Yes, I know that telling bad beat stories is very tiresome work, yet when you get them heaped upon you time after time it helps to have a friend to commiserate with. So, Mike and I have been trading bad beats via email and text this week. Americas Cardroom seems to specialize in handing them out like candy at Halloween. We have both had our aces cracked by basically junk hands. There have been more WTF moments than I can count. Some of the beats make me think about changing my basic strategy which is essentially get my money in with the best hand. This does not always work out as the guy playing J/5 suited will tell you. I understand shoving with crap. That is something we all are sometimes forced to do because of chip stack, position, etc. What I do not understand is the players who insist on calling big raises with essentially junk hands in the hopes I suppose of flopping big, or maybe catching a piece figuring you have nothing, etc. It just seems like stupid play to calculate that your cards are probably live if you have junk, and the raiser probably doesn't have a big pair. I understand a lot better the guy who limps on the button with his trash hand after a ton of limps. He is probably playing correctly and getting great odds with position. It is the guy who re-raises with junk after calling a tight utg player's big raise with a caller. I "get" the squeeze play idea, and sometimes it works, but really, UTG, Tight????
So, faced with multiple losses today in the AC games and a righteous win in Pokerstars (playing my normal game), I am considering how to play in tonight's Wheeler game. As it is basically a turbo game I am thinking that the early chip up is the only way to go. Hitting the final table short stacked is not a viable option. In order to do this, unless I get monster cards early, I must therefore gamble more and widen my calling options. We'll see how that works out providing I don't fall back to my default position of tight aggressive.
Pictured below is a great hand I saw (fortunately not involved in) playing some Omaha this morning. I bought in for $400 and ultimately cashed out for $1040. The cards were running really good for me in this game, filling up my 2 pair on the river, etc.
So, faced with multiple losses today in the AC games and a righteous win in Pokerstars (playing my normal game), I am considering how to play in tonight's Wheeler game. As it is basically a turbo game I am thinking that the early chip up is the only way to go. Hitting the final table short stacked is not a viable option. In order to do this, unless I get monster cards early, I must therefore gamble more and widen my calling options. We'll see how that works out providing I don't fall back to my default position of tight aggressive.
Pictured below is a great hand I saw (fortunately not involved in) playing some Omaha this morning. I bought in for $400 and ultimately cashed out for $1040. The cards were running really good for me in this game, filling up my 2 pair on the river, etc.
2 comments:
Bad calls from idiots is not my problem lately, although my illustration below includes a bad call. I am having trouble deciding when to shove when I'm short-stacked. Last Sunday I had about 8 big blinds with A-10 in fairly early position and was able to limp in. The flop was A-3-9 with 2 diamonds. The player to my right bet 2,000 and I just went all-in behind him for 6,000 more. Jimmer (luck box) and JJ both called and the original better folded. Jimmer had 5-7 diamonds (the bad call because they were so small) and JJ had A-3. JJ would have beat me anyway, but naturally Jimmer hit his diamond (and only one). I was out and JJ was crippled. I think if I'd gone all-in pre-flop I may have just taken the pot. Who knows?
@ dewey
I think your best play was to shove. A shove from early position looks so strong that both the other players would have folded.
Speaking of bad calls, last night I had AA, QQ raised with one caller. I re-raised huge and QQ tanked for a bit then re-raised all-in. He flopped a queen and rivered quads. Later said that he thought I had something like jacks because I bet so much. He also commented that he got knocked out of the last tournament with the same hand vs. AA. So much for learning through experience. i always always want that call since I am miles ahead, but shows you cannot beat luck. He was out a little later with another series of bad calls.
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