Wowowow were there ever some donkeys out last night. I had a great session at 2/4 and 3/6 NL. I felt like I was doing quite a lot of things right: good table selection, applying a lot of pressure in position with deep stacks, building big pots against the fish, etc. I made a few mistakes, of course, but not nearly as many as these guys. Some examples:
Full Tilt Poker No-Limit Hold’em, $6 BB (5 handed) Hand History converter Courtesy of PokerZion.com
SB ($640.30)
Hero ($639.10)
UTG ($591)
MP ($591)
Button ($535.90)
Preflop: Hero is BB with 3s, 3c.
3 folds, SB raises to $18, Hero calls $12.
Flop: ($36) Qs, Qc, 3d (2 players)
SB bets $24, Hero raises to $71, SB raises to $118, Hero raises to $271, SB raises to $716.3 (All-In), Hero calls $421.10 (All-In).
Turn: ($1444.40) Kh (2 players, 2 all-in).
River: ($1444.40) 4d (2 players, 2 all-in)
Final Pot: $1444.40
I usually 3-bet any pocket pair in a blind battle, but this guy was so bad that I wanted to just take a flop with deeper stacks in position. And what a flop! Without much going in pre-flop, I’ve got to start building a pot right away and hope he has something. His flop 3-bet I read as either a Q or a re-steal, so I put in a tiny 4-bet figuring he never folds a Q and might be tempted 5-bet bluff. He ended up shoving 22, so, uhm….
Full Tilt Poker No-Limit Hold’em, $4 BB (5 handed) Hand History converter Courtesy of PokerZion.com
MP ($768.60)
Button ($389.40)
Hero ($1348.20)
BB ($506.60)
UTG ($400)
Preflop: Hero is SB with 9h, 8h.
1 fold, MP calls $4, Button calls $4, Hero completes, BB raises to $20, MP calls $16, Button calls $16, Hero calls $16.
Flop: ($80) 9s, 8d, 2d (4 players)
Hero bets $78, BB folds, MP raises to $314, Button folds, Hero raises to $1328.2 (All-In), MP calls $434.60 (All-In).
Turn: ($2156.80) 4c (2 players, 2 all-in) .
River: ($2156.80) 8c (2 players, 2 all-in)
Final Pot: $2156.80
This raise out of the blinds is almost always a big hand, so the BB is the guy against whom I was trying to build a pot on the flop. Instead, I got paid off by a dude who had limp-called AA in a four-way pot. No one plays a set this fast, especially not a fish, so I wasn’t much worried on the flop. I thought we might have the same hand or maybe he had like JT or something. But nope, just Aces that decide to wait until they were beat to raise.
This next one was actually a tough hand. The BB was a very loose and aggressive regular who seems to be a winner in the game. I just got the feeling early on that he was going to play back at me a lot and not allow me to bully the table. His name, in fact, was HyperAggroDonk. We don’t have a lot of history together, but he’s probably seen me around enough to figure I’m a competent player as well.
Full Tilt Poker No-Limit Hold’em, $4 BB (6 handed) Hand History converter Courtesy of PokerZion.com
UTG ($635.25)
MP ($933)
Hero ($942.45)
Button ($398.50)
SB ($190)
BB ($424)
Preflop: Hero is CO with Ah, Kd.
2 folds, Hero raises to $14, 2 folds, BB calls $10.
Flop: ($30) 4c, 5d, Td (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $23, BB raises to $69, Hero calls $46.
Turn: ($168) Qs (2 players)
BB bets $120, Hero raises to $859.45 (All-In), BB folds.
Final Pot: $1147.45
The flop is the kind that I’m very unlikely to hit and very likely to continuation bet, making it a good candidate for a check-raise bluff. I felt like BB would have a draw, one pair, or total air much more often than a monster. My call represents an overpair, which isn’t to say he’s definitely going to give me credit for one. I intended to fold to a turned diamond and otherwise evaluate his bet to see whether he left room to fold. I picked up a gut shot and got the sense that I could knock him off of a lot of his one pair hands if he had anything that good, so I went for it.
I just plain got scared in this one:
Full Tilt Poker No-Limit Hold’em, $6 BB (6 handed) Hand History converter Courtesy of PokerZion.com
CO ($362.50)
Hero ($980.40)
SB ($915.15)
BB ($597)
UTG ($600)
MP ($186.10)
Preflop: Hero is Button with Kc, Qc.
3 folds, Hero raises to $21, SB raises to $70, BB calls $64, Hero calls $49.
Flop: ($210) 5d, Qd, Kh (3 players)
SB checks, BB checks, Hero checks.
Turn: ($210) 4c (3 players)
SB bets $150, BB calls $150, Hero calls $150.
River: ($660) Jc (3 players)
SB checks, BB checks, Hero checks.
Final Pot: $660
I posted it on 2+2 and got less than rave reviews:
“you checked the flop. ok, slowplaying? um, bet the flop. that is forgivable.what on earth are you thinking overcalling the turn like that? you really are putting one of them solidly on QQ or KK? wtf wtf wtf? jesus. raise.river it checks to you. you say you can’t envision them checking worse hands. will they call? YES PEOPLE LOVE TO CALL FOR THE LOVE OF GOD PLEASE BETmy head is spinning “
Ouch.