Low stakes time.

Today I Noeledge grinded 3 tables of 200NL while the crew sweated. It was standard for the most part. Lets get to the action.

Hand 1: Villain is 32/24/3.6-453 sample

Absolute Poker No-Limit Hold'em, $2 BB (6 handed) Hand History converter, Courtesy of PokerZion.com
Button ($74.80)SB ($327.12)BB ($474.80)UTG ($185)Hero ($225.80)CO ($440.05)
Preflop: Hero is MP with Qh, Qc. 1 fold, Hero raises to $8, 3 folds, BB calls $6.

Flop: ($17) 6d, 8h, Kh (2 players)BB checks, Hero bets $12, BB raises to $40, Hero calls $28.
I had a sick feeling villain was going to check raise this board and almost checked. The crew felt it was a bet and I believe it was. Villain does what i felt would happen and calling is a must. Yes he could have better but this can be a draw as well or a move.

Turn: ($97) 2c (2 players)BB checks, Hero checks.
he checks we check as there is no reason to bet.

River: ($97) 8s (2 players)BB bets $194, Hero folds.
The river is interesting as villain sizes out an overbet shove. These are spots where I think those of us grinding 200NL and below might be tempted to make an amazing hero call, DONT! If he turns a busted FD into a huge bluff more power to him we will catch him soon enough. It is much more likely he holds a monster.

Final Pot: $291
Results below: BB doesn't show. Outcome: BB wins $291....Read more!

Hand 2

Hand 2: Villain is 19/14/2.8-Large sample

Absolute Poker No-Limit Hold'em, $2 BB (5 handed) Hand History converter, Courtesy of PokerZion.com
Hero ($290.40)SB ($397)BB ($171.40)UTG ($148)MP ($554.90)
Preflop: Hero is Button with As, Ah. UTG calls $2, 1 fold, Hero raises to $10, SB calls $9, 1 fold, UTG calls $8.
Flop: ($32) 2h, 5s, 8c (3 players)SB checks, UTG bets $12, Hero raises to $32, SB raises to $101, UTG folds, Hero folds.

This is an awesome hand and shows a solid concept. When I get donked into by shorty I am never folding and will be glad to get it in. The great thing about his donk lead is it allows me to make a small raise and get info on where SB is at in the hand. Any action he takes besides folding is going to be alarming. He 3bets and at 1st I am tempted to jam, I might spew my stack here but the crew wouldnt allow me to, majority rules and I think we can clearly see this is a fold. His check 3 bet is so strong it isnt funny and a large part of his range, though very spewy, is small PP.

Final Pot: $177
Results below: No showdown. SB wins $177....Read more!

Hand 3

Hand 3: Villain is 56/4/5.4- 84 hand sample

This hand appears very standard but may be a spot where some low limit grinders get owned.

Absolute Poker No-Limit Hold'em, $2 BB (5 handed) Hand History converter, Courtesy of PokerZion.com
Button ($151.62)SB ($559)BB ($106)Hero ($390.82)MP ($41.83)
Preflop: Hero is UTG with Qc, Qs. Hero raises to $8, 3 folds, BB calls $6.
Flop: ($17) Jh, Jd, 9h (2 players)BB checks, Hero bets $12, BB calls $12.
To check call the flop he can have a pretty wide range, Jx, 9x XXh and a combo of straight draws.

Turn: ($41) 6h (2 players)BB checks, Hero checks.

The turn completes a draw and he checks. Betting here is a sin, especially because of stack size. It is rare villain calls with worse on this turn and checking will get me value on the river from those hands. Also if villain check raises I have to fold everytime. betting is spew in our opinion.
River: ($41) 4c (2 players)BB bets $14, Hero calls $14.
River is an easy call. way to extract max value donk, LOL.

Final Pot: $69
Results below: BB has Jc 9s (full house, jacks full of nines). Hero has Qc Qs (two pair, queens and jacks). Outcome: BB wins $69....Read more!

Poker swings.

Poker Swings

This article is going to focus on the types of “bad” swings we encounter throughout playing poker. The points I’m looking to focus on include:

• What causes swings
• How often do they happen
• How big will they be
• How can you stop them

What causes swings?

