A few more plays...

I wanted to review a couple more plays I had during my Foxwoods trip so I will probably get those out in the next few days. Some where really bad and others were good. I also have a post on my semi-retirement from Online play. Obviously I will be back. However I think that I have some good points to bring up as to why I need a break.

My boy MiamiDonk has made his big announcement. No it is not that he has quit poker and become a full time sports gambooler. He is starting up a higher priced MTT that he calls "The Big Game". It is going to be a $75 game on Full Tilt. The idea I guess is to have a bigger prize pool, smaller field, and keep out the rift raft. Although if you are rift or raft you can always qualify through a token race. I personally doubt the $75 tag will keep too many people out.. besides me of course.. Perhaps that was the point? Anyway.. I will be playing in the first game if fate allows, I.E. I jack my Full Tilt free monies for the month up to $75 before the big game. Otherwise I may just be watching on the sidelines. It sounds like it is going to be a good tourney. I hope it gets off the ground running.

I apparently went something like 10-4, 9-5 in this weeks NFL action. If I was a sports betting man I guess I might have made some money. I may yet get in on the action.. who knows..

Now for an interesting hand I had with KGB. You remember him. The Russian guy who said I was easy to push off hands. Well screw him. Here was an interesting play. I have JTo and limp in because I like the hand and alot of limpers are already hanging out. The flop comes AJ3 with three hearts. Now I have second pair weak kicker. I see KGB lead out for $20. I have around $70 left at this point. I think about the hands I have seen KGB play. I just can not give him credit for the Ace. I think he would have raised an ace. I also realize he likes to push me off pots. So I think for a while. The whole table starts taunting me on.. saying "Ooooh he feels froggy". I have a redraw to a J high flush if I am wrong but something inside says he is on a draw. So I make a decision and push my remaining chips in. He says "Fuck, I did not expect you to do that!".. finally after agonizing for a while he calls.. No more hearts come and he does indeed lose the hand with his flush draw and an over. It was an interesting play.

I am not very fond of plays like this for the most part. If your right you feel smart, but what is the real EV on plays like this? If he spiked a heart or a King he would have won the hand. So I was decently ahead but he had alot of outs. I have not run the odds but I would say it was barely above a coinflip.

Let me mention another really good read I saw in a recent Mookie. The flop comes TT8 and the guy in EP check-pushes I beleive.. he has one caller. He turns over 99 and says: HA! I knew you did not have a Ten. Good read. Nice odds. However he got nailed by a Jack on the river. Now while I really do not like QJ's play here I actually do not like 99's play either. Against its the kind of hand where your pretty weak so why put so many chips in the middle? Do you really want to protect a pair of 9's that badly?

I think especially in low stakes poker games where you can get paid off bigtime with monsters it pays more to keep the weak hands small. You will get bluffed off of a few hands here and there but is the 6% edge over time really worth it when you can get your money in so much further ahead?

I think the response will be that in the long run you take any edge you can. While I philosophically agree with this I think the long run can be a really fucking long time and you easily could go broke before that happens. In games where people make less mistake I think you are forced to exploit smaller edges and make better reads. In lower stakes poker games however you just do not need to push the small edges. You will get your money in the middle with 80-90% favorite hands and the people you are playing against will be more than willing to call you. Just a little thinking about if you should adjust your game depending on who you are playing.