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unfortunately, my various serious illnesses put a major damper on a lot of my plans, most especially my coaching schedules.  I have decided to postpone coaching until September.  In the meantime, I am:

A) More than happy to go over hand histories and answer questions via IM and especially email.

B) More than happy to recommend coaches for you guys if you want coaching asap.

C) Totally understanding if you guys are upset with me, I’ll try to do what I can to make things right.

 That said, I’m feeling up for it, so tomorrow I’m heading to Vegas for my first time.  I’m going with a big group of friends (this trip has been planned forever), and we’re staying in the Venetian.  If anybody has any good tips about bars, restaurants, clubs, or anything else, please hit me up.  I’ll be there all week.  2p2er and High Stakes Pro MatthewRyan will be there also, as will Moonshine, a friend of mine IRL and a great poker player.  Really looking forward to it.

Also looking forward to filming my video series with Tubasteve, look for it coming out on DeucesCracked. 

Last but not least, poker update– im officially chilling in the +100k neighborhood for the summer.  35 in june, 46 in feb, 19 in aug so far.  making more than $1 a hand.  hooray.

 anyways, hit me up with questions and stuff, and especially advice on vegas, and ill hit you back. 

peace

A

not going to be coaching till i’m well.  this sucks aggressively.

 sorry guys

ill let you know when im well again.

A

Every poker player can remember improvements in his thought process.  We know how important the decision-making part of poker is, so we have the tendency to jump straight to it.  When we started with poker, it was: “I have an Ace and a Jack, and those are pretty good so i’m going all in!!”  Then later it became, “I know hand strength is relative, so I’m thinking about his hand… and I think mine’s better…. so I’m going all in!” Then eventually it became, “Hand strength is relative, and mine’s better, and I think he can call me with worse hands, so I’m going all in!”.  Hopefully you can see how the thought process gets filled out and our decisions eventually become better. 

Many (all?) players cut short the process of gathering and evaluating information before the decision making stage.  Essentially, they reach an amount of information that lets them solve basic situations, they get comfortable using that information, then they get lost whenever a new situation comes up that requires information they haven’t been accumulating.  Let’s talk about one of these spots now. 

A wise friend, Ben, got in a discussion with me over a hand.  Late at night, in a HU live game (the kind we’ve played thousands of for exactly zero dollars) he had made a loose call against my river shove.  I was bluffing, and lost.  I desperately tried to explain to him how my range crushed his hand and how bad of a call it was.  He replied: “That may be, but I’m not playing against a range.  I’m playing against your hand.  And you either have it or you don’t.”

You either have it or you don’t.

Hmmm.

So what about ranges?  Do those not matter?  Won’t good players play a number of hands in the same fashion? With different intents?

 Damn straight they will, but it’s the last sentence that matters.  “With different intents.” 

Let’s consider the river.  When somebody bets the river, it is invariably for one of two reasons:  1) to get value from a worse hand, or 2) to make a better hand fold.  There is no in between, no two-way bet here.  It’s only one of the two.  And the other guy knows damn well whether he’s bluffing or not.  However, most handreaders seem to ignore that obvious question– is he bluffing me or value betting me?– and proceed straight to the “how does my hand do against his range?” question.  Well, the truth is that he has two different ranges.  One is for value betting and one is for bluffing.  If you can figure out which one is more likely, you can test your hand against that range.  It’s only if you think that each is equally likely that you have to evaluate your hand against his entire composite range.  Guess what?  It’s pretty damn rare when it’s equally likely someone is valuebetting you or bluffing you.

 I’m going to give you three examples.

First was a hand between CTS and Ike (i think its Ike, somebody correct me if I’m wrong).  Both players are 230ish bb deep).  Cole (extremely loose and aggressive) raises UTG, Ike calls on the button with 66.  Flop comes down As7c6d.  Cole bets, Ike makes a raise in position, and cole calls.  The turn is a Ts.  Cole checks, Ike bets (for value), and cole shoves all in (a little less than 200bb on top).

