I think I’ve now lost my last eighty-six consecutive coinflips.
Well… as I mentioned… every monster hand he’d hit up to that point he very aggressively bet. He’d actually had a few, so I had a chance to see how he was playing. And I did say- from the Turn on- I played poorly and he outplayed me. So I don’t really disagree with this.
The reason I went all in: I was pretty sure I had him read correctly when I replayed the hand in my head vs the style he had showed so far vs how he was playing. I really thought he was going to have a weaker Ace- and felt obligated to keep calling with the top pair. He had a good stack at that point. Obviously any bet you go all-in and lose, especially when you were just outplayed is a bad bet. But as you fail to mention one possibility. You mention 2, but there are really 3.
1> He folds… fine by me, it’s a good pot at that point. I’m one who is happy to grind and grind if I need to and wait out my big pots.
2> He calls and has me beat. Which is what happens.
3> My read is correct and I win a monster pot.
Obviously I was very wrong- but I thought if he had trips or better he’d have gone at it like he had every time before that. Two of those situations favor me, I really don’t get outplayed too often. I really trust my reads- when I’m not playing well are days that I just am not trusting my reads. I end up kicking myself all night.
When I say I would do it again- I don’t think that hand is going past the flop with most players nearly every time in that situation. You are right, in retrospect, I probably should have slowed down though after the turn. Like I said- I don’t really disagree with what you say. I just don’t think it was an awful bet… just one that didn’t work out- and ended my day 
Sure, I missed the part about you having a read on him which obviously makes a difference. So you were really unlucky twice - one that he called and hit his miracle card, and two that he then decided to slowplay it, messing up your read.
However, I still don’t think your option 3 exists in this kind of situation - if you’re read is correct, he’s not going to call with the losing hand, unless he is a very poor player indeed - the sort of player where you would pay a lot of money any time you could buy a seat at their table :).
Why does the hand that you’re posting show RobotArm’s hole cards?
That happened during our weekly game about a month ago. It was such an interesting hand that I copied it from the hand history and pasted it into our thread. When Oslo found this thread, he went there and copied it.
I thought of that hand, and considered pasting it here, but I didn’t want to rub salt in Oslo’s wounds twice.
And I never even told him the really sad part.
Spill!
When I hit three-of-a-kind on the flop, I was still thinking I might check. It’s a friendly game, good poker etiquette, and all that.
Then Oslo put in a bet.
snerk
The structure was that we started with 1200 in chips (no rebuys or add-ons) with the blinds 25-50. The blinds increased every 15 minutes (by the time the two initial tables joined, they were 500-1000).
There were two money prizes.
Sounds like people just didn’t appreciate that with the blinds going up every 15 minutes, they needed to get busy sooner rather than later - pretty typical with inexperienced tournament players, should be to your advantage if you play aggressively (which by the sounds of it you do).
The table largely consisted of beginners (Las Vegas tourists having fun cheaply).
I take your point about getting stuck in with the blinds going up so fast - I think the Casino wanted the tournament to finish in a couple of hours so they could run another one.
This is longer than I intended, and it only barely fits the theme of the thread. I just started rambling, sorry. Also, it may be a little disjointed since it was written in two sessions, days apart. And I have no idea why parts of it are written in the present tense while others are in the past tense. So, again, sorry.
- Playing in Atlantic City three weekends ago. I want to check out Caesars’ poker room for the first time, so I decide to play in their Saturday afternoon tournament: $150+25, advertised as a deep-stack event since they start you with 20K in chips (10K is standard in most local casinos).
