I'm Baaaaaaaack. And Deja Vu in the 40k Guaranteed

First of all, continuing with a theme I first posted yesterday, I am officialy Back. I was playing like an absolute jagass for the better part of a week, but last night I officially put an end to my donkplay and came in second place in a $25 turbo sng. The actual profit was only a little over $40, but it's the thought that counts. After playing exclusively MTTs for the past several days, this was my first poker win of any kind since early last weekend, so it means a lot more than the actual cashish does. And plus, the only reason I didn't win the damn thing was because of this stupid dominating bad beat:



so I can't beat myself up over that too much. The point is, I have morphed back from donkey to man, after spending a week playing basically every 84o and T2o that came to me and not giving anyone credit for anything they would be willing to call my maniacal bets with. Ahh it was fun while it lasted, but being back to playing winning poker is a great place to be.

Secondly, while enjoying my newfound non-donkness on Thursday night, I had a horrible case of deja vu, of the worst possible kind of event having happened to me before. You will recall my recent post about how I lost in this week's Wednesday night Mookie tournament in the 14th hand of the tourney on this setup:



Well, last night after a quick IM chat with Surflexus, we both decided to make a run at the 40k guaranteed tournament on partypoker at 10:20pm ET. This is a tournament in which I have cashed a few times before, and ultimately it is the largest of the non-rebuy nightly guaranteed tourneys (more than twice as big as any other nightlies in fact) at anywhere near its buyin level. Things started off ok as I chipped up about 15% over the first 10 or 15 hands with a few well-timed bluffs, steals and maybe even some good cards or two thrown in just for fun. I was dealt Kings early and hit a King on a flop that also included an Ace, and I managed to grab another 1700 chips or so on that one play alone. Then, with just over 5000 in chips only 29 hands into the tournament, I actually won with the Hiltons!



Literally, the first time I can remember my Queens holding up in any meaningful way in at least several months, if not longer. Ever maybe. Effing biatches. Anyways, this hand got me up over 8400 chips, and into the top 20 out of over 1700 players remaining at the time (2421 entrants overall), and nearly twice the tournament average, and it was off to the races. I was back to playing well, I had accumulated a nice stack through smart play, and I could smell the cash coming as we crossed the threshold where less than 2/3 of the original field remained in the tournament. Just seven minutes after my chipup with the Hiltons, this hand happened, when I was not expecting it in the least:



Can you believe it? Knocked out of two MTTs in two consecutive days by my KK running into AA? In the Mookie, it was early in the tournament, such that I was left knowing that I never had a real chance in that thing because this was destined to happen on hand #14. In the party 40k last night, however, my preordained destruction did not occur until hand #39, and not until I had recorded several solid wins and made several solid poker plays to get where I was, into the top 30 out of 1600+ players remaining, and even then it had to happen with someone who was one of the half a percent of players then in the tournament who actually had more chips than I. So just like that, in the span of about 2 or 3 seconds (literally!), I go from thinking about what the 10k+ in cash for first prize will look like when I lay it all out on my bed, to IGMFH. Two days in a row. Effing rigged I tell you.

For those of you who don't already know, the next WPBT POY event has been set up for this weekend, Sunday night at 9:30pm ET to be exact. Check out Byron's site for the details, as always, and be sure to be there to play. Currently I'm in 47th on the wpbt leaderboard, which is incredible given how donkeyish I've played in these events for the most part. But then I look at the people ahead of me on the list, and I know I'm better than most of you, so....

Mistreated at the Mook

Well I have good news and bad news. The good news is that I'm Back Baby!!! After three or four straight days of nothing but early-exit MTTs and donking off chips, I can say after Wednesday night's action that I seem to have righted the ship. I managed to restrain myself from betting too aggressively and especially from pushing hard with cripey 94o and T2o hands like I have been going out of tournaments on lately. I felt back to my normal self at the virtual felt tables, and I'm feeling quite sure that I've put this latest episode of donkery behind me.

Now for the bad news. Last night's Mookie tournament involved me getting abused. Not by another player, not even by a suckout per se, but really just by the cards in general. What I mean to say is that, in all seriousness, it was preordained from the moment we sat down to play that I would be crippling myself on hand #14 of the event. Period. There was no way whatsoever for me to avoid this from happening. Take a look at the action on hand #14:



You gotta love those Kings-against-Aces hands. Fuckin pokerstars.

I would be remiss though if I didn't show this hand that occurred about 10 hands later, as I struggled to hold on to my lousy 350 chips that I had left after the fuckage above:



I think I love the DQBs just as much as I hate the KK vs. AA hands (when I'm on the side of the Kings). But two hands later, I moved in my ultrashort stack with the sOOted Hammer, and I lost to QJo, out in 30th place out of 34 entrants. A pathetic showing, but not one I can beat myself up over at all. No way I'm folding KK preflop to an allin raise, from anyone in the Mookie tournament.

Later in the evening I played a 180 sng, in which I got all the way to 45th place before busting out, despite winning less than 10 hands in the entire tournament, and not a single big hand after doubling up on the first hand with a sweetass boat over boat beat. I didn't cash, but believe me when I say that the way I had been playing this week, I could never have made it to 45th place. I played it smart and I played it strong, and even though I didn't quite make it to where I want to be, I proved to myself that I'm back and ready to play the quality of poker that I demand of myself in order to have a realistic shot at big MTT money.

Tonight I'll probably be playing the usual MTT suspects: $5 turbo on pokerstars at 10:39pm ET, the 17k guarantee on fulltilt and the 40k guarantee on party. Maybe I'll see you there.

Anatomy of a Slow Play -- Part Two (Updated With Results)

After last week's post, I thought it would be helpful to post another real-life hand example I have played in recent days where I was faced with what I thought had to be the best hand, as well as two opponents whom I wanted to dupe into giving me their chips.

A few nights ago I'm in the nightly Bracelet Race on FullTilt, and the blinds are up to the 80/160 level. I'm in the big blind, so I'm already in for 160 chips. The first two to act both fold preflop, and then 5th position (cryhrse) bumps it up but only 2x to 320 chips. Two more folds, and the cutoff (ZapperRon) calls the 320 bet. SB folds, and I look down to find K2s. Normally most definitely not a hand I would go to war with preflop, but for just 160 more into an 880-chip pot at that point, I had to make the call so I did. I watch the flop come out in stunned silence:



You gotta love it when you flop a boat, especially top boat where I have the stone nuts. There is hardly any better feeling in poker, other than maybe flopping quads or a straight flush (those are always okay too!), or maybe flopping two pair or better while playing the Hammer for a reraise preflop. So, there's already 1040 chips in the pot, and my goal now, along the lines of my previous post, is to figure out how I can get all the chips from both of the players in this pot with me. As I've discussed, that's just how I roll when I get a monster flop like this. So, with the action to me, I figure I'm not going to get paid if no one else hit this flop, so I check it. Not my usual move in a slowplay situation, but in this case where I have flopped the stone cold nuts, I figure I need to give someone else a chance to catch up a bit on the future cards. I was happy to see this betting action ensue after my flop check:



