I’m guessing that almost everyone who reads this will already know what Slow Rolling is. This post is intended for that one person who doesn’t. If I can reach just one person who, thanks to having only played online, has never heard this before, then I’ve made the world a better place.
Slow Rolling is when you know you’ve won the hand–either because you have the nuts, or because your opponent has already tabled his hand following the final round of betting–and you deliberately take a long time about turning up your winner. The idea is to taunt, tease, and torment your opponent, making the suspense go on longer than necessary. That may be the single most egregious violation of poker etiquette possible (short of, perhaps, throwing playing cards Jesus Ferguson style at someone. Ferguson, of course, is a consummate gentleman who only throws cards at inanimate objects, but if you’ve ever seen him chop a carrot in half with a queen of spades, you’ll have some idea what I’m talking about).
Actually, I’ve just reminded myself of a section in Doyle Brunson’s Poker Wisdom of a Champion. Hold on while I dig it up…
…
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At least I think that’s the book it was in. I can’t find the quote for the life of me. Anyway, Brunson asserts that the two worst breaches of poker etiquette are slow rolling and asking to see the losing hand. You’ll just have to trust me on that. Unless someone else can come up with a cite? Anyone? Bueller?
Anyway, don’t slow roll. It’ll cause you to lose all respect at the poker table practically instantly.
Posted by Beck as Poker at 3:42 PM PDT
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To everyone who has ever said, “I hate getting aces,” or, “My aces always get cracked,” or, “I’d rather be dealt a pair of deuces than a pair of aces,” or anything else of the sort: you are a dumbass. Thank you for donating.
The closest thing to excusable would be the comment, “I hate playing aces,” since aces are a difficult hand to play because when you’re beat, they’re very hard to get away from. But hard decisions is what poker is all about. You make (or lose) the real money on the tough decisions, not the easy ones. Everyone can make easy decisions. Not everyone can make the correct tough decisions, just like how not everyone can win money playing poker. If you’re going to go into things with a negative attitude towards the best possible starting situation, you’re going to be foredoomed to endure negative results.
It’s just that simple.
Posted by Beck as Poker at 11:34 PM PDT
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The next time you’re dealt deuce-trey, whether suited or not, fold it.
Everyone knows that 7-2 offsuit is the worst starting hand in hold ‘em. What a lot of people don’t realize is that head’s up, the worst hand is 2-3 offsuit. Sure, if you’re on the button and half the table has limped in and it’s a no-limit game, you can limp in with it, but then you can limp in with any two cards in that situation where you can see a cheap multiway flop with high implied odds. Sure, play any two cards out of your small blind if you want. But don’t ever think you have a hand with any intrinsic value. Not ever. Stop playing 2-3 already!
Anytime I’m in a game and I see someone table 2-3, I smile inwardly. It’s an awful, awful hand. Here’s a few of the reasons why:
- If it’s suited, it’s drawing at the lowest possible, most easily beaten flush. If it’s not suited, then it’s that much worse.
- The only no gap connectors that can make fewer straights are A-2 and A-K, and those both benefit from having an ace. Only K-Q ties it.
- The only nut straight it can make is a wheel, and then any 6, 7, or 8 takes away the nuts.
- The only open-ended straight draw you can catch is to the ignorant end of said straight.
- It’s the hand with the most opportunities to be counterfeited.
- It has more hands which dominate it than any other hand.
- No one can ever have an underpair to your hand, so you basically need to always hit two cards to improve with confidence.
- If you connect, it will get outdrawn more often than any other connecting cards.
Don’t let the fact that they’re connected cards fool you. 2-3 is a horrible, -EV hand. Fold, fold, fold, and again, fold.
Posted by Beck as Poker at 1:50 PM PDT
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All the time, people at the poker table ask what you were holding when you drag a pot without a showdown. And I never tell. But I feel obligated to say something. I used to just say, “I forget,” which is basically the poker equivalent of telling someone to get bent. I didn’t like the sound of that though, so I took to saying, “Same thing you had: two cards.” But that tended to confuse people. So I switched to saying, “Two cards and a dream,” which I thought had a nice ring to it. The problem with that was people interpreted it as a declaration that I was bluffing. Then Mike Sexton (or some other poker announcer–I forget) used the phrase, and I didn’t want people to think I’d ripped it off.
Of course, some times people will ask if I had a hand and be dead wrong about what I had (typically when I’m bluffing). In many of those cases I’ll just wordlessly nod, thus reinforcing 1) their bad reads, and 2) their fear that I’m holding a monster any time I’m in a pot [number two applies because for some reason, people always assume the worst when they're asking about the hand you might have had].
