blonde poker forum

3 hands from tonight on Blonde NL100 full-ring, all within half an hour. I'm straight off a bad hour on the NL200 on Mansion, playing tighter than usual and probably weaker. But leaving aside my paranoia for a moment, what do you do in these spots?

No 1 - Get KK UTG. Normal raise to $3.50. UTG+2 reraises to $9. His PT stats are about 15/5/5, tight-agg-agg. I make it $28.50, he pushes. We both started with roughly 100 bbs.

No 2 - UTG+1 raises to $4. Folded to me in the SB with JJ. He's 17/4/1.3, and only started with $20. What to do here? I called. Flop T-high. I check, he pushes. And now?

No 3 - UTG+3 raises to $4. I'm next with KK. I reraise to $11, folded round. He makes it $26.50. He's 12/4/1.9 and starts with $75, which I cover.

Pass.

He only has $20 nows? push.

Pass.

you could make a case for folding the first one.

Not calling in the last two is a disgrace..(in my humble opinion)

no1 - does he ever do this with QQ or AK - personally i call, but i never fold KK preflop for 100bb unless the action is sick

no2 - if he only has $20 ship it in preflop, as played easy call

no3 - again ship it in

sorry if they had aces in 1 + 2, but folding KK for less than 100bb imo is burning money.

I'd agree with that...that's why I said "you could make a case for folding nr1"..I personally wouldn't fold kings preflop here

1 - shove (wouldnt fold KK pre to this as he probably has QQ AK)
2 - shove (he dont have enough to get away)
3 - shove.  (juicy pot which he probably has QQ AK again)

i agree, too much effort to fold KK pre in online cash.

1. I think i'd probably call, but as i dont really play cash this may be a losing long term call given the situation...

2. Insta-call...

3. Think i'd be re-raising all-in...

Thanks for the replies. I posted them because they all came in such quick succession (less than 30 mins apart) and because I 'just knew' I was behind every time. The day before, I shoved for 100bbs with AA, to a pre-flop reraise, and got a call from a decent player holding KK. Made me think, surely he 'knew' I had AA - and shouldn't he fold here?

Anyway, maybe thinking about this too much, I folded the first of the 3 hands that I posted to his shove. I was about 95% sure he had AA.

Hand no 2 with the JJ, obviously I called, and lost to AA.

Hand no 3, KK again, I shoved to the reraise and spiked a K to beat AA.

I've just done some back-of-an-envelope maths on the three situations. I think the results are interesting. (Though it's been a while since my last maths lesson... please someone let me know if I've screwed this up somewhere! Also haven't checked the wining percentages etc, they're rough estimates).

Hand no 1 -

I reckon a player with his stats has AA more than 80% of the time here. But let's say it's 75%. 5% he has KK, 20% he has something else.

So if I call his shove, about 60% he has AA and I lose my $70 call. 15% he has AA and I win his stack + my original $28.50 + the blinds, = $129. The 5% we chop with KK. The other 20% i win about 75% of the time vs QQ/AK, so 15% I win 129 and 5% lose 70.

So ((60 x -70) + (15 x 129) + (15 x 129) + (5 x 70))/100 =  (1935+1935-4200-350)/100 = -6.80


Hand no 2:

I reckon someone with these stats has me beat at least 60% of the time (I actually think it's more). Unlike the other 2 opponents, he's passive as well as tight.

So here 60% of the time he has QQ+. If I spike a J one time in 20 then I win 3% of hands for $25.50, and lose 57% for my $16 call.

The other 40% of the time he has AK/AQ. Here I win about 35% for $25.50 and lose 5% for $16.

So ((3 x 25.5) + (57 x 16) + (35 x 25.5) + (5 x 16))/100 = -4.03


Hand no 3 -

He probably doesn't have AA quite so often here as in hand 1, since he doesn't have so much info about my hand as he's done the reraising rather than me. But still, with his stats, he's got to have AA 60% of the time here at least. So if I push:

I don't reckon he's folding often - maybe 5%, where I win the $39 in the pot.

The rest of the time, if 60% he has AA, 5% KK and 30% something else (QQ/AK):

48% I lose my $64 push to AA; 12% I win his $75 + my original $11 + the blinds = $87.50.

Of the other 30%: 7.5% I lose 64, 22.5% I win 87.50.

So (195-3072+1050-480+1969)/100 = -3.38


Obviously this is totally player-dependent - I'm rarely if ever folding any of these hands. But I think that in the above I have, if anything, underestimated the likelihood of my opponents having me beat. And still it looks to me like they're all folds.

The one I'm actually personally most interested in is number 2, especially as everyone seems to think it's such a clear call - I think I lose quite a lot of money to shortstacks who vaguely know what they're doing, because of not letting go when I've got some sort of a hand. Here I pretty much know I'm behind, but call as it's only $16. Relative to the pot, though, it's a big call, which I reckon probably makes it quite firmly -EV. That said, obviously you can't keep folding in these situations as you're just giving the green light to the pesky shorties to shove at you at any opportunity.

Further thoughts (or criticisms of my maths!) much appreciated. Cheers.

Edit: numbers above aren't quite right (surprise!) - I missed out the half pot I get back if he has KK too. Ah well.

Obviously my last post is based on the fact that I think he probably has AA here - in a full-ring game against tight players, I just don't see it being QQ/AK more often than AA, but I might be wrong.

Some excellent self analysis there mos, the only thing i'll say about the 2nd hand is once it comes with no overcards, u simply cannot fold, its exactly the flop you wanted... Also with him having so little chips, theres no decision here, u have to call...

ah I didnt notice it was full ring- changes things slightly but i still prob call. 6 max im prob never folding any of these. Unlucky though mate, pretty sick setups!

Yeah, this is true... I guess I'm left wondering then whether it's even a call preflop.

I see your point, but there is no way i'm folding JJ for $4, tricky situation this...

For anyone who plays full-ring cash at these limits, if you take on board the following advice I guarantee your profits from playing KK will increase.

As a general rule of thumb, don't commit yourself to more than 50BB pre-flop with KK. If you are prepared to end up all-in pre-flop with KK with 100BB you are going to lose a shit load.

Hands 1 (100BB) and 3 (75BB) are easy folds against an unknown player. Against players as tight as these two, you have to respect a re-raise. Hand 1 is a call, and hope to hit a set. Hand 3, is a fold once he 4-bets. However against someone with his stats, I wouldn't even raise pre-flop here.

One of the reasons full-ring cash is so profitable for experienced players is because so many others can't adjust from their tournament playing style where KK is, correctly, rarely folded pre-flop.

(More advice on full-ring cash on my blog. :) )

1) Fold
2) ship
3) ship