Was this a mistake?

There was a hand I had at the casino tonight that I've been thinking about. Mostly because after the hand everyone told me I was nuts.

A new guy sits down at the table and starts playing wild. I mean really wild. His first hand: Seat 5 raises preflop 3xBB, wild guy reraises 6xBB, Seat 5 pushes all in for 33XBB, wild guy CALLS. HE CALLS WITH K6s.

The next two hands he goes all in preflop and get no callers. Couple of hands later I reraise him with AKo, check to him when I flop an Ace, and take his stack. He buys in again and goes on a rampage. He had no standard preflop raise, he would just grab a big ass stack of chips and throw it in. Usually about 15-25xBB.

He was no dummy. He was just crazy. And probably rich. I think he was waiting for a seat at a higher stakes table. He was drinking and having a good time.

So anyway, he outdraws and outbluffs the guy next to him and takes about $400 from him in twenty minutes. The guy next to him used to be tight, but he keeps trying to win his money back from this maniac. He can't. Now he's on tilt.

So here's the hand.

Wild guy has around $400 in chips.
Tilt guy has around $200.
I have $520.

Wild guy bets $60 preflop UTG.
Tilt guy raises him to $120 total.

I'm in the small blind and have AKs. I fold.

I'm quite sure that I had the best hand. But I didn't want to call $120. And I knew if I pushed all in Wild Guy would probably call. I knew that regardless of what I flopped, Wild Guy would probably push. To make matters worse, Tilt Guy gets to draw for free. It was late. I was happy with my money. I didn't want to take the chance. Was I a wussy?

For anyone interested:

Tilt Guy had K7o.
Wild Guy had ATo and hit a T on the turn winning the hand. No AK came up. However, I was really surprised to see Wild Guy only CALL the $60 raise from tilt guy rather than put Tilt Guy all-in for the last $80. Wild Guy also checked the flop when he missed. Perhaps he would have folded preflop if I pushed.

Oh by the way, this was really weird and funny. On the turn when Wild Guy hit the T, he checked. Tilt Guy FLIPPED OVER HIS CARDS and showed his King high and THEN went all in. LOL. That was crazy.

Originally Posted by Checkways

There was a hand I had at the casino tonight that I've been thinking about. Mostly because after the hand everyone told me I was nuts.

A new guy sits down at the table and starts playing wild. I mean really wild. His first hand: Seat 5 raises preflop 3xBB, wild guy reraises 6xBB, Seat 5 pushes all in for 33XBB, wild guy CALLS. HE CALLS WITH K6s.

The next two hands he goes all in preflop and get no callers. Couple of hands later I reraise him with AKo, check to him when I flop an Ace, and take his stack. He buys in again and goes on a rampage. He had no standard preflop raise, he would just grab a big ass stack of chips and throw it in. Usually about 15-25xBB.

He was no dummy. He was just crazy. And probably rich. I think he was waiting for a seat at a higher stakes table. He was drinking and having a good time.

So anyway, he outdraws and outbluffs the guy next to him and takes about $400 from him in twenty minutes. The guy next to him used to be tight, but he keeps trying to win his money back from this maniac. He can't. Now he's on tilt.

So here's the hand.

Wild guy has around $400 in chips.
Tilt guy has around $200.
I have $520.

Wild guy bets $60 preflop UTG.
Tilt guy raises him to $120 total.

I'm in the small blind and have AKs. I fold.

I'm quite sure that I had the best hand. But I didn't want to call $120. And I knew if I pushed all in Wild Guy would probably call. I knew that regardless of what I flopped, Wild Guy would probably push. To make matters worse, Tilt Guy gets to draw for free. It was late. I was happy with my money. I didn't want to take the chance. Was I a wussy?

For anyone interested:

Tilt Guy had K7o.
Wild Guy had ATo and hit a T on the turn winning the hand. No AK came up. However, I was really surprised to see Wild Guy only CALL the $60 raise from tilt guy rather than put Tilt Guy all-in for the last $80. Wild Guy also checked the flop when he missed. Perhaps he would have folded preflop if I pushed.

Oh by the way, this was really weird and funny. On the turn when Wild Guy hit the T, he checked. Tilt Guy FLIPPED OVER HIS CARDS and showed his King high and THEN went all in. LOL. That was crazy.