Cryhrse minbets, and ZapperRon ron calls that minbet. I figure that could mean a lot of things. Either one of my fishponents could hold a pocket pair, A solid Ace, or (hopefully) be slowplaying while holding the case King. Either way, in this case I still feel like I need to give someone else the chance to catch up to me, and although with the leadout bet and the call it is entirely possible that someone might call a not-too-large raise from me here, the one thing I do not want to do just yet at all costs is tip the strength of my hand. Surprise is my greatest asset here the way I have played this hand. I flat called a preflop raise of 2x out of the BB at pot odds that made a call compulsory. Then I checked the flop. As far as these guys are concerned, I could have the Hammer (actually, I would have raised with that...) or really any other two cards. In their eyes I've got nothing, and I don't want to do anything just yet to disabuse either of them of that notion. So, I just call, not worried about giving free cards with my nut boat still sitting out there, leaving 1520 chips in the pot as the turn card comes:



The 9 of diamonds. Not as good as a higher card coming for me, but it is also a second diamond, hopefully making someone a backdoor flush draw that they might be willing to call a smallish-sized bet with. I can't worry about someone having a K9 here, so I opt to just check it again, opting to keep with the charade that I have basically nothing in the hole. Again my element of surprise with this hand is the single best thing I have going for me right now, given the way this hand has played out. Cryhrse, the original preflop raiser also checks, which I found to be curious given his preflop raise and his minbet on the flop, but as I'm pondering what this could mean, ZapperRon puts in a smallish bet of his own:



The 320-chip bet represents barely one-fifth of the pot, so I can't read too much strength into this bet, and as these guys still don't have any clue what I have, and now with the second diamond falling on the turn, I want to keep both of these guys around as long as possible here, so I smooth call the 320. Again, you will barely ever see me slowplay a big hand for this long, especially online, but flopping the nut boat is one of those very few situations where I think this can be a useful, and not very risky, play. I was happy to see Cryhrse, the original preflop raiser, also call this small bet, building up what was now a sizable pot of 2480 chips heading into the river card, which I am hoping against hope will make someone a second-best hand that they simply can't get away from no matter what size bet I throw at them with my nuts. The river card comes the Jack of diamonds, making a possible backdoor flush on the board as well as a possible straight to anyone holding QT:



OK now here is the most interesting part of the hand to me. Obviously, I intend to bet this hand since the river is going to be my last chance to get some good money in here. But these guys might still think I literally have nothing, reading my preflop call as a pure pot odds move, then my flop call of the minbet as also a move that was clearly dictated by the odds being laid by the pot, and even the turn bet of 320 into a pot with over 1700 chips not indicating much strength. In the end, I figured that since Cryhrse had bet preflop and on the flop, and since ZapperRon had bet on the turn, I figured the odds were pretty solid that at least one of them would make some kind of a stab at the pot here. So, I did the thing that I figured would enable me to get one or both of these guys more pot committed:



That's right --- playing online, I checked the flop with the nuts, checked the turn with the nuts, and then checked again the river also holding what I was sure to be the nuts. You won't see me check all three streets in holdem probably more than once or twice a year, and really only in this situation, where I have a very hard to beat nutty hand right off the flop. But in this case this seemed to be the smartest, most strategic way to get chips into the pot and yet continue to throw my opponents off about the strength of my hand.

I was very pleased to see Cryhrse throw 800 chips out there to start the action:



ZapperRon thought for a while, and then folded. I was definitely disappointed in that I was hoping his turn bet meant he had either picked up two pairs or trips with the 9 on the turn, but in the end I got a solid 800 or so chips from his stack so I couldn't be too upset with that outcome.

Question: What's the money move here for me? I've definitely won the hand, right? Given my cards and the play of the hand thus far, do I raise here? How much? I need to come up with the amount that gets me the maximum amount of Cryhrse's chips, but not so much that he folds to my raise. What's the money move?

I will have my decision and the results of the hand posted later but want to give some time for your thoughts and responses before then.

**********************************************
Update With Hand Results:

Almost every time I'm faced with a decision at the river, it usually helps me to review the betting patterns and what's happened so far, to try to determine my opponent's likely holdings and the best way to deal with that range of holdings. So here, Cryhrse had led off the betting preflop with a curiously small 2x raise. Then he bet small on the flop, but his check on the turn seemed curious for a guy who just up and bet another 800 at me on the river. I read the strangely small preflop raise and the check on the turn as feigned weakness, and I was betting this guy had something playable. Not the stone nuts, but something he was willing to go to war with. So, I made the decision to move in on him:



And he responded:



Folded. Dammit. I'd love to tell you what he had, but I never saw it. Though I feel fairly sure it was a medium pocket pair. I think that's the best thing that fits the preflop 2x raise, the bet on the flop when a pair hit the board, and then the river bet when he thought he might be able to steal. Either way, I won 4080 chips with this slow-play, so I chalk that one up as another successful maneuver. Although I am pissed I didn't lay off a bit with this river bet. I'm sure I could have gotten a call for something less -- as many of the commenters have suggested, anything from 1000 to maybe 2500 or so would have probably worked better. I just thought he had played this hand like something he was willing to go with here.

Bastardly Tactic

This has come up with various bloggers over the last few days so I thought I would post it here for everyone to consider. This only applies to those of you who play often on pokerstars (for some reason there are still many of us), and it's a little tactic I use when I am pushing in on someone. It is an especially nice trick if I basically know I've snowed someone and they are about to dump me a significant slice of their stack. I will quote directly from my response to a comment to yesterday's post:

"I do purposely leave $1 behind with most of my allin bets on pokerstars. That's because I want to be able to talk smack to the victim while they ponder handing over their chips to me, and pokerstars doesn't allow chat during an allin situation (dont ask me the possible justification for this move). I'm all about psychological warfare man, and that $1 is often enough to megatilt someone with my pompous banter. You should try it sometime, it can be very liberating on pokerstars."

You should try it. There's nothing like taunting someone while they agonize over a bet that you already know they can't lay down, in a manner that is not usually available to you on pokerstars.

Is this wrong (said a la George Kostanza, of course)?

By the way, here is a really great quote for all the New Yorkers out there, from one of the funniest sites around. It is from Overheard in New York, a website that posts actual conversations that are actually heard and said by actual New Yorkers:

Girl #1: Can I see your digital camera for a sec?
Girl #2: Not now.
Girl #1: Why not?
Girl #2: This is 125th Street. A little risky to be taking out expensive electronics.
Girl #1: Understood. I'll ask again at 86th.

--4 train

Hoyazo = Donkey

That's right everyone, come and find me on pokerstars soon, because I am playing like an absolute donk these past few days. I've certainly taken some bad beats as well, but in all I've been playing when I'm not at my best, and the results have definitely been predictable.

In a nutshell, about a week ago Hammer the Youngest stopped sleeping through the night at 7 months of age. Not the "waking up at 2am for 5 minutes" kind of non-sleepage, but rather the "up every effing 45 minutes during the entire night" kind. The worst kind. As a result, my wife and I have been getting about as much sleep as Waffles locked in a room full of horny Japanese dominatrixes wearing schoolgirl uniforms. And since I have very little ability to stop playing regardless of my mood, I've been playing when I am way too tired and just generally feeling frustrated, and the results have defintely shown up in my game.

