WinStar (February 5 & 6)

Setting goals, listening to podcasts, reading articles.  It was all for naught.  I played twice at WinStar, losing both times for a grand total loss of $450.  This puts me down for the year $100.  I have sworn off WinStar because I simply cannot win at that casino, but I’m sure that will last about as long as any of my previous commitments to swear off the cruel game of poker.

 

I had four hands worth discussing, with one of them still haunting me today because I truly am not sure whether I made the right decision or not, but we will save that one for last.

 

The first situation was after playing for about five hours the first night.  I had been down nearly all night and prior to the start of this hand I was close to being back to even.  I had about $230 to start the hand.  I was dealt pocket queens with seven players at the table.  After the blinds had posted and another guy limped, the player to my immediate right, who had only been at the table for four hands, made it $8 to play.  I re-raised with my queens and made it $35 to play.  That is a little higher than I might usually re-raise when the original raise is $8, but nothing crazy in my opinion.

 

The action folded back around to the original raiser, who didn’t take long to say he was all-in.  Since this was only his fourth hand, I had no idea what kind of player he was.  I had worked so hard for so long to be where I was.  Had I called and lost, I would have been left with $80 and I wasn’t buying any more chips that night.  I didn’t want to risk so much on a hand I was either dominated, dominating, or a coin flip to win.  I elected to fold and wait this guy out.

 

It turns out I didn’t have to wait long.  About 30 minutes later I had figured out that this guy was extremely aggressive, raising pre-flop every third hand on average.  On just such a hand that he raised $7, I looked down to see pocket queens again.  I said out loud, “Let’s try this again,” and I raise it to $35 again.  This time, instead of re-raising me all-in, he just calls after everyone else folds.  The flop comes 9-8-3 and I bet $50 after he checked it to me.  He calls the bet and the turn was a 10.  He checks again and I was left with only $85 at this point.  The pot had $170 in it and I decided to push all-in.  He called very quickly and showed pocket nines for a set.  I didn’t hit a queen or jack on the river and was busted out.

 

Being that he simply called my re-raise the second time makes me think he had a stronger hand the first time and my fold was correct, but his aggressive style of play also makes me think he didn’t have a better hand than my queens and I should have called.  Before leaving the table I asked him what he had on the first hand that we didn’t show and he at first acted like he didn’t know what I was talking about.  He was a foreigner to this land, so that might be true, but once I got him to realize what I was talking about he said he had a pair.  I told him I knew that, but how high.  He said he couldn’t remember.  Uh-huh, likely story.

 

A big hand I won on the first night of play didn’t go how I thought it was going to.  I had K-10 of hearts and after limping into the pot we saw a flop of Q-J-5 with one heart.  There was a bet of about two-thirds the pot and a caller.  I elected to call and see what happened on the turn, which was the 7 of hearts, giving me an open-ended straight draw, flush draw, and possibly a draw to the king for best pair.

 

I checked the turn and when the player behind me bet about half the pot, the third player called and I decided it was time to make my move.  I raised all-in and was prepared for either both to fold, both to call, or to get it heads-up and draw for my better hand.  The initial bettor on my left thought for a long time and finally decided to call me.  The third player folded.  I told my opponent that he was ahead at this point, but that I had a lot of draws.  After seeing my hearts, he responded (not in a condescending or annoying way) that I didn’t have as many outs as I thought.  He flipped up A-Q of hearts.  There went my flush draw.

 

That left me with three kings, three aces, and three nines (the nine of hearts gives him a higher flush).  A black nine came on the river and I more than doubled my money.  This win put me near even for the night and I was about ready to call it quits when I came into the two queen hands mentioned earlier.

 

Other than the hand I am saving for last that was about it for the first night.  I had a really good $1-2 table and if I cannot beat that kind of table at WinStar, then there is just not any kind of table I can win at that casino.

 

The following morning was a disaster.  In 90 minutes of play I won three hands total and two of those were for pots of less than $10.

 

The most significant hand of the second session was when I held 9-9.  I limped into the pot and a player in late position made it $12 to go.  Two players ahead of me called and I decided to see if I could get lucky and hit a nine for a big payday with so many players involved.  The flop came 8-7-2 with two hearts.  The first player bet $22 and I went all-in for another $61, bringing the total to $83.

 

Despite not getting a third nine, this is a perfect flop for my middle pocket pair.  It is just below my hand, so any player who hit a pair is going to have to draw out on me.

