blonde poker forum

So here we are again obviously on a bit of a heater and on the final of Omania $30+3.

We sit 3/5 with 205k and blinds are 8k/16k.

There is a short-stack on my left with 50k and another opposite me betweem the two big stacks(350k/500k) with 85k

Big stack(500k) on my immediate right who is min-raising every hand makes it 32k UTG as per usual and I have 9975ds. I make it 64k.

Good, bad, indifferent?

Bad unless he folds which can be unlikely depending on the player and your image. Laddering is worth a bunch.

Please can you explain your reasoning for wanting to do this? Don't mean to sound patronising or whatever, just curious. :)

1) I'm trying to accumulate all of the chips and I have a nice hand.

2) He's playing his big stack well raising every hand and I'm ahead of the majority of his range and I look stronger than his perception of mine, I have position on him and I'm sure he doesn't want to double me up.

3) Two of the three players behind me will probably be more concerned with laddering than getting involved with any marginal hands and the other big stack will now need AA or possibly good KK to tangle with us.

Going to have to disagree with both these comments. Even if he is opening 100% 9975ds is doing nowhere near well enough vs that range to have enough equity to consider pulling this move with. It's ICM suicide. When we're 3 out of five in a pretty big equity comp 9975ds is not a hand i would consider 3b'ing an utg open from the CL with. My reasons for this is that you are putting pretty much zero pressure on him, he's going to peel literally everything he's opened, because, he can put you in so many horrible decisions post flop on a huge amount of runouts. Remember your going to be the guy busting in 5th with two massively short stacks sat behind if you loose the hand, not him. It's a shame man, you've burned $$$$ in equity here. ul

So yeah, just don't get it really. Did you think he might fold?

If he comes back over the top then you've literally just handed a 1/3rd of your stack to him as you can never call it off?
Would want to preserve this stack size with two mega shorties behind like my life depended on it, not 3b'ing a 1/3rd of it off attempting to rep extreme strength when we have very little to gain and huge amount of $$$$'s to lose.

Hey Ralph,

I really beg to differ also. 9975 isn't going to flop too well and I expect the guy to fold like never if he's playing well as you say. He's getting a good price to see the flop and he knows he can make the situation horrible for you on a lot of flops.. So we are now going to be seeing a flop with a pair of semi connected 9's with a pot sized bet left. He flops any semi decent equity and he's going to go with it and we've risked our tournament with an extremely marginal hand when there are two shorties behind us. Flop comes J83 and he checks to you, what do you do? Same applies on A84, monotone flops etc...

Here it's just a case of letting him run the table and we just 3bet him when we've got a premium hand AA/KK suited connected QQ etc

Just read my post again and don't want you to think I'm being a pompous cock!

It's just I have and still do make mistakes like this and want to try and help you to prevent it happening again, hope you understand.

Would way prefer to hear that you laddered to 3rd waining to 8bb or whatever it takes to get there. Take off as much as you can then! :)

The old addage of 'I'm playing to win' is all well and fine, but your not going to win until your heads up.

I don't play PLO much at all, but seems pretty horrific to me. I mean 3-betting to 1/3 of your stack with a hand like 9975ds, which isn't a particularly good hand... and seems like probably a very bad hand when stacks are shallow as it doesnt flop very well, has 0 blockers to big rundown/AAxx hands or anything the bigstack could put it in with. Also just seems like villain is very rarely going to fold given sizings and how much ICM pressure you're in... and for this reason will be putting it in your eye a decent amount too. Given stack sizes i'd be folding everything I wasn't going to be going with here... and if i was going with something I wouldnt be clicking it to 64k given ICM, there's not really any hands i'm desperate to get action with here.