First, another shoutout to Jordan for setting up the NYC blogger homegame this past Friday evening. Without getting into the details, I picked up QQ once, and otherwise not a single playable hand in the entire night. Yet I stole pots with abandon, made a couple of big calls on flops which helped me somewhat, a lot of fun bluffs, and ended up busting out in 5th place in our 9-person tournament when I stoopidly pushed on the button preflop with 94o against who I thought was a weak limper in early position. Turned out he called me with AKo, and IGH. In the cash game I also didn't see a single playable hand, so had to resort again to bluffery and thievery to sustain myself, until I hit top two pairs on the turn with KJ on the same card as another player there hit a flush. I couldn't put him on the flush, though, since I had made sure to give him poor odds to draw to his flush with my flop bet with top pair 2nd kicker. Thing is, this guy ended up fishcalling that bet with just a jack-high flush draw and no other hit on the board, so when he made his flush on the turn I moved in on him because I figured he couldn't be so out of it to have called with just a flush draw. So even though I got donkeyed out of a buyin on that hand, again I clearly played it correctly. But the results for the evening were not good despite my smart play.

The tiredness factor really began to set in on Saturday, when I played a 180 sng on pokerstars and was doing quite well. I had outlasted Weak_Player and Garth already whom I didn't even know where in the tournament, and those two joined in along with Jules and Mr. 180 sng himself, Waffles in railbirding me as I progressed deep into the tournament. With 20 people left, this hand happened:



This fishclown moved me all-in on the flop with just top pair Queens and his smelly 3 kicker. But then on the effing river he took the pot down, taking my money that would have had me in the top 2 of the remaining 20 players. I was furious, and because of my level of fatigue and frustration, I got pretty damn steamy pretty damn fast. Then, to top it off, I played back against an obvious stealer from the small blind, and ended up allin preflop when my opponent turned over this hand:



I know why this happened; the guy was in the SB and looked 100% like he was stealing when he raised preflop after I limped with my AJo. I let fatigue and tilt convince me to put him allin, and he took a lot of my chips. Then the exact same thing happened on this hand, 5 hands later, against another small blind who had been steal-raising in this exact situation all night long:



I'm sure you won't fail to notice how my starting hand requirements seem to be dwindling with each play -- again, that is fatigue talking. And that hand knocked me out of the 180 sng, squarely on the bubble in 19th place with the top 18 getting paid.

By this point I was fully cognizant that I was playing like donkey, and I knew it was lack of sleep and just general moodiness that resulted from the lack of sleep. But did I stop playing until those conditions could be eliminated?

Sunday night's big game was the MissT74 WSOP satellite, playing winner-take-all with 22 other opponents for one seat to a $1000 WSOP event this summer. A lot of MissT's players and friends tend to be RGPers, so I figured I would be up against a bunch of cerebral poker studs who have been playing for a long time and have developed a certain layer of logical understanding of the game that I don't usually run into. Instead, I found a level of competition very similar to the players I run into regularly in the other blogger tournaments in which I play, albeit a little bit tighter as a group. I once again my stole way to some early chippage, and then won a very nice pot against a couple of short stacks to vault into first place among the 17 remaining players (including busting the gracious tournament hostess herself):



About 25 hands later, I had my Aces cracked for a large pot that really hurt me to lose:



but then I made up for that with a two-out suckout of my own on a short stack to stay alive:



Eventually I made the final table (albeit in 8th out of 9 players left) -- I was at the final table from which one winner would win a WSOP seat! Technically, this was by far the closest I had ever come to actually attending the World Series of Poker. But I had a lot of work to do to overcome 7 stacks larger than mine and win the tournament buyin. I played a smart game, pushed and stole as required, and managed to chip up into 5th place out of 8 players remaining. Then, with me in the big blind, the button raised big when it was folded around to him, and I reraised solidly with my AJo, against a guy who had stolen repeatedly and folded to reraises preflop from the button. He quick-calls me and flips over A4s against my AJo! I was about a 3.5-to-1 favorite to become the new chip leader at the table with 6 players left and a trip to the WSOP on the line!

Then this flop came in support of my dominating favorite hand:



He flopped a fucking flush with a dominated hand to send my dreams of the World Series back on hold for another year. What an effing animal to even make that play. I was and still am furious. That WSOP buyin was mine for the taking, and I was really controlling that table, and then this. F Pokerstars, F Tony Sopran0 (oddly enough, winner of last night's DADI V tournament as well, so congratulations you donkeyass mofo!), F it all.

It is against this backdrop that I entered the DADI tournament on Monday evening. I had been playing like pure donkey, suffered some horrendous and devastating beats, and was still tired out from another sleepless weekend. Funny thing is, I started off the DADI by winning the first five hands played at my table, staking me to a 7th place start out of the 78 entrants in the tournament. People like Jules, Byron and DNasty at my opening table just had to sit and watch me steal, steal and re-steal my way to 6 early hand victories without showing down any of the garbage I was actually playing.

Still though, my donkness quickly got the best of me, as I started to push too hard with less than optimal hands, and another favorite donkey move of mine these past couple of sleepy days, to "force" myself to read someone for a bluff when there was no actual reason to believe they were bluffing. The classic example of this was when I crippled myself with this donkey raise on a flop with which my cards did not connect at all:



He of course reraised me allin, and I had to fold. I figure he had at worst A9 (that would make him a fish), or more likely two pairs or trips. From this point on, I struggled to get back to respectability but never really recovered from my donkness. I did manage to double up once on a second-nut-flush made on the turn, and then again after donking off some more chips when my top and fourth pairs bested someone's second and fourth pairs, but in the end, I moved in on the flop with an open end straight draw on a flop that was highly unlikely to have hit my opponent's hand:



got called by KT, and IGH in 66th place out of 78 entrants. And congratulations to Lifesagrind who wins the bounty of the poker chip shower curtain, which I will be sending out this week, as well as to Mr. Sopran0 who took down the entire DADI tournament for the big victory, one day after busting me from the WSOP satellite after I totally abused him preflop.

One quick point on this: throughout this post I've referred to myself and my recent play as donkeyish several times, but never as "fishy". Fishy means playing weak, like one of these pussies who lets me begs me to bet them out of every pot on the flop in the 70% of hands where they don't hit anything worth defending, or it means making a call on the flop at poor odds with just a draw, because you don't know what you're doing. It's important for my own personal edification that I clearly state that I have not been playing like a fish of any kind these past few days, and did not again in the DADI on Monday night. I'm not sitting around making dumb calls and waiting for people to take my money. Instead, I am over-aggressively giving my money, and that to me is not fishy. It donkish. And donkish is me lately.

But watch out everyone. Monday night was my first good night of sleep in days. Mrs. Hammer and I have finally agreed to just let the Youngest Hammer put herself back to sleep unless she really goes nuts screaming, and as a result we got about 6 or 7 straight hours last night for the first time in a long time. So I should be back on the tables tonight and ready to take everyone's money. So many donkeys, so little time....