 

At this point, the pot has $131 in it.  The original pre-flop raiser thought for about two minutes and finally decided to fold.  He later said he had tens.  The player on the button also thought for some length of time and decided to call.  The first player who led out for $22 decided to fold.  He said he had A-8 after the hand was over.

 

The turn was an unforgettable card and the river was a heart.  The player on the button showed K-Q of hearts and won the pot, sending me back to the hotel room swearing off WinStar poker.

 

And that brings us to the final hand of consequence.  At the beginning of this I had $225 in chips.  I was dealt A-K offsuit in late position.  There were two limpers in already and I elected to raise it to $7.  I should mention that this table was one that a $7 or $8 raise was the norm and it was within the first 20 minutes that this happened.  Both limpers called my raise.

 

The flop came K-6-2 rainbow.  Both players checked and I bet $15.  The first player folded and the second called.  The turn was a six, pairing the board.  My opponent almost immediately bet $75.  I responded by almost immediately calling.  The river was a two, creating a board of K-6-2-6-2.  My opponent didn’t wait long to push all his chips into the pot.  He had me covered, making it a $128 bet to me and there was now approximately $330 in the pot prior to my call/fold.

 

So what do you do here?

 

If any card comes on the river that isn’t a two, I think I would have called.  For my opponent to bluff the turn, that is one thing, but to then follow that up and bet everything I had on a river after my immediate call on the turn is a pretty bold bet if you have worse than my hand.  The only hands I could put him on that I could beat other than a complete bluff was K-Q, K-J, K-10, or K-X suited.

 

I go back and forth on whether he truly had me beat, but it was so early in the night, I didn’t want to call off my last $128 without being pretty sure I could win the hand.  Maybe I was playing too conservative in that position.  Maybe that is why I am ultimately a loser at WinStar, but I laid the hand down, hoping to get a chance to make it back later in the night.  Unfortunately things ended when, likely previously explained in this post, my queens lost to a flopped set.

 

Call me an idiot if you think I should have called the A-K hand.  Or tell me it was the smart move.  I really don’t know.  I can’t seem to separate myself from the situation to look at it objectively and make a decision.

Poker Goals (Monetary & Otherwise)

Listening to my recent podcast hosts, I was reminded that setting poker goals is a good way to start the year off.  Although we are in the early part of February I have only played one session of poker, so setting a goal at this point isn’t cheating too much, but it does make things a bit easier since I am $350 up without ever having made my first objective.

 

To begin with, this is not the first year I have ever set a goal for poker playing.  While not being able to remember exactly what past years I’ve attempted doing so before, poker goals are not entirely foreign to me.  I do recall that I did not meet the goals that were set forth, so actually accomplishing these ambitious endeavors could be a first in 2015.

 

The first goal I will be attempting is the amount of time I play cards.  Having 2.5 kids at home and living 90 minutes from the nearest brick-and-mortar casino limits my potential playing time (and I don’t count the time or funds won and lost in my home game because it is usually just five guys and that is too small of a game to validate in my poker accounting).  That being said, if I can play 150 hours this year I will consider that pretty good.  In the poker ledger I have at home it breaks down how many hours I have played since 2009, but off the top of my head I cannot recall whether 150 hours is too high, too low, or just right.  If I can play two times a month (I only played once in January), that averages out to 12.5 hours per session.

 

The second goal is a monetary one.  I would like to average $15 an hour playing poker this year.  Again, my hourly rate is available to me at home, but I am making this number up off the top of my head.  If I had to guess, I would say with the limited amount of time I actually get to play, making $15 an hour isn’t completely ridiculous.  After winning $350 last month, I am somewhere around $45 an hour, but a single loss of $200 would bring that amount way down.

 

If I were to accomplish both of my first two goals, I would win a minimum of $2,250 from poker for the year.  I have never won that much money, so I doubt this happens, but it will be interesting to see how things shake out this year.

As for in-game play, I want to open up my range of hands that I will three-bet (or re-raise with) pre-flop.  My range of hands I three-bet right now is very slim, so I want to open that up a bit more and be more aggressive with three-betting.  A recent tip I learned about three-betting is that the hands worth three-betting pre-flop are at the top of your folding range to a raise.