Logistically, the event is a fiasco. Advertised as a deep-stack event, it is actually a short-stack tourney: yes they start you off with twice as many chips, but the blinds are four times as high! The chips are difficult to differentiate: as opposed to the standard colors for the 1K and 5K chips (bright yellow and gray, respectively), they’ve decided to go with ashy-tan and brownish-gray; I have very good eyesight, and even I’m reduced to leaning and squinting every other hand to see what my opponents have got. Dealers and floor-persons have little idea what’s going on. Only 16 people show up . . . for a Saturday afternoon event in June. Table 1 is supposed to be the final table, but when it comes time to combine the tables they decide to sit everyone at Table 2 because one player at that table is wheelchair bound with cerebral palsy, and would have a relatively difficult time relocating; this is a fine, common-sense decision, except when the tables combine they go ahead with S.O.P. and randomize the seating assignments for everyone, forcing the wheelchair-bound player to move to the other side of the table.
Speaking of said differently-abled player, I think he was treated very courteously by his fellow players. Due to his disability, he had great difficulty counting out specific bet amounts, frequently making string-bets that no one objected to, though it was within their rights to do so and would be to their advantage. Other than that, no special notice was taken of his condition – no one played soft or condescended, we bore his ill-humor and whining with aplomb, and when he left the table the remaining players felt free to remark that he was a bit of an asshole. I have no real experience with the handicapped, but I’ve heard that it’s polite to treat them no different than anyone else to the greatest extent practical. This fellow was an equal at the table.
Anyway, I didn’t play very well, but I caught enough cards to finish 3rd and win a few hundred bucks.
2) Later that same day. I leave a very good $2-$5 NL game to play in the Taj Mahal’s $300+40 Saturday tournament. The World Series of Poker is going on in Vegas, and next weekend is the 4th of July, so the field is unusually small, only 54 players. A quick scan suggests that about a third of that number are tourists just out to gamble, and few of the more knowledgeable ones seem better than I am, so that’s good.
I start in Seat 8. Seat 7 is a garrulous, friendly man with a European (Italian?) accent. To his right is a the most touristy tourist to ever play poker, a chubby mid-thirties fellow, very American, drinking beer and joking loudly no matter how many mistakes he makes – he is the best kind of poker player in the world. In Seat 4 is a quiet young man with glasses and a Phillies jersey; he knows some basic strategy and plays reasonably, but is inexperienced, nervous, and cursed with the most obvious physical tell: he trembles when he has a big hand. This tic will go away with experience, but for now he’s easy pickings for any observant player. Seat 3 is a fairly attractive blonde, probably late 30s, with large (probably fake) breasts concealed by a tight-fitting top; it’s cold in the poker room and her nipples are erect. The European and the tourist continually make good natured (but inappropriate) remarks about her looks, along with somewhat more veiled references to her chest.
To my left is a sociopath. He drinks screwdrivers. He mutters just loud enough for others to hear about what retarded fish they are. He openly tries to collude with a third player when the guy in the Phillies jersey is all in. He has (naturally) a smoking hot girlfriend who sits and watches him play for while – he’s going to do something awful to her someday. Of course, nothing I could describe here would differentiate him from a run-of-the-mill asshole, but there was just something about his presence. I really think he was a psychopath. Worse than that, though, he was a dangerous, aggressive player directly on my left.
I only remember one particular hand from the tournament really well: Late stages of the tournament, blinds 1.5K-3K, plus antes. I’m in the BB with AQs. A solid, very aggressive player makes it 9K UTG (the sociopath has been knocked out by this point) – we both start the hand with about 90K, which is somewhat above average at this point. Folds to me, I decide to smooth call; if I were to reraise it would have to be all-in as I’d be pretty much committed, and he’d only call the all-in with a better hand.
Flop comes Q95 rainbow. At this point I made what I think is one of the few really good plays I made all tournament. If I check he’ll bet, but he’ll fold to my raise without a good hand. Given the way he was playing, however, I was pretty sure if I threw out a probe bet, 10K, he’d blast over the top with any two, since my bet would look so much like I was just taking one stab at the dry flop before giving up. I bet 10K, he immediately pushes for 80K, I insta-call. He turned out to have QJ, so the money was probably going in regardless. Still, I think I played it well, and I went to the final table a few orbits later with a big chip lead.
