Badly Played?
 

Cryptologic
No Limit Holdem Ring game
Blinds: $10/$20
9 players
Converter

Stack sizes:
UTG: $1420
UTG+1: $1130
MP1: $1350
MP2: $1350
MP3: $1850
CO: $3930
Button: $780
SB: $1590
Hero: $1550

Pre-flop: (9 players) Hero is BB with Q[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] A[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]
UTG folds, UTG+1 calls, 2 folds, MP3 calls, CO folds, Button calls, SB calls, <font color="#cc0000">Hero raises to $100</font>, UTG+1 calls, MP3 calls, Button calls, SB calls.

Flop: 8[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] A[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] 4[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] ($500, 5 players)
SB checks, <font color="#cc0000">Hero bets $400</font>, <font color="#cc0000">UTG+1 raises all-in $1030</font>, 3 folds, Hero calls.

Turn: 3[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] ($2560, 1 player + 1 all-in - Main pot: $2560)


River: 5[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] ($2560, 1 player + 1 all-in - Main pot: $2560)


Results:
Final pot: $2560
UTG+1 shows 7c Kc
Hero shows Qh As

I played this hand earlier in an mtt. wondered if anyone would mind taking a look and pointing out where i may have gone wrong.

cheers

Re: Badly Played?
 

I dont see the problem with your play, you got it in ahead. I guess if you were afraid of the flush on the flop you could of tried to control the pot better

Re: Badly Played?
 

After the flop, you should have bet more that the pot, in order to chase out the flush draws. $400 into a $500 pot, the flush draw has proper odds to call you. I would have bet at least $600. Then he would have made a mistake calling you.

Him going all in like that was a bad move on his part, unless he was trying to bluff you out of the pot. Pretty stupid on his part, since you raised preflop, and bet out again on the flop.

Of course, since he called a 5X raise preflop with K7s, I doubt you could have chased him out with a machine gun. The only bad play you made was not betting enough on the flop, other than that, you played it fine.

Re: Badly Played?
 

My view:
Preflop fine
Flop I would have check, then call if necessary
Turn probably check around
River maybe I'd call depending on the player, size of bet etc.

Re: Badly Played?
 

2 clubs should of scared you, especially with an all in, like that couldnt of been anything other than a pocket pair or a flush draw which you had the pair beat with no hits on the flop should of placed him on a flush or A something

So your only two options were to bully/check to see where you stand, you choose to bully, and ya the raise should of been a little over the pot, when he shoved there, I would of thought he was a maniac, but your Aces still had a chance of getting flushed out.

He got lucky...

Re: Badly Played?
 

[ QUOTE ]

I played this hand earlier in an mtt. wondered if anyone would mind taking a look and pointing out where i may have gone wrong.

cheers

[/ QUOTE ]

Raise more pre-flop. You are crushing the range of the loose-passive donk's who frequent these small-stakes SNG's and you are way out of position. I'd raise it up to at least $160, maybe even $200.

As played, I'd bet the pot on the flop but generally you played it fine. Sometimes the donks just get lucky.

Re: Badly Played?
 

I think your main problem here is the PF bet sizing. The pot had 100 chips in it and you raised 80 more, giving the first player 9:4 odds. After he called, you could be sure you were going to be facing the whole world with terrible position in huge pot.

Early in an MTT, I'd pop this to more like 150 pf, hoping to get a single opponent/take it down, or at least face less than 4 players.

Re: Badly Played?
 

[ QUOTE ]
My view:
Preflop fine
Flop I would have check, then call if necessary
Turn probably check around
River maybe I'd call depending on the player, size of bet etc.

[/ QUOTE ]
You can't be serious?
[img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

Re: Badly Played?
 

sorry to sound ignorant but i have a couple of questions:

bill: i am not quite sure how i have given him odds to call me post flop by betting 400 into 500. is that that not 2.25/1 where he needs approx 4/1 to justify calling? i appreciate that he has the river too but i am not going to give him that for free if he did not hit on the turn.

peace: is checking not the worst thing i can do if i have him on a flush draw as i will be giving him a free card to beat me?

cheers for the input, any more is welcome

ok missed a couple of posts that came in between me loading the page and writing a reply.

i will ceratinly take on board the point about the pre flop raise i have actually thought about that myself in the past and will increase it next time something like this happens

as far as being scared of the clubs i knew there was a good chance that he was drawing to a flush and i could lose but i figured i was getting about 3/1 on my call of his all-in and it was about evens for him to hit it so it was worth the call. i suppose on thing i wanted to confirm was that this call would be profitable in the long run? if so i am not overly fussed that i lost this time.

ta

Re: Badly Played?
 

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peace: is checking not the worst thing i can do if i have him on a flush draw as i will be giving him a free card to beat me?


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Yes it is by far the worst thing you could do. Some of the advice people are giving in this thread is just bizarre.

Re: Badly Played?
 

cheers thoman8r good to know that i am not going completely mad!

Re: Badly Played?
 

The important point is risk vs. reward. Your big risk is that your hand is dead. In this situation that's not a small risk. He could easily have held AK given that he called a raise preflop. But it's even worse than that. You had a lot of callers, any one of whom could hold AK or have hit a set on the flop. In that case any bet you make is throwing money away. But what's your reward if you do bet? Not much - since anyone without a hand is likely to lose to you anyway. There's no real gain here.

The ONLY gain from betting the flop is that you push out the strong draws e.g. clubs here and even that might not succeed - even that might fail and cost you more money - exactly what happened.

Re: Badly Played?
 

This one of the pitfalls of posting in a beginners forum. Your better off posting MTT threads in the MTT section as you will get much better responses.

Re: Badly Played?
 

I'm surprised at how much bad advice you have managed to bring out with this.

Preflop, you could have raised a lot more, but it's not a big mistake to raise the amount that you did. Raising a smaller amount means more bad hands will incorrectly call. Typically, when I raise from the blinds, I raise about twice the size of the pot. Raising the size of the pot makes more sense when you have position, or when many players have not acted yet.

Post-flop, this is standard. You got all of your chips in as a big favorite. Were you really confused about whether you played this well, or did you just want to say that you got your chips in ahead and lost? That is a "bad beat" story, and they are a waste of time. When you have a strategy question, make sure you are specific so that your hand doesn't look like a bad beat story. It also helps not to show the results, so that you get real advice instead of useless rationalization tailored to the results.

Re: Badly Played?
 

[Smile] There will always be debate about playing style. Pay your money take your chances. YMMV. I am no beginner. I am signicantly up both long term and short term. Different strategies may work for you - I'm just describing what I know works for me.

Re: Badly Played?
 

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Post-flop, this is standard.

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Exactly right, and you know what? Standard play is losing play. Most players are losers.

Re: Badly Played?
 

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The important point is risk vs. reward. Your big risk is that your hand is dead. In this situation that's not a small risk. He could easily have held AK given that he called a raise preflop. But it's even worse than that. You had a lot of callers, any one of whom could hold AK or have hit a set on the flop. In that case any bet you make is throwing money away. But what's your reward if you do bet? Not much - since anyone without a hand is likely to lose to you anyway. There's no real gain here.

The ONLY gain from betting the flop is that you push out the strong draws e.g. clubs here and even that might not succeed - even that might fail and cost you more money - exactly what happened.

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AK is unlikely as someone with this would probably re-raise again, not call in a pot with several other people. Also he failed to push a club draw out but got his money in as a favourite. This makes a profit in the long run and was good play. Your advice is ridiculous.


Raise a little more pre-flop but what you did wasn't particularly bad. As has been said, post-flop you got your money in as a favourite.

Re: Badly Played?
 

It's a common fallacy that seeing with hindsight that you got your money in as favorite, proves that the play was a good play. It doesn't.

Re: Badly Played?
 

It's not uncommon for a pre-flop raise to be flat-called with AK.

Re: Badly Played?
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Post-flop, this is standard.

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Exactly right, and you know what? Standard play is losing play. Most players are losers.

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Heh. I meant standard by winning players.

Some losing players would check or make a small bet, letting people draw cheaply. Some losing players would make a huge overbet, losing value from weaker hands.

Re: Badly Played?
 

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It's not uncommon for a pre-flop raise to be flat-called with AK.

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It is pretty uncommon for a player to limp with AK, and then call a raise. The OP raised from the big blind after several people limped in.

If you aren't happy with AQ on this flop after this preflop action, you are setting your standards way too high, and you just won't get enough monsters to avoid blinding down.

Re: Badly Played?
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Post-flop, this is standard.

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Exactly right, and you know what? Standard play is losing play. Most players are losers.

[/ QUOTE ]

No, it's standard for a winning player because betting is +EV.

Re: Badly Played?
 

pzhon: No i was geniunely interested in whether i played this hand in the correct way. besides the odd game with friends for a couple of quid after a night out i have only been playing for about 2-3 weeks and the concept of pot odds and the thinking involved in betting etc are new to me. also please understand that i had always assumed that i had been playing the correct way which it now turns out i wasn't ;o) and if i had assumed this was correct and it wasnt then i would not learn. it has probably been a long time since you were a beginner but for me (and possibly others) finding out if a play was correct is equally if not more important than knowing if it was wrong when ur starting out. i take on board the view of not posting the results though and how this could look like i was just whinging, my future posts will not contain results.

to clarify then, i was especially interested in playing post flop with so many other players as most of what i have read only covers these situations against one other player. also as i was re-raised by the first person i did not get to see how my play would have worked out against the others.

cheers

Re: Badly Played?
 

It might be a winning play on a weak table. I very much doubt it would be a winning play on a reasonably strong table.

Re: Badly Played?
 

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[ QUOTE ]
It's not uncommon for a pre-flop raise to be flat-called with AK.

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It is pretty uncommon for a player to limp with AK, and then call a raise. The OP raised from the big blind after several people limped in.

If you aren't happy with AQ on this flop after this preflop action, you are setting your standards way too high, and you just won't get enough monsters to avoid blinding down.

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If a player limps with AK (which is not a rare play given AK) then they are unlikely to reraise. I believe flat calling a raise is much more common with AK than reraising especially in Nolimit where most people are scared to death at the idea of having their whole stack in on one pot. We know occasionally that people tend to slow play aces, well I think they slow play AK even more.

Re: Badly Played?
 

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If you aren't happy with AQ on this flop after this preflop action, you are setting your standards way too high, and you just won't get enough monsters to avoid blinding down.

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If a player limps with AK (which is not a rare play given AK) then they are unlikely to reraise...


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First, it isn't very likely for AK to be out there. Second, it isn't very likely for someone to play AK that passively preflop. The limps and calls are evidence that AK isn't out there. It's not bulletproof evidence, but that's the way to bet, and it is not close. Third, the probability drops further when you see another ace on the flop, leaving only 8 combinations of AK instead of 12.

It's really strange that you are bringing up AK as a possibility and advising caution when no one else has shown any aggression in this hand (by the point at whicj you recommended checking). AJ and AT start with twice as many combinations, are more likely to be played passively, and will still pay you off here. People may be playing lower aces, too. You are more than twice as likely to be crushing someone with kicker problems than you are to be behind AK. You don't have room to find out whether you are up against AT, AJ, or AK until showdown.

Again, if you aren't willing to put your stack in with AQo on this flop with a stack that is not much larger than the pot, you are going to blind down unless you get hit by the deck. You don't flop quads very frequently, and you should recognize top pair, second kicker, as a very strong hand with these stack sizes.

Re: Badly Played?
 

But it's not just AK, that's just an example, it's also AA, 88, 44, A8, A4 or even another AQ offers no value. Any of these hands might be out among 4 callers to a raised pot. I rate the limp as some evidence that AK may not be out there, but not the flat call.

Bear in mind also that Hero is coming out betting from early position - 2nd in 5. He has no 2nd round information on the three players behind him when he makes his bet on the flop. If he were in late position then I would start leaning more your way and saying his flop bet was better.

A big problem arises if Hero is raised on the flop. Raiser could be holding almost anything, a draw, two pair, a set, nothing at all. To the raise that happened I think it was a close call whether Hero should have laid the hand down, depending on how the raiser plays. Not being a whole lot more money to call relative to the pot size is probably the only thing making it worth a call here. If the stacks were much deeper it's a definite lay-down to the raise IMO. That's another big problem to coming out betting, Hero puts himself in a position (this betting round) of potentially facing drawing dead for all his money instead of just a small portion of it.

Re: Badly Played?
 

You played it ok. you just lost. sorry,

Re: Badly Played?
 