Second example can be read here:  http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showthread.php?t=196036&highlight=punketty. Punketty, extremely loose and aggressive, c/r the turn on a Ad9cQh8h board.  Hero holds AhQd. 

Third example, and most classic example of all, can be read here:  http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showthread.php?t=38&highlight=mahatma.  Villain is Prahlad Friedman, extremely loose and aggressive.  Prah c/c flop on a KTx board, leads for pot on a blank turn, and shoves an A river.  Hero holds AK.

In every single one of these threads, the first 5-10 people who jump in say the same thing: “you have a strong hand against a tricky, aggressive opponent.  you can’t fold!”  The gut reaction is to address our hand vs his hand range on the whole.

Now, heres an exercise for you guys to try at home– Try to decide in each example, whether or not CTS, Punketty, and Prahlad are more likely to be bluffing or value betting.  If you decide value betting, then try to decide how our hand stands up against his value betting range.  Voila, you are better at handreading. 

PS: nobody said this would be easy.  and if they did, i didnt get the memo.

 good luck from thailand

A

so i want to apologize for flaking so severely on this blog.  It kinda fell by the wayside as I’ve done some other stuff.  So let me update quickly, then let me outline where this blog is going to go:

 First, whats new with me?

Well, I’m up about 55k between June and July, so that’s a pretty good summer so far.  I’ve been playing mostly 10/20, some 5/10 and 3/6 of course.  Logging 50k hands-ish at 10/20 with a strong winrate makes me feel pretty damn good about my game.  My first video is coming out at some point this month on Deucescracked, on the subject of image building (although i run into the nuts awkwardly a couple times preflop, that sucked for demonstration purposes).   I was also on a session the other day with one of my top-level students where I was trying to demonstrate why c/r the flop can be good, and ran into the nuts like 3 straight times with him on the line.  That wasn’t much fun either.  Oh well.

Naturally, at the peak of my summer (+like 90k or something) i withdrew like 45k, and then went on a large downswing, so im a little short money online at the moment… but hey who cares.  Life’s for the living ya?

 Currently I’m in Penang, Malaysia.  I’ll be here for another few days, then I’m going to Koh Samui to kick it on the beach for a while.  Then Bangkok for a little, then back home for a day, then to Dartmouth, Boston, NYC, Vegas, then what’s either going to end up being Morocco, Egypt, or Greece.  So yeah, I’ve got a busy summer ahead.  To my students– don’t worry, we’ll still be able to make this work.  Any of my long time students will tell you that while I travel a lot, I do make an effort to be available.

So let’s talk about the blog.  So far this has been just like life updates with the occassional poker article.  I’m going to add something starting in September:  Monday Night Moneymakers (not like Chris).  What is MNM going to mean?

I’m going to open up my Deucescracked email account to any and all DC members of any limits– screw it, any and all poker players of any limits (although DC members will get priority).  I don’t care if you play 5nl or 2000nl, I want you to feel free to send me hand histories from tough spots you encounter.  I’ll select an interesting one each week, analyze it on the blog and have it posted every Monday night by 10pm EST.  I’ll post the email address and more details as September approaches.  I’m not starting this now because I’m going to be bouncing around the world too much to keep my promise with this, and I want to take making you guys better seriously– cause that makes me better. 

Honestly guys, coaching has made me a million times better at poker.  Once upon a time, I couldnt play 10/20 without dumping a truckload of cash.  Now I feel totally at home there.  Before then, I couldnt beat 5/10 or even 3/6.  Now those games feel like safe fall backs.  Helping teach people this game helps me learn it better myself, so help me and help you and get psyched for Monday Night Moneymakers in the fall!

Also, I’m going to be in Vegas Aug. 19-24th, if anyone wants to kick it feel free to let me know.

Much love from Malaysia my friends,

A

Somehow this weekend I ended up staying up till 5am on both Friday and Saturday nights.  Physically it feels terrible, haha.

 I wanted to update the blog to throw a few things out there.  First, I entered the FTOPS event 11 today… first prize was 263k.  I finished first.  four thousand two hundred and sixty-first. 