The tournament pays six places. In order, the payouts are roughly: $6,700, $3,800, $2,800, $1800, $750, $350.
As the final table progresses I begin to feel confident that I’m the best player there. There are only a couple of seemingly bad players, but there are a half-dozen really mediocre ones. I chip up pretty steadily the first few orbits, stealing and re-stealing from the other players (all of whom seem terrified of bubbling). Really, though, my strategy is to avoid big confrontations: I’m pretty sure a deal will get done before long, and it will be important for me to still have the big stack when that happens; having a somewhat bigger big stack will not help as much as having a medium stack would hurt. In the only hand I play with any sizable postflop action, I win about 60K from the 2nd biggest stack by calling down three streets with second pair; after this I have over 40% of the chips in play with 7 players remaining.
Around this time talk of a deal begins in earnest. The other plays have been trying for a while to get me to agree to a “chop” – that is, they just want to divvy up the prize pool equally among the remaining players. When I demur, they make a (B.S.) counter-offer of giving me an extra $100 each, leaving me with about $3000. No. I initially counter with an offer of $4,900 for me (leaving the rest to be divvied up however they want); this is too much, but I figure it’s a good starting point for negotiations. Talk of a deal is constant and intermittent (if you know what I mean), and I gradually lower my asking price.
We get a 5 minute break at one point. While everyone else goes to the bathroom, I break out a calculator and a sheet of paper in order to figure out my equity. It’s pretty simple. With 42% of the chips in play, it’s .426,700 + ~.253800 + ~.15*2,800, etc. I estimate that my expected payout in the tournament is about $4,300 (I later decide that this is actually low). When the break ends and discussion of a deal resumes, I share this figure with the table and say that I’m willing to leave some money on the table, but only to an extent. I say (sincerely) that I need at least $3,800. The rest of the table squabbles a bit, and eventually declines.
As we play I continue to chip up steadily. Clearly no one is willing to play a pot against me, so I start stealing the blinds every other hand with impunity.
More discussion of a deal. There was my specific demand that others weren’t enthusiastic about, and there was a medium-stacked player (total narcissistic jerk, but that’s neither here nor there) who demanded more than the other medium-stacked players would get. These two demands received most of the attention from the table during negotiations, but nobody seemed to notice that neither was a real stumbling block. The narcissist was only trying to take a few hundred dollars of equity out of the pot, and I was actually trying to put a few hundred dollars of equity back into the pot.
Though no one realized it, what was queering the deal were the two short-stacks. The rest of the table was still using the ridiculous notion of a “chop” as a basis for discussion, only moving around a couple hundred buck between short and medium stacks. This left the two short stacks, who by all rights should have gotten about $700 each, receiving $1,900 each, and no one seemed to have a problem with this. Meanwhile, the four medium stacks argued with each other about why none of them were getting their fair share. I would have said something, however: 1) the two shortstacks were nice guys (including the friendly European from my first table), 2) in spite of this obstacle, the table seemed to be inching towards a deal I was eager to make, and 3) getting into their argument would have generally sucked.
Anyway, they eventually sorted it out. By this time I had accumulated enough chips that the table had to concede even more than I’d asked for previously ($4,100). As we cashed out, the tournament director whispered to me that I was her favorite since I didn’t take part in the squabbling, just politely named my price and left it at that.
So, it was a very decent cash. Ironically, however, it underscored for me the extent to which tournaments are a poor use of my time. I got pretty much the best result possible: up $3,460 ($4,100 minus the entry fee and a tip for the dealers) in about seven hours. But if I’d stayed at the 2-5 NL table for that time instead of playing the tournament, I’d have had a better chance to make that much than I did playing in the tournament. More importantly, the most likely outcome of seven hours at the 2-5 table is a profit of a few hundred dollars. The most likely outcome of playing in the tournament, by far, is -$340.
