Planning For The Weatherford Tournament

My buddy Joey from the Weatherford game I play each month sent me the blind schedule for the upcoming end-of-the-fiscal-year tournament in August.  The receipt of his message has stirred anticipation for the tournament and I have started working out strategy for the night.  The tournament will be held on August 23 and the blind structure is as follows:

Ante     Blinds                    Time

            $25-50                    25 min.

            $50-100                 25 min.

            $75-150                 25 min.

            $100-200              25 min.

$25      $100-200            25 min.

$25      $150-300            25 min.

     10-minute break

$50      $200-400            25 min.

$50      $250-500            25 min.

$100    $300-600           25 min.

$100    $400-800           25 min.

$200    $500-1,000       25 min.

$200    $600-1,200        25 min.

     10-minute break

$300    $700-1,400        25 min.

$300    $800-1,600        25 min.

$400    $1,000-2,000    25 min.

$500    $1,200-2,400    25 min.

$500    $1,500-3,000    25 min.

$500    $2,000-4,000   25 min.

 

There will be approximately $158,000 in chips at play and I will begin with $8,000.  The most a player can have is $11,000 and there will be about six people with the maximum amount.  Last year I finished the tournament in third and had only $9,000 to start, but the cap was set at $10,000 in chips.  I could pay $80 to have an additional $2,000 in chips, but I don’t think with this blind structure there is an urgent need for the additional amount.  If I were at $4,000 or $5,000 I might consider it.

 

I don’t know an exact amount of players who will be in the tournament yet, but I expect it to be about 18.  My strategy going into the tournament is to play tight but aggressive in the first four rounds when antes are not a factor.  However, once the antes are implemented and there is more at stake before the cards are ever dealt, I will become much more aggressive with my standards for a starting hand.  Obviously this plan could change drastically depending on how the cards are falling.

 

Should I take a big hit early on, I may have to go into lockdown mode until I get a good enough hand to start pushing.  Yet, if I get a rush of good cards in the beginning I could start pushing people around with my chip stack, no matter what the size of the pot pre-flop.

 

Once I have a clearer idea of how many players will be involved and what the exact starting chip stacks will be I can formulate a more concrete approach.

Weatherford (May 25)

We are nearly through five full months of 2014 and unfortunately I have only played three sessions of poker in that time.  The first game I won $60, the second game saw a loss of the same amount, and this most recent game resulted in a $215 profit.  After eight hours of play I logged a $26.88 hourly rate for the evening.

The game started very well for me, as I was able to build my $100 buy-in into $510 after about four hours.  I was hitting a lot of great hands and they were always slightly better than my opponent’s hand.  The sickest win of the night for me was when the river card gave me a full house while at the same time making a flush for my opponent.

There were two hands of consequence that I thought I would share.  They are a bit of bragging as I made the correct decision (folding) for both, but that partly is what this blog is about.  The first situation was when after the river I had top pair (aces) with a jack kicker.  The cards on the board were A-Q-?-10-?.  The two unknown cards were inconsequential and there was no flush available.  I had raised pre-flop with my A-J suited and by the end of the hand, with betting on the flop and a check on the turn, it was down to two of us.  I made a bet about half the size of the pot and was raised by about three times the size of my bet.  I considered that if I was beat it was likely by either A-10 for two pair or K-J for a straight.  I figured A-K or A-Q would have re-raised me pre-flop by the player I was up against.

After a few minutes of thinking the hand through, I was leaning toward the straight.  I just couldn’t fathom a hand my opponent held that was worse than mine and he would be raising me on the river, unless it was a complete bluff.  I opted to fold and showed my hand.  He was startled at what I was folding and when asked if he would show he allowed me to pick one card.  The card shown was a king.  That meant he had to hold either an ace or a jack for me to have made the correct decision.  The next day I called him and asked what he held.  He said it was the straight and I have no reason to not believe him.

The second hand in question was near the very end of the night.  I held A-5 and a player behind me made it $10 to go pre-flop.  A player on my right called and I called.  The flop was A-5-2 with two clubs.  The player on my right checked, I checked, with plans to raise after the pre-flop raiser made a continuation bet, and the pre-flop raiser obliged by making a $20 bet.  The player on my right then raised it to $100 even.

This was not part of the plan.  I had about $350 in front of me at this point and knew it was going to cost all of my chips by the end of the hand, so I had to be sure I had the best of it by the end.  With the top two pair the only hands that beat me were three aces, three fives, three twos, and a straight with 4-3.  Normally I would not rule out the player who had raised it to a hundo having 4-3, but in the last six months he has been in quite the slump and those types of speculative hands are starting to be removed from his repertoire.  That left a pocket pair that hit.