Frustrated by my quick exit (got owned when a guy overcalled 2 people w/ AK, i had AQ, flop AKx), I decided to play a little 3/6.  About 3 hours later, i was up 5k, and called it a day to go watch ratatouille.  Great flick. 

At one point a couple of my students sat down on various tables and played against me, kinda funny to play against someone you talk with regularly on skype.  Also good to show these students that i’m not totally FOS, as I had a few 2k+ stacks on 3/6 tables. 

All in All, life is very good.  Poker is good, coaching is good, i’ve got a great girl situation right now, my friends are still cool, its starting to get warm, and im planning out my summer. 

By the way, this band called Project Jenny Project Jan came to Dartmouth the other night, they were fantastic.  Kind of a techno meets indie rap type of situation.  Very good.

 For those of you guys looking for more poker articles, I’m going to write one soon regarding bluffing ranges vs value ranges.  You’ll see what I mean.

Happy Mother’s Day Mom and Grandma!

Love

A

How’s it going everyone?

 I’m sitting in class right now, debating whether or not I should play poker or online boggle instead of paying attention.  Meh.  Either way, I’m hoping to play a little bit this month.  The last three months I’ve played less than 10k hands/month, which is really kinda too little.  Coaching has been more of a priority, as I’ve been getting a lot of applications and keeping a full schedule.  I just started taking new students again, but I don’t know how long that window will stay open.  I feel like I’m thinking about poker better than I ever have before, and I’m getting better at diagnosing my students’ leaks and constructing appropriate lesson plans.  Life’s good.

My parents are coming out this weekend so I won’t be doing any coaching or playing.  Pretty excited to see them, they’re bringing all my favorite foods from home.  Holla.  Family’s the most important thing.  Also breakfast.

This weekend is pigstick, awesome party.

Anyway, i’m really tired, I don’t sleep enough, and I still gotta figure out this summer.  Now i’m thinking June= Oregon, July=vienna/prague/croatia/greece/turkey, August=NYC, Sept=LA, but thats liable to change.

its a jungle in here… and I’m like a tiger…. and Dwight is a monkey, who stabs the tiger in the back with a stick.  Does the tiger fire the monkey?  Does the tiger, transfer the monkey to another branch?  ah?? We don’t know what’s going on in the tigers head… we don’t have the technology

A

So it turns out that between schoolwork and coaching I’ve got like no time to play anymore.  Which is too bad.  At least I feel like I’m doing something productive though!  My skillz are definitely getting much better.  Unfortunately it’s left no time for the other things I like to do in life, like playing music, working out, drinking with friends, etc.  Hopefully I’ll get that back as I get better at the language so the work doesn’t take that long.

As for coaching, the demand just keeps rolling in.  New App’s every day.  I think I’m going to order a chicken caesar wrap in a few minutes.  Life is good.

 I got Smash Brawl.  I like it. 

I’m going to repost the leverage post onto Deuces Cracked, as I don’t know if it’s getting that much exposure on the blog.  Tough to tell without comments. 

I don’t know why Hillary doesn’t drop out of the race.  Barack is so Teflon but she’s trying really hard to ruin that.  Mathematically its basically impossible for her to win unless Barack releases a sex tape, which to be honest, if it was with Obama girl would probably boost him in the polls.  By the way, go onto youtube and check out the swiftkids videos.  Hilarious. 

Otherwise, just happy it’s finally sunny and warm.

Hold it down

A

what a sick villa

This could also be titled “Why it sucks to get minraised OOP (feat. T-Pain)” 

There’s a reason many poker players are fascinated by investing– our day-to-day job is essentially a collection of small investments; he raises UTG, I have 55…. I’ll invest 4bb.  Maybe my investment pays off, maybe it doesn’t.  In real-world investing, however, leverage is the name of the game.  Let’s consider real estate quickly.  The larger the loan you receive from a bank to buy a house, with a low interest rate, means the less of your own capital you have to risk to make the investment.  Let’s take a house being sold for $1M.  If the bank puts up $500,000 and you put up the other half million, you’re not getting very good leverage.  You’re both risking the same.  However, if the bank puts up $900,000 and you put up $100,000, all of a sudden you’re leveraging the bank.  You are risking a relatively small amount against the large amount of the bank.  Assuming that you can turn a profit from renting the house at a rate higher than the interest on the loan, the better your leverage the faster you’re in the green.