Playing at Foxwoods last night, a new one came up, and I rather liked the results. Playing 2/5 NLHE at Foxwoods, I open raised to in EP with AQo. Two players called, and the flop came J-T-5. I fired out a continuation bet, one player folded, and another raised. He seemed weak, and with plenty of outs, I called. The turn was another five, pairing the board. I checked, my opponent bet, and reading him (correctly as it would turn out) as still quite weak, I raised all-in. He folded. Hand over.
I definitely had no intention of showing my hand after that play, but as I dragged the pot, the player to my left [who had not been involved in the hand] asked, “Tens full?” So I decided to give an honest and straightforward, if uninformative answer.
“I’d rather not say.”
The guy asking chuckled and quipped, “Actually, that says it pretty much right there.”
“Exactly,” remarked the fellow who had just been bluffed out of a large pot.
I think I finally found an answer to that question that I like.
Posted by Beck as Poker at 12:00 PM PDT
5 Comments »
From Terrence Chan’s blog, this is easily the funniest poker post I’ve read in a long while. Come to think of it, I can’t really remember the last funny anything I read about poker. So, hey, rare privilege!
Be sure to read through the comments as well.
Posted by Beck as Poker at 10:26 AM PDT
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So… read any good books lately? Drop a book review in the comments if the mood takes you.
One from me: The Book of Bluffs by Matt Lessinger. This book gets a solid thumbs up from me for two major reasons. Lessinger highlights the first reason early in the book by pointing out that while countless books have been written on poker strategy, no books have been written focusing exclusively on bluffs, and bluffs should be a serious part of anyone’s game. If you never bluff, you’ll never make any money outside of low stakes games. Not only do bluffs increase your win rate (when done correctly), they make you much less readable. The second reason is a concept which hadn’t occurred to me, yet which should be self evident: a bluff, in order to be successful, has to tell a story. Lessinger repeatedly emphasizes that a good bluff must be believable, that it must paint a convincing picture, and that you must have a reason for thinking your bluff will work. “The only way I could win the pot was to bluff at it” is not a reason why you think a bluff will work.
Most of the book is comprised of examples of “standard” bluffs that you can run, along with advice for frequency (how often you should try it), expected success rate, and difficulty. While the examples are both entertaining and valuable, the books primary value comes from its emphasis on the fundamentals of bluffing (especially considering that most people don’t even realize that bluffs have fundamentals). Overall, I give this book a “highly recommend you buy it” rating, just one notch below “must own”.
Posted by Beck as Poker at 2:45 PM PDT
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This happened in the 1/2 NLHE game at Foxwoods a couple weeks ago.
A player was down to $20 and was ready to double up or leave. He went all-in blind, got one call, got lucky, and doubled up. The next hand he went all-in blind again, got one call, got lucky, and doubled up. Having moved his stack up to $90 or so, he reverted to “normal” poker.
After a few hands, he open raised and wound up folding to a scary board and a big bet. When he folded, he showed a big pocket pair and made a joke about his luck. One orbit later, and down to about $75, he open raised to $10 under the gun. This guy had moderately loose (but not unreasonable) raising standards (at least when he wasn’t going all-in blind), but didn’t pay much attention to position. Two players called him, and I, sitting on the button, looked down at pocket 10s.
That’s the situation. There are a lot of things you can quickly recognize about the situation, and the ability to realize these things quickly and naturally come with experience, and are an important part of successful poker play.
I realized that he was a bit frustrated and a bit tilty. I realized that he was in a gambling mood. I realized that the players behind him probably weren’t that strong.
My standard play on the button with tens after a raise and two calls would be to smooth call and see what developed, taking advantage of my position to make the most or lose the least with my strong but vulnerable hand. This time, however, I raised to $50. Now ask yourself: what was I trying to accomplish and what did I hope would happen?
Well, I got just what I wanted. The UTG player thought about it a long time, finally smiled, said, “Let’s gamble,” and went all-in, and the other two players folded. [Note: often times the phrase "let's gamble" is a tell signaling a monster hand. In this case, I was confident it meant just what it said.] I called, naturally, and turned up my tens. The UTG player complimented the hand, but declared he was going to hold off on showing it. When the flop came A-J-9 I was pretty sure I’d been outdrawn. The king on the river reinforced that fear.
Then UTG turned up pocket 8s and I dragged the $170 pot.
Afterwards the player who had been in the big blind commented, “That was a pretty bold move with just pocket 10s.” I smiled and said I was feeling lucky, but inwardly I was smiling, proud of my read of the situation and ability to adroitly attain my desired result.
Of course, situations like that don’t come up very often. But as long as you’re always considering the mindset of other players, situations that are similar enough will come along more often than you might at first expect.
Posted by Beck as Poker, Poker Strategy at 2:29 PM PDT
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First up, how to handle offensive player behavior (with unexpected tag team from another player):
I had just cracked Irishluck7777’s pocket kings with AJ, doubling through him. I could have defended myself by pointing out that his preflop re-raise left me getting 3:1 express odds, and much better implied odds, but defending your play is never +EV. The ad hominem attacks actually began before he even called my all-in river bet. Oh, and his Full Tilt player icon was a gnome.
