First impressions for this week
by Adanthar on 06/10/07
Unfortunately, I'm continuing to run very bad (0 for 3 big 70/30's in just one Sunday tournament is impressive, honestly, as is running Ax into AA 4 times this week), but in the meantime, there are definitely benefits to being out here. Playing live is certainly different, but the games are so much easier/the players so predictably bad that I can feel myself improving - thinking about new lines, getting people to fold through raw aggression, and opening up my game in a number of areas. Live players telegraph their hands so much and so thoroughly that simply taking away pots, including big ones, is incredibly easier. A bunch of hands from this week:
1)The hand I posted about a couple of days ago (63d on the AA8 flop) is a fantastic Yeti theorem hand. Bluff recently published a segment on 2+2 poster's Yeti's theorem, which, in a nutshell, is "people who bet/3 bet a paired board never have anything". It's so true, especially on AAx boards, where an ace just never 3 bets a raise (a big mistake pretty often, BTW), especially not a small 3 bet. Pulling the trigger on a four bet with 6 high is something else altogether, though. I have no idea who the button is, but I'm sure I'll be seeing him on TV at some point.
2)In the 1K sat I played last night, I raised with AA and got called by an MP player who then folded QJ face up on a JT7 flop because "I bet so much" (2/3 pot, when we were 100 bets deep - this is a profitable call if he puts me on exactly AA.) This is just another "live players are so bad" post, but this week, I've been trying to see how profitable it is to check TPTK+ after a PFR, especially on multiway boards when I'm sure someone will bet. So far, that's been pretty mixed live (most of them are so straightforward that they just don't bluff no matter how much you want them to, and the rest are so bad that it's irrelevant whether you check or bet) but has gotten some nice results online. Nobody ever believes a PFR followed by a checkraise on a K72 board, either.
3)Another fun hand from the 1K: two limpers at 50/100, I raised to 500 with AK (I'd been raising a lot and had 8Kish behind, covering everyone), they called and the flop is AQJr. Both limpers thought [I was 100% sure that both had at least some piece of this flop], then checked. This is a very tough spot online that most people misplay - the fact is that you usually have too many outs to bet/fold to a CR profitably, and if you follow the predictable "bet the flop, check behind on the turn" line, when either villain bets the river you will often be folding the best hand (because you can't really call that bet profitably.) The correct play here in multiway pots, especially vs opponents that won't 2 barrel bluff, is to check behind and look for cards that change your turn equity (also balancing out the times you check behind with something like 99).
After I checked, the turn bricked off, the first limper bet 800, and the second thought forever and called. Normally, online, this is a close decision between a call and a fold, but live, it was very easy to tell the second guy just didn't have much - a weak ace at best. So I overcalled, the river bricked off as well, we checked through it and I won a nice pot. The interesting part is that I'm pretty sure I missed a small value bet on the end - something very hard to make online against anyone half decent, but pretty easy with live reads. I'll get better at these as the month goes on.
Tomorrow's event is a 2.5K NL freezeout and/or some sats I'm looking forward to; hopefully, it'll break me out of running bad :)
Comments
lakeoffire says
On a smaller scale, sounds like my week. I know it will turn around...good luck!06/10/07
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