With a little out-loud discussion, but not revealing what I had as I did not want to give away anything to the player behind me, I decided I indeed was beat.  I folded, as did the pre-flop raiser behind me.  He showed K-9 of clubs, which gave him the nut flush draw.  He decided it was too expensive without me involved to draw for the flush.  I showed my top two pair and the winner of the hand showed pocket twos.

I’ve said this before, but sometimes the most memorable plays of the night are not calls, but folds.

With so little playing time this year due to Sawyer being born I decided to look back at my results since 2009.  I added up my career stats and discovered I have won nearly $5,000 in poker games over the course of 464.5 hours of play.  My hourly rate since keeping these statistics is $10.70.  Not great, but it is better than being a losing player.

2013 In Financial Review

Keeping a detailed log of my poker winnings and losses since 2009 has had one common thread each year until the most recent one: an overall profit.  For 2013 I lost $450 and lost a total of $3.79 every hour of play at a poker table.

The lowest point of loss for the year was $1,270 by June 13.  I was able to start digging myself out of the whole by that point, but there just weren't enough time games I played in by the end of the year to completely return to the black.  My largest loss in a single game was $320 and largest win was $500.  In 32 games, twice I broke even.

It was a disappointing year in general as I had a lot of losses that couldn't be dismissed by bad luck or poor play alone.  Many professional poker players talk of long-lasting losing streaks that just can't be explained.  I am far from a professional poker player, but the first half of the year did seem to be like a prolonged prank by the poker gods to stick it to me.

Here's to hoping 2014 gets back to a profitable year.

The All-in Overbet

During a $20 rebuy tournament last night, a debate came up about pushing all-in with a sizeable stack pre-flop when the blinds and antes were small enough that the player in question wasn’t considered truly short stacked.  There were actually three moments of said player pushing all-in pre-flop (or not doing so when the situation actually called for it) with so much at stake and so little to win that I wanted to discuss each one in detail.

The first instance of pushing his stack was with the blinds at 50-100, no antes, and the rebuys were still available.  He had $4,000 in chips (which we started with $7,500) and with the two blinds and a limper already in the pot ($250) he shoved it all in.  He never showed the hand but it was eventually explained that he had something close to K-J suited.  Risking $4,000 to win $250, even with rebuys still available, isn’t a good bet in my opinion.  Everyone ended up folding and he did win the pot, but he could have accomplished the same goal and risked far less money had it resulted in somebody actually waking up with a hand worth calling.

The second moment of discussion took place during the same blind level, with rebuys still an option.  The player in question still had approximately $4,000 in chips and after the guy in the big blind tried to raise out of position, this player folded pocket twos without ever putting any money in the pot.  It went around to the big blind, who then did raise it to $350.  With the ability to still rebuy and the knowledge that the big blind is going to raise, I think calling the $100, letting it get around to the big blind to raise it another $250 and then making a move then is the smarter play.

The outcome works in your favor by playing it deceitfully.  If you make the re-raise of either an all-in, which I wouldn’t do, or bumping it anywhere from $800-1,200 you now get a few options to win the hand.  You could either win it right there with everyone folding to your re-raise or win it with a bet (as long as you haven’t gone all in) on the flop whether you hit or not.  Even being called for an all-in at some point isn’t the worst thing in the world as you could win the hand at a showdown or rebuy and start with a fresh $7,500 should you lose,

By limping with the first bet, knowing it is going to be raised behind you, and then making a re-raise after the big blind raises, you are winning at minimum $550 (small blind called the $100, big blind’s $350, and your $100).  Playing the hand this way makes more sense if you are trying to either double up or rebuy as fast as possible.

The final situation was when the player held A-10 offsuit and pushed all in pre-flop for $3,600.  Blinds at that point were $100-200 with a $25 ante and the rebuy period was over.  Losing would knock him out of the tournament.  With $3,600 in chips, in my opinion, it is too early to push everything pre-flop without a raise ahead of you.  It would take a really bad player or somebody with so many chips that losing $3,600 was meaningless to make a call with something worse than A-10 when there is only $400 in the pot prior to the all-in raise.

With the big blind at $200, you can make a raise of $600-800 and if you get a caller or two then you still have $2,800-3,000 in chips if you lose the hand and not put any more money in.  Yes, after that you would need to start thinking about being in all-in mode, but with $3,600 I believe it is simply too much to lose and too little to win for an all-in pre-flop raise.  Maybe if rebuys are still going on that raise would be okay, but when you are risking your tournament life on A-10 offsuit and the money out in the pot would only increase your stack by 11 percent it doesn’t make sense to me.