Bounty on My Head Tonight at the DADI

I just wanted to officially post here that I am placing a bounty on my head at tonight's DADI event. Whoever hits the 3-or-less-outer to bust me out of tonight's DADI tournament starting at 9pm ET will get their very own poker chip shower curtain. Quite the novelty item for the casino supplier or the aspiring poker addict enthusiast in your life. And all you have to do is call me with your mf'ing JKs against my AKs, and spike a jack on the river like everyone else did to me this weekend on the tables.
Note: The winner of this bounty will undoubtedly be a donkey.

Anatomy of a Slow Play -- Hand Result

Here's what the two guys I abused from the last post actually held in their hands:



Congratulations to Wes, who nailed the results spot-on. Either he makes great reads, or he figured out my naming convention for the screen shots and just checked it out for himself. ;)

More later on my weekend poker action. Which sucked btw, I'll tell you that right now.

Anatomy of a Slow Play (Updated With Results)

"If you're going to sell your car, you polish the tires first."

I heard Mike Francesa say this yesterday on the radio about how the Knicks need to repair relations with Stephon Marbury in order to better be able to convince someone to trade for him. The Knicks have to make him look good, look attractive to someone else, so they can get someone to pay them a good price for the player. They're not going to get what they want by continuing to make Marbury look bad, or even by neutrally acting like they like him but not enough to want to fight for him.

I follow this exact same approach when I'm slow playing a monster hand in no limit holdem. You have to make the hand look like something which your opponents want to play against you, before you try to get them to buy your bet for all their chips. And, although many of you probably don't know this about me, I take my slow playing very seriously. See, the thing that I really get is that slowplaying is a lot more than just checking your trips on the flop, and then reraising big on the turn for a nice-sized win. It's an entire act, a whole production, which if executed perfectly almost always has the capability to get you the other guy's entire stack. That's always my main goal when I am dealt or flop a monster hand -- not "how can I win this hand?" or even "how much money can I extract from my opponent with this hand?", but rather "how am I going to get every single solitary chip in that guy's sorry stack over to my pile right here?" That is the goal every time, and every single action, inaction, delay, bet, etc. from the moment the hand is dealt until the moment you rake in the chips should all be designed to get you to that goal of your victim's entire stack coming your way.

If the above is not the way you're playing your slow plays, then there is room for improvement. In my next few posts I'm going to show you exactly how I slow-play a big hand, with real-life illustrations from a couple of big hands I've recently played in tournaments online. I'll take you through my thinking each step of the way, why I did what I did, and how well it worked for me in each case.

A couple of nights ago, I'm 15 or 20 minutes into an 18 person sng on pokerstars, and I look down to find pocket Aces on the button. With blinds of 15 and 30, there are only two late-position limpers into the pot when it gets back around to me.

Rule #1: Slow-playing a monster hand before the flop -- especially online -- does not mean quietly limping preflop, in particular in late position with only two late-position limpers in front of you. As I mentioned earlier in the week, if you regularly limp into pots with your premium hands, high pairs especially, then you will frequently lose those hands eventually, to the suited connectors, Axs and all the other fish you allowed to get a cheap look at the flop. They flop a draw, you can't chase them out, they hit their draw on the turn or the river, and then I have to read your blog the next day about how your Aces got cracked on the river by some clown's JTs. Don't blame them. If you're regularly (or even semi-regularly) limping in preflop online with your Aces and Kings, then you should blame yourself, not only for allowing, but for in fact encouraging your opponents to stick around by enhancing their implied odds to call by calling yourself.

Following this advice, I put in a standard preflop raise of 5x the big blind, or to 150 chips. This was enough to knock out the blinds -- something I am not at all unhappy with, since I want to get the iffy drawing-type of hands out of this pot early -- and my two late limpers each decide to call my largeish bet preflop. This gets me two things: 1. It tells me that at least one if not both of them, assuming they aren't total fish, is on some kind of a hand. I love this, as I want nothing more than for them to be holding KK and QQ, or AK and AQ, something like that. And 2. I also know that these two are types who do not like to fold to a smallish raise once they've already invested something in the pot. And of course, I've gotten 450 more chips into the pot with my obvious favorite over whatever they happen to be holding, bringing the total pot before the flop up to 495 chips.

Here comes the flop:



I, of course, am thrilled about this flop. I've hit top trips, there is no flush draw possible, and the possible straight draws (T9, 56 and 69) should have already been chased out by my 5x raise preflop, so although I need to keep that possibility in the back of my mind, it isn't something I really need to be concerned about right now. So, how am I going to play this to get all of my my opponent's (in this case, all of both opponents') stacks?

Well, for starters I can't let these guys know I've hit a monster. In fact, given that I led out with a 5x raise preflop, and an Ace hit the board, my first concern has to be with making sure at least one if not both of these guys stays in the pot. If anything, ideally I want them to think that I'm the one concerned that an Ace came on the flop (like I would be if I had, say, Kings or Queens in the pocket, for example). That's my objective on a flop like this.

Rule #2: Slow-playing a monster on the flop also does not mean just check-calling the flop. As with the preflop situation, the right thing for me to do here, assuming my opponents are decent poker players, is not to just check, in that a check on the flop after a 5x reraise preflop from me would likely set off some bells in the heads of my more observant and skilled opponents. Rather, my game on the flop should be to do whatever is necessary to make these guys think I have something in my hand, but that I don't love the flop, and in particular the Ace on this flop.

So, both opponents check to me on this flop. Here's my move:



A bet of 150 into a pot with 495 chips. #1 only a poosay is going to fold to this bet from just a pot odds perspective, so I accomplish my goal of keeping these two guys around to hopefully hit something on the turn or river and bluff me off some more chips. #2, this will add another 450 chips to the pot which I am nearly guaranteed to win, and, most importantly, by betting just 30% of the pot, I am subtly planting the idea in my opponents' heads that I'm not happy with this flop for my pocket cards. I've made it look like I was taking a last feeble stab at the pot on the flop after my 5x raise preflop failed to get me the chips. This subtle impression I've (maybe even just subconciously) planted will come in handy again shortly.

So did my 150-chip bet work in convincing these guys that I am weak enough for them to call with? Yes, big time. The first guy flat called my 150 bet. That tells me that he doesn't like what he has either, but he has fallen for the pot-odds factor with my 150 chip bet in the hopes of hitting something on the turn or river, or maybe trying to bluff me out of the pot later. I guarantee you if I had checked my trips on the flop, he would have checked along as well, so that would be at least 150 chips of lost equity for me in this pot by doing the super-weak thing and checking the flop. And then, the second guy clearly thinks he's got a bead on me. It's fairly obvious that the guy to his right is weak with his flat call of my 150 bet on flop, but this second opponent has taken the bait hook, line and sinker. I'm building him a story -- I made a largeish 5x raise preflop against two late position raisers, I might have been stealing entirely or maybe I have a medium pocket pair or two paints, but in any case he thinks he knows I am scared of the Ace on the board. And he's going to take the pot right now with a raise to 450. So by my subterfuge from the very moment I saw my hole cards, I now have made two decent-sized bets in this hand, getting 2 callers on the flop, and now one caller and the other guy raising me already in this pot. So far the execution has been flawless. But the best acting is yet to come.

