blonde poker forum

not sure if i've posted on here before...a couple of interesting spots from a recent comp that i'm sure i could have played better.

level 4
sb v bb: he has 25k, is on the red at 4 in the afternoon & in the 30 mins. he's been on my right has shown one out & out move, betting 3 streets with 10 high.
i have 40k, a shade above average, blinds 150/300.
all fold around, he pulls in his cards, goes to peek, doesn't, & makes up the 300, blind.
i look, find 9-9 & make it 1100 total.
now he looks & makes it 3300.
what next?

level 8
400-800 w a 75 ante.
average is around 50k, i'm sitting on 78k & raise to 2100 on the button w A-10s.
sb folds & bb who has 120k raises to 7700 - he's taken some big pots with no show, reasonablly active, i suspect a little fishey, possibly french lol.
what' next?

Pls post more on here in that case Julian. Few people get to play in the comps you do and vs the interesting players that you do.

Hand 1) call.

Hand 2) pass.

ty cos,
yeah, prob a good idea, need to work on my lingo, i gather 'back-raise' is enough to tilt some folk...

1. I think you are better off trying to set mine here. You are just about getting a price to justify, esp as we are prob getting paid if we hit. Im not inclined to assume a bluff here. No point the the 4 bet as you turn your hand into a bluff as you pretty much have to fold. The call also means you could proceed with caution on a good flop if if slowed down.            2. I think you are playing so deep here you can call and play a pot in position. Not ideal putting in 10% pre, but the right flop could help. I peel here. You cant really 4 bet as you have enough fold equity for him to 5 bet commit you, with a bluff, Making a fairly minimal dent in his stack if you happened to 6 bet jam (holding AA), he can fold. Hope that is clear. Sorry for no paras. On my mobile.   

1) this looks like a move but with position i would call and play from there

2) yuck, i don't really like calling here and i really want to muck but there would probably be something inside wanting me to do something aggro. I think i would have a good ponder of how i would react to action before i made the raise so i had a plan based upon what had gone on before. If in doubt i'd pass.

Ugh so you're sure he didn't look pre in hand 1. ewww. I'd prob call and stack of on alot of good flops for our hand.

Hand 2 I would flat the 3bet and play some pokers, our hand is too strong to 4 bet, if he's active then we can definitely pick up chips post flop if we connect, also if he's french as you say then lets keep the PSR down and play a pot in position with him. That and ATs is a well good hand on the button ,  why the hell should we have to fold it......

Notts was my learning ground, backraise is fine with me!

Julian. Would be great to see you post more. Maybe we should put like a glossary of terms in the pha post if it would encourage more people to post. I assume you know most terms but others may not be comfortale. Just a thought. As for back raise . . . . . .  . . . Erm no. :-) 

Hand 1, i think 4b calling it off is way better than calling.

Hand 2, i dunno, if u got a more solid read on him call, but i think folding is probably best.

You haven't mentioned what sort of image you're trading off in either hand so it's more difficult to know how to proceed. However, Hand 1 I doubt I'm laying down 9-9 vs a dude who calls blind before 3xing my raise. If you call he's gonna fire plenty of flops it seems so 4-betting seems better. If you've been active 4-betting seems much better. Hand 2 I can find a call if you've been active on the button but more inclined to fold this than the 9's.

Everyone knows Julian's image: golden!

lmao, yer, he looks like a mirage from afar. In yesteryear he was approached by bluesquare for being the physical billboard of their blackpool poker festival, the northern lights.

Min 4bet the first and let him spaz, do it with a grin on ur face too, he won't refuse.


Second one is just a pass I think.

I used to like you, that was before you said that using the phrase backraise is fine.

I never used to like you.

Backraise is com!

image is prob solid-ish for the first spot,
so he'd backraised to 3300, i opted for the 4bet w my 99, made it 11k & he pushed all-in for another 14k or so.
obv i wasn't passing, he had kk, i hit trips.
i think the fact i knew he'd limped blind just skewed the situation, i would def just call the back-raise otherwise w position.

for the second hand i'd lost a +100k pot w aa v quad 4s like 30 mins earlier, so i guess i could be viewed as vulnerable to spew.
i called,
flop was a,k,5, 2 clubs & he led out for a pot sized 14k, i'm sitting on 70k, gulp

golden.

hand 2. situation where the grossest play in poker is the best. call, probs call most turns too.

I got as far as backraise...

we def need that glossary

99 in hand and 9 on board = a set - btw did it come on the flop?

I read the phrase, 'a set of trips' in a book earlier and was like wtf.

Hate backraise too   :P

Cant fault getting the 99 in one bit if you're sure he didn't look before limping.



I call flop in hand two because I have top pair.