Your thinking, r.e he's opening all the time I should fight back at some point  is defo correct imo, however this is defo not the hand to do it with. As stacks get shallower in PLO the hand selection dynamic changes a fair bit and the main things that happen is that BIG cards (speshly big pairs) become much more powerful, run-downs and mid-hands (like this one) lose their value very quickly with decreasing stack sizes. People's ranges for being all-in/committed pre-flop widen up and the first hands that come in are the AK[Q/J/T]* hands and those are hands that can vry easily dominate this hand you have. AKJ9 with a suit of yours and you have 25% etc.

In a cash game you could 3bet a hand lile 9975ds IP comfortably as you get 4bet by a MUCH tighter range and your hand has postflop playability (blockers/flush draws/straight possiblilties/set outs etc) you can call or fold to a 4bet depending on the stacks etc and not be making mistakes.

So hands I'd look to attack his extremely wide opens with are strong JJ hands (QJJT with a suit etc) Most QQ hands (all DS and all AQQ* and KQQ*) pretty much every combo of KK that isn't horrible, all AA ofc, all ds AK** hands, and all hands with A[broadway][braodway] single suited and better - these hands are strong because they block a lot of the premium hands we could run into. Hands with small pairs (TT and below) are useless here, and the same goes for the vast majority of run-downs, 5678single I'd fold for e.g, obviously premium dbl suited rundowns like 89TJ ds you'd just get all-in although actually these are no where near as good as you think they are here.

Hands like 9975ds really play so much better with deeper stacks. Short-stack PLO is ALL ABOUT BIG CARDS

Also here, I'd POT it, not make it 65k - no way to make it 65k/fold and really what we want here is FOLDS so if I was to play this hand I'd shut my eyes and pot it I think.

Appreciate the replies and in the cold light of day accept that my play was not good at all in that spot.

He peels and the flop came A,K,T with 2x one of my suits.

Pretty horrible and probably what I deserved. I checked the flop back and he took a very nice pot down on the turn.

Several hands later after the blinds have passed through I find KKQ9 hh in the same position and the same man opens to 32k.

I'm sitting with ~120k at this stage but the shortie on my direct left is down to 27k and the other shortie has 85k. Big stacks are 350k and raiser has 550k.

As on the previous round I 3-bet to 64k but this time I only have 55k behind which should to my way of thinking infer that I am not going to be folding now.

Should I have just potted here?

I'm going to say yes, because going back to what I said about the previous hand, you want to maximise the number of folds you are going to get as you really dont want to letting your opponent realise his equity in the hand given your ICM  position. Could even consider folding? But i'm not sure how narrow you should be getting it in here given ICM and that it's PLO.

Just to clarify the ICM position, we have $700 locked and the next two jumps are both ~$300 with $2600 up top.

with the KK** potting and making it 64k are pretty much the same, as you said yourself it does infer you are not going to be folding so same result achieved. Because of this I'd just pot as it's simpler.

In the 9975 hand when you flop a FD I think you are completely obligated to just pot/go with it on the flop given your range and the money out there, but you're right this is a very good example of why we should pre-flop. Think though you got an alrite amount of fold equity in this flop + you have a FD that's unlucky not to be live, I think not seeing all 5 cards is a pretty big mistake given you put 35% of your stack in pre-flop.

Hi Ralph,

Love these, keep them coming.

I know your PLO experience, & you, very well, you've been playing the game profitably since decades before blonde was even thought of.

I think the 9-9-7-5 hand has been done to death by better players than me, but I fancy you just got a bit frustrated with Mr Raise-A-Lot. At that stage, I'm happy to wait a while, those shorties will be feeling the pinch very soon. Patience is out of fashion, maybe correctly, but there's much to be said for patience, & gear-changes in these spots imo.

The other spot is a different case entirely. With our stack, it is THE dream spot for us. I'm insta-potting it. We can rarely be in terrible shape here, & even if we are behind - extremely unlikely - we are rarely worse than 40/60 in these situations. We may even be 60/40 jolly.  It's a great spot for us to make our move, with a view to winning this thing, & if we perish, so be it. He may well fold, too, in fact x% of the time he does, & we've scooped a chunky lump of dead money, and sent him a message.

