Matusow's O8 article

[slik]

I just read an O8 article he wrote on full tilt: http://www.philivey.com/phil-ivey-tips.php?learntips=94, where he justifies cold capping 9KQ2 in a multiway pot from the big blind preflop. I think he is really incorrect for cold capping a basically 3 card hand from the second worst position. Does any one else agree with him? Perhaps you can help me see the light (if there is any).

[SmoothDude]

It's not something that I would do, but he explains it pretty well. If you think everyone else is playing the low cards, then the board is far more likely to bring high cards.

I know Gus Hansen said something similar for NLHE which is why in multi-way pots he loves the low cards.

[Micturition Man]

[ QUOTE ]
It's not something that I would do, but he explains it pretty well. If you think everyone else is playing the low cards, then the board is far more likely to bring high cards.

I know Gus Hansen said something similar for NLHE which is why in multi-way pots he loves the low cards.

[/ QUOTE ]


Dubious as Matusow's O8 argument is, Hansen's HE argument is awful, assuming you have paraphrased it correctly.

[Truthiness24]

I think that Buzz hit on the key part of this post and the Matusow article.

[ QUOTE ]

I shuffled and dealt. I couldn't believe Mike would find many favorable flops for his hand, even with the aces plus twelve low cards pulled from the deck.

And he didn't.

But then it dawned on me - nobody else did either!


[/ QUOTE ]

We can make strained arguments to support Matusow's extremely stupid & -EV play if we want to. Truth be told, I think that the play is only marginally -EV for a pro-level player, and it pays for itself in tiltboy value if you get to scoop a monster & show that you're capable of playing those cards. But I think that this misses the point. There IS something useful in here.

One substantial hole in the games of ordinary O8 players is that they don't look beyond they own hands to consider that of others. They assume that you have to nut-peddle in order to win. They assume that, if they didn't hit the flop, then another player did.

Wise posters here know that this thinking can be exploited with aggression. But ordinary players, and sometimes really good ones, understand the importance of aggression but forget why they are doing it.

Let's say that I open (PFR) from the cutoff with A2JJ. Or KKT5. Or KT93. It really doesn't matter. BB calls.

Now I'm not going to automatically c-bet the flop, but I am going to c-bet a whole lot of the time. And I'm going to c-bet for one of two reasons: either I hit the flop, or I think the BB missed the flop & I can pick it up right here.

I believe that it is way more useful (and fun!) to catch a flop with junk, drive it home, and show it than to make the conventional play. When you do that, you earn respect, an unpredictable image, and room to really play. It is here where I think that Matusow's article had a good point. (That said, I really just think he tilted & is trying to minimize his own embarrassment.)

It is going to seem elementary to most posters here that you put your opponent on a range of hands and act accordingly. But I am really sure that this is NOT the way that most people think when they play O8. They don't see beyond their own hands because they think that they will be beat if they don't have the nut hand or nut draw. They seldom consider that your positional raise may be some form of bluff, and, even if they do read it right, they often don't have the stones to do anything about it.

I read something above about Matusow being a NLH player playing O8. The tone suggested that this was a bad thing, that he just didn't "get it." I think that there is more to learn from bringing a NLH perspective to Omaha that most people think.

[Truthiness24]

I wish someone would disagree with me and tell me why I'm wrong. I'm like the 495th best O8 player that posts here. Maybe. On a good day for me.

There are many more credible voices here than mine. I like to give my two cents, and I think I know what I'm talking about, but I'm really not learning anything or getting much out of this if I don't get feedback.

Or has everything already been said about this?

[DeNutza]

WOW...interesting post.

Mikes hand sucks..period...The problem with him capping
is he has little straight, no flush potential.

Reverse implied odds will punish him here....This is
same concept to holdem suited connectors, etc, going up
in value multiway and offsuit hands going down in value.

Another problem is, the other last acting players also may
have recognized their hi hands have value now and
called/raised w/ them as well, totally destroying
his "hi card" clumping theory.

He'll be chasing AA, AK, etc too often also.

A pair and flush combos add tremendously to hands like this.

[ericicecream]

It's rare that Mike can make a str8 from his 3 cards here without being beaten by a flush. So he must be looking to win primarily with pair(s).

While I think the perspective is worth pondering, as Buzz said, I certainly don't think a 3 card non-flush hand OOP is the one to do it with.

One more thing I haven't seen mentioned, is how the cap inflates the pot and encourages chasers. An A235 hand can call a flop as bad as 5JQ here and probably show a small profit by sometimes makeing 3 fives, aces up, a backdoor wheel or low.

[franknagaijr]

I read the article and it made sense at the time, and then I just revisited and crunched the numbers to come back with the judgement that it was a borderline losing gamble, but a great way to establish a table-image as a total jack-in-the-box and to put all the solid players on tilt if it worked out for him.

There were four players who really liked their cards, 20 out of the deck. Safe to assume the four aces are accounted for, possibly three deuces, and a whole bunch of baby/wheel cards. 28 black box cards.

It cost MM two big bets to see the flop, and for the sake of argument, let's assume there will be about 20 big bets in the pot apart from what MM requires to continue to the river. That's 10 to 1 odds if he scoops, 5 to 1 if he chops.

Also for the sake of argument, let's say that of the 20 cards in play, distribute as follows:
4 - Aces
8 - 2 to 5
2 - 6 to 8
2 - 9 to K

I think the ace/wheel guesses are reasonable, but we have no way of knowing how many of the 6 to K cards are accounted for.

MM's ideal flop is trips, or TJx rainbow. If all of the Ts and Js are live, he's about 13% (C1) to flop those two cards, but more likely about 9.5% to flop that desireable outcome. If all Ks, Qs and 9s are live, he's about 7% (C2)to flop trips, which is potentially enough to take the high pot. That's an optimal 20% chance of seeing a flop worth continuing on. (It drops for every 9TJQK that is not live.) Can he continue for an inside straight? Can he continue on two pair on a flush draw board? Even with so many babies accounted for, I don't think there's a mathematical justification here for these lesser draws.

Without digging deeper into post-flop probability, let's give him a 50% chance of taking the top half of the pot, and a 50% chance of no low being awarded. He needs a 5 to 1 return on the initial investment to consider getting involved, which he is almost getting preflop, and post flop, he is probably getting the odds he needs to continue on any favorable flop.

I think if we dug deeper into the flush possibilities, his straight draws drop in value, and also his flopped trips drop in value as well. By the time you plunge into the math here, he cannot have been 'correct' to cap the pot here, but he was probably not ridiculously incorrect either.

It helps that MM was playing with tight, knowledgeable players. In the average Lo8 donkament, MM would have no way of guessing how many low cards were accounted for based on the action so far. You've seen people get excited about KKT5, so don't try this at home, kids.


C1 - ((8*4*26)/(28 *27 *26)) *3 =0.0146
C2 = ((3*2*26)/(28*27*26)) * 3 *3 = 0.0714

[Beavis68]

matusow is a crack head

[TMTTR]

[ QUOTE ]
matusow is a crack head

[/ QUOTE ]

That is true -- although it doesn't mean his thought process is wrong in the right game.