isn't a particularly strong hand and with a bigger stack, or more players left in, I might even fold it. Online I'm not keen on limping with A9, unless it's suited, because players are so keen on limping bigger aces. I decide to raise. Given the size of the other stacks, I think 1000 will be enough. This is not a big raise, and theoretically I should be putting more in. But putting more in would necessitate pushing, which I think is an unnecessary risk. I expect to fold the blinds and both limpers. If I don't, I have position and the way our game usually plays, a push on the flop should do the trick.

The blinds fold but D calls quickly. I think she must have what she considers a good hand. This could be just about anything! But her range for calling this raise is probably any pair, Ax, K9+, maybe QJ, possibly connectors of some sort: 98s, 87s, that kind of thing would be very possible. J folds. If I wanted to know whether he was any good, he told me with this fold. He is being asked to put in 700 chips and the pot holds 2450. That's better than 3 to 1! What can he have that isn't worth a call at those odds but was worth limping? This sort of thing often happens. Earlier Da, a useless and predictable player who was pretty much bludgeoned by the deck this night and ended up winning, had folded his big blind to a min raise from the small blind. Let's say the blinds were 50-100. The bet into him is 100. The pot holds 300. There simply is no hand bad enough to fold here. Yes, the small blind might have AA and you might be crushed (a worse than 6 to 1 dog) but nearly always you will have chances (even a badly dominated hand, such as 72 vs A7 is just shy of 3 to 1; with live cards you are nothing like that badly off).

The flop comes 873r. I have missed (I don't give any value to the backdoor straight draw or the overcards at this point) but I have already made my decision. Whatever D does, I'm pushing. Unless she pushes. Then I'm folding.

This is why. If she bets, she has likely hit the flop. Maybe she had A7 and hit her kicker. It's possible she began with a pair but if it's an overpair, she is likely to checkraise. If she has a set, same story. A check is likely a sign of weakness: an underpair or overcards, maybe a draw; although she's aggressive, she is dumb with it, so she'll tend to bet overcards on a flop like this but not T9 (terrible players don't often have a semibluff in their armoury). Although she checks a strong hand, there are many more weak hands she can have. So why if she bets, would I push? And why if she checks, would I not just bet out and try to fold her out?

If she bets, I may or may not have the odds to call, but doing so is just a way to piss your stack away. I only have about three thou left and calling a couple of bets to chase the odds here will severely dent that. If I chase for two bets of 500 say, which would be about the least I could see her betting, I am down to 2000 and I'm looking for spots to push in. My opponents are weak players precisely because they do just call the bet here. I've learned not to (unless I and my opponent are deep enough to make it worthwhile).

If she checks and I bet, I have to fold to a raise. So I just lose whatever I bet to any decent hand. I have to bet a decent amount if I bet, because I want to take this down, preferably folding out smaller pairs (which are of course beating me) and hands such as AJ/AT, which are possible holdings (and also beat me). But any decent bet that is raised is going to cripple me and she might just call with the pairs and bigger but not massive aces.

So I push.

She thinks for a long time. There's some input from other players, which I find irritating, because they frame it in terms of pot odds, which would not be a consideration for a player like D. It's annoying because they want her to call (everyone likes the big confrontation and they suspect that I'm bluffing on this raggy flop) but of course I want the fold.

She folds. That gives me enough chips to see me through to the money. When we are down to three, I am in the short stack by a mile. I have an M of about 2 (mostly because players have been so slow counting off chips when they've gone all in, so that the blinds have risen quickly with few hands dealt). I am in desperate straits so I need a break. I get one. W, who should simply fold and allow me to bust out, gets into a confrontation with the big stack. They get it all in on the flop. W is miles ahead but the other guy has called him with a flush draw (without the correct odds of course). The other guy catches his flush and that leaves me HU with him. I put it all in blind. There's no point even picking up my cards when I am this short. It turns out I have a decent hand: QJ. I would have pushed anyway.

But let me tell you how Da's night has been and what kind of player he is. Earlier, when we were on two tables, I picked up A2 in the big blind. I'd hardly played a hand but this was just limped to me. So the flop comes KK2. You tend to think that you are ahead in my spot, because whenever the board is paired, it's unlikely, especially six- or seven-handed, that one of the others has trips. So I bet out and Da calls. Calls! He might as well send me a note saying "I have a king". I check the turn and he bets. I automuck. He flashes me K6 (which I would not have played in his shoes). That's good, right? Slowplay it some? Well no, I don't think so or not enough so. I can have several types of hand on this flop: a K of my own, a 2, a pocket pair or nothing. But the only way I'm putting more money into this pot is with a PP or the K. If my K is big, I'm going to bet the turn and river and he's going to be paying me off, maybe going bust. If I have a PP, I'm not betting, but I might call a small bet on the river if I don't think he has the K. But this is an unlikely holding for me because we are only three to the flop and I am likely to have raised two limpers with my pair, particularly if it's a decent one. And he has to check behind the turn (this is a common move in poker, strong-weak-strong; it's what players will often do to make a very strong hand look like a bluff on the river). With the hand I had, even if I paired my ace, I'm not keen on putting more money in. Maybe he should raise the flop? I dunno. That way, he can get away from a strong king, but some players are reraising with K-baby here, so he can't fold.

Anyway, I push with QJ, he has K7. Of course. And I get no help and that is that. I'm happy though. I played solid poker. I didn't get much in the way of cards until we were shorthanded and then I couldn't get action. It's tough with hands like AQ and low M. You have to push but if the table lacks gamble, you just pick up the blinds. On one hand I woke up with 66 and pushed. J, who had limped, agonised and agonised. But he folded his 55 face up. Pity. If he called, I probably would have won the tourney, because the double-up would have put me second in chips.

posted by Dr Zen @ 1:27 pm