60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

Tony Ma is on my immediate left. He hasn't played a hand since the Johnson administration, and I'm talking Andrew Johnson. I open UTG with A-Q. Tony 3-bets.

Time to pull a play from Tommy's arsenal and fold?

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

How many hands have you played? I don't like it but I'm no student of Tommy.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

[ QUOTE ]
Tony Ma is on my immediate left. He hasn't played a hand since the Johnson administration, and I'm talking Andrew Johnson. I open UTG with A-Q. Tony 3-bets.

Time to pull a play from Tommy's arsenal and fold?

[/ QUOTE ]

Call, for 2 reasons:

A) He has KK. For this reason, I call the extra sb and see the flop.

B) One physical law of the game that I have incorporated through hard work and practice over the last 3 years and which has resulted in lots of money ... do the opposite of Angelo.

TSP

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

Call and take a flop, but be ready to give up fairly quickly if you don't flop something.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

Does Tony Ma really play that bad?

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

There's a difference between being card dead and being a rock. And even if he's a rock, unless he's really good postflop, you're getting 6.5 to 1.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

"Time to pull a play from Tommy's arsenal and fold?"

FWIW, I have never raise-folded BTF with AQ. But then, I've never played with Tony. :-)

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

Okay Andy I gave your hand a little more thought and I think the best way to play it would be to go ahead and see the flop and then fold on the turn.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

AJ would be a no brainer fold but AQ is worth a call.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

If he is only raising with AK, AA, KK, QQ then you are only going to continue when you flop an Ace. I believe you will flop an ace about 15% of the time. (1 to 5.5, or 1 in 6.5) But when you flop an Ace you won't always win and you will probably put more money in when you are behind, than he will put in when he is behind. I think you about 10% equity in this spot.

I know this is simplified analysis but I would lean towards folding. (I've folded AJ in this spot but not AQ)

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

i have never folded for one more bet, preflop after i raised, and dont plan too. =)

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

Most Commerce regulars would ask Tony to take the profit, you could go that route [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

He really is that tight but I'd still try and flop a monster.

-DeathDonkey

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

Since the main reason why we are calling is to spike an Ace, I don't think that it matters whether we have AJ or AQ.
I am calling here with A2.

In fact, I am calling with any 2 cards because as someone else said, there ain't a hand that I would fold for 1 more bet after I raised preflop. If it gets 3 bet and 4 bet, well that's a different story and there are lots of hands that I would fold.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

[ QUOTE ]
If he is only raising with AK, AA, KK, QQ then you are only going to continue when you flop an Ace. I believe you will flop an ace about 15% of the time. (1 to 5.5, or 1 in 6.5) But when you flop an Ace you won't always win and you will probably put more money in when you are behind, than he will put in when he is behind. I think you about 10% equity in this spot.

I know this is simplified analysis but I would lean towards folding. (I've folded AJ in this spot but not AQ)

[/ QUOTE ]

Flopping a queen and flopping an ace give you roughly the same equity against that range. Both times you're a small favorite, so it'd be pretty silly not to continue when you flop a queen.

Board: Qh 6d 7s
Dead:

equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 46.8360 % 46.84% 00.00% { QQ+, AKs, AKo }
Hand 2: 53.1640 % 53.16% 00.00% { AQo }

Board: Ah 6d 7s
Dead:

equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 48.0247 % 47.76% 00.27% { QQ+, AKs, AKo }
Hand 2: 51.9753 % 51.71% 00.27% { AQo }

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

Sorry. I meant folding to a 3-bet preflop after making it two bets yourself. And you know I used "arsenal" as a compliment.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

A-A, K-K, Q-Q and perhaps A-K.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

That's close to how I played it.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Tony Ma is on my immediate left. He hasn't played a hand since the Johnson administration, and I'm talking Andrew Johnson. I open UTG with A-Q. Tony 3-bets.

Time to pull a play from Tommy's arsenal and fold?

