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I got myself into some trouble with a hand that I played a few days ago. It was a situation where I was in the big blind and the hand folded around to the small blind. He raised my blind, as he had done a few times earlier. I was getting tired of it and decided to make a stand.
Poker Stars $2/$4 No Limit Hold’em – 6 players
Hero (BB): $405.50
UTG: $128.45
MP: $363.75
CO: $87.65
BTN: $242.60
SB: $290.75
Pre Flop: ($6.00) Hero is BB with 3h Th
4 folds, SB raises to $12, Hero calls $8
(I made a very loose call here. As I stated earlier, I was getting tired of the SB raising my blind.)
Flop: ($24.00) 9d Kh Ts (2 players)
SB bets $16, Hero calls $16
(I flopped second pair on a draw heavy board. When the SB led out, I decided that I can’t fold just yet. This could be just a standard continuation bet.)
Turn: ($56.00) 6h (2 players)
SB bets $37.50, Hero calls $37.50
(The turn now gives me a flush draw along with my second pair. After the SB bets out again, I decide that I am probably behind, but that I’ll call and see if I can hit my flush or improve in other ways.)
River: ($131.00) 3d (2 players)
SB bets $80, Hero calls $80
(Well, I hit two pair on the river. I decide that I can’t fold my two pair and call the SB’s river bet.)
Final Pot: $291.00
Hero mucks 3 T
SB shows 9 K (two pair, Kings and Nines)
SB wins $288.00
I ended up losing a big pot here to the SB’s flopped two pair. I got stubborn and decided that I had to defend my blind in this situation. This was just a bad play all together. Calling was a bad situation here and put me in a situation after each street where I felt that I couldn’t get away from my hand. I ended up losing quite a bit of money that I never should have had at risk in the first place.
March 9th, 2010 9:20:18 PM GMT+5 | Posted in Poker by windizzle | No Comments
I just played a hand on PokerStars in the last hour which I find quite interesting because of how different the hand would have played out if traditional play at the table had occured. Fortunately for me in this case, that isn’t what happened and it turned out to save me my stack.
Poker Stars $0.50/$1 No Limit Hold’em – 6 players
The Official 2+2 Hand Converter Powered By DeucesCracked.com
UTG: $100.00
Hero (MP): $126.60
CO: $257.80
BTN: $102.70
SB: $127.65
BB: $100.00
Pre Flop: ($1.50) Hero is MP with K K
1 fold, Hero calls $1, 2 folds, SB calls $0.50, BB checks
(I decided to just limp here and hope for a raise behind me so I could 3-bet. I don’t really do this often, but for some reason I decided to make this play here. My plan backfired when action folded around to the small blind who just completed and the big blind then checked.)
Flop: ($3.00) 2 J 9 (3 players)
SB bets $1, BB raises to $4, Hero calls $4, SB calls $3
(The SB leads out at this flop and is raised by the BB. I’m not happy here but I decide that it’s too early to fold my big pair. I just flat call the raise.)
Turn: ($15.00) T (3 players)
SB bets $5, BB raises to $15, Hero folds, SB calls $10
(The SB bets out after the turn card and then is raised again by the BB. I decided that my hand must be no good and folded.)
River: ($45.00) 7 (2 players)
SB checks, BB checks
Final Pot: $45.00
SB shows A A (a pair of Aces)
BB shows J T (two pair, Jacks and Tens)
BB wins $42.80
(Rake: $2.20)
So the SB had AA and the BB had JT for a turned two pair. If this hand has played out like it should have with a raise preflop from either myself or the SB, I would have gotten stacked and the SB would have taken my 126 BB’s instead of losing 20 himself.
February 28th, 2010 7:57:10 PM GMT+5 | Posted in Poker by windizzle | No Comments
Last month, Full Tilt Poker introduced a new version of poker on it’s site call Rush Poker. In my opinion, this may change the way that poker is played in the future. It’s too early to say for sure, but let’s just say that I have a hunch.
Rush Poker is quite different than normal poker. In Rush Poker, you are seated with a pool of players, not just the same five or eight others depending on whether you are playing a 6-max or full ring game. In Rush Poker, when you fold a hand, you are automatically moved to another table with five or eight new players who have also just folded their hand. By choosing to play Rush Poker, you are able to see four times as many hands per hour as you normally would. As soon as you fold your hand, you almost instantly have another hand to play. Imagine how fast the action is if you’re multi-tabling.
So I had heard about Rush Poker for the last month but since I have predominantly been playing on PokerStars, I haven’t had a chance to try it out. I decided to do something about it a week ago and made a small deposit on Full Tilt Poker and have been hooked ever since.