Anyway, you know all that, but I hope you keep posting these, they are a refreshing change to what is (to me) the humdrum NLH stuff.

What about a hand like 4567 6789 etc where we are perhaps connected or suited same situation? Can we peel or is that bad at this stage?

I'm sure that you are right Tony.

I was getting a little frustrated by the constant bullying which allowed me to briefly lose my sense of perspective and in an instant the dynamic of the table had changed for me.

I 3-bet my KKQ9 ss to 64k and all fold to the bully who peels naturally.

On a QT4r he sets me in for my last 55k and reveals a comely Q833 ds, so I was in really good shape to overcome my earlier transgression.

Well until the runout came hh to give him a flush :(

I could almost hear the sniggering of the shortstacks....

So be it, it does not matter. This was the spot, the rest is variance.

The only thing I do different here is full-pot it pre. At this stage, I want to play for stacks, win or lose.

The matter of "big cards" was raised earlier. For me, this is the essence at THIS stage. Earlier on, yes, we can take a look with our medium rundowns, but this shallow, I just want to see paint x 4, & that's more than enough for me to pull the trigger. I'd always be the raiser, not the caller, of course. If they fold, fine, we rarely lose when they all fold pre.

Hope your heater - now into it's 27th year I assume - continues.   

Think the KKxx hand is a fold considering opponent stacks

Edit: typed that after Ralph's reply and not reading the new posts. Just read the results post, sigh

Well it's not the greatest hand, but how often - assuming we full pot it - will we get a fold?

25%, 33%, 50% of the time? We might get looked up, yeah, but we are not in bad shape if we do.

I'm one of those loathed & much-maligned nits who apparently ruin tourney poker, but this looks a terrific spot to me. We can't wait for Aces, & you know how it is with shortstacks, when we most want them to bust, they always keep doubling up!

If he doubles he goes to 3.6bb

Think ICM is a much bigger factor in PLO comps compared to nlhe comps, simply due to your preflop edge being significantly less pre flop in any circumstance. (ie with any hand)

With no antes in play and sitting on 8bb there is no pressure to take a flip (which kkxx essentially is vs most of his calling range, he's never folding btw) for $$$$ in equity when there is a 1.8bb stack going to go through the blinds in 2 hands.

Yes, that is fair comment, I agree.

This is really quite an interesting aspect that I possibly didn't give enough thought to, possibly due to my actions on the previous orbit, although I was fully aware of the 27k(1.65bb) stack on my left.

Anyone else advocating folding KKQ9 ss in the cut-off in this spot after yet another min-open from the bully-boy?

Don't get annoyed. He is playing correctly by raising lots, and you are making money by folding lots. Everyone should give each other a pat on the back and count the $$$ with a smile on their faces. I don't understand saying we can't wait for aces. This has no relevance at all. We make money by watching the short stack spinup. Would you believe I've cashed 2 PLO8 comps with less than starting stack this year. Some person literally threw 100$ out of the window because he couldn't be arsed to wait for me to be in the big blind or get my chips in. Here you have a situation where you can potentially earn 20x your buyin for folding and watching someone bust out. You NEED to be bursting with excitement to watch this happen, not getting frustrated about the guy winning all the pots. My ICM isn't perfect and my PLO equities aren't world class but we can probably make a solid argument for folding AA** here. We probably can have as much as 42% to bust and do little to increase our chances of winning. ICM is the bible at this point. Karabiner your last post shows a fundamental flaw in thinking, you use "yet another" and "bully-boy" to describe another poker player. If i call someone a fish, Tikay would describe my thought process and attittude as flawed, how can I play properly against someone I have marked in such a negative manner. "I'm better than him, so I deserve to win the pot". This is never true in poker. Folding kkq9ss really does suck, but we are getting such good odds to ladder further it seems like a no brainer, as does the 9975ds.