 

The final goal I am setting for myself is to read two poker strategy books.  It has been years since I read a strategy book on Texas Hold’em, so I will count re-reading the books I already own because there will certainly be lessons to take away that I have forgotten over the years.  I would like to also add something about reading a poker blog regularly, but it will be too difficult to keep track of how many I read throughout the year.  We are going to start slow and simply keep it at two books.

 

Well, that is about it for my goals this year.  Should I come up with some later, maybe I will update this post or do a new post adding any potential ambitions.  Wish me luck this year as I attempt to continue being a winning poker player.

Thinking Poker Podcasts

Today I was in the mood for poker and I have a game coming up at WinStar this Thursday that has me very nervous.  Joanna and I are going on a trip to Broken Bow in Oklahoma and on the way we are staying at WinStar.  I plan on playing once Thursday night and again Friday morning if things go well the night before, but with my history at WinStar, it isn't going to go well.  I suspect the trip without gambling is going to cost about $400 and I am attempting to break even with my poker winnings, but I have a great fear of turning this $400 trip into $700.

 

Since I have won a few home game tournaments lately, I have been wanting to hear poker discussion more among my friends, and luckily I found a website that my server at work allows me to access (because it is poker related) that has podcasts.  I listened to two posts today and took a few notes from them that I thought were worthy of talking about here.

 

The first is this tidbit of knowledge: when semi-bluffing a hand, you want to be the last one betting.  I probably instinctively knew that, but I don't actively make sure I am the last bet when involved in a semi-bluff.  I feel like I am, but when the podcast speaker mentioned that, a little light bulb in my head went off that made me think that was so obvious.

 

Because of my track record at WinStar, I am going to be playing a timid game (which I know is a bad strategy), so I'm not sure how many semi-bluffs I am going to be making.  However, when I find myself in a situation that I am making a semi-bluff bet, I am going to be sure to be the final aggressor.

 

The second thing I heard I don't think I necessarily agree with.  The host said when short-stacked (which means about 15 big blinds remaining) late in a tournament, it is better to have A-5 suited than a hand like 7-4 suited on an all-in shove.  Before I get too deep into my thinking on this I will stipulate that if the all-in hands were A-5 suited against 7-4 suited, I would obviously rather have the A-5.

 

So what do I mean when I say I'd rather have 7-4 suited (besides it being my favorite non-premium hand)?  The reason I would rather push all-in with 7-4 suited than A-5 suited is if you get called, 7-4 has a better chance of being live.  If you get called with A-5, odds are your only live card is the five since your opponent called with a higher ace.  Obviously getting called by a pocket pair higher than seven but lower than an ace is going to stink when holding a seven and a four, but I just feel more comfortable hearing "call" when I move all-in with 7-4 than I do A-5.  Probably not that much more comfortable, but I have to at least feel like my cards stand a better chance than the ace-high hand would.

 

I don't know, maybe I am alone in this thinking, but like the podcast host said, "if your opponent has Ace-big, you are getting called no matter what."  Wouldn't you rather have two live cards at that point?

Weatherford (January 17): Night Of The A-J

After finishing 2014 in the black, which I will hopefully do a review of my play from last year, I started this year off well after winning $350 in Weatherford on Saturday.  There were two hands of consequence, only one of which I was included but both involved A-J.

 

 

We will begin with the hand that I was not playing.  One of the players in the hand defends his action, but in my humble opinion the call was completely wrong and there is no defense for it.  A player in middle position, who we will call Player B, raised pre-flop to $8 and two players, players A and C, called.  Player C was behind the raiser and Player A was in early position.  The pot has $26 in it at this point (the extra two dollars were from the big blind).

 

The flop came J-7-4 rainbow.  Player A checked and the original raiser, Player B, bet $17.  Player C called, bringing the action back to Player A, who then raised an additional $60.  After the flop came out, Player B’s bet put the pot at $43, Player C’s call brought it to $60, and Player A’s $17 from the initial bet made a pot of $77.  Then if you include the $60 from Player A’s raise, the pot is at $137.

 

So to recap what has happened, there is a pre-flop raise with two calls, a bet on the flop from the original raiser, a call, and a raise from a player who initially checked.  So far everything looks on the up-and-up.  Player A could be trying to steal a pot with nothing as he believes Player B is making a continuation bet and Player C is weak or Player A could have a strong hand and is wanting to take the pot down right here and now.  But this is where it gets interesting.