First let us look at what a swing is. Simply a run of consistently losing more than normal. A swing is not a run of bad luck always. It can be and is probably more often a run of bad play. In poker we play to maximize our winnings from positive expectation situations, meaning making plays that will win in the long run. The swings are what happen between now and the long run.

One common cause of a swing is mathematical. If a situation can happen, eventually it will. It is mathematically possible to lose with your AA vs KK twice in a row, so if you play enough, expect it at some point in time. This would be a down swing, yes a very short one, but still a down swing all the same. Now a situation like this can often cause a player to play worse than they normally would over a few hundred or even thousand hands and turn a 2 hand down swing into a large down swing.

The 2 graphs are a perfect example of this. The top graph is from a winning player that has great control of his game and plays close to his “A” game no matter how bad things get. It shows in his swings which are frequent but small. The bottom graph is from another winning player that admits to tilting a bit after a cooler or 2. And although a winning player, the swings are amplified to be much larger than bad luck or mathematics would cause them to be.

I believe the biggest part of swings to simply be a run of bad play, usually following a short run of bad outcomes in favorable situations. But there are a few other things that can cause bad swings, such as playing tired, drunk, poor game selection, or playing in a bad mood. You may say these aren’t swings, just bad times to play. But anything that causes a loss is part of what can cause a bad swing.

Yes it is possible to endure large swings when playing your 100% “A” game, but they are fewer than many wish to admit. Many things cause a bad swing, but it’s mostly the player that causes them to be so big.

How often do they happen?

Well this is not really something you can answer, because it’s never consistent. Part of controlling how often they happen is a large difference in the skill of a player. A top player can expect to see 5 buy in swings happen every 30,000 hands. While a good player can expect to see swings of the same size twice as often and many times much larger than just 5 buy ins.

Two large factors in the frequency of bad swings will be the style/aggression of your play along with your ability to control playing you “A” game.

Again, if we focus on the 2 graphs, we see that 2 top players encounter swings as different frequencies and different sizes. Although both show decent winnings, the one that controls swings obviously can win quite a bit more.

How big will they be?

Again, not an easy typical answer to this question. It’s another player dependent situation. I’m not an expert on knowing the situations everyone has been through, but I can comment based on my observations of many winning players graphs include the 2 shown here.

It seems quite common that players encounter swings on occasion of 10 buy ins along with often runs in the 5 buy in range. At any rate, our focus should not be on how large we can expect a downswing to be, but on how we can get out of it ASAP.

How can you stop them?

Well if you are a top notch emotion controlling grade A player as the player from the top chart is, you don’t have to do anything. Just keep playing and it will end. But for the remaining 99.9% of us, there’s more to it.

The best advice that can be given for getting out of a bad swing is simple, quit playing. That’s it. No don’t quit poker, just quit for the day. Get your mind off it and do something else. Preferably something you enjoy. Quit thinking poker, don’t study poker, don’t review your hands, don’t sweat someone, just quit for the day. All those things just mentioned you shouldn’t do are good things to do……..tomorrow.

If you refuse to quit for the day, or come back the next day to the same results, get help. Have someone watch you play. Many players play better when being watched, they fear making dumb plays and will focus more on their “A” game. This can come in the form of a coach, friend, spouse, or a CR member that likes to trade sweat sessions.

Be honest. Don’t tell yourself along with others that is all bad cards. Look through those hands and really pick yourself apart. You can’t improve your game if you are not honest about where it is. Don’t just look at the big hands either. Pay attention to the little ones. When a bit upset from a cooler, it’s possible to spew a lot of money over playing too many small pots and causing a large downswing of many many small pots.

If you just can’t seem to pull out of a swing, get a coach right away. I think any poker player that is serious about playing should be getting coaching at all times. But during a long down swing you should defiantly be paying someone to help you rather than paying your opponents off just to play you.

I hope this will help you understand bad swings. Obviously we focused more on tilting than swings, but really that’s all swings are. A way to say tilting without taking the blame. You can see from many top players graphs that swings happen to everyone. So next time you are on one yourself, come back and visit this article, remember you are not alone and focus on getting out of it.

...Read more!

Hand 1: 14th Jan

This week was Dice14 playing four tables of $2/4NL on Full Tilt.

Hand 1

This hand caused quite a lot of discussion. We've annotated it with our thoughts as the hand played out, and we've added the thoughts after discussion underneath.


