Biggest chipstack blown by "creative" play

[Junior Senior]

Whats a big stack?
 
 
and what good is blowing on it? - sorry i'm a begginner

[tikay]

Wow, thank you Keith. Knowing you as I do, I just know you would not make those comments unless you meant them.

At the risk of boring other readers, I must comment on your analysis.

For the first 4 hours on Friday, I think I played better than I ever have. Big calls - ususally a problem for me - I made plenty, & was aggressive and brave, "no fear". Perhaps I had an adrenelin rush because of it, but when I got moved to Dave Colclough's table the wheels came off big style. Dave harbours the view that I play too many hands. I think he's wrong. But when I arrived at his table, a weird thing happened. We were 7 handed, & I kept getting hands which, in my opinion, were genuine raising hands in late position on a short-handed table. A-J, A-Q, KQ, A-T, one after the other. I kept raising, someone always found (& usually showed) a  monster. Raise-Pass, Raise-Pass, Raise-Pass. And I can feel Dave looking at me & thinking "what on earth are you doing Tony, trying to impress me, or what?". I was not prepared to risk my entire stack on a coin-flip, so I had to keep putting hands down.

Dave & I don't talk poker play much - in poker terms he is a hero as far as I am concerned, but the world & his wife are forever bugging him with flop stories & poker questions, so I don't talk about my poker with him much at all, it just would not be fair on a man I care a great deal for. But, to be honest, it would not be natural if I did not try to impress him, in my own little way, on the odd occasions we meet at the table.

He was raising an awful lot - so much so, he commented he had received more great hands in this one comp than the whole of his Vegas adventure this year.

I am known to be a weak player, & Dave knows that. So when he mini-raised my blind, & I had 3-3, I resolved to defend. I just decided he had a big A, and I was prepared to back my judgement all the way, something rare for me. Nothing on the board suggested to me he had hit his undercard, & I kept calling. The call on the River was, in my view, mandatory. He would have bet the same with nothing. I was wrong - spectacularly so - he had the Aces, & had milked me every yard of the way. I have never felt so stupid at a poker table in my life, & I must confess, my head was completely "gone". Made a muppet play in front of - against in fact - my business partner, friend, & poker hero. How awful was that? Once the table had stopped falling about with mirth, Dave suggested, Yes, I DID have to call the River bet, pot odds etc, but my mistake was not betting the flop, to see where I was. He was right, of course.

And Jim Reid's call against me? Awesome, just awesome. I THINK I made a good and brave move, and he misread the position as it turned out - he thought I was fluushing, whereas I was trying to represent a set or 2 pair & protecting them against a flush. Jim's a great friend of mine, & my respect for him is enormous.

And I guess you heard about my "odd" play when I turrned the nuts with A-3 of clubs, and we had an K-Q-J-T situation (2 clubs) on the turn. I massively overbet, on the belief that at least ONE of my oppos MUST have an A & would be obliged to call, giving me a lovely freeroll. None of them had an A, but one guy was forced to pass his ugly (8-9) straight - 8-9 of clubs, dammit!

Oh well, we live & learn. It's back to grinding for me I think...... Is it heck - I intend to persevere with this more aggressive game. Chips are on offer lads.

I really do appreciate your kind words Keith, & I feel slightly better for hearing them from you of all people.

[The Camel]

I've been giving the first hand in particular some thought and the more I think about it the more I like a check raise.

DC is certain to bet this flop whatever he holds. And the check raise looks very powerful especially given the common perception of the way you play.. Whatever he's got he must fear the 8. And if he calls a big move on the turn will almost certainly win you the pot... Unless the turn card is the 8 when you should check-fold to DC's bet.

I LOVE the A3 move. You are very unlucky to find noone with an ace. In fact it is far more likely one or two have aces than a player has a hand like 89c where a smaller raise would have much better.

In fact, the allin move is so good here, it is one of those very rare occasions where someone with the nuts would almost certainly be correct to fold. How often is that the case in Hold'em? A super play and very unlucky not to succeed.

[tikay]

The 33 v AA. Well, I did have in mind representing the paired 8's, but when the third eight hit the turn, I thought "he ain't gonna buy THAT" any more. We can't gloss over this one, it was just giddam awful play. But I could & should have played it less passively.

Your other comments? I'm speechless, coming from you, that's praise indeed. OK, forget the grinding, it's all-out attack from now.

But WTF does "the common perception of how you play" mean........? DON'T ANSWER, PURLEASE.......

[JP]

Tikay, I agree 100% with The Camel and I play that hand exactly the same way as you did with the A-3c.

In response to the original post, I had 17k at the end of a £20 rebuy and I was out about 30 mins after the end of the rebuy period!

Best (worst!?) play was trying to move riverdave off 2 pair when i had a 7 high flush (7-4s) draw only cost me 12,000 with the blinds at 100/200!!!

Heads up I lost to a guy who had one big blind left as well, that was a good one.

Oh and out of interest where was the raise from DC when you had 33, any chance of a reraise preflop??

[tikay]

JP,

I was in the BB - which had been under siege for an hour from the world & his wife, & Dave was in mid-position. If I had Re-Raised Pre-flop, well, i am done with the hand if Dave re-pops, but if he smooth calls my RR, I am back in the poo. Either way, I probably lose less than I actually did.

