Rather than discussing another hand where I lost, let me show you where I made a mistake and did not maximize my profit on a superior hand. This occurred on Tuesday night, and against a guy who had loaned me enough money to get back in the game when I'd been busted out, so maybe it's better that I didn't maximize from a spiritual standpoint.

It's late and I've been down and finally started to make a comeback. I was catching the deck. I'd had AA and AKs in the last four hands when I looked down to AKo in the big blind. I thought I was under the gun and reached for chips, and then realized it wasn't my turn. I played it off like I was just preventing a raise with a marginal hand with my misplay, as if it were just a ruse and actually just checked to the flop. The flop was QJT rainbow. The small blind bet out six, and I just hesitatingly called, hoping for callers after me, and hoping to let the small blind think he was in command of the hand. The turn made two of a suit, and the small blind bet another six. I wasn't worried since I didn't put him on a flush draw since he bet out on the turn, so I called again. The river was a blank give me the nuts, and the small blind bet again. Earlier in the game I'd changed a green chip saying they were bad luck for me since every time I'd had one previously in the night I'd lost. When this situation came up I had a green chip I'd won in a previous pot, so I threw in the six and the green chip, making a little speech about how they were bad luck for me, so I might as well throw it in. I was raising twenty-five into a thirty-four dollar pot. I should leave the speech-making to Anthony. Rather than indicating the nonchalance about the amount that I bet that I hoped it would, I think my speech communicated my cheerfullness, and to my opponent cheerfulness was probably coming from the strength of my hand. My opponent folded his top pair. With the nuts in this position the minimum raise should have been a no-brainer. Let him re-raise me if he has a strong hand, and let him pay me off if he only has a medium hand. Any hand that he can call a twenty-fiove dollar raise with he has a fair chance of raising a six dollar re-raise with, and if he doesn't have a hand that good, he might still pay me off for six more dollars. I got greedy, and it probably cost me that last bet. Analyzed more deeply, a twelve dollar raise might have been optimum, so as to disguise the value bet but still offer him 4 to 1 odds while making him think I was trying to force him out.

By the way, the post below is also new, so don't ignore it if you've been here recently.

First of all, I want to apologize about last week's post. There were so many typos and it wasn't until today that I figured out why. Apparently there's some kind of conflict between Firefox text boxes and Windows Vista. Some of the characters I type just don't appear and sometimes they appear out of order. I thought I was going crazy but then I really got to watching and it isn't just sloppy typing.

Staying with the losing hand posts, here's one from tournament play. It's not so much a hand analysis as it is just a small scenario. I had 4500 in chips, never having had more than five thousand. Through auspicious folding and timely betting, I'd managed to hang around all the way up to 500 and 1000 dollar blinds, and survived one round. I was looking hard for another good Degree All-In Moment, but got 72 on the big blind, leaving me with 3500. I posted the small blind and then looked down at A8 offsuit. It was the best thing I had seen in several hands and I decided the small blind was a good place to go. The action made it all the way around to the chip leader who was right in front of me. He bet 5000 puttinng me all in if I chose to call. This is where I made a logical error. Somewhat earlier the big blind had been short-stacked, almost as severely as I was. Through a couple steals and a winning hand she'd gotten quite a few chips in comparison, about fifteen to twenty thousand. With my own short stack and the short stack I had it in my mind my opponent had behind me, his 3500 raise was likely just to push us around a little and steal the blinds if we didn't have premium hands. I called with my A8. When the big blind folded behind me I looked and saw her fairly large stack, I realized he probably had a legitimate hand to bet five thousand into her when she was in the big blind. I also failed to realize that there were still people playing poker at this blind level. With my own measley stack I was down to so few options it wasn't really poker, but for him 5000 was just a good opener. Sure enough, he turned over pocket nines. Five quick cards later and I'm out of the tournament in 8th place and, as it turns out, just out of the money since they all took a hundred off the top before I'd made it past the end of the table. Oh well, I'd have had to double up at least once to even think of suggesting a deal. In hindsight I pulled the trigger too quick. The gap concept seems to dictate an all-in bet with A8 offsuit in that situation, but the call was careless when I had at least nine more hands to hit something legitