Theory Time with MJ - Creating Profitable Situations With a Short Stac

[MJBuddy]

We're nuts, we're idiots, we're online poker players.

What does this mean? It means we make money from nuts, idiots, and people who call themselves poker players.


Ok that was irrelevant to what I’m going to discuss here today, but it sounded fun in my head and the things that sound fun in my head are what I open conversations with.

So on topic: We play online poker. Yes I’m reminding you of this. If you needed to be reminded, then this topic is going to be a bit too complicated. This was the test, did you pass?

I know one of you didn’t. Stop bullshitting.


Anyway, so why does the fact that we play poker online matter? Because online MTTs typically run with fast structures with small stacks and very little room for creative play compared to high buy-in, live events.
This means, more times than not, you will become the dreaded short stack. There’s nothing wrong with not making it to short stack. Busting in a cooler, suckout, etc is perfectly fine, but when you lose a hand and end up with an M of 7 or 8, with 12 BB and Harrington says play looser and more aggressive but you can’t justify open raising with anything because if you get called you’re committed to any pot and if you get reraised you’re committed and if it’s a full moon you’re committed and if someone raises light on your BB you’re committed and if a black cat crosses the street and curls up counter-clockwise on your bed JUST AS your second card is dealt, you sir, are COMMITTED.


So how the hell are you going to get chips before you’re blinded into oblivion or worse, 0 FE against the blinds?
I’m going to start off by denouncing Harrington’s zone theories. Not because they are bad, or because they don’t work theoretically, but because online is a different animal than live play. A loose, slutty animal by comparison. Think bonobos (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonobos), just with computers. Anyway, pushing A9 UTG sounds fun and cool and exciting. But in actuality you’re going to get called online. Now you might ask, “isn’t that good? A9 isn’t garbage with a short stack!” Yes it is. A9 is as good UTG with a short stack as it is with a medium stack. It took me a long time to figure this out – lots of bubbles in 45 mans at FTs when I jammed that weak Ace MP and got called and cursed my luck. In actuality there is a better way!

Few Key points in all of this:

1. Aces are dangerous anywhere but LP.

2. Showing bad hands when you get called jamming pre-flop makes you look loose.

3. Most players don’t take position into account with regards to short stack play, thanks to Harrington’s advice that all-in vigorous trumps position and being all in changes your positional mechanics post-flop.

4. Limps are weak. UTG limps are less weak, but still weak. MP limps may as well be 23o to you. Of course this isn’t always true, and I’ve had “loves to slowplay” reads on people. GENERALLY, limps are weak. When you’re short stack, you’re taking big risks to get back in the game, so you work on generalities. It’s fine to assume certain things based on observations made at the table, however.

5. Raises are serious, regardless of your stack. You can’t get involved when a nit raises and has you covered.

6. Despite what sagely advice your father, mother, pastor, or conservative friends have said, Always Jam loose, and only call tight.

So here we have a few things to outline everything I’ve learned, especially in 45 mans where SS FT play is standard.

The shorter the stack you have, the closer you should treat your two cards. We treat AK like KK-AA. We treat AQ like AK and eventually like QQ-KK. We treat KQ like QQ-KK, etc. as our stacks become nothingness in order to get some chips in with fold equity and jam for value against wider ranges.


Oh, and here’s the part where this goes from “no [censored], thanks for wasting my time” to “huh?”

Play your connecting cards like pocket pairs.

Why’s that? Because you have a better chance of not being dominated, you have huge fold equity LP, and you have a damn short stack. Use the same logic as before. If AK becomes KK-AA, why doesn’t 98s become 88-99?

Typically we play our connecting cards like their lower card. We play AK like KK, refusing to fold it except for the deepest of situations. We play AQ like QQ as the blinds begin to catch us.

Generally, I play my suited cards like the lower of the two cards, and my unsuited cards like 1 lower than that (Playing 87s like 77, and playing 87o like 66).

I detest open jamming from UTG with anything other than premium hands. That said, most of this strategy is MP-LP moves you can make that are nearly always +EV at the time when you absolutely must take the smallest of edges to double up or increase your stack.

Some basic examples to help clarify:

You’re in the BB with a stack of 4500 with 300/150/25 blinds. The pot is 675, but you have more than 10BB. You’re in the CO and you pick up 9c8c.

UTG folds, UTG+1 folds, MP1 calls 300, MP2 folds, MP3 calls 300, Hero…

So here you have a pot that’s 1275, your stack is 4500. The pot is now slightly under 1/3 your stack, and you really need to ask yourself, “would I call, fold, or raise all-in with 88?” And really if you don’t jam with that line, you’re DEFINITELY playing too passively pre-flop with a short stack. What hands are players limping here? Weak Aces? Low PP? suited connectors? Which of these hands are going to make a big call to your jam? Some of the bigger aces will (A7+) but they fold frequently as well, and the bigger they get the less they are in the range of hands. The same logic applies to the PP. How often are you seeing 88+ here? Incredibly infrequently. And will suited connectors even call? Infrequently.