But it was fun.
3) After the tournament, I should have been exhausted and ready to grab a bus home, but I was too wired. I picked out a bus on the schedule leaving in about two hours and went back to play a little 2-5. This table wasn’t as good as the one I had earlier in the evening, but it was still profitable. The player on my left was a well-groomed Hispanic with a mustache and not much of an accent. I only go down to AC a few times a year, but I know I’ve been at his table a couple of times before. He plays good.
We chatted for a bit, then licked our chops when we saw a terrible player go back into his wallet for a full $500 rebuy after going broke.
I’m ambivalent about poker as a profession, but when I’m at the table I never have any qualms about taking someone’s money. There’s only one type of player who comes close to giving me pause when I have chips in front of me. It’s always a man between the ages of roughly 30 and 55, and it’s always, for some reason, either an Asian or an Hispanic. This type plays very loose and passive (the worst possible style), and never cracks a smile or makes conversation. What most distinguishes this type is their rebuys. They’ll have several hundred in chips, and (inevitably) lose it, sometimes in drips and drabs, but usually in huge chunks. The player then goes into his pocket and gives the dealer about three or four hundred dollar bills, and continues playing. He loses that very quickly, then goes into his wallet and buys in for about $200. He loses that, at which point the small bills start coming out. A couple of $50s, mostly $20s, but also some $10s. The player guards this new stack a little more carefully, but eventually it too is lost. At this point he usually scrounges up what he can to reach the minimum buy-in for the table, but sometimes leaves, stone-faced, or goes to the ATM and starts the cycle all over again.
I left as scheduled a couple of hours later. Including all profits and expenses for the day, I was up $4,530. I’d later use this score as a an excuse to play a little less poker online. Soon, I will probably use it as an excuse to buy an iPhone. So, maybe a real job would be better for me.
I loved reading it. Feel free to post these adventures any time you are in the mood.
She’s got you right where she wants ya. 
Great stuff, VarlosZ - that’s the second long post of yours I’ve enjoyed (and I normally avoid reading long posts) - the other was about swimming, but poker is much more interesting! When you had AQ in the first tournament, I was sure you were going to say your opponent had KK! Well played, sir.
A recent poker story: yesterday I was in a low-blind NLHE ring game on-line. The guy to my right raised 4xBB, and I decided to just flat-call on the button with pocket tens - as it was only a 6-seat table, there was a case for re-raising, but I decided I would prefer to play a small pot as I could not have called if he came back at me pre-flop. Everyone else folded and the flop was perfect for me, 10 9 2. He bet roughly the size of the pot, and I decided I was strong enough to flat call here to trap him. The turn came 8, and he went all-in for about 3 times the (now sizeable) pot. I decided he didn’t have QJ and called, and was delighted to see him flip KsKc. You do not need to be a very experienced poker player to have a 50% chance of guessing the river card correctly :).
I made up for it later by getting lucky and winning a SNG, so what goes around comes around, I guess.
I’m a social player. Pizza and penny-ante poker, dealer’s choice, with my friends is a great evening for me. I’ve never played a tournament in my life.
So a bunch of us are playing a couple of weeks ago and the dealer calls Hold-Em. I catch 5-8 of diamonds. My buddy Dave catches pocket kings. The flop comes up with 6-7 of diamonds and a king. The turn gives Dave his 4th king. The river gives me my 9 of diamonds.
Ah, how sweet it was. The look on his face when I showed my straight flush to his 4 cowboys was priceless.
That’s astonishing - but I’d want to check the dealer didn’t fix it! :eek:
Unfixed. We haven’t got any mechanics in our little group.
The only sad thing about it is that someday I’ll probably take a shot at playing in a tournament just for the fun of it. And I know this will never happen again in my lifetime… 
Well if you did have a mechanic, how would you know? 
:eek: :smack:
P.S. At least one Vegas Casino offers a bad beat payout whenever a full house is beaten…