HMM all-in
you know you have the best of it
if you can't afford to lose it, play at lower limits

I don't mind the fold. You really don't know what tilt guy has, although you can assume it's a wider range of hands than he usually would raise like that. AK vs. two random hands is not a big edge, especially if one of them is a pocket pair. In this situation I'd prefer to have at least a pocket pair to call with - jacks or better.

vs. their actual holdings you were in a good position (50% to win) but vs. say pocket nines and KQo, you're <40% to win. Which is decent against two players, but still not really the kind of odds you're looking for when going all in.

Originally Posted by dalecooper

I don't mind the fold. You really don't know what tilt guy has, although you can assume it's a wider range of hands than he usually would raise like that. AK vs. two random hands is not a big edge, especially if one of them is a pocket pair. In this situation I'd prefer to have at least a pocket pair to call with - jacks or better.

vs. their actual holdings you were in a good position (50% to win) but vs. say pocket nines and KQo, you're <40% to win. Which is decent against two players, but still not really the kind of odds you're looking for when going all in.

Yeah but that means you are two to three to win, but your pot odds are one to two. How can you NOT call?

Definite push for me

If you think you have the best hand, you have to push. This is an excersise in trusting your reads and something I believe to one of be my final leaks.

If you had no read outside of them being a maniac and tilting, then I don't mind the fold.

-'rilla

Originally Posted by iopq

Yeah but that means you are two to three to win, but your pot odds are one to two. How can you NOT call?

That's assuming neither of them has kings or aces. In the situation I probably wouldn't put either of them on a hand that strong, but it's not beyond the realm of possibility either. As I see it:

- best case scenario, you're 50% to win (which would be an obvious call on pot odds)
- likely scenario, you're slightly less than 40% to win (which would be a good but thin call on pot odds)
- unlikely scenario, one of them has aces or kings and you're a huge dog (bad call)

Since you don't actually know what they hold, I would tend to average them out and assume it was something like #2. Which makes it a profitable but thin call. You need at least 33% and you're getting actually about 38%. That's a profitable edge - and I'd exploit it every time in an online game with a large bankroll in reserve. But in a casino with a slower single table and possibly less money on my person to play with, I might be content to let it go. That's all I'm saying.

If you're playing for pure profit I think you have to call, but in a situation where you're at a casino with limited funds, and just trying to make a small profit and have a good time, I think it's foldable.

Originally Posted by iopq

HMM all-in
you know you have the best of it
if you can't afford to lose it, play at lower limits

I know I know I know. However, this is a $100 buy in game. I slowly built that stack up after 7 hours of play and didn't want to risk it all there against two guys that I can't outmanuever. Had I not been running bad lately, I may have pushed. But I needed a win that night, and I know that's not the best way to play poker.

Btw, what does HMM mean?

Originally Posted by a500lbgorilla

If you think you have the best hand, you have to push. This is an excersise in trusting your reads and something I believe to one of be my final leaks.

If you had no read outside of them being a maniac and tilting, then I don't mind the fold.

-'rilla

Yeah, that's why I sat there and thought about it for a long time. My initial instict was to push. But then all these doubts came into my head like what if one of them actually has a high pocket pair? It was the first time Tilt Guy actually raised Wild Guy pre-flop (he usually just called him down). I knew he probably didn't have AA KK, but it was possible (I definitely thought his hand was better than K7o that's for sure). And even Wild Guy has to hit a hand sometimes. What if the big blind had a aces? Stupid doubts, but enough to make me fold them. I should probably stop overthinking in that situation and just follow my instincts.

Originally Posted by dalecooper

I don't mind the fold. You really don't know what tilt guy has, although you can assume it's a wider range of hands than he usually would raise like that. AK vs. two random hands is not a big edge, especially if one of them is a pocket pair. In this situation I'd prefer to have at least a pocket pair to call with - jacks or better.

vs. their actual holdings you were in a good position (50% to win) but vs. say pocket nines and KQo, you're <40% to win. Which is decent against two players, but still not really the kind of odds you're looking for when going all in.

Oh God bless you, Dale. Someone good at math actually agrees with my lay down. I really need to learn how you do that. Can you tell me the best place to learn it?