Hero raises to 4500, BU folds, SB folds, BB folds, MP1 folds, MP2 Calls 4200
Hero shows 9c8c. Villain shows 77

And here is where an important principle that many don’t realize or respect comes into play:


Your equity comes from exploiting players and forcing players to make bad decisions that they feel are correct.


When a villain can make a +EV call that is +EV for both you AND him, you both win in the long run. It’s much more +EV for him to fold, but the largest pots you win in poker are when both players make the correct decisions and you simply get lucky with a bunch of dead money!

This post originally was going to be about pushing small SC edges as a short stack EVEN in multi-way pre-flop pots. Some people do it anyway, but I really wanted to explain the logic that applies to why we make these decisions and why they are profitable.

Another example:
You’re in the BB with a stack of 4500 with 300/150/25 blinds. The pot is 675, but you have more than 10BB. You’re in the CO and you pick up 6c7c.

UTG folds, UTG+1 folds, MP1 calls 300, MP2 folds, MP3 calls 300, Hero…

Is this the same situation as previous? Almost really. Would you push 66 here? Personally I would most of the time. Sometimes I won’t. Remember that 88-99 are more likely now, though they still may fold to a jam. Let’s assume that someone here has limped with two broadway overcards either through bad play or a good read on you, and they plan on calling your jam here.

You jam 4500, they call 4200. There’s 1275 in dead money, which is a little over 10% of the pot. You are 40/60 against the range of AJs-ATs,KTs+,QTs+,JTs,AJo-ATo,KTo+,QTo+,JTo. But the FE you gain against most of these hands is huge. Is QT, KJ, QJ going to call you? Yes. But not frequently enough to make up for the 10% edge you’re not getting here in odds. The higher in their range their hand, the more it must be discounted because it was limped. The lower the range of their hand, the more FE you have against it. This jam has to work one time a tournament when the pot is offering you 1/3 your stack for it to be profitable, in order to make up for the 10% edge lost as a 60/40.

The best part?

[ QUOTE ]
3. Most players don’t take position into account with regards to short stack play, thanks to Harrington’s advice that all-in vigorous trumps position and being all in changes your positional mechanics post-flop.

[/ QUOTE ]

A few rotations later, if your M falls under 5, when you jam JJ+ in EP, they’re going to assume your range is much looser than your EP range and call looser as a result. I see so many hands pop up here because of general disbelief that I have a hand *this time* and many players think they’re either in a flip/have me dominated with lower PP/weaker Aces.

Well this is long, it’s probably boring, but it’s why I go deep so typically in my MTTs. I create opportunities for players to make +EV calls for me and +EV folds for me. Yes you will run into overpairs, but you also have significant fold equity against the overpairs that you have to be afraid of within their ranges.

This post is to prematurely celebrate my 1200 post, which I'm sure will come as a result of me clarifying something I explained badly here. I do think some concepts here haven't been explored, at least recently, on this forum and if they have been, definitely deserve to be discussed again.

[hamnegger]

good post the limp limp is rare case though but i get the point.

[chh]

time and time again I've pushed a weak hand utg because harrington said so... and I've grown more and more annoyed about the results, cause the chance that someone does have a good enough hand to call is just too big
(Pen and Paper tell me that there is a 50% chance that someone behind you will have AQ+/88+ whenever you are UTG)

Thus, I ve generally been pushing hyper aggressively in late position, and only somewhat decent hands UTG. But that said, it's probably still better to push 64o on the CO than pushing AJo utg though it seems counterintuitive at first.

[black666]

A+

[Bruut99]

I agree withe the OP. I love 910s 10 times more then the usual A3o. Wich gets dominated HARD by any ace and pocketpair.

[Tackleberry]

[ QUOTE ]
I agree withe the OP. I love 910s 10 times more then the usual A3o. Wich gets dominated HARD by any ace and pocketpair.

[/ QUOTE ]

I´m convinced that this is just a matter-of-feeling. The calling-range of our opponents doesn´t change depending from our cards. And mathematical A3o is fairly break-even with T9s against a normal calling-range.

The problem of domination just arises postflop if we have to play (not being all-in) and risk our stack against a hand that dominates us (which is hard to recognize). After pushing, the domination is no real factor anymore.

[MJBuddy]

You are less likely to be called with A3 but more likely to be a 70/30 dog. You are more likely to be called with SC, but more likely to be a 60/40.

Thus, I think SC are more profitable LP because your jam with Ax has to work 3 times for every 1 time you get called (IT DOES! but that's not the point), and with SC it needs to work one time for every 1 time you get called*

*Assuming the pot is 1/3 your stack when you jam. I will jam here with any pot 20%, but the larger the pot the less FE you have but the more dead money equity you have - it's win/win.

