ITH Poker Forum

[ammbo]

I was seated at a table with Hoyt Corkins in the 10 seat, I was in the 6 seat. I took his blinds once, that was fun. Kathy Liebert got moved to the 1 seat early on in the first level and paid me a great compliment. She looked at Hoyt then looked at me (I sat on her left yesterday) and said, "Oh great, I picked a great table." Her sarcasm was heavy.

I ran my stack up to 24,000 by busting a short stack. He was the weakest player at my table yesterday so when he defended his blind against me a second time I decided to push on him with . He showed . I turned and rivered two pair and he was gone.

A while later the player on my immediate right made it 2000 to go on a 600 blind. I looked at and reraised him to 6000. He called. The flop was . I pushed my remaining 13,000 into the pot and he called immediately with . He received an additional on the river to seal the deal. I am out.

I have given some thought to that last hand. I wanted action. Taking the pot preflop was not an option. He had shown that he could make loose calls and raises earlier so I felt good about giving a good price to him. My wife said push preflop but I had 21,000. I did not want to overbet and get him out. Oh, well. If I never got sucked out I would win every event.

I will enjoy the sun and hopefully make another one of these trips. I feel like I played great poker and if I can avoid getting unlucky I have a great shot at these things. I will return with an added boost of confidence. Hopefully I will make some cash in the side games to pay for the overpriced food.

I may not be on much in the next few days, as the networks here are terrible.

[LDorey]

sorry to here that ammbo. But great job anyway Enjoy the rest of the trip

[chrisjp]

Sorry to hear about the result, ammbo, but it must be very encouraging to play well. Good luck in the side games.

Chris

[Tanya Peck]

Nothing you could have done, and I always say, if I'm going out, I'm going out with AA, KK or AK.

Have a great rest of your trip.

[nsidestrate]

That sucks. You still get a sweet trip out of the deal. I guess we'll have to focus out support on Mets!

[JSaw]

Nice run Ammbo...enjoy the rest of the time in the sun.

[mrpinkmcpink]

A while later the player on my immediate right made it 2000 to go on a 600 blind. I looked at and reraised him to 6000. He called. The flop was . I pushed my remaining 13,000 into the pot and he called immediately with . He received an additional on the river to seal the deal. I am out.

I have given some thought to that last hand. I wanted action. Taking the pot preflop was not an option. He had shown that he could make loose calls and raises earlier so I felt good about giving a good price to him

I think if I had a re-raise of another 4000 would not look like a particlarly good price to me. I'm guessing there was about 1000 in the pot to start, 3000 after his raise and 9000 after yours. That gives him odds of 2.25-1 and immplied odds of 5.5-1 if he can bust you.

As regards hitting his set this definately isn't good enough odds. If you add in the possibilty that you could only have had over cards and therefore he thinks that he might be able to take it down at some point, then it still looks like a marginal call for him to make. I guess my point is that your raise is almost not pricing him in (from his point of view not yours - I like your raise and you're going to be happy if he calls).

I'm probably missing something here, so please correct me, as I'm sure I'm wrong (!) I just dont think I would have made that call in his position.

[mchilger]

MrPink, bad players don't play like you .

Tough break but that is poker. I don't see playing it any other way and I like the raise to 6000. You make your opponent pay a price for calling as he is getting odds with whatever hand he holds and you have to go after big pots in certain situations. In this case, you don't mind a fold but you don't mind a call either as you have to take risks in poker.

Watch the sun!

Matthew

[SRH]

Tough break, Ammbo. Despite the beat, sounds like you're having fun. We'll look forward to your next post when you get home....as you're peeling your sunburn.

Thanks for the update.

[chrisjp]

Matthew:

I don't see playing it any other way and I like the raise to 6000. You make your opponent pay a price for calling as he is getting odds with whatever hand he holds and you have to go after big pots in certain situations. In this case, you don't mind a fold but you don't mind a call either as you have to take risks in poker.

This is a very important concept. I use to make larger raises to blow people out of the water, but I was often just winning small pots. I started thinking about many of carn's posts and they made sense. Sometimes you want to price players in (still giving them the incorrect odds) and then take a bigger pot.

ammbo takes that pot on the flop unless the guy hits the set. As I've heard ammbo say before--you have to NOT get unlucky. And if a king fell on the turn or river...

Chris

[mchilger]

There is one other danger with KK and that is an ace falling on the flop. You might be beat out of the pot even if your opponent doesn't hit a set. Granted this is unlikely since your opponent will also be afraid of the ace but some players will gamble and make a move at you. Ammbos's reraise though still prices his opponent out of the pot even if his opponent has an ace.

The key is to make your opponents make a mistake. If you raise too small then your opponent might be getting odds for a call even if he knows he has a weaker hand. By raising so that he isn't getting the correct pot odds to call you force your opponent into a mistake. In these situations it is easy going to bed at night.

Raising too much is also a mistake as it take big pots to win tournaments...unless by raising a lot you think you can get an opponent to call by sensing weakness in your raise.

NL is quite easy really as you just need to learn three skills which are easy to understand...1/ Know your opponents 2/ Know when to bet and 3/ Know how much to bet. Once you master those three things you will win a slew of tournaments.

Matthew

[chrisjp]

Thanks for the post Matthew. I was wondering about the scenario of an Ace flopping. Since the player was on ammbo's right I assume ammbo had postion (unless ammbo was SB of course). Opponent wouldn't be in there with anything but AK, would he? Plus AK is very unlikely since ammbo has two Kings. Not even AQs I suppose. Of course Mr Pink (nice job Mr Pink) showed that he shouldn't be in there with a low pocket pair, so maybe he would be making loose preflop calls with other holdings.

What do you do on an flop?

1) Opponent checks to you.
2) Opponent bets half the pot.
3) Opponent puts you all in.

Like Matthew said. NL is an easy game if you practice a little.

Chris

[dansensel]

[quote="ammbo"] If I never got sucked out I would win every event.

[quote]

Are you quoting Phil Helmuth from the WSOP on purpose??

I beleive he said "If luck wasn't involved I'd win everyone."

[scapegote]

Are you quoting Phil Helmuth from the WSOP on purpose??

I beleive he said "If luck wasn't involved I'd win everyone."

shhhhh.... ammbo is phil's code name for online play. Speak no more of it.

Scapegote

[mchilger]

Chris, 1 & 2 are very opponent specific. Does the player checkraise a lot? Does he bluff a lot? Does he bet out strong hands? If he checks I would probably bet out...enough to where it doesn't look weak and not so much that it would kill me if I am checkraised. Sometimes I would check while planning to bet out the turn if checked to me...it can appear as if you are slowplaying. Depends on my betting patterns before that hand and what I perceive my opponent would do.

I would fold to most players betting at least half the pot. That is a good bet as you are really in a predicament. You could call and put pressure on your opponent to bet out again on the turn but that's tough. Again, depends on what I perceive my opponent would have most likely done.

This is a weak player. Sometimes they can be very predictable while other times they can be very unpredictable. It depends on what kind of weak player they are.

Like I said, this is an easy game