I guess what all this boils down to is risk versus reward.  Is the money you are risking worth as much as what the reward is?  To me, his decisions to push all in with so much money at stake and so little to win were poor financial decisions at the poker table.  But in all honesty, what do I know.  Small stakes rebuy tournaments are my Achilles heel right now.  Maybe my thinking is completely wrong and that is why I rarely finish in the money at these things.

WinStar, Weatherford, Granbury (One Loss, Two Wins)

In 2013 I've played cards three times, once at WinStar, again in Weatherford, and finally in Granbury.  The Granbury game is new for me, but it consists of mostly the same people as Weatherford on a smaller scale.

I lost $300 at WinStar in my first game.  I won $220 in Weatherford.  I won $350 in Granbury.  All of this has resulted in starting off 2013 with a profit of $270.

The one hand worth discussing thus far is one I folded on the flop and I have no idea if I made a good fold or not.  I think it was a smart fold, but not sure if it was the correct one.  I started with 5-3 of clubs. I was the small blind and completed my bet after two other players called for $2.  The big blind checked and the flop came out J-5-3 with two diamonds and a spade.

With bottom two pair, I led out for $10 into an $8 pot.  This was an overbet, but I didn't want those with a flush draw to see a $6 or $8 bet and call despite the odds to not do so.  Making a double digit bet would run away flush draws.

The big blind folded, one player called, and the last player raised it to $40 total.  It was now $30 more to me.  I believed I was in the lead at this point, however, after contemplating the situation I opted to fold.  The following are my reasons:
1. The player who raised had about $400 in front of him and I had a little more.  If things went past the flop it was likely going to be a very expensive hand and I wouldn't be sure I had the best hand by the end unless I hit another five or three.  I could raise another $60-90 and possibly win it right there, but if he called or raised I would have to shut things down at that point and not feel good to any future bets.
2. Being the small blind, I would be in poor position for the rest of the hand.
3. I had another player behind me who could be slow-playing something big or would call on a flush draw if I called and then I'm still going up against the draw that I was trying to avoid.

All this combined made me decide to fold and wait for a safer spot to gamble my money.  The player behind me also folded and the turn and river were shown to be a four and two.  This meant an ace or six had a straight.  I felt I would have not had the best hand by the end and folding was the safer play.

You might disagree with my play, but bottom two pair in that situation was good, not great.  Oh well.  I still ended up with $450 in front of me.  After starting with only $100, my profit for the night was $350 and my beginning in Granbury has started off well.

Weatherford (December 8)

Last Saturday was the final game in Weatherford for the year, and I ended on a high for 2012.  Winning $210 for the evening put me in second place for most money won this year among the group who plays in my favorite home cash game.  A guy named Brandon earned more than $2,200 this year and I finished with a profit of $1,690 in a total of 12 games.

For the entire year thus far I have profited $1,365 and am hoping to play one more time before 2013 rolls around.  Unfortunately, I don’t have any great hands from the night to discuss.  I did make one really good call with top pair, seven kicker on the river against a player I read as bluffing.  My call paid off as he didn’t have the pair of aces beat.  It was a good read on my part and I was proud of myself for trusting my gut.

On Saturday, I played for 8.25 hours, resulting in a $25.46 hourly rate.  I’ve had a good year, but didn’t play as many hours as I planned or won as much money as I would have liked.

Whether I play one final time or not, I will do a yearly recap on my games and update how much I won and the hourly rate for the year.  It will be interesting to see how this year compares with the past three years that I have been keeping up seriously with my poker play.

Casa de Cook ($20 re-buy tournament)

In an attempt to bring poker back to Arlington, we held a home game tournament last night at my new house and had eight players show for the event. That is the most we have had for a game like this in a long, long time.

The structure was slightly different than our old games in that we only started with $7,500 in chips ($10,000 is the norm) and the blinds started at $25-50 with re-buys being allowed for the first four rounds. Rounds lasted 30 minutes each.

I want to start keeping track of who re-buys, who goes out when, and other things about these games to see if there is a pattern. The following is the structure of the tournament, when re-buys took place and players eliminated.

$25-50: No rebuys
$50-100: 2 re-buys (Josh, Matt)
$75-150: 1 re-buy (Hector)
$100-200: 4 re-buys (Bart, Slope, Bart, James)
$150-300: Hector eliminated
$200-400
$250-500: Josh eliminated, Slope eliminated
$300-600: Bart eliminated, Danny eliminated
$400-800: Matt eliminated

James had the lead going into heads-up play with Clint, so they chopped the pot $175-125. It was supposed to be split $200-100.

The official standings look like this:
1st - James
2nd - Clint
3rd - Matt (same bubble spot as always)
4th - Danny
5th - Bart
6th - Slope
7th - Josh
8th - Hector

We had a good time and everyone said they want to make this a normal thing. Hopefully we can get a game together once or twice a month.