[ QUOTE ]
bill: i am not quite sure how i have given him odds to call me post flop by betting 400 into 500. is that that not 2.25/1 where he needs approx 4/1 to justify calling? i appreciate that he has the river too but i am not going to give him that for free if he did not hit on the turn

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No, fraid not. Pot odds are a right pain to understand, but once you got it, you'll make better plays and win more.

Basically, pot odds are the chances of making your hand vs what you the pot is paying you if you call.

Quick example, let's say the pot is $100, and there's two players to the flop. You're holding Ah 10s. The flop comes down Ac 9c 2d. You opponent checks to you. You figure him to be on a flush draw with two clubs.

There are 9 clubs left, and two cards to come, which means he should hit it 1 out of 3 times, or 1/3 of the time. This means that he will win 1 and lose two, or that he's a 2:1 underdog.

If you bet out $50, which makes the pot $150, he's getting 3:1 on his money. If you bet out $100, he's getting 2:1 on his money ($200/$100). As longs as his odds of hitting and the price the pot is paying is better or even, he's correct to call. In order to protect your hand and give him the wrong odds to call, you have to bet out more than $100. $150 to $200 would be about right.

I wish I could explain it better, but I'm not that good. If you google pot odd in texas holdem, there's a number of good articles on it.

Re: Badly Played?
 

And that's part of the problem... the "correct" amount to bet in order to push out the draws is quickly heading towards the amount that you will only get called with if you are drawing dead.

Re: Badly Played?
 

This is so standard and played the ONLY way you can play it NH

Re: Badly Played?
 

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the "correct" amount to bet in order to push out the draws is quickly heading towards the amount that you will only get called with if you are drawing dead.

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No, it's not. Your judgement is really far off. If your intuition tells you that a two-tone A84 flop is bad or mediocre for AQ, or that AQ isn't a good hand, or that people won't call with many worse hands, or that this hand is not worth protecting, then you need to revise your intuition, not try to convince the world it is wrong.

Re: Badly Played?
 

[ QUOTE ]
Quick example, let's say the pot is $100, and there's two players to the flop. You're holding Ah 10s. The flop comes down Ac 9c 2d. You opponent checks to you. You figure him to be on a flush draw with two clubs.

There are 9 clubs left, and two cards to come, which means he should hit it 1 out of 3 times, or 1/3 of the time. This means that he will win 1 and lose two, or that he's a 2:1 underdog.

If you bet out $50, which makes the pot $150, he's getting 3:1 on his money. If you bet out $100, he's getting 2:1 on his money ($200/$100). As longs as his odds of hitting and the price the pot is paying is better or even, he's correct to call. In order to protect your hand and give him the wrong odds to call, you have to bet out more than $100. $150 to $200 would be about right.

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The problem with your example is you're calculating as if Villain gets both streets to catch his flush for the price of one. Hero gets to charge him once for the turn card, and again for the river. Only if Hero is out of ammo does Villain get both streets for the first price.

Re: Badly Played?
 

&gt;&gt;&gt;If your intuition tells you that a two-tone A84 flop is bad or mediocre for AQ.

Bad, no. Mediocre against any reasonably strong table after 4 callers to a raise pre-flop, yes.

&gt;&gt;&gt;or that AQ isn't a good hand,

I agree AQ is a good starting hand.

&gt;&gt;&gt;or that people won't call with many worse hands,

If people are prepared to call a big bet on the flop with worse hands, then those callers are weak players. The play isn't too bad against weak players, because you will get value from dead callers. Against a table of strong players there is little such value and the ONLY value is in pushing out the draws.

Re: Badly Played?
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Quick example, let's say the pot is $100, and there's two players to the flop. You're holding Ah 10s. The flop comes down Ac 9c 2d. You opponent checks to you. You figure him to be on a flush draw with two clubs.

There are 9 clubs left, and two cards to come, which means he should hit it 1 out of 3 times, or 1/3 of the time. This means that he will win 1 and lose two, or that he's a 2:1 underdog.

If you bet out $50, which makes the pot $150, he's getting 3:1 on his money. If you bet out $100, he's getting 2:1 on his money ($200/$100). As longs as his odds of hitting and the price the pot is paying is better or even, he's correct to call. In order to protect your hand and give him the wrong odds to call, you have to bet out more than $100. $150 to $200 would be about right.