So, how do I best handle BigSpendurrr's raise on the flop here, to ensure that I get both him and bobhope to call me for the rest of my chips? I could just smooth call's Big's raise. But why wait for another street to get him to commit, when if he is on a draw he will likely not be willing to pay to draw at the river, but obviously likes what he has enough to be willing to draw with two cards to come? Seems to me now is my best chance of getting him to commit for my other 520 chips, and I don't want bobhope to fold either. So what do I do?



That's right, I reraise Big's raise of my small probe-looking bet on the flop, but only to a measly 750 chips, not even twice his raise. What I'm doing here is telling these two guys that I still think I have something strong in the pocket, but nothing that I'm willing to put in a large reraise with. That is enough to get two quick-calls from my opponents, and still so far this slow play is proceeding to perfection, and I've now gotten bobhope to commit his entire stack on what should be a losing hand from the beginning:



To any kind of an astute player, the vibe I've given off here says one of two things at this point: Either (1) I have a medium-high Ace (AT, AJ) and needed to find out where I'm at with my raise to 750 on the flop, or (2) I have QQ or KK in the pocket and wanted to take another desperate stab to win the pot with my raise. Either way, these guys are both cooked. And notice again how my actions have managed to get not one but both of these guys basically pot-committed against my trip Aces nuts hand on the flop.

And the King on the turn helps me as well, because I figure the King is the most likely holding other than an Ace (which is already on the board) given that these two players both called a 5x raise before the flop. So much so, that when the King is out, bobhope is already all-in, and Biggie isn't going to wait around for me to reraise him again. He just puts me all-in right away:



And I can call, knowing I have the stone nuts at this point in the hand, and that at best my opponents are drawing to just a small handful of straight- or full house-producing outs.

Anybody care to guess what these two guys were holding in their respective hands? I'll put that on the blog after giving some time for people to post their guesses.

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Update with Hand Results:

Here's what the two guys I abused from the last post actually held in their hands:



Congratulations to Wes, who nailed the results spot-on. Either he makes great reads, or he figured out my naming convention for the screen shots and just checked it out for himself. ;)

More later on my weekend poker action. Which sucked btw, I'll tell you that right now.

Rollercoaster at the Mook

A lot of crazy and mostly bad stuff happened to me last night on the virtual tables. I started off by playing in the weekly Mookie tournament at the Big O Poker Room on pokerstars. I've played in this event three times I think, with only one final table quick exit to show for it. People say tournaments like this are more for the cameraderie, trash talk and general atmosphere than for winning. I think that's bullshit. Yeah I'm there to talk trash. But I'm also there to walk all over everyone in the field. Every week. Last night I came with my guns blazing, ready to play hyper-aggressively and really put some moves on the people I like to play with regularly.

The tournament gave me a chance at a marquee-type of hand right away. In my last post, I was just explaining how terrible of a decision it is generally to slow-play a monster like Kings or Aces online. "Especially on pokerstars" I said in fact. In the very first hand of Mookie's tournament, Katitude failed to heed my advice. Kat limped in with Kings in middle position for a 20-chip blind. One other limper, and then I raised it to 100 with KQs (diamonds). Not a hand I'm going to call an allin reraise with for sure, but something I like to try to isolate with so I can be heads-up with it, maximizing my chances with a hand like KQ. My raise works, and it's just Kat and I to see a flop of Q26 with 2 hearts and a diamond. More or less a dream flop as far as I'm concerned. I've hit top pair and 2nd kicker, and no reason to think I'm anything but way ahead here. After limp-calling with her Kings preflop, Kat now checks her overpair to me (do you not read my blog, Kat?). Into the 290 chip pot, I decide to win this one right here, just in case Kat is chasing a flush (my notes on her indicate she will do this from time to time). I bet 400. Kat mulls it over, and surprisingly calls me. Immediately I'm thinking I might be beat. But I have definitely seen Kat chase flushes, even at subpar odds, so I can't be sure of anything. But I've played with Kat enough to know that if she had nothing on the flop, she would have folded, that I am sure of.

The flop comes a 3 of diamonds. This doesn't help me, although it does give me a longshot draw at the second-nut flush. Kat, who has just limp-called with Kings preflop, then check-called a bet 1.3 times the size of the pot with an overpair Kings on the flop, now checks to me again (obviously Kat really doesn't have any respect for the advice in my blog). The pot now has 1090 in it, so I want this pot, and I still think I might have the best hand. With Kat's check on the turn rag, I now know she either has a busted draw or a monster. I should check. But instead, I bet a little more than the size of the pot again, 1200 chips. I figure, I came here to play aggressively and put on some moves tonight, Kat is one of my good poker friends, and I think I might have the best hand. Kat thinks for a few, and then calls it. The bells are now pealing loudly in my head. Now I know what I'm up against. It's either Kings, Aces, or trips on the flop. The Kat that I know wouldn't chase that flush after the turn card, especially not when risking the humiliation of being the very first person knocked out of a blogger tournament like this. I only have about 500 chips left, and I'm drawing dead to at most 8 or 9 outs (the remaining diamonds for a runner runner flush). I'm pissed that I didn't rein it in when my spidey sense first starting tingling after Kat smooth called my flop bet. I hate when I let my aggression donk off more chips than I should on a losing hand.

Anyways, I'm already steaming just about 90 seconds in to the Mookie tournament, and here comes the river: Another diamond! Kat moves in for her remaining couple hundred chips, I have to call obviously for a lot of reasons, and she flips up:



There's the Kings. I busted Kat on the very first hand of the Mookie last night, by sucking out a sick runner runner flush against her overpair to the board with pocket Kings. The thing is, this was surely a suckout, but surely not something that was just plain bad luck. It was bad luck for Kat, but all serious online poker players will tell you that if you limp in with a monster, and make no move to win the pot on the flop or turn, you are just asking to be sugged out on. Pokerstars is not kind to slowplayers. Don't forget it.

So this is the part where I tell you all the great things I did last night with the early chip lead in the Mook. Well, take a look at this hand that happened literally 3 hands after I busted Kat:



We got it all in on the turn, and then I lost with the second-nut flush to the nut flush's allin bet on the river, when we both had two of the flush suit in our hand. It's the ultimate can't-possibly-get-away-from hand in a no limit holdem tournament, and I got dealt it. There was only one card in the deck that could have beaten me (the King of Clubs), and it had to be in my opponent's hand along with another club, of which I had two and there were three more on the board. Eight more clubs in the entire deck, and my opponent had to have two of them, including the King of Clubs. I challenge anyone to lay that hand down in that situation, period. Regardless of the betting up to that point (which btw consisted of both of us betting fairly conservatively, because of the Ace on the flop which neither of us had a piece of).