And the reason you are less likely to be called by A3 is because you hold an Ace, so there are only 3 left and a lot of the weaker ones will still fold.

Edit: One of the biggest things I used to repeat in my head in 45 mans was "God dammit, dominated again" So I started adjusting my range of hands thinkings "Well they're only going to call with monsters anyway, so let's push a hand that's 60/40 against the monster's range." This theory definitely wasn't perfectly sound, but it was a great launch off point.

[Tackleberry]

[ QUOTE ]
You are less likely to be called with A3 but more likely to be a 70/30 dog. You are more likely to be called with SC, but more likely to be a 60/40.

[/ QUOTE ]

Sorry, I don´t get that:

Hand 0: 64.990% 62.36% 02.63% 1755471708 74002134.00 { 88+, A7s+, KJs+, A9o+, KJo+ }
Hand 1: 35.010% 32.38% 02.63% 911551800 74002134.00 { A3o }

Hand 0: 65.159% 64.80% 00.36% 670154840 3740970.00 { 88+, A7s+, KJs+, A9o+, KJo+ }
Hand 1: 34.841% 34.48% 00.36% 356594836 3740970.00 { 98s }


I assume that PokerStove considers that one A is gone, if we hold A3o - or am I wrong here? I verified it by trying to calc five times AKo against each other - which leads to an error. [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img] If it is the case, it indeed should not care at all if we held A3o or 98s.

[MJBuddy]

Ax is a possible/very probably limping hand at all levels from weak players. With 2-3 limpers in front of you, the chance that one of them has an Ace is lessened, the chance that someone left to act is lessened, and the chance that an ace too weak to raise will call you is low.

Also, though your calling range is probably good here in the AIPF on the BU vs BB, but take into account the limp/call range which has to be closer to

55-99, A5s-A9s, A6o-ATo, KJs+, KJo+.

If these weak aces call, you're a dog (at work, no stove, can't get numbers). If these pp call, you're a dog. Drawing to 3 outs either way. Only 4 hands call where we're barely ahead (KJs, KQs, KJo, KQs) and JT does call here sometimes...for some reason (donks!).

Can't run all kinds of ranges here, but I think yours is off.

[BarryLyndon]

I will add a few caveats, though I generally agree with everything MJ said:

1. Be wary of tables that totally disrespect MP2+ raises but have the utmost respect for UTG, UTG+1, or MP raises. Use that to your advantage by raising a larger variety of hands from EP, even when you hover around an M of 8. One thing I'm learning is that if you build a porfolio at your table where you are raising a bunch late during the middle stage of a tournament but not at all early, you're going to find yourself shortstacked (or be unsuccessful as a shortstack) because you are going to get too much action against your steal attempts and not enough with your quality hands from earlier positions. When you push with, say, 109 from EP for a sizeable stack, 88 is going to have a lot tougher a decision for 75% of his chips than when you push from LP. Much depends on table dynamic and you can't be wreckless about it, but it's something to think about.

2. Be VERY wary of when you have a re-steal stack. And don't just limit your resteals to CO+ raisors. If you see an MP2 or CO-1 get out of line or smell weakness, than it's time to re-steal. Re-steals can get you out of [censored] stack situations right quick. A lot of times these days I would rather try to preserve a re-steal stack if there is a big fat target over a LAG's head then try for a steal with 109s from CO-1. To me, they are entirely more profitable and you accumulate more chips. You also happen to get more respect from your table this way, which let's you pull of more steals from late (3-betting, in my opinion, will always instill fear in poker players, no matter how much Harrington they read).

3. ALWAYS be wary of a tricky UTG or UTG+1 - before making a big ass push for all your chips with connectors, really ask yourself what kind of player is UTG/UTG+1? Is he the type who has limped before and who is a pussy? Or is he solid and waiting to trap? What's his stack size? What's your FE? Can you find a better spot, or is 35/65 a blessing now? For instance, if blinds are 150/300/75 and UTG has been solid (or decent) and at 3500 he decides to limp, then your 98s from the BB at 3000 may not be so great. A lot of this is based on feel, and punishing limpers should be a default - but if he just played our defaults, we wouldn't be good, observant players.

Conversely, if you have a strong and an M of like 8 or 9, be wary of stacks to your left that are just waiting to push steal. The LP RAI is becoming so incredibly popular and you never REALLY know when a limper is being tricky. However, since you are a [censored] ninja 2+2 poster, you can both spot the tricky limpers and be one yourself.

4. OK, so here is where I recommend that somebody posts something on the "weak ace" in online play, since I think that weak aces are both over played by some short stacks and grossly underplayed by others. Ax is easily one of the more misunderstood hands in online play, and there are several times where, off the SS, you can RR for value / push for value. And other times where you are getting the right equity for a push but just can't seem to make the play with A6 because of fear of running into AJ.

Barry