First, I'd like to start with a deeply-felt and sincere moment of silence. The blog KOD is MIA, and we all hope it isn't RIP. Come back to the five-and-dime, KOD, KOD.
Secondly, thank you to everybody who read or commented yesterday on my now 10-day old busto hand deepish (98th) into the 28K. I'll get to the way the hand played out in a second, but first I'd like to give a big shout out to Yancy (let me know the link and I'll link you up, buddy), who pointed out my inability to perform simple arithmetic, and to
Emptyman, who gave me the title of this post. You win the prize, Empty, a coveted spot on my blogroll! Why, most people have to perform unspeakable acts of depravity to receive the literally tens of page views that such a plum spot of real-blogstate provides. All you had to do was give me a good start toward my real reason for posting on this hand.
Namely, there are holes in my game, and I'd like to patch them. I ain't ashamed, ya'll. There's holes in your game, too. Can I get an amen?
See, I know that mblitzo made a bad call. Not the most godawful call ever, a pretty standard "you see it every day" sort of bad call, but a bad call nonetheless. I don't know what range you'd put somebody on there, but you're only ahead of a total bluff with AQ unimproved. Unless you are up against an AK total bluff. Then you're hurting. A total bluff will occur, but it's going to be a small percentage of the time against most players. That percentage will be a piece of a pie chart that is viewable, but it's going to be a measly piece of pie. You ain't gonna get no whipped cream or nothin'.
Next you have to assume that a small but pie-noticeable amount of the time, you are totally crushed. A3s will do the trick, as will 55, 33, AA, KK, or QQ. Those last three are all pretty plausible hands for a smooth call pre-flop, and the first three aren't out of the question. I'd say you're looking at a small piece of pie, but bigger than the bluff. There is room for a single maraschino cherry.
Next, you have to assume that a very large percentage of the time, you are up against a pair smaller than your overs. That's going to be the kind of pie-piece that could kill a lumberjack. In this case, you need at least 3:1, and that's if you are up against deuces or fours. For sixes through Jacks, you're going to need 4:1. I'm going to assume an underpair to a queen is the hand that most of you put me on, and you'd be right. As a matter of fact, I had one of the very bestest hands old Mblitzo could have hoped for. I had deuces on this paired board, which means that he has the counterfeiting outs.
The turn was a four, the best possible card for me since it gave me an OESD to go with my already better hand, took away his Ace outs, and made me a nice 80% favorite.
The river was another four, which send me packing.
I want to be clear, I don't consider this a bad beat at all. I had a somewhat better hand that didn't hold up. I played better than my opponent . . . though I'm not sure just how MUCH better . . . and I lost anyway. If I had won, I'd have been in the top 5 in chips. I put what I felt was maximum pressure on my opponent while I was still reasonably sure my hand was better, and I got him to call with a worse holding. I know I was taking a risk with a pretty weak hand. He may just as well have had an overpair (ANY pair is an overpair), but my read was that he didn't. I see an all-in with a medium pair and a rope-a-dope check or a little pull bet with a monster. That's my read, I went with it, I was right about that.
But I think I was wrong about something, or a couple somethings, and I'm not sure what. That's why I'm posting. These are the hands that keep sending me out. I have a read that the villain has an overpair and missed. I have a medium pair and am pretty sure I'm ahead on an ugly, low, uncoordinated board. I bet hard, hoping for a fold, but hoping even more for a bad call. If I'm in early position here, I'll often check-raise to get some more money in the pot. I get called a lot by AQ, AK, and AJ in this position. Sometimes KQ. Did you know that paint cards show up a LOT on the turn and river? They sure do against me.
Here's where yancy and Emptyman come in. The checkraise got more money in the pot, sure. But it also sweetened the odds. Still not enough to make it a worthwhile call, but enough to make somebody think that it might be. I sweetened the pot thinking it was correct, but I'd pulled too hard on this guy, and now I couldn't push. The odds weren't right, but that doesn't matter if you can't do the math.
Speaking of guys who can't do the math . . . I've got egg on my face. Thanks, yancy, at least now I know that I'm sloppy. Sheesh.
Let's recap. You are deep into steal territory in an MTT, past the money. You have an M around ten. You have deuces in the BB and face a raise 3x from EP. How do you play it? You're going to have overs after the flop. If there is an overpair, you're crushed. Is this just an auto-fold? I don't personally think so, not even from an EP raiser, not when everybody's stealing. But maybe that's a hole in my game. Do you raise? I don't think so, because a raise is pot-committing me with deuces. But maybe that's another hole.
What do you do if you call it and the flop comes raggedy, but misses your set? Do you just shove into the original raiser? I don't think so, because if so you may as well have done it pre-flop, but . . . well you know.
You can't call an all-in, but what about a 1/2 pot bet that screams "C-bet"?
Where do I get away from this hand? Or do I even want to?
Let me know, Internet! Tell me I'm a donk and then tell me why! I'll tellya "Thankee sai" for your trouble, believe me. What's your strategy in this hand?