[/ QUOTE ]

Call, for 2 reasons:

A) He has KK. For this reason, I call the extra sb and see the flop.

B) One physical law of the game that I have incorporated through hard work and practice over the last 3 years and which has resulted in lots of money ... do the opposite of Angelo.

TSP

[/ QUOTE ]

TSP --

There's no need for this sort of personal attack. Please take it elsewhere or, better, stop doing it.

Andy --

I've only played mixed games with Tony and he's tight but not thaaaat tight. I'll defer to DeathDonkey here but if (before I read this thread) it were the first hand of hold'em I'd ever played with Tony, I'd call and get ready to fold later.

Tommy --

All right, now I've seen something like five posts from you in the past week. I hope this keeps up.

--Nate

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

Thanks. Interesting.

So approx 30% of the time we flop a hand with 50% equity. The rest of the time we have to fold because we are OOP against a tight agressive player.

Sometime we flop a monster, sometimes he flops a bigger monster. He has position on us.

Using this corrected analysis we still only have about 15% equity on average, and we are out of position against a player who usually has a better hand. I don't have any proof that calling is -ev but it seems there is more chance it is -ev than +ev.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

[ QUOTE ]
AJ would be a no brainer fold but AQ is worth a call.

[/ QUOTE ]

I disagree with this statement. I think the two hands (AJ and AQ) are very close, and both worth a call.

The thing is, if the flop comes Qxx (and you have AQ), you're likely to lose a lot or win less than a lot because you are out of position. That is, I think you could just bet/fold or check/fold those flops, and be done with the hand. With AJ, if you just check/fold on Jxx flops, you'll be in about the same spot.

I wouldn't necessarily recommend playing either of these hands this way, just saying that you could, and they'd have about the same value.

Really, you are hoping to flop a monster which is just as likely with AJ as it is with AQ. The only real difference in this spot is that with AQ you can flop one more openended straight draw (JT8) than you can with AJ.

That one extra straigth draw doesn't make one hand a clear fold and the other worthy of a call.

Josh

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

with AQ you can suck out on JJ. a lot of uber tighties will 3 bet JJ but not TT, that's where they draw the line. AJ you can muck for one more bet and not be making an EV error. AQ is tougher. that was my thinking.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

[ QUOTE ]
AJ would be a no brainer fold but AQ is worth a call.


[/ QUOTE ]

If you're serious, this is retarded.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

"there ain't a hand that I would fold for 1 more bet after I raised preflop"

well i think that's wrong. i had QJo one time and i raised and this really loose passive scared guy 3 bet and the blinds folded and i folded. he flashed me AA. it wouldve been dumb to call as that's all he could have.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

[ QUOTE ]
with AQ you can suck out on JJ. a lot of uber tighties will 3 bet JJ but not TT, that's where they draw the line. AJ you can muck for one more bet and not be making an EV error. AQ is tougher. that was my thinking.

[/ QUOTE ]

The problem with this is that they way you suck out on JJ with AQ (and not AJ) is by flopping a queen. The problem is that so often you are up against AA, KK, or QQ here that you'll end up losing a lot of money with these Q-high flops.

Perhaps more accurately (and alluded to in my OP), you'll win fewer bets those times you win than you'll lose those times you lose. It's just not a favorable spot to be in.

I just don't think those hands are two different. For the record, I think I'd rather have A5s than either of these hands.

Josh

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

"I'd still try and flop a monster."

against guys who play that tight youre not going to make that much anyway even if you do flop a monster. the more i think about it the more im sure folding preflop actually is correct and i would guess andy realised that after the fact.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

There a lot of reasons not to fold in these spots. One that doesn't get mentions is that you have an edge in that you know he is rock tight and you don't want to encourage him to try and raise more especially with him on your left. Raising and folding one time, will cause a scene, likely embarass him and ultimately make him tougher to play against. All he has to do is throw in the occasional raise against you w/ 45s and he is already a ton tougher.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