Bear in mind, I don't agree with your laydown because of the math per se - mostly because I understand why making thin calls for all your chips in a casino game can be very frustrating. When I play online with a decent roll, I'd call that all day long. But we're not always playing poker strictly to squeeze out every last cent.

Learning odds: here are some good resources.

http://simulator.pokertips.org/simulator.php

This is a good hand simulator for calculating specific hand odds. During my day job I often run a number of simulations to see about different situations, and commit the rough numbers to memory. Like your odds if you have overcards vs. a pair, a pair vs. overcards, a pair vs. a single overcard, a flush & straight draw vs. one pair or two pair... etc. All that stuff is very useful to know.

http://www.homepokergames.com/odds.php

This is a good overview of common odds on situations that happen all the time.

http://www.flopturnriver.com

Heh heh. Check out the strategy sections on this very site, they go over calculating pot odds and all kinds of other stuff.

and checkways, i completely understand what your motive was for folding. that was a whole lot of money to be risking on ak even if you were a favorite. i more or less just started playing .5/1 exclusively, and yesterday over many hours i worked to a 500bb stack, with a 320ish bb stack in the room. me having that much money was important, and i just am not willing to risk 320 dollars without near nuts. so i played scared of the guy. there was only one hand where it changed my play, and in this case i think it was a relatively unimportant hand though i might've won an extra 25 bucks or so, but it was worth it to me. I think that once you work your buy-in up, you can't be faulted for not playing within your bankroll, but that might just be too much money for it to be worth risking, to you (especially when you have a marginal situation like pushing ak preflop. if you fold aces or something you're nuts.)

I understand that fold Checkways, even though I probably would have pulled the trigger.

You never what you will run into with those kind of players at the table.

That being said, I also know what it is like to be up 300$ session only to have it chopped in half by a similar call only to see my hand totally dominated, (ie my AK vs AA).

Murphy's law had it that the one time I decided to call that maniac, he actually had a hand.

Oh well. Life goes on.

Well, Aces or Kings only come to one player once in 221 hands. That means that either one having aces or kings is less than one percent chance since they play, what, almost every hand?

Plus, you can outdraw those hands too. So I'll say you had either a:

50% chance of winning with them having crap hands
40% chance of winning with them having a pair
5% chance of winning with one having aces
25% chance of winning with one having kings

so the last case happens one time, the second to last case happens one time
the small pair case happens eleven times, the high cards case happens the rest of the time in one hundred

that adds up to 45% chance of winning with the information you have
your pots odds indicate a call as long as you have at least 33% chance to win

in any case, just bring more money with you next time so that your stack is hopefully ridiculously larger than theirs ANYWAY so you won't be afraid to make the right call

Originally Posted by dalecooper

Bear in mind, I don't agree with your laydown because of the math per se - mostly because I understand why making thin calls for all your chips in a casino game can be very frustrating. When I play online with a decent roll, I'd call that all day long. But we're not always playing poker strictly to squeeze out every last cent.

Learning odds: here are some good resources.

http://simulator.pokertips.org/simulator.php

This is a good hand simulator for calculating specific hand odds. During my day job I often run a number of simulations to see about different situations, and commit the rough numbers to memory. Like your odds if you have overcards vs. a pair, a pair vs. overcards, a pair vs. a single overcard, a flush & straight draw vs. one pair or two pair... etc. All that stuff is very useful to know.

http://www.homepokergames.com/odds.php

This is a good overview of common odds on situations that happen all the time.

http://www.flopturnriver.com

Heh heh. Check out the strategy sections on this very site, they go over calculating pot odds and all kinds of other stuff.

Awesome, thanks!

Originally Posted by iopq

in any case, just bring more money with you next time so that your stack is hopefully ridiculously larger than theirs ANYWAY so you won't be afraid to make the right call

Yeah, based on that I know I probably should have done it. Math says it's the correct move to make (not that I knew that at the time, I'm still learning how to add).

As far as the quoted statement here, it's a $100 buy in game. I can't buy in for more than that at anytime so I have to win to have a big stack.

I can almost guarantee you that you pased up on a +EV situation but if that 400 dollars is important (and as a new professional it likely is) then i can understand the fold. Situations like this are why it is so important to have a big bankroll and not play scraed.