The problem with calling that A-10 type hand is that we hit but don't like it. Makes you wonder if calling is good. I can't see any case for folding after calling pre so would call villain's bet. Also you could hit a J and a Q to make a run.

I'm more than happy calling one bet. lets play some turns/rivers/have some reads.

 ;tightend;

genius - nicely worked in!

not quite the same - but was playing a 5 re buy last night and the bloke next to me asked how many 'lives' id used. I had to leave the table to stiffle my laughter

now we're talkin

I hope everytime you all write backraise you have a Wadey right arm sticking out?

*elbow in your arm repeatedly* "Did you see that shit he backraised me with boud? I fookin' knew he had shit, I fookin' knew it"

Wadey may just be the greatest

there both folds imo. Hand 1 your oppo is too shallow to set mine. Vs some oppo's you can set mine here but not against somone who is gonna fire 100% of flops and leave you guessing. Hand 2 is tough, if you think you can read him well and sometimes bluff him off a flop he didnt connect with then i suppose a call is just about OK. without history of him 3betting then i would fold.

The problem with folding hand 1 is that because you're switched on and notice things at the table you see that villain doesn't look and that sort of thing is your edge. So when he 3-bets it looks like a move. If you fold now because he's put some heat on with a completely random hand it seems pretty pointless staying awake to notice that kind of stuff. It would seem at the time that he's limping to 3-bet and you've seen that so what can you do. If he is making a move he is surely betting 100% of flops which makes the hand tricky to play imo. I still like the 4-bet pre.

but he looked at his cards before he 3bet to 3300, fair enough we noticed he limped the 300 blind, but now the situation is the same as if he would have looked at his cards and opened with a raise.

If he knows his hand when he completes and then 3-bets he looks pretty strong imo. If he pretended to look, limps, and then 3-bets he will think he looks like this pretty strong hand to us, especially if we didn't spot he limped blind. So what you said about folding makes sense and his move is a good one. I don't know why someone completes blind if they aren't thinking funky thoughts. I figured limping blind set up the potential for this move and didn't figure he limps blind only to check his hand and find gold. I would find it hard to accept his 3-bet is a genuine big pair that has me beat at the time hence liking the 4-bet.

i think it was a queen high flop, i turned the 9...

the second hand i'm afraid to say that i pushed after a short dwell....folding just felt too weak after the preflop call & calling just felt too passive & potentialy committing.
him leading out for the pot put some fuzziness in my mind & i'll admit i was really unsure what to - in these spots i hate taking too much time as that makes any aggressive action look suspicious so i opted for the big heave, figuring he'd have to be a hero to call with a-q/a-j.
i swear to god he took a whole minute (i was feeling guuuud), stood up called with a-k.
suddenly didn't feel so guuuud

Agree with Trigg here.

Fair enough we've got this read because oppo didn't look at his cards but so what.

We've raised with 99 and we've been looked up. To me we're still a bit too deep to potentially go bust with a non premium hand based purely on a physical read that may well be a reverse read.

Set mining isn't an option because we're not deep enough so just pass. Possibly even show it if you want to rock up your reputation and possibly get someone to pass AK later on ;)

EDIT: Obviously we're not going bust because we have oppo covered but I think you know what I mean.

we can call with the 99 pre if our read is stronger, setmiming 99 here is horrible as trigg stated. Calling gives us deffo more than 1 way to win the pot, but we need to understand and have a strong read on villain.

Im another who is glad to see you post on here Julian, although the phrase 'back-raise' should be confined to the poker scrapheap.
The only sentance it fits into is "They were sooooooted, it's my favourite hand, I knew I was behind but I still back-raised him"!!!

FYP

Just noticed your sig Evil,lololol

last line is so lol.

WTF?

By the bye, wonderful to see Thewy Posting on here. Breath of fresh air.

He has my permission to use any legit poker expressiion he so desires. Including "backraise".

"/snipped....... However he is a bit of a fish."

Aren't we turning 9-9 into a bluff if we raise/fold when we get looked up? bvb against a player who plays his cards in the dark this seems awfully weak. We are saying that after limping in the dark we know for sure villain has woken up with one of the 5 hands that can beat us. And I don't know how we can say that.

wow, feel free to call me an old school live donk but folding 99 pre to a 3 bet blind on blind just feels way too passive, esp considering what we've seen in a short 30 mins from this guy.
i agree in the clear light of day that the a-10s should prob be a (reluctant) fold.
tx for the input guys.

I don't get it. So you are turning your AT into a bluff. Forcing out all his bluffs and only allowing him to call with a hand that beats you?

Yes we are turning it in to a bluff but so what?

If we shove or raise aren't we bluffing as well? What calls or back raises us that we beat? Ok we may get 10's to fold but probably not against this oppo. If we're lucky we get a race. Even a nutter probably passes 8's.