I have personally found the play to be pretty horrid overall, with people seeming to make absurd moves at all the wrong times. My thinking is that some of these players just can’t seem to make decisions this quickly and seem to panic at times. I know it’s only a small sample size that I have, so I guess I’ll have to wait to see how things shake out over time.
I went back to PokerStars last night to play some regular 6-max and I was really bored. The pace was way too slow for me after a week of playing Rush Poker.
I sure hope that PokerStars will implement some form of Rush Poker in the near future. I have a feeling that they are waiting to see if it’s popularity sticks. I think it will.
February 22nd, 2010 10:33:43 PM GMT+5 | Posted in Poker by windizzle | No Comments
I played in a local live game recently where the blinds were 50 cents and a dollar with a $100 max buy-in. On my second hand, I picked up AK in the small blind. There were several early limpers and the button then raised to $12. He struck me as an aggressive player, one who could just be trying to steal the dead money with a wide variety of hands. But since I was out of position and completely unfamiliar with most of my opponents, I decided to play it safe by just flat calling the raise, and then deciding what to do after the flop. The big blind decided to come along as well and all the early limpers folded.
The flop was K-Q-T. I had flopped top pair top kicker, however this flop made me very uncomfortable. TPTK is normally a pretty good hand, but with this flop, is would be too easy for one of my opponents to have flopped a two pair hand or better. I decided to check and see what my opponents did next. The big blind bet $25 and then the player on the button moved all in. While I was thinking about what to do, the BB acted out of turn and said “I call” and turned up his cards to reveal that he had KQ for top two pair. He was so eager to make the call that he didn’t notice that I was still in the hand.
With the action being on me, the BB had to pull his bet back. I then announced that I was folding and turned over my cards while thanking my opponent for saving me some money.
The button ended up having KT for a worse flopped two pair hand and the BB doubled his stack in the hand.
The moral of this this story is that you should always wait for your turn to act in a live poker game. If not, you will sometimes cost yourself money. I have seen this quite a bit playing live poker, especially with inexperienced opponents.
February 17th, 2010 3:58:40 PM GMT+5 | Posted in Poker by windizzle | No Comments
In the past few days, I’ve encountered two hands and situations that I’ve never come across before in my seven years of playing poker. Here they are:
Poker Stars $0.50/$1 No Limit Hold’em – 6 players
Hero (MP): $163.85
CO: $109.60
BTN: $101.00
SB: $23.70
BB: $145.40
UTG: $151.55
Pre Flop: ($1.50) Hero is MP with A A
1 fold, Hero calls $1, 2 folds, SB raises to $7, BB raises to $17, Hero raises to $43, SB calls $16.70 all in, BB raises to $97, Hero raises to $163.85 all in, BB calls $48.40 all in
Flop: ($314.50) 6 2 K (3 players – 3 are all in)
Turn: ($314.50) J (3 players – 3 are all in)
River: ($314.50) 3 (3 players – 3 are all in)
Final Pot: $314.50
Hero shows A A (a pair of Aces)
SB shows K K (three of a kind, Kings)
BB shows Q Q (a pair of Queens)
Hero wins $243.40
SB wins $68.10
(Rake: $3.00)
I’ve never seen AA, KK and QQ all at the same 6-max table at one time. Luckily though, I was only sucked out on by the short stack and ended up winning a big pot against one of the other big stacks at the table.
Poker Stars $0.50/$1 No Limit Hold’em – 6 players
CO: $314.10
Hero (BTN): $114.75
SB: $120.00
BB: $101.10
UTG: $114.20
MP: $188.00
Pre Flop: ($1.50) Hero is BTN with Js Qs
2 folds, CO calls $1, Hero calls $1, 1 fold, BB raises to $6, 1 fold, Hero calls $5
Flop: ($13.50) Ts As Ks (2 players)
BB checks, Hero checks
Turn: ($13.50) K (2 players)
BB bets $7, Hero calls $7
River: ($27.50) 4 (2 players)
BB bets $16, Hero raises to $48, BB raises to $85, Hero raises to $101.75 all in, BB calls $3.10 all in
Final Pot: $203.70
Hero shows Js Qs(a Royal Flush)
BB shows K A (a full house, Kings full of Aces)
Hero wins $200.70
(Rake: $3.00)
Wow, my first Royal Flush of any kind and a flopped one at that. My only concern was how was I going to make any money on this hand. Needless to say, my opponent flopped top 2 pair and then turned a full house. I’m sure after the turn, he was wondering how was he going to get any money out of me. Two monster hands colliding and I was able to stack my opponent.
This is why I play poker.
February 8th, 2010 5:20:45 AM GMT+5 | Posted in Poker by windizzle | No Comments
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