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The problem with your example is you're calculating as if Villain gets both streets to catch his flush for the price of one. Hero gets to charge him once for the turn card, and again for the river. Only if Hero is out of ammo does Villain get both streets for the first price.

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Which is why I suggested looking it up. There's too many variables you have to take into account: Stack sizes, position, player types (LAG, TAG, etc), the board, number of people in the pot, cash game vs tournament for starters. I'm not a teacher, and there's no need for me to be one. Start buying the 2+2 books, in five months, I've gone from chum to baby shark. [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img]

I can't remember which Sklansky book it's in, but it states that you make money when your opponents make mistakes. If you always bet enough so that the drawing hand is getting the wrong odds to call, then overall, you're going to win.

We've all had bad beats when some donk calls with the two outer and hits, but if they never hit, they'd never come back, or they'd start to learn to play, and take away our profit.

Re: Badly Played?
 

when liveinpeace advised to check the flop and re-evaluate when it gets back to you I originally thought that was the worse advise possible but now I am not so sure.

I think the flop bet was a mistake. He should have raised more if that would actually get people to fold or just limped behind if a big raise only bloats the pot and doesn't get more people to fold. The worst possible scenario is having a very good but not great hand OOP in a multiway pot which is where OP ended up.

Now that you are here with 5 to the flop and a T500 pot you have to ask yourself "If I bet close to the pot, what do I do if I am raised?"

My answer to that question is that betting 400 is going to commit me to this pot for better or worse because if I have to go all-in it's going to be 1050 to call in a 1950 pot and 2:1 is good enough odds against the range of hands that may push at this level"

I figure the reasonable range of pushing hands to be A4, A8, 88, 7c6c, 6c5c, AcXc, 44 and perhaps 2c3c. Then other possible pushes to come from players with any hand with 2 clubs as hole cards.

Now the pertinent question is, "Do I want to commit myself with TPGK against 4 opponents early in a tournament when I am OOP"

If the table is as weak as most people assume I think the answer is there are better times to gamble. If the table is tough as everyone assumes LiveinPeace assumes, I think the answer is there are certainly better situations to risk your whole stack.

Even with this rambling that I've done I don't know that I could check/fold but I can see it as more reasonable than I did when it was first presented.

Re: Badly Played?
 

Right, and check/call picks up a LOT of value from air bluffers, this is value lost if Hero comes out betting.

Re: Badly Played?
 

[ QUOTE ]
No Limit Holdem Ring game
Blinds: $10/$20
9 players

[/ QUOTE ]

not sure where the tournament thinking is coming from. I thought OP mentioned it, but can't find it now...

does the stakes of the game impact the decision? At the micros where I play, this flop action is oh-so-standard (as is the result).


Against STRONG opponents, tp2k has RIO problems. But 5 to the flop for 5BB? Doesn't sound like strong opponents. Anyway, I'd think we desperately need to protect this hand from the draw. With 4 opponents, it's more likely than usual.


Main take-home lesson here: raise more preflop! AQ oop in a multiway raised pot is the worst. Raise enough that you're reasonably sure to be heads up. Taking down the pot right now would be the best possible outcome.

Making the right move preflop generally has the result of making your post-flop decisions easier.


edit, found it:
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I played this hand earlier in an mtt.

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so reads on the villain would be important, but basically this is totally normal, and I really don't see how you could check/fold this flop.

Re: Badly Played?
 

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If people are prepared to call a big bet on the flop with worse hands, then those callers are weak players.


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You mean they are bad or loose players. Weak (as in weak tight) would mean they fold too much.

Betting is good against strong players, too, because

[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] A strong player with a decent (but worse) ace knows that you may bet on this flop without an ace. A strong player may call with air or a weak draw in the hopes that you give up on the turn, setting up a profitable bluff or semi-bluff. This is one way to counter the strategy of trying to turn trash into a premium hand by raising from the blinds and betting any flop.

[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] Strong players will often have draws that you need to push out or charge by betting.

However, assuming that random players are strong when they just limp/call is bad.

Checking the flop is a bad play. You have a strong hand. Protect it, and get value from weaker hands, instead of giving up before you see any aggression from your opponents at all.