Digital Thinkbox

PokerStars

Played 96 hands in two sessions. -$0.43

Couple of poorly played hands wiped out the modest gains I made this day.

After taking about 5-6 weeks off of poker after my SnG experiment I decided to take a shot at learning No-Limit Poker. I still have a respectable bankroll left after a rather horrible downswing in the SnGs, but I wanted to start out low and work my way up rather than jump in at the level I was rolled for.

To this end I picked out the micro-limits at PokerStars. I’ve been playing a 6-Max, $5 maximum buy-in game single tabling to learn the game and how it differs from limit and tournament play. No-Limit poker is definitely a different breed from the limit cash games I’m used to. Hand reading is MUCH more important as is bet sizing.

I don’t play a lot of hands right now since I primarily single-table and spend my time concentrating on the action at the table trying to put players on hands and make good decisions. I will play 100 or so hands in a sitting and then take a break. My goal is to re-evaluate my position ever 1,000 hands and determine if I think I have the skill and confidence to jump to the next level: $10NL.

Over the last 30 days of play I’ve run fairly good, but not hot. I’ve had my winning days and my loosing ones. For the most part I play ABC poker, with few tricks and almost no bluffing. Bluffing and fancy play just doesn’t work at this low a level as the players either not smart/experienced enough to notice or don’t care. Seriously, I think most of the people play at this level are just gambling and could care less about skillful poker.

Currently I’m +$8.40. Of course I’m not going to get rich, heck I’m not even going to eat at that rate, but that isn’t the point. If I can’t reasonably beat these nano-limits, how could I possibly win at higher stakes against presumably better players. I do not expect to “crush” this level, I’m not sure it is even possible with the wild and loose play that players exhibit here.

In reality I just want to demonstrate that I can win consistently at this level before moving up. There is very little profit potential, and the play is extremely crazy. So crazy in fact that I am forced to play a very tight ABC poker game, not that this style of play is a bad thing. Tight is usually right.

Goals

For December I’d like to hit 2,000 hands of $5NL at PokerStars and then take a look at my play. If I continue as I have I don’t think I’ll have a problem jumping up to the next level, $10NL. I’m almost sufficiently rolled for $25NL, but I feel that a 2 step jump would be too much of a change. My observations show that one level increases are fairly smooth, while a two level jump introduces some fairly significant changes in play.

As far as bankroll management, I want to have at least 20 buy-ins for the level I am playing. Currently I’m over rolled for both $5NL and $10NL, but not quite sufficiently rolled for $25NL. If I drop 5 buy-ins I’ll immediately evaluate my play and consider dropping down a level to rebuild the bank-roll. Which is another reason to move up to $10NL, $5NL is as low as I can go!

This hand for example:

BB bets like 2.5 times the BB, but there were 2 limpers so his bet was a little small. 180-200 chips if he was going to raise that hand at all. Frankly it is trash this early. Even more astonishing is that UTG called this raise. K6s just isn’t that great of a hand especially to a raise ahead from you.

The flop shows two scare cards, not the least of which is an ace. They both check. I suppose you could argue that the pre-flop raiser should have put out a continuation bet in order to induce a fold, or at least gather information. On the turn this occurs to him with a little min-bet. Well by now UTG has a hand, although a small one. River brings another ace, and BB bets 100, he should have done this on the flop since now UTG isn’t going anywhere.

Here is another example, with more chips at stake:

MP1 puts out a 2.5x BB + limpers bet, sorta. Its a little weak, but some people like to vary their bets. Personally if I’m going to bet/raise I want them all to be the same. If the hand is worth betting, I just use a standard bet size in all cases. This has the advantage of disguising my hand. Do I have AA, KK, QQ, AK, AQ? No one knows. Regardless, KQs isn’t something I’d play here, I’d probably fold this. Still it isn’t a horrible hand, and he did bet it strongly, and gets a caller; with A4s.