Needless to say, this hand put me on mf'ing ubertilt. I think I made it two hands later until I just angrily pushed with that killer hand 92o. Just to stick it to my tilting ass, pokerstars went and gave my opponent a full house by the turn.



So that was me, out in 36th out of 42 players in the Mook. Congrats to Miami Don for knocking me and my 9-2 offsuit out of the tourney, and to RoccoBoxer who took it all down in the end. See you all next week I'm sure.

More later....

WWdN Tuesday

It was a good night for WWdN. After another solid weekend, I had played donkily at the blogger charity event on Sunday and through most of Monday as well. This same thing happend last week, and then last Tuesday I logged in at 8:30pm New York time to see a lofty 78 people signed up for Wil's weekly tournament, one which I ended up final tabling for the second straight week. So last night when I sat down to find 98 entrants to the tourney, I had a similar feeling of optimism about my coming performance.

Then I looked at my opening table, and the color started to drain from my face:



You can see from the comments that others felt similarly. BadBlood, StB, Trip, not-will-wonka, myself of course, in addition to former WWdN winner Heffmike and a couple of unknowns rounded out what was without a doubt the best worst starting table I've had at any blogger tournament. I could instantly feel my dreams of a Wes-esque threepeat at the WWdN final table slipping away right from the get-go.

I started out playing my usual aggressive game. I lost a decent-sized pot early when I had to fold a medium-strength hand to a well-timed reraise of my pot-sized flop bet, so I was down to in the 1200s early from a starting point of 1500 chips. But then I slow-played Kings and won my way back to even. Warning: Do not try this at home. Anyone who slow-plays Kings, in particular online, and doubly in particular on pokerstars, will regularly be slammed with at least one Ace on the flop, or three flush or straight cards, another high pair, etc. You only slow play these monster hands just barely enough to keep people guessing. And not any more often than that. Ever.

It was like that for most of the first session of the WWdN, and I was extremely card dead, getting really not one other playable hand beyond those Kings early on. Then on Hand #58 of the tournament, I was dealt ATs in middle position, with which I made a standard 4x raise before the flop. Blood quickly moves allin from last position when it folds around to him. Now, I've seen Blood do this before, mostly where he is on a shortish stack (he was here) in situations where he has medium pairs, AK or even the Hammer. I figured I was the favorite over most of his likely holdings with this move, so I called, hoping for the Hammer, but seeing him flip 88 instead. I did not hit an Ace or a Ten on the board, but I did make a runnerrunner flush to win it on the river. It didn't look pretty the way I busted BadBlood, but in my defense I have to say that I was only a 52.4% to 47.2% dog, so this was not a bad beat. And frankly, any time you can get a guy like BadBlood off of your table for good, you thank your stars and take it. In accordance with my long-term policy never to apologize for bad beating anyone, I won't say I'm sorry for anything. But I will admit, and I told Blood so, that I wish he didn't get booted like that. But I'll take it, as that win propelled me up to around 19th place out of 65 or so players remaining at that point.

In the 65th hand of the tourney, I busted unknown player Alexe55 who was also on a short stack at the time. With blinds at the 50/100 level, Alexe55 raised to 300 preflop from late-mid position, a place where I had watched (and noted) him steal-raise from no fewer than four times already in this tournament. I pegged that as "his move", so I reraised him back to 750 with my KJo, thinking I probably had the best hand, or at least 1 or two overs, so I was in ok shape regardless. He pondered just long enough to tell me he knew he was done but was going to push because he had committed himself to the pot, so I knew to call his re-reraise, and when we flipped, my read was right on:



My dominating hand held up, and I was up to 13th place out of 60 left. In fact I entered the first break after 68 hands, having won 11 out of the 68 hands (16%), but my problem was card deadness, as I only saw 13% of the flops, far less than where I am when I'm on my game. Nonetheless, I felt great to have been able to survive to the first break, and in fact to have excelled, at such a recockulously tough table to begin with.

The thing was, the second session didn't bring me any better luck with my starting cards than the first session did. In fact, I literally didn't get a single hand that you would consider "playable" for the first 50 hands, almost 45 minutes, following the first break. I basically sat around, stole a few blinds, had a couple of hands folded around to me because everyone fears (correctly) that I will raise them and steal if they have nothing, but that was it for most of Round 2. Then on Hand #118, I raised 4x preflop from middle position with AQs, my first playable hand in 45 minutes, and was reraised allin by a late-position player on a stack about 1/3 the size of my stack. Pot odds and his short stack-worthy lessened raising requirements dictated that I call, and my AQs lost out to his 66, knocking me back down to around 2400 chips.

By Hand #130, my card deadness had prolonged to such an uncommon degree that my flops-seen percentage had dwindled from an already lowly 13% at the first break to now 8%. Again, those of you who know me or have played with me before will know how abusrdly unusual it is for me so see only 8% of flops. I'm usually up around three times that, if not more, especially in just Round 2 of a nlh tournament. Let's just say that my cards were absolute cripe in the WWdN and leave it at that. So, in Hand #130, I was dealt T8o, a total crap hand without argument. It was folded around to StB in late position, who put in a standard blind-stealing raise for him of 4x the big blind which was an $800 bet at the time. Now, I have personally watched StB put in this same raise on at least twenty different occasions in a large number of blogger tournaments, and I have personally reraised him out or seen others reraise him out of pots because he's been stealing in those situations, so I knew his raise didn't mean shiat. I was so sure in fact, that I decided to take my small stack (at the time I was in 26th out of 32 remaining players) and reraise him allin, hoping to get him to fold his obvious garbage and retain his 4000-chip pile. He pondered for a few seconds, and then calls, flipping mf'ing AKo:



And IGH in 32nd place out of 98 entrants. Not a bad showing, and in fact I played great against some very tough competition with what was the worst set of starting hands I've ever consistently encountered in a tournament, but obviously you just hate going out on a hand like T8o. Oh well. Next week I'll have to start a new streak of WWdN final tables. And congratulations to Maudie for taking down the tournament, way to go. I love it when a well known blogger wins these things, that always seems to make it more fun to me.

After busting out of the WWdN, I played an 18-person sng on pokerstars with GCox, Jordan and Mookie. Gary went out first or second on some bad luck, but I messed with several people's heads at my starting table, and entered the final table with a massive stack:



Unfortunately, one of the players at the table was the resident luckbox, time and time again spiking stoopid cards at very low odds, and eventually this gem happened with Mr. Lucky to me to knock me out on the bubble:



Gotta love that one.

OK I'm going to try to play in Mookie's tournament this evening, I'd say the odds of my attendance are about 95%. Especially since it is in Drewspop's honor tonight. Hopefully I'll see you there.

Resolution to Hot Hand #2

Once again thanks to everyone for the thoughtful insights and comments to Hot Hand #2. I'm going to post the results of the hand here. I'll also point out that this time, nobody guessed correctly what the donkfish was holding. But that's a good sign, because I would argue that anyone who could get a read on this hand has some serious mental issues and an even more serious total lack of poker thinking.