We raise with 99 with an effective 85bb stack. Oppo back raises us and now we have a decision.

Yes there's a decent chance we're ahead but I just think we're too deep to risk so much for 3.3k

It's a very tough hand in this situation. Shallow it's easy because we obv jam. Deeper we can set mine or out play post flop depending on oppo.

Also does oppo know that we noticed he hadn't looked? If he does know then it changes the strength of our hand against his dramatically. If not then we've got to take this as it is and say that we've just been 3 bet and we've only got 99.

+1 to that,fk the haters say back raise,trips even three of a kind for me good to have someone of your pedigree posting on pha

BTW how do you pay someone a compliment/show respect without being a fanboy ?

Just do lots of ass kissing (like you have just here ^^^^^^^) then finish off by saying PS: I'm not a fanboy.

Julian Thew is one of about 3 people on the circuit you're allowed to be a fanboy of without being a gook.

Yes we are turning it in to a bluff but so what? So what? Well we're not bluffing buddy that's what. There's actually 4,400 in the middle not 3,300 and that's like 15bb's so I don't think it's such an insignificant amount to just let go and move on. I think tightening villain's range to big pairs isn't based on much and I think his range is much much wider than that. If he looks down to find any big ace and prob any pair he could well 3-bet. We knew about the effective stack sizes you mention before we raised so we knew the awkwardness of the situation but still raised, so what was our plan? Villain also knows the dilemma for us if we don't have a hand with these stacks so can raise just because of that. But we do have a hand so we're not bluffing and we do have plenty of FE to shut out overcards and that's not bluffing either.

1. 6600 call shove
2. Purely dynamics based, sometimes its an easy fold, sometimes it an easy 4 bet/call , sometimes i just call. Given u called pre i prob call like 90% time on this flop, the other 10% im making a small raise and calling shove if I think he can spazz. Im shoving never and probably folding never.

LOL,I can't say i've ever been a "fan" of anyone who i don't no, don't no how that would work.I certainly have respect for an ept/gukpt winner and it would obv be a benefit to me and others if he posts on here more often

If we think we're ahead of his range then of course it's not a bluff. We just want to figure out a way to get all the chips in. I can't see how the action here makes us think that were so far ahead though.

I just don't like going bust in a deep situation with 99 is all.

Obviously I would raise 99 here but then again I would've raised a lot of worse hands as well that I would easily lay down. The fact that this hand is better than my usual raising range doesn't mean I'm going to hang on to it for dear life and get 85 bigs in the middle pre.

Something I'm trying to work on now is not getting stuck on hands like this. Just because it's a good hand doesn't make it good enough to risk so much so early in a tournament.

It's just a pair of 9's ffs and on a table where we seem to have an edge so can profitably play flops. Why risk doing the lot on a hand that is so vulnerable. If I get it wrong and oppo has bluffed me then wp him. I'll get him back later at some point and hopefully for a lot more chips than the 1100 that I've just done.

What's your thought process/strat if you look down and see jacks instead bud?

That's just not fair!!!!  ;D

Why couldn't you make it QQ instead? Much easier then for some silly reason.

I obviously prefer JJ here but I'm still not getting 85 bigs in pre unless I'm very sure of oppo's range and also his perception of my range.

If I back raise here with JJ and get shoved on I don't expect for 1 second that I'm going to be ahead but now for some reason I'm commited.

Yes I know it's exploitable but there you go. Exploit me. I'd much rather be playing 58 blue and get the lot in on a nice looking flop.

yeah pretty much...i guess i felt i wasn't gonna pass, wanted to get my stack in first & would have very happy with the 21k profit.
not the best play i ever made by any stretch.
has been v interesting getting all the diff responses rather than just bouncing it around in my own head.
will post some more iffy spots soon

Time to own up.  Have you ever found yourself in a spot where you know it is a bit spewy, but you don't really mind because you know you will bink it anyway?  ;D

sorry been away and only just caught up with this thread

trigg - im not sure you can say calling 2200 getting 10:1 on his 22k behind is wrong at this blind level. The pay off to set mine is huge, and although you are getting your minimum price well worth a call of 5% of ur own stack.

As for your opponent firing 100% of the time whos cares? You are set mining - you want him to fire if you are happy to fold on a none 9 flop. 

10:1 is not enough imo when you factor in his air and the time he misses and c/f's when we hit.

i usually look for 15-20 - but in some spots, when you are going to get a bazillion BB's it is worth it to take the straight price

Surely that is arguement for not taking the straight price, the deeper you are the less likely you are to stack villian, no?

Backraise is the new hip, 3-bet is so passe.

The times they are a-changing, try to keep up shrewdies ;)