"The problem with this is that they way you suck out on JJ with AQ (and not AJ) is by flopping a queen. The problem is that so often you are up against AA, KK, or QQ here that you'll end up losing a lot of money with these Q-high flops."

youre right i didnt think about that. youve convinced me that folding AQ preflop wouldve been the right play. thanks.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

You have immediate odds to flop an ace. AK may or may not be in his range, but even if it is 100% its still a call, but closer. Raise/folding draws attention to the fact that he sucks and will flip a lightbulb off in his head. We will make some money when we have the best hand. Easy call as boring and unartful as it is.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

"Raise/folding draws attention to the fact that he sucks and will flip a lightbulb off in his head."

when people play bad enough to have such a narrow raising range raise/folding against them once in a blue moon wont change their retardation. bad players play bad because theyre bad, it takes a LOT to change if it's even changeable.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

Clear your pm's. I don't have your # right now.

-Michael

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

I agree that, metagame, folding would be bad. It might have been fun to have folded my cards face up though.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

If you knew he had A-A, you were getting 6.5:1 to see the flop with Q-J winning the pot 15% of the time (even if his aces are of your suits). Knowing his cards would mean you had a good chance to either lose a small pot or win a big one, no?

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

Fold turn?

The Hand
 

I called thinking I should fold but too embarrassed to do so.

Flop came K-x-y. I checked, Tony bet, and I folded. He flashed me pocket aces.

I'm kind of sorry I posted this with the negative comments about Tony's play. For the record, he's won two World Series bracelets in limit poker and he's won close to $4,000,000 in tournaments. He plays very, very tight pre-flop in limit. He's always been cordial, congenial, and gentlemanly the few times I've played with him.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

"If you knew he had A-A, you were getting 6.5:1 to see the flop with Q-J winning the pot 15% of the time"

dont be naive.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

Thanks for the euphemism. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

It's been so long since I've done flop calculations that I forgot how, so this is by feel only.

Against AA you should probably fold. But even if he has KK, QQ or AK, you've got 3 chances (on the flop), to hit one of 3 cards. So even if these were his only holdings, I wouldn't fold for one more bet to see the flop. And I highly doubt any 60-120 player would only 3-bet with these holdings. Against JJ folding AQ borders on terrible.

Lastly, if he truly is this tight, his hand is much easier to read than yours. This is profitable on later streets and will often make up for taking slightly the worst of it pre-flop.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

This thread is ridiculous. For those of you who think folding is a good idea, here's how AQ fairs against a range of only AA, QQ, KK, and AKs when it flops an ace or queen.

The 30% when you flop a queen is pretty decent considering that against a player like this you shouldn't ever have to call a river bet if it gets that far.

Can anyone else chime in about Tony's range here? What is he doing with JJ?


Note that when you're facing this range, you'll flop an ace just shy of 15% of the time, and you'll flop a queen about 15.5% of the time.

Board: Ah 6d 7s
Dead:

equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 28.4007 % 28.30% 00.10% { QQ+, AKs }
Hand 2: 71.5993 % 71.50% 00.10% { AQo }


Board: Qh 6d 7s
Dead:

equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 69.5407 % 69.54% 00.00% { QQ+, AKs }
Hand 2: 30.4593 % 30.46% 00.00% { AQo }

I haven't done math on it yet and I don't have time now, but I think a case can be made for calling even if we drop his range down to only KK and AA, provided that he also plays straightforwardly postflop.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

"but I think a case can be made for calling even if we drop his range down to only KK and AA,"

how much do you think youre going to make with AQ when you flop an A against KK in the hands of this sort of player? and how much do you think youll lose against AA? youre being way too optimistic here youre not at all taking into account reverse implied odds.

Re: 60-120 Hand Against Tony Ma
 

Justin -

I agree with what mike says.....if he was allin after his preflop 3 bet, then i agree that calling is automatic. The problem is that you are out of position with a dominated hand. your reverse implied odds are too high, and you'll virtually always end up losing more than you can win.

J