By way of summary (you can read all the details in the next most recent entry to the blog below), I was dealt pocket Queens in middle position. I raised it up 3x the big blind, and only the big blind called. The flop came J53 with two hearts. My opponent bet 400 into a pot of 1080, which I raised to 1200 with my overpair and with the potential flush draw out there. He called. The turn came the 8 of hearts. My fishponent bet 160 into a pot of 3480 (Gutless!! Gutless!!). I raised it up to 1200 once again with my overpair, which my opponent again called. Then the river was a 3 of hearts, making four hearts to the board and leaving me sure I had lost to a brutal runner-runner flush for basically all my chips.

When we flipped our cards, my overpair Queens was up against:



That's right, folks. The fishdonk had AQo, with the Ace of hearts. So, my read had been right on all along, almost to a tee. And the cards absolutely schmeistered me with the runner-runner flush to knock me out of the tournament (actually I had a few chips left, which I built up a bit until this bad beat on the river eventually did me in officially, but you get the idea).

But moreso than the incredibly horrific cards I ran into in order to lose this megapot in Hot Hand #2, I would really like to hear everyone's thoughts on what this fish could possibly have been thinking with his calls on the flop and the turn. I mean, I might be able to accept that he was willing to call off an appropriate portion of his hard-earned stack with just the backdoor nut flush draw and the two overs, but I saw to it personally with my flop raise that he definitely did not have the odds to make the call on the flop, not with the possibility that I could be four-flushing, have top pair, or even have ANY pair for that matter. That was a redonkulous call, was it not?

Even worse than that call, when the third heart came on the turn, yes that gave him the runnerrunner nut flush draw, but it could have also made me my complete flush, and he still had stone cold nothing. Not even AK-high. Just AQ-high and a 1-card flush draw, in a pot that his opponent had bet strongly into twice. And I properly put it to him on the turn, reading his cards almost exactly, and charging him basically all of his remaining chips on the turn to stay in on his 20% flush draw / Ace draw (and he couldn't even know that an Ace would win it for him, after my aggressive betting along the way in the hand). Again, unless I am missing something, is this not one of the donkiest plays in the history of poker blogger tournaments?

Now tell me, would any of you have been able to put this guy on this hand? Even I, who read him more or less like a book in this hand, still put him on the Ace of hearts and a Jack, for top pair on the flop at least. To call my large flop bet for around a third of his hard-earned stack, with nothing but two overcards and a backdoor nut flush draw, that is just inexplicably donkalicious to me. Then to call again on the turn with still just the two overs, but now a flush draw instead with just one card to come, it's pure donkfish. And yet IGH from a tournament I had been given a second and even a third chance in, and was finally just starting to turn things around and made it to the top 10 of the remaining players. Just. Plain. Sick.

Am I wrong here guys??!! Could I possibly have avoided this outcome given the way the cards fell?

Lots of Poker Content, Another Blogger Tournament and "Hot Hand" #2

Lots of poker content to post today, so I'll get right to it.

First of all, an interesting development occurred this weekend for me online. I got convinced by a bunch of bloggers to venture back to the cash games, an arena which I decided not to dabble in several months ago. Late last year I was struggling my way through the growing pains of beginning to play poker online. I've been playing in casinos and at home games for nearly 20 years, for the most part with good success. When I started playing online, I played those games exactly like I would play in a b&m casino, which those of you who often do both will know is a mistake. Aside from a couple of big wins, I lost a lot for my first few months of playing online. Eventually I found my way from the $1 and $2 MTTs on pokerstars and some low-buyin sngs on partypoker to the cash games, with the possibilities for significant wins and quick hits that are just not as easy to come by in $2 buyin tournaments populated by 2200 donkfishes and myself. However, not really understanding the vagaries of online vs. live play, I took lumps at the online cash tables. Lots of them. To the point that I basically decided not to play online cash games after a few too many suckouts and bad beats for large pots. Aside from the occasional blogger donkfest at $.01-.02 omaha, this is a decision I have stuck with for the last several months, while my tournament game has turned around and become clearly positive thanks to at least one final table and significant payday in a large MTT in each of the past four months.

It is against this backdrop that I let a bunch of bloggers talk me into joining them at $.10-.25 nlh on pokerstars this past weekend. The list of players included GCox, Garth, Wes, SoxLover (a fellow New Yorker and someone with whom I've never played before outside of a blogger tournament), and later jjok joined in the fun as well, and as we sat down I was determined to play things close to the vest, much tighter than my usual tournament game, as I was NOT about to come out and get felted quick in front of this bunch of bloggers, as would have been commonplace last year when I was learning the ropes of playing online cash games. I was not going to bet at every flop regardless of my hole cards when checked to me, and I was not going to play Ax and other fishy hands like that just for the sake of having a good time with the bloggers.

Problem is, I couldn't help it. As the first cards were about to be dealt, I was positive I had a handle on my normally aggressive play. But when we started playing, the first hand was checked to me on the flop by two preflop limpers, and while my mind said "check", I watched my finger click on the button that said "bet" right after watching my hand raise the bet amount to the size of the pot. I was quickly folded to by both limpers, and thus began my return to the cash tables for the first real time in 2006, since I seem to have come into my own in terms of my online play and results. Long story short, I bluffed a lot, raised and showed a couple of Hammers, and then hit a couple of hands and got paid on them because of all of the betting I was doing -- in short, I played much the same game as I play in nlh tournaments nowadays. And not only did I have a blast playing with the other bloggers, but the results were the kind I like as well (this was after I bought in for the table max of $25):



Now don't get me wrong -- I'm not trying to act like these dollar amounts are anything special whatsoever. It's just a few bucks, it's low limit stuff, and I know that. But still, these are the limits I played at at some point during October/November of 2005, and consistently lost at to the point of a complete swearoff of playing on those tables anymore. Now, I played against bloggers and nearly tripled my buyin. It was awesome and a great time. So great that I also joined another group of bloggers at a Limit holdem cash table, a game I have played no more than one time during my brief online career, with similar results after a $25 buyin:



Later in the weekend, I ventured out into Full Tilt's cash nlh games, also with solid results thanks to my tight but uber-aggressive style as developed this year (also with a $25 table max buyin):



So you may be seeing more of me at the cash games in the future on pokerstars, partypoker and full tilt.

Also, a big shout out goes to fellow blogger Garth for his huge win at a 180 sng on party, to the tune of over a grand for first prize. Way to go, Garth! Sir Waffles must be so proud.