 

Player B then goes all-in for an additional $18 above the $60, for $78 total.  That raise makes a pot total of $215.  Player B obviously has something pretty good because he knows he is getting called by at least Player A since the raise is so small.

 

Player C then goes all-in, which now that I look back I don’t think was legal since Player B’s all-in raise was for less than the minimum.  After $78 goes into the pot from Player C to cover Player B’s all-in, it is an additional $249.  So for Player A to call both all-ins, which he can cover and would leave him with approximately $60, it is going to cost $267.  Prior to anything Player A does, the pot now has $482.

 

Player A has now seen a pre-flop raise from Player B, a call from Player C, a continuation bet from Player B, a call from Player C, an all-in re-raise from Player B after Player A’s check-raise, and an all-in re-re-raise from Player C.  The only way I make this call is with a set, and even with a set of fours or sevens I am not thrilled.  Player A decided to call with A-J, which is top pair-top kicker.  I don’t know how you can justify making that call, but Player A attempted to do so all night long.

 

It turns out, Player A had the same hand as Player B and Player C had a set of sevens.  Nothing came that changed the outcome and Player C raked in a pot of $749.

 

I have gone through every possible scenario in my head and in no situation do Player B and C have hands worse than A-J.  I could maybe get behind the idea that had Player B with the smaller stack of money been the second one to go all-in after Player C, it might be worth calling with A-J because you would probably lose to Player B, but the large side-pot with Player C would be worth chasing, however, that is not the way the hand progressed, so that argument is moot.

 

The second hand, which I was involved in, is one in which the final decision is certainly worth debating.  The player to my immediate right straddled the blinds for $5.  This basically means there are three blind hands now and the player who is the third blind for $5 has final action pre-flop, no matter what happens with the betting.  I look down and see A-J of spades.  I raise it to $15, which is now a 3x raise because of the straddle.  The player on my immediate left calls the bet.  The small and big blinds both fold.  The player who straddled re-raises and makes it $30 to go.  It is another $15 to call, which I and the player behind me do.  The pot now has $93 in it.

 

The flop comes out A-A-3 rainbow.  The first player, who re-raised my initial raise pre-flop, bets $45.  I instantly call and the player behind me folds.  The pot now has $183.  The turn is a ten.  I don’t recall whether it now made a possible flush draw or not, but that really wasn’t much of a concern for me.  My opponent bet all of his chips, which totaled $65.  It was now my decision to call or fold $65 to win a pot of $248.

 

A-J is a very good hand at this point.  I am getting almost 4-1 odds on my money to call.  The only hands that beat me are A-K, A-Q, A-10, A-3, 10-10, or 3-3.  I either beat or tie everything else and there is another card to come.

 

Discussing this hand with my friend yesterday, he believes there was so much money to win I should have called, even if I think I am beat.  I disagreed and believe that if you think you are beat, despite what is at stake, you lay the hand down.  Obviously there are exceptions to this as there are times when the bet is such a miniscule amount compared to what you can win that it is worth calling with a weak hand.

 

Going through the possible hand scenarios, I couldn’t see where someone would be willing to put all their money in the pot without a good ace when they have to know I am holding one of them.  My friend said he might have been making that play with a high pocket pair, but after you get called on the flop, it takes a lot of guts, that most players at the level I play at, don’t have to go all-in with a pocket pair lower than aces when two are on the board.  That leaves A-x lower than my jack.  With the way the hand played out, it just didn’t seem like he was making a move with something lower than a jack as his kicker.

 

I ended up folding my hand, showing the A-J.  The player also showed A-J, meaning I would have split the pot.  While I can look back and know what would have happened, I still think folding was the correct play in that position.  It just didn’t make sense that he would push all-in with a hand worse than mine, no matter how loose of a player he may be.  Pushing all-in without an ace in that position is insane and pushing with A-9 or worse is very aggressive, especially after seeing your opponent make a pre-flop raise, call your re-raise, and instantly call your flop bet.  I’m not saying it isn’t done, but it takes a lot of guts to do so.

 

Being a good poker player means playing the odds and knowing when to call and fold.  Being a great poker player means making calls and folds other players won’t make.  I am not a great poker player by any means, but I am striving to become one.  Laying a great hand down like my A-J is not easy and sometimes it isn’t correct, like in this case, but no matter the odds, no matter the money at stake, occasionally folding a big hand is the correct play.