[elblondie]

DC is certain to bet this flop whatever he holds. And the check raise looks very powerful especially given the common perception of the way you play.. Whatever he's got he must fear the 8. And if he calls a big move on the turn will almost certainly win you the pot... Unless the turn card is the 8 when you should check-fold to DC's bet.

Are you on drugs Keith ? He check raises me and I pass Aces? I hadn't seen them for 3 weeks! He could have turned an 8 over and I would have still called. the poker gods need to know that when they send 'em my way, I'll die with 'em before I abandon 'em.
Actually Tony should never have called the pre flop raise with 33. So what if I am stealing? He has 5 times the average stack. He doesn't need to take risks and should be sat on that fence like he normally does. Stop trying to make him feel better. He has to suffer to learn. He got carried away just like a kid with a new toy...'nuff said.
 
 

[mikkyT]

Todays little lesson comes curtesy of a Tuesday nights £20 Pot Limit re-buy tournament at the Riverboat at the beginning of this month...

I was sitting pretty, roughly 50,000 in chips, 2nd or 1st chip leader (not sure what the guy had on the other table), two tables remain with less than twenty entrants running. I had been saying to myself, "don't play any more hands". The guy sitting next to me, one of the many new faces, also commented on my chip stack, and I made the same comment to him. "I don't need to play a hand".

On the table with me was another young chap who had a similar amount of chips. Subconsiously I think I was marking them as mine.

With blinds of 500-1000, I am dealt a :ts::jh: in BB. Early (the young chap above) makes it 2000 to go. Everyone folds round to me, and I call the 1000, The very next hand after saying to myself "no more hands"! UTG calls the extra 1000 and we see a flop.

:js:::::

I make it 5,000 to go. UTG folds, and I am re-raised for another 5,000, which I call. Very bad call on my part here, he could have had J with a higher kicker, or a spade flush draw. I don't have him for two pair, hes only been raising with cards, but I don't have him for a higher pair.

::

I open with 10,000 and after a very long think and with the cards hovering above the line ready to be dropped, he eventaully calls.

::

I push enough chips for him to be all in, and he calls. STUPID thing to do. The backdoor flush was out there, if he hasn't got it he's going to check, maybe I was trying to represent, but he's calling no matter what anyway. He laughs to himself, turning over :jc::tc: and he says "Wow, split pot after all that". He didn't realised he'd hit the backdoor flush. He was prompty corrected and all those chips where pushed in his direction.

My biggest mistake was calling the initial extra 5,000. He had raised on the pre-flop, and now he was back raising me. He was demonstrating strength, and I should have been a lot more wary than I had been. I had top pair, but he could just have easily made two pair (I correctly didn't think he had), or more likely had a jack with a higher kicker.

I eventually finished 10th that night, gutted of course. But my lesson is that when I say to myself "Don't play a hand, I'm happy with what I've got", I should actually mean it! And if I do try to play, do it with better than J10

[The Camel]

[

Are you on drugs Keith ? He check raises me and I pass Aces? I hadn't seen them for 3 weeks! He could have turned an 8 over and I would have still called. the poker gods need to know that when they send 'em my way, I'll die with 'em before I abandon 'em.
Actually Tony should never have called the pre flop raise with 33. So what if I am stealing? He has 5 times the average stack. He doesn't need to take risks and should be sat on that fence like he normally does. Stop trying to make him feel better. He has to suffer to learn. He got carried away just like a kid with a new toy...'nuff said.
 
 

Not call your raise with 33? And you think I'm on drugs?

Let's go to a parallel universe where the third 8 doesn't appear on the turn.

Tony check raises you on the flop and then moves in on the turn. Give him a little bit of pain relief and tell him you would have passed. I thought you were a nice guy....

[tikay]

Well here's a strange thing. Mr Steal/Bully/Raise Camel tries to make me feel better, & just when I start to think maybe it was not so bad after all, His Wonderfulness, Poker's so called Mr Nice Guy, chimes in with "dont make him feel better, make him suffer".

Actually he softened up a bit in a pirvate e-mail - he just said "you lost the plot. Who do you think you are, Phil Ivey?.

If the rest of the guys don't mind (too bad if they do....) lets take this a step further.

I make semi final after semi final, & exit somewhere between 8th & 12th. Scores of times. Why? Because I tend to "freeze" mid-comp. So when I got the big stack at Sheffield, Thewy & Willie told me "keep playing, USE those chips". So I tried to. I KNOW Keith would keep his foot to the floor.

But when Dave & I mentioned the affair, he said "forget the individual plays. You should have just sat quietly. Do NOT get involved. You did not need need to. Stick the fence up your arse". And I took that as good advice, after the event. But it's hard to pass AQ on the Button when you have a mountain of chips on a short-handed table, or just roll over when you hold a small PP in the blinds & someone attacks your blind.

I guess the answer is somewhere between. Really Dave is right, I should have nutted up, but thats the VERY problem I have been trying to solve. Would Dave pass AQ on the button on a 7 handed table if caked up? Don't know. Would Camel? NO CHANCE!

Anyway, I took my new game to Notts last night (Monday) & bliitzed the Final table, it was men against boys, I walked it. luverly.