In other news, I played like an uberdonkey in the WPBT charity event held on Sunday night, April 16, and should not even have made it as far as I did, which was 30th place out of 61 entrants. I mean, I played like an absolute moron. I hate when that happens and it feels like I can't actually control it. Every time I bluff-raised for any reason, I was reraised big and had to fold. It happened so often, in fact, that evntually I started calling the reraises, knowing ahead of time that I was behind. Why would I do that? But I did it at least three times. The first time I lost to another top pair but better kicker than my Ten, donking off around 2/3 of my stack on that one fishcall. I was too disgusted to screen shot it even. The second time I called a big reraise knowing I was behind, I managed to effectively cripple Columbo, the second time I have bad beat him out of a blogger tourney in the past couple of months, when my A7 sucked out on his AK or something like that. I was too busy typing "gl" and "nh" into the chat to get a screenshot of that one either, but the point is, I really lucked out when my lower kicker hit the board, our common card came on the river but I sucked one out there for sure. Then, a short while later I hee-hawed my way into this hand on a short stack against Drizz:



The thing is, after this second suckout on another hand when I absolutely knew I was behind, and probably dominatedly behind, but still called anyways, I had kind of a wakeup call. Like Tony Soprano, I felt like I had been given a second chance at life in this tournament, and I was going to start playing smart and turn things around. The two sets of pocket Kings that I received within the next 10 hands helped things turn around quite a bit as well, culminating with me in 10th place with 37 players left in the tournament, and leading up to my Hot Hand #2:

I'm dealt pocket Queens in middle position:



Knowing how to play holdem properly, I raised it up 3x to 480, a bet which was called only by the original big blind in the hand, bringing the pot total before the flop to 1080, already a nice sum compared to the current stack sizes, and the flop comes great for me, with three undercards to my Queens, two hearts and no reasonable straight draws:



He leads out with a bet of 400 into the 1080 pot, which I took to mean that he was on a draw of some kind, or just two high cards. I couldn't see this guy, whom I had played with at this table for some time already, betting this way with any Jack in his hand. So, again, knowing how to play holdem correctly, putting my opponent on a draw, and wanting to win right away with those devious Hilton sisters, I raised his ass then and there to 1200, nearly the size of the pot with his raise in there:



Question #1: Did I play this correctly? I can't imagine just letting him play with a likely draw when I have an overpair, but one that instantly loses to any King or any Ace hitting the board on the turn or the river. But if you feel differently, do tell.

My thinking was that I had to give him bad odds to call with any kind of a draw, and at that point I was just hoping he might make a crying call with a medium Jack or something like that. But in reality anyone but an utter donque would have to fold to my 1200 raise at that point without some kind of a big hand. He agonizes for a good 25 seconds before calling my bet. The next card comes:



My fishponent bets out 160 chips into a pot that currently already has 3480 chips in it. I can just hear Doyle screaming out "Gutless bet!!" from his ranch in Montana or wherever he is right now.

Question #2: How do you play it now? I of course am annoyed about the third heart falling. But the biggest reason for my large raise on the flop was to get rid of the guy who was going for a flush draw. After he agonizingly called my large flop raise, getting only slightly better than 2-to-1 for his call, I couldn't realistically put him on a flush draw only. But what do you think I should do here? Just call? Or raise?

In reality, I made the decision to raise him up big time. As I consistently say in the blog, I have learned over time to trust my poker instincts, and in this case, my read was telling me that this guy had the Ace of hearts, giving him a nut flush draw on the turn, as well as a Jack for top pair top kicker, which might support his decision to call my big raise on the flop. That was just about the only thing I could put him on that makes both his weak lead on the flop, the call of my flop raise, and this weakass lead bet on the turn make any sense (and it was still not just one but a series of moronic questionable plays to even get to this point).

In any event, I raised it up to another 1200, basically committing myself for my remaining 450 chips regardless of what came on the river, and basically committing him to the rest of his chips as well if he called this bet. I figured if this guy hit his flush then obviously I'm done, but otherwise there was no way anybody, even the donkiest donk that ever donked, could call this bet without the made flush:



The donk once again agonizes, and it just wasn't his style to falsely agonize, at least not for this long, so I figured I was still probably ahead, and then he called my 1200 bet. Him not reraising me all-in there for our last 400 chips into a 6000+ chip pot at that point, that made me more sure than ever that he did not have a made flush after the turn.

Then the river comes. Another heart.



He put in the rest of his chips on the end, which I dutifully called because of the massive pot odds, although I knew in my heart of hearts (pun intended) that I had just lost to a made flush.

Question #3: What two cards does this guy hold in his hand?

I'll have the answers to these questions and the stunning conclusion to Hot Hand #2 in a day or two, to give time for people to comment if interested.

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UPDATE: Once again thanks to everyone for the thoughtful insights and comments to Hot Hand #2. I'm going to post the results of the hand here. I'll also point out that this time, nobody guessed correctly what the donkfish was holding. But that's a good sign, because I would argue that anyone who could get a read on this hand has some serious mental issues and an even more serious total lack of poker thinking.

By way of summary (you can read all the details in the next most recent entry to the blog below), I was dealt pocket Queens in middle position. I raised it up 3x the big blind, and only the big blind called. The flop came J53 with two hearts. My opponent bet 400 into a pot of 1080, which I raised to 1200 with my overpair and with the potential flush draw out there. He called. The turn came the 8 of hearts. My fishponent bet 160 into a pot of 3480 (Gutless!! Gutless!!). I raised it up to 1200 once again with my overpair, which my opponent again called. Then the river was a 3 of hearts, making four hearts to the board and leaving me sure I had lost to a brutal runner-runner flush for basically all my chips.

When we flipped our cards, my overpair Queens was up against:



That's right, folks. The fishdonk had AQo, with the Ace of hearts. So, my read had been right on all along, almost to a tee. And the cards absolutely schmeistered me with the runner-runner flush to knock me out of the tournament (actually I had a few chips left, which I built up a bit until this bad beat on the river eventually did me in officially, but you get the idea).

But moreso than the incredibly horrific cards I ran into in order to lose this megapot in Hot Hand #2, I would really like to hear everyone's thoughts on what this fish could possibly have been thinking with his calls on the flop and the turn. I mean, I might be able to accept that he was willing to call off an appropriate portion of his hard-earned stack with just the backdoor nut flush draw and the two overs, but I saw to it personally with my flop raise that he definitely did not have the odds to make the call on the flop, not with the possibility that I could be four-flushing, have top pair, or even have ANY pair for that matter. That was a redonkulous call, was it not?

Even worse than that call, when the third heart came on the turn, yes that gave him the runnerrunner nut flush draw, but it could have also made me my complete flush, and he still had stone cold nothing. Not even AK-high. Just AQ-high and a 1-card flush draw, in a pot that his opponent had bet strongly into twice. And I properly put it to him on the turn, reading his cards almost exactly, and charging him basically all of his remaining chips on the turn to stay in on his 20% flush draw / Ace draw (and he couldn't even know that an Ace would win it for him, after my aggressive betting along the way in the hand). Again, unless I am missing something, is this not one of the donkiest plays in the history of poker blogger tournaments?

Now tell me, would any of you have been able to put this guy on this hand? Even I, who read him more or less like a book in this hand, still put him on the Ace of hearts and a Jack, for top pair on the flop at least. To call my large flop bet for around a third of his hard-earned stack, with nothing but two overcards and a backdoor nut flush draw, that is just inexplicably donkalicious to me. Then to call again on the turn with still just the two overs, but now a flush draw instead with just one card to come, it's pure donkfish. And yet IGH from a tournament I had been given a second and even a third chance in, and was finally just starting to turn things around and made it to the top 10 of the remaining players. Just. Plain. Sick.

Am I wrong here guys??!! Could I possibly have avoided this outcome given the way the cards fell?