Friday, August 19, 2005

Unfortunate color change

I've had three straight losing sessions at $20/$40 live. The last session has the dubious honor of changing my net results for the last month and a half of $20/$40 from black to red. I'm down exactly 1.2 big bets from my last 70 session hours; that's -$48 for those of you who aren't math majors.

The true test of poker players is not how they play when running well, but how they handle things when running poorly.

Again I am having doubts on whether or not I am paying off too much on the river.

There are 3 hands from my last session that I've at least had some second thoughts about whether or not I should have called the last bet on the river. A simpler way for me to have handled these hands would not to have gotten involved at all, but how the heck am I going to learn anything if I never put myself in questionable situations?

Perhaps paying off on the river is not the main issue. Perhaps, I am just not paying enough attention to my opponents' tells. I'm allowing myself to get check raised far too often on the turn when I have just fallen behind on the last card. I could sure save a lot of money if I could spot tells of strength more often.

All of the following hands are 9 handed live $20/$40 limit hold'em. They are all very simple hands that occured within the span of 25 minutes with at most 1 new player at the table during that time.

hand #1
MP is an average player, MP+1, and the blinds are loose passive. MP+2 is aggressive when he has a legit hand, but is otherwise loose passive while drawing
- preflop: fold, fold, MP raises, MP+1 cold calls, MP+2 cold calls, I cold call in the CO w QhJh, button folds, blinds both call. (6 players, 12 small bets)
- flop: KhTc6d MP bets, MP+1 calls, MP+2 calls, I raise, all fold to MP+2 who calls (2 players, 18 small bets)
- turn: KhTc6dJd, MP+2 checks, I bet, MP+2 check raises, I call (2 players, 13 big bets)
- river: KhTc6dJc2s, MP+2 bets, I call, MP+2 shows Qd9d.

Preflop, I know that QJ is a frequently dominated hand, but as I'm sure you could tell from my frequent posts about wanting to fold, I won't get too married to top pair (or even 2 pair) if there is a lot of raising and reraising postflop. I expect multiway action for just 2 bets, and that is what I get.

Originally, I had only raised the flop to get a free card on the turn. However, I was able to get heads up. MP+2 plays some real trash hands and is quite the chaser. 78, 79, 89 suited and unsuited are well within the range. AT or in fact ~any~ A is quite possible. I didn't notice any tell from him, so I keep firing on the turn.

I know I am behind when he check raises the turn, and when I don't improve on the river, I don't have much choice but to pay him off. The pot is too big.

hand #2
button and BB are loose preflop, and chase reasonable draws post flop.
- preflop: fold, fold, MP (villian from previous hand) calls, I raise with KsQs, fold, fold, button calls, SB folds, BB and MP call (4 players, 8.5 small bets)
- flop: Kh7sTd, checked to me, I bet, everyone calls (4 players, 12.5 small bets)
- turn: Kh7sTd8d, checked to me, I bet, button and BB fold, MP check raises, I call (2 players, 10 big bets)
- river: Kh7sTd8dJd, MP bets, I call, MP shows 8s7d

This looks like another ABC hand to me. Does anyone play it any differently? (with the same information, i.e. I, yet again, have no tells on my opponent(s))

Okay, come to think of it, I don't have any doubts about whether or not to call on the river for these first 2 hands. In both hands I hesitated for 3-5 seconds before calling. Given the way these hands played, could I have saved a bet on this hand which happened only a few minutes later?

hand #3
MP, MP+1, BB are loose, passive with med str hands and draws, raises have always been with legit hands, no semibluffs yet; button is a solid player
- preflop: fold, fold, MP calls, MP+1 calls, MP+2 calls (villian from previous 2 hands), I call in CO w Kh9h, button raises, SB folds, everyone else calls (6 players, 12.5 small bets)
- flop: Ks6c8h, checked to button who bets, BB folds, MP, MP+1, MP+2 call, I check raise to see where I am at, button folds, MP and MP+1 call, MP+2 folds. (3 players, 20.5 small bets)
- turn: Ks6c8h7c, checked to me, I bet, MP folds, MP+1 check raises, I call (2 players, 14 big bets)
- river: Ks6c8h7cAh, MP+1 bets, I call, MP+1 shows Kd7d.

MP+1 is a loose player, but he does pay attention to the action since he loves to talk about hands later. I've played with him for well over 15 session hours. I have no doubt in my mind that he had remembered that I had been paying off on the river 100% of the time thus far. Even getting 15:1, I think I can fold here, but I pay him off anyway.

I didn't see him doing the "looking quickly at his chips" tell or the "looking away from the action" tell. I was looking right at him when the turn card was dealt, but I extracted nada from it. Gosh, it is really frustrating that I'm not learning to read opponents better.

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