I didn't intend to use those terms as derogatory as the big stack should be bullying here by opening 90% of hands, I did say previously that he was playing his big stack well.

It just so happened that his being on my right and continually raising happened to get to me a little yesterday for some reason and skewed my thinking somewhat. On another day I would have happily let him knock everyone out and laddered in my customary fashion.

I only ever put hands up on this board that I feel that I might have misplayed and welcome the feedback so that I can hopefully improve my game even at my august stage of life which I hasten to add is considerably less august than gramps.

this is literally the game plan in small stakes 6 max hypers

have to disagree with everyone, I think the KKQ9ss is as clear a jam as you'll ever have...


i think you have a lot of fold-equity, he's opening like 80% plus of hands right? surely we can assume he's folding quite a bit of that (in practice he actually isn't as he called K833single but if we learn he is calling 100% of his opens then I think we should be jamming even still given we're a big equity favorite at this point) and we're defo miles better than a flip we can get this in ~70% quite easily. We have like a premium hand here don't forget.

You should jam/pot for sure though we really want him to fold ideally, K833 call is just very bad obviously.

I think we got too much equity and fold equity to not jam here, maybe the ICM is a consideration but would have to look at the payouts etc. If we don't jam here we're basically handing him the 1st place, imo.

Not EVERYONE, I still think it is a terrific spot to get it in & stated as such.

Hi Adam,

You make some very fair points there, & I agree up to a point.

I just think, though, that if the Shorties both 2xUp, & we end up failing to get a top three cash, we'll be rueing that missed spot for ages, "jeez, if only I had taken that chance when it was offered" sorta thing. These things can really mess with our heads.

I definitely agree that we can motor with VERY small stacks in PLO, & even smaller stacks in PLO8. Most folks push way too early, imo.

Oddly, & perversely, my greatest regret in poker (playing) was missing out on ther Final of the 2012 $1,500 WSOP PLO8, when I "went for it" with 11 or 12 left even though there were three stacks each with less than three Bigs. It still brings a tear to my eye 18 months on. That was a once in a lifetime chance for me to make a WSOP Final Table. I'll never learn.....

Incidentally, congrats on that splendid Genting cash, very nice. The official winner, Richard Milner, caught my eye actually, as the Head of Poker Next Door, & thus my Boss, shares that very name. He's crap at poker though.

I thought the 9975 was terrible, but potting this looks fine.  The min raise again is just wrong.  You have already shown on the 9975 hand you aren't doing this with monsters, so he isn't going to fall for your show of strength.  But even if you had AAxy I still think it is a disaster because of the chip stacks.  You definitely prefer him to fold and if you get the AAxy in pre you can be pretty sure you are ahead.

I might try and do se calcs on this shove when I get a chance.  Maybe I am wrong.

Yes - I want to play for my stack here, & I'm full potting it. I don't mind either way then, whether Matey Boy calls or folds, I've done the right thing.

Let me just clarify a couple of points here.

I didn't min-raise. He min-raised to 32k and I made it 64k with only 55k back which is considerably different to making the same move with 140k back previously. With hindsight I should definitely have potted although I felt it obvious that there was no way I was folding having put more than half of my chips in at this stage.

His peel was with Q833 ds.

I never considered folding the KKQ9 hand at any stage although I was aware of the very short-stacked player on my left.

I think you played it right Ralph. The 9975 hand I guess you just got a bit of an itchy finger (happens to me all the time lol "not done anything in a while, I wanted better cards than these but I'll have to make em work" won't be the last time :P ) Just thinking about it, had I played the 9975 hands like you before (raising to 65k and folding AKJdd or w/e) then raising to 65k with 55k back (which is basically being AI) is kinda cool because you're ikely just trying to get him to ship in a bit lighter/call and get it in badly OTF, take the variance on etc. Quite like it.

In general principle though we'd much rather he folds 100% than calls 100% here, and there is always the risk you get busted by a hand that would fold to a pot P/F which is obviously annoying.