Irishluck7777: idiot
Dealer: Irishluck7777 has 15 seconds left to act
Beck: gnome
Dealer: Irishluck7777 has requested TIME
Hal2001: zzzzzz
Dealer: Beck shows two pair, Aces and Jacks
Dealer: Irishluck7777 shows a pair of Kings
Dealer: Beck wins the pot ($78.40) with two pair, Aces and
Jacks
Irishluck7777: !#$&ing die
Beck: i decline your offer
Irishluck7777: i hope youre family burns alive
Beck: your, not youre
donkeytard: please use proper grammar in “youre” insults
donkeytard: haha, beat me to it Beck
Beck: great minds, etc, etc
OK, looking at it again, it doesn’t seem quite as amusing as when it was happening. But it’s Friday Randomness time, and I’ll post what I want, damn it!
I call this next one, Suicide By Min Raise:
This is one of the strangest hands I’ve played in an online game, which is saying something. Ordinarily, I’m not a huge fan of just reading hand histories, but this one is… special. I’ve edited out the unnecessary bits (people folding preflop, etc) to make it marginally more tolerable. It’s too bad I was short stacked at the beginning of the hand.
vbace1234 posts the small blind of $1
Raceman1 posts the big blind of $2
The button is in seat #9
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Beck [7c 5c]
Hal2001 calls $2
Beck calls $2
Raceman1 raises to $4 [Min Raise #1]
Hal2001 calls $2
Beck calls $2
*** FLOP *** [7h 5h 3s]
Raceman1 bets $2
Hal2001 folds
Beck raises to $4 [Min Raise #2]
Raceman1 raises to $6 [Min Raise #3]
Beck raises to $10
Raceman1 raises to $14 [Min Raise #4]
Beck raises to $22
Raceman1 raises to $30 [Min Raise #5]
Beck raises to $37, and is all in
Raceman1 calls $5
Beck shows [7c 5c]
Raceman1 shows [Ah As]
*** TURN *** [7h 5h 3s] [9c]
*** RIVER *** [7h 5h 3s 9c] [Qd]
Beck shows two pair, Sevens and Fives
Raceman1 shows a pair of Aces
Beck wins the pot ($80) with two pair, Sevens and Fives
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $83 | Rake $3.00
Board: [7h 5h 3s 9c Qd]
Seat 2: Raceman1 (big blind) showed [Ah As] and lost with a pair of Aces
And that, my good readers, is how you misplay a pair of aces, price in 75s, get out drawn, then stack off.
Posted by Beck as Poker at 1:21 PM PDT
4 Comments »
A new player sits down at the table to your left, folds his first five hands, then re-raises your middle position pre-flop open-raise.
Do you include AK in his range of potential hands?
Posted by Beck as Poker at 10:14 AM PDT
3 Comments »
I just played a hand online which, afterwards, I was thinking about whether I could/should have played it differently in an attempt to get more money. That thought led me to the idea for a poker blog post. Here I solicit discussion on playing a hand.
The context for these hands is very important. These are intended to be pure “babe in the woods” type posts where you don’t really know anything about your opponent.
1) It’s an online hand, so you don’t have any real reads on the player
2) It’s a player you haven’t played before and don’t have more than perhaps 20-30 hands worth of history to go off (which is basically enough to begin gaging aggression and preflop standards, but not much else.
3) Your goal is to maximize EV in this situation over the long run. So while a play might work disastrously or wondrously on any given day, you want the play which will be the best performer over the long run.
So here’s the hand that got me thinking. I’ll be brief.
In a 1/2 NLHE game I open-raised 3XBB 2 off the button with Ac6c. The player on my left called (25% VP$IP, 12% PFR after 28 hands), everyone else folded. The flop came Ah 9s 6h giving me top & bottom pair. I bet 4XBB, the player on my left raised the minimum, I re-raised 8XBB, the player on my left folded. End of hand.
So what do you think? I was thinking a better way to play the hand might be to smooth call the raise, then check-raise the turn (unless a 9 came, counterfeiting my two pair). The min-raise in position, however, is often a sign that a player is on a big draw and looking to buy a cheap river card, so if a heart came on the turn (or a 10 or a 5), I’d either need to turn cautious (which could prove expensive, and because I was being timid, and the other player worried about a flush draw, could lead to me folding the best hand), or, if I still checkraised the turn despite a 3rd heart, I might not get any action as my opponent put me on a flush.
This type of situation comes up all the time. So how do you play it?
Posted by Beck as Poker, Poker Strategy at 12:18 PM PDT
4 Comments »