Stack sizes:
UTG: $1022
Hero: $458.90

Pre-flop: (6 players) Hero is Button with Qh Qd
UTG raises to $14, 2 folds, Hero raises to $48, 2 folds, UTG raises to $149, Hero calls.

This opponent is an aggressive regular. He made a pretty quick 4-bet from UTG to our BTN 3-bet. Here, we'd expect his UTG 4-betting range to be fairly strong as we'd expect him to assume our 3-betting range is strong. We elect to call looking for a non A/K flop.


Flop: 7d 6d 9c ($304, 2 players)
UTG bets $333, Hero folds.

The timing of his bet (insta), and the fact that our hand looks like QQ/JJ, led us to make a fold here. He can't expect us to be folding anything after we call pre-flop, so he's very likely to have QQ beat here.


Uncalled bets: $333 returned to UTG.

Results:
Final pot: $304


In hindsight, we think that a decision needs to be made pre-flop when he 4-bets. Either we're ahead of his range or we're behind, and we should shove or fold accordingly. The problem with calling a 4-bet is that you have such a tiny range for doing so. What would anyone call this 4-bet with other than AA-JJ? AK will shove pre-flop as it wants to see five cards. JJ may fold quite often, KK will probably shove more often than calling, so that leaves AA and QQ as out main range. Most people would probably just shove AA, that leaves ou range as something like QQ, AA, JJ, KK (in rough order of frequency).

Now, that is a strong range, but it allows our opponent to play well post-flop really. If he was 4-bet bluffing he can check-fold or bet if he hits hard. If he was 4-betting for value, he's able to make a decent decision post-flop. The only way to counter this small range is to make it wider. However, I don't think widening our 4-bet calling range is going to be particularly profitable. Therefore, never calling a 4-bet is probably the best way to go....Read more!

Hand 2: 14th Jan

This week was Dice14 playing four tables of $2/4NL on Full Tilt.

Hand 2

Stack sizes:
UTG: $512.80
Hero: $418.30

Pre-flop: (4 players) Hero is BB with Jd Jc
UTG raises to $14, 2 folds, Hero raises to $48, UTG calls.

This opponent was a tight player and there would have been some merit to flat-calling with JJ pre-flop here. However, we think that raising is still the best play. It helps to define his hand when you raise, and it gives you the initiative on the flop. We estimated that a rough calling range for him would be any pair (as he does have implied odds), possibly AK/AQ, and occasionally some suited connectors (although these will be very rare).


Flop: Kd Kh 8c ($98, 2 players)
Hero bets $66, UTG calls.

This isn't a great flop against his range as we're probably not going to fold out any better hands. We might get a bit of value from some worse hands (TT/99), and we make a bet. His range for calling this flop is likely to be AA, KK, QQ, JJ, TT, 99, 88, AK. He could float with AQ, although this is unlikely. Again, he could have 98s or 87s, but this is very unlikely too.


Turn: 8h ($230, 2 players)
Hero checks, UTG checks.

We don't think there's much value in betting the turn here. We might force a fold from QQ, but that's not enough of a reason to bet. He checks behind, which we think he'll do with his entire range.


River: Ah ($230, 2 players)
Hero checks, UTG bets $175, Hero folds.

This is a weird river card because it doesn't look good, but it doesn't really affect the values or our hands. We check again and he makes a bet that looks like a value bet. Out of the range we've given him, he'd have to be turning TT/99 into a bluff here quite often to make this a profitable call. We don't think he'd do that very often, and there's a large portion of his range that would value bet this river (AA, AK, KK, 88).


Uncalled bets: $175 returned to UTG.
Results:
Final pot: $230...Read more!

Hand 3: 14th Jan

This week was Dice14 playing four tables of $2/4NL on Full Tilt.

Hand 3

Stack sizes:
UTG: $540.70
UTG+1: $660.80
Hero: $452.30
Button: $611.20
SB: $408.40
BB: $439

Pre-flop: (6 players) Hero is CO with 6c 6h
UTG calls, UTG+1 raises to $18, Hero calls, Button calls, 2 folds, UTG calls.

The raiser here was an aggressive regular and we'd been battling with him over a couple of tables. This is definitely a reasonable spot to go ahead and make a 3-bet, but the limper and the button were both loose players so there's more value here in calling and having them call along.