No doubt about this, calling 325 chips with A4s at this stage is a little loose. It sometimes makes you wonder if these players are even watching what is going on. MP1 c-bets the flop, he doesn’t have a hand yet, but he was the pre-flop raiser and he doesn’t have totally crap. He could be ahead. He sizes his bet a little low in my opinion because he is giving the CO 5 to 1 pots odds to call. CO calls, with nothing but A high, granted he is ahead now, but his hand sucks and he calls a rather large bet. Pot is getting pretty big now. MP1 is now pretty committed to this pot, and I doubt CO is going anywhere.

Turn is a 9, and MP1 throws out this weak bet. He might as well push it all-in here IMO, not that he has a hand. He has a flush draw with one card to come giving him 9 outs, but the same holds true for CO. In fact they both really only have 7 outs since they both hold clubs, AND CO has the Ace for the nut flush draw. CO calls of course, not that he knows this, but he is getting 10 to 1 pots odds with a 5 to 1 flush draw, calling is the clear choice here.

River brings the holy grail for MP1, his beloved king drops! His bet is small, he is already committed to this pot, might as well push the rest in there. Even more amazing, CO calls. With Ace high. He is clearly paying no attention to the MP2’s betting patterns. Oh well MP2 takes this pot down and now has a healthy stack.

Still neither hand is that great at this level, I would have folded BOTH of these hands and moved on. Both of these hands are dangerous. MP2 with KQs was behind the whole time until he got lucky on the river, spewing chips the whole time. Of course the same could be said of CO for calling down with A4s. This is why we play a very tight game early on. Let the loose player beat the heck out of themselves and pay us off when we get great hands.

My first day two-tabling $11 SnGs. Up to this point I’ve played a single table at a time. Some of the crazes who play a lot of these things 12-table if you can believe that. I’ve multi-tabled cash games before, but never SnGs. I played three pairs for a total of six games. Here are the results:

Set 1: 4th, 4th
Set 2: 6th, 6th
Set 3: 3rd, 3rd

Poker is rigged.

OK so its been 51 games since my coaching began about 2 weeks ago. Not a huge sample size I realize, so I won’t spew numbers since they will not have any meaning. I can say, with a reasonable degree of confidence, that my over all play has improved dramatically. For example:

1. Min-betting and min-raising – Gone
2. Tighter early play – Check
3. Paying more attention to push opportunities – Good
4. Being mindful of relative stack sizes – Getting better
5. Paying attention to other players and putting them on ranges – Improving
6. Stop overplaying huge hands (AA, KK) – Check

These are all examples of concepts and plays that I wasn’t even aware of pre-coaching. I was a min-betting fiend, hey its just a push of the button right? Just stopping that and using a large “standard” raise (3x BB give or take) has really helped. People either fold, or feed me chips. There is nothing better than this hand:

I’m not really certain what this guy was doing, but GIMME ALL YOUR CHIPS!

However, I’m still not rolling in the $$$. Clearly these players aren’t respecting my l33t p0k3r skilz. More likely, I’m missing +EV situations, although I’m getting much better at pushing in these +EV situations to grab the blinds. Blind stealing is the life blood of any tournament player, especially SnGs.

The other aspect of my play that I must work on is putting other players on ranges. This can be difficult at this level since these people can, and do, play everything. Of course that is a read in itself. Knowing a player is really loose give you an idea of what they are willing to call all-ins with, and really, the looser the better in some cases. Against strong hands, I WANT a loose player to call me. Sure they will occasionally suck out and get all my chips (Occasionally HAH! Like EVERY FRIKING TIME!), but the times they don’t I will have revitalized my stack.

Finally, there is the mind game. This is probably the hardest of all to address. Indeed, my biggest enemy at the table is Me. Getting bored, pissed, distracted, etc will damage my game more than folding a hand. This is especially true when I’ve played well, but still lost. I HATE that. Nothing makes Jack more cranky than playing a good game, and getting busted in 4th place.

OK so I was going to put a pic of a crying baby, but a panda is sooo much cooler.

I figure after the one hundredth time this happens I’ll be able to laugh it off, rather than screaming in rage at the poker gods.