Cool, so what does that have to do with poker?

I’ll give you something from my experience.  I played pretty ABC en route to beating 2/4-5/10 on FTP, but when I reached 10/20 I realized that ABC was probably not going to be enough to cut it anymore.  However, I was reasonably good at picking out mistakes in overall game dynamic, and I quickly realized that people were c-betting way way way too often (a problem that is just now slowly becoming corrected).  So, my plan was to raise and c/r a lot of flops.  Sounds like a good plan, right?

Damn straight it was.  The problem was that I had no sense of leverage.  In the past, while playing ABC, I had generally been raising the flop with strong hands far more than bluffs.  And, when you raise a strong hand, it doesn’t make much difference whether you raise huge, average, or small, so long as you’re still stacking off.  For example, if I have 55 at 5/10 with 100bb stacks, I call a raise OTB, pot is 82 on a flop of 7h5h2c.  He bets 60, I raise to 300, it doesn’t really matter that my raise size is kinda too big because I’m always stacking off when he shoves.

The problem is, if I have Ts9s on that same flop, and I raise to 300, I’m burning a fair amount of money.  It’s not that raising T9s is bad on that flop–it’s not bad at all.  It’s that past a certain point, I’m not buying anything with the extra money in the pot.  I’m sacrificing leverage.  What’s the difference between raising to 300 and say, 250?  How about 200?  How about 175?  Let’s assume, for the sake of debate, that 175 is the optimal amount to raise on that flop.  If my opponent comes over the top, he’s generally committing a stack.  So we’ll say that i’m risking 175, and he’s risking about 750.  That’s leverage.  Now, he needs me to be bluffing more than 4 times for every 1 time i have a hand worth stacking off with to break even by shoving over the top.  He’s unlikely to be able to profitably come over the top enough times.   Additionally, his default with overpairs is going to be to autoshove a flop like that, which is actually incorrect (except with AA) in situations when I’m only really calling him with the NFD, monster combo draws, 2pair or sets.  Essentially, the beauty of leverage in position means that our opponents can basically do nothing right.

 Often, the only theoretically correct move when faced with such a small raise is to just call it OOP.  This allows villain to continue with bluffs.  However, a good villain will manipulate board texture and bet sizes in such a way to bluff and value bet at proper frequencies to keep us from playing profitably at all.  In short, if you keep bet sizes small, your range balanced, and you dominate the button, it’s damn near impossible to play OOP. 

One theoretical hand to consider:

MP raises, I call OTB with XX (i call a very wide range here).  Pot is 8bb.

Flop is:

8c7c3s

MP bets 6bb, I raise to 18bb with…..? (5c6c 9c6c Tc9c 87s 88 77 33 Acxc QJs Axs 44 KQo AdJd AA 22)

you get the idea.

 One thing to think about:  Some villains nowadays have started reducing their c-bet % by c/f a lot of flops as the PFR.  This is a GREAT reason to call a wide wide range facing their raises pf.  However, it should disincline you to raise flops with air as much as you might normally do.

Try this on for size.

HA

A

hey Everyone,

So life’s good as its starts to warm up in New Hampshire after one of the snowiest winters in history, and I’m getting back into the coaching swing after my trip to the Caribbean.  The coaching boom has really brought a lot of talented, dedicated students who really want to learn the ins and outs of poker.  I wasn’t anticipating seeing this much demand so soon after I got back, but I’ve gotten myself nearly fully booked up in a hurry.  Which is fun, I like coaching. I should have some availability if you get in soon, but the waiting list might have to be brought back into action if it gets too much more crowded.

 In other news, I’m still somehow not totally healthy, classes are really hard (advanced Arabic is a tough one, who knew?).

Anyways, this particular post is in no way content filled, but I will be writing an article entitled “Leverage and You” or something this week.  I know I’ve been saying that.  This time I’m sincere.

 Holla