Flop: 5c 4c 7c ($78, 4 players)
UTG checks, UTG+1 checks, Hero bets $56, Button calls, 2 folds.

We hit a very interesting flop. We have possibly 6 straight outs, 2 straight flush outs, and we might have the best hand. It gets checked to us and we decide to bet. The rationale behind this bet is that it's virtually impossible for the pre-flop raiser to have a hand he's willing to continue with (as he would bet). He's also very unlikely to make any sort of play at us as it's a four-way pot and he'll be playing more straight forward. It's likely that one of the looser plays may call us, but we could have the best hand, and most certainly have decent equity.


Turn: 7s ($190, 2 players)
Hero bets $100, Button raises to $200, Hero folds.

Unfortunately it was the player behind us that called, so we have to play the turn out of position. We elect to make a "blocker" type bet, which gets fairly quickly min-raised. This is now a really awkward spot. We have to assume that the BTN has a made flush or a 7. He could also have a made full house. Even if he only has the bare Ac, the river is going to be really tough for us to play. Given all of this, we think a fold is probably best.

Another option on this turn would have been to check-call. This would work pretty well if we felt that our opponent wouldn't be betting the river as a bluff very often at all.


Uncalled bets: $100 returned to Button.
Results:
Final pot: $390...Read more!

Hand 4: 14th Jan

This week was Dice14 playing four tables of $2/4NL on Full Tilt.

Hand 4

Stack sizes:
SB: $458
Hero: $418.30

Pre-flop: (6 players) Hero is BB with 9d 7h
4 folds, SB raises to $16, Hero calls.

The SB here is a very aggressive regular, so we felt it would be fine to defend with a hand as weak as 97o here.


Flop: 9h 8d 2s ($32, 2 players)
SB bets $20, Hero calls.

This is a good flop for us. We make a very standard call.


Turn: 6h ($72, 2 players)
SB checks, Hero checks.

This is a really interesting spot on the turn. The standard line is to check behind this turn and then make a decision on the river (and this is the best line in general). However, we think this turn brings up a really interesting and unusual spot. This is a spot where it would have been a really cool play to bet the turn to induce a bluff raise from our aggressive opponent. If we bet this turn, it looks like we're floating (why would we bet a marginal hand on the turn?), and an aggressive opponent is definitely capable of making a play blind-on-blind. Obviously we're never folding if we bet the turn - it's for value.

River: Ah ($72, 2 players)
SB checks, Hero checks.

The river is a standard check behind. I think we would've called a bet as the ace is a really good card for him to represent if he has air.


Results:
Final pot: $72
SB showed 6c 5c
Hero showed 9d 7h...Read more!

Hand 1 : 7th Jan

Ok, so we had our first sweat session of the new year last night. LuckySOB, DODGYKEN, and peten2toms were present. Dice was spending some time with family before returning to school. LuckySOB was playing 2/3 tables of $2/4NL on Absolute. These were the interesting hands that came up, with our thoughts interspersed. All hands are on 6-max tables, we've just shortened them to save space. If you want to leave any feedback or questions about any of the hands, please feel free to do so in the comments. We'll be checking back regularly.


Hand 1

Stack sizes:
Hero: $494
SB: $1594.85
BB: $782.20

Pre-flop: (4 players) Hero is UTG with Jh Ah
Hero raises to $16, Button folds, SB calls, BB calls.

Flop: 5s 6c 4c ($48, 3 players)
SB checks, BB checks, Hero checks.

This is a terrible flop to make a continuation bet into two players on. We check and plan on giving up the hand to any action.


Turn: As ($48, 3 players)
SB checks, BB checks, Hero bets $36, SB calls, BB raises to $72, Hero calls, SB calls.

This is an awkward turn as it's necessary to bet to protect against all the draws versus two players. However, the ace is a card that the other two players will expect us to bet pretty often, so the fact that they've checked twice doesn't necessarily mean that they're weak here. We do make a bet (planning on probably checking behind on the river), and we get a min check-raise from the BB.

This is a spot where a fold is best. Even though we're getting super odds from the pot, the BB has made a really small check-raise on the turn into a three-way pot. It certainly doesn't look like he's trying to force us out.


River: 7h ($264, 3 players)SB checks, BB bets $60, Hero calls, SB folds.

He bets so small on the river that we're pretty much forced to call. However, the mistake we made here was on the turn. We were forced to pay off another 15BBs on the river due to our poor turn call.


Results:
Final pot: $384
BB Shows 7d 8h


...Read more!

Hand 2 : 7th Jan

Hand 2

Stack sizes:
Hero: $511
SB: $277.40

Pre-flop: (5 players) Hero is Button with Ts Qd
UTG calls, CO folds, Hero raises to $16, SB calls, 2 folds.

A very standard button isolation when UTG limps in.


Flop: 8h 3d Qs ($40, 2 players)
SB bets $8, Hero raises to $24, SB calls.

We hit top pair and get donk led into for 1/5th of the pot. We elect to make a small raise. We discussed this afterwards and decided that it's probably best to just call here. SB's range for donking is probably wide, but something like Qx, 33, 88, any pair, JT, J9, T9, air. There's not a lot of value in raising here as it's essentially turning our hand into a bluff.

We decided that raising these donk leads is probably a better if you have nothing yourself (or bottom/second pair). When you have top pair, it's probably better to call and try to see a cheap showdown (unless your hand is so strong that you want to build the pot, or the board is drawy enough that you need to protect).


Turn: 3c ($88, 2 players)
SB checks, Hero checks.

Standard check for pot control.


River: Kh ($88, 2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $56, SB folds.

We go for some thin value on the river and get a fold.




...Read more!

Hand 3 : 7th Jan

Hand 3

Stack sizes:
UTG: $314.31
Hero: $512.70

Pre-flop: (5 players) Hero is BB with 9s 5h
UTG calls, CO (poster) checks, 2 folds, 2 folds, Hero (poster) checks.

Flop: 9c 8s 5c ($14, 3 players)
Hero bets $12, UTG calls, CO folds.

We hit top and bottom pair on a very draw-heavy board. These are spots that need to be played fast as our hand is very vulnerable.

Turn: Th ($38, 2 players)
Hero checks, UTG bets $20, Hero calls.

The turn makes the board scarier, and we check to UTG. After discussion, we agreed that betting is better here as we still probably have the best hand, and we need to continue to protect it. When you hit a poor two pair, it's important to normally keep betting to protect your hand.

River: Td ($78, 2 players)
Hero checks, UTG bets $24, Hero calls.

At this point, the odds we were getting to call were so great that a call seemed necessary. However, if we had bet the turn, we might not have had to call the river. This is a decent example of how errors on previous streets can compount to errors on later streets. This isn't a huge error, but you can see the point.

Results:
Final pot: $126
UTG Shows Jc Qc


...Read more!

The group resumes...

We started this group back in July. A Cardrunners member called peterpjames had the idea of a group of low limit players starting blogs and forming a community that would help each other out. The idea was excellent, and it worked very well - there are still a lot of regular bloggers from the original core of us. Five of us decided to begin another group. We felt like we were perhaps the most serious and committed players at the time, and we felt that forming a "break-away" group would benefit our progression further. Our plan was to have a weekly group sweat session followed by a discussion, as well as simply being there for each other as we went along on our poker journey.

We started this site with the plan to track our progress, and to discuss topics and hands that we found interesting or important. Unfortunately, we fell back on updating the site and then left it alone altogether. Well, now we're in 2008, we plan on starting the site back up with regular updates. The original group began with five members: Alex (DWarrior), Jason (LuckySOB), Joe (Dice14), Martin (DODGYKEN), and Noel (peten2toms). Unfortunately, Alex has decided to stop playing poker for the foreseeable future so our group is now a foursome. We wish Alex all the best with his studies, and hope he returns to poker at some point.

The plan for the blog in the immediate future is to write up the interesting hands that come out of our weekly sweat session. We'll be writing up the discussion that takes place after the sweat on the most interesting hands, and it'll be posted on here. We'll also be updating our own stories at the bottom right of the page. Each of us will have a link, and you can click on that link to read about where we've come from, and where we're at now. Along with this, there will be other things put up on the site regularly, and we'll all continue to update our personal blogs.


All the best for 2008,

Jason, Joe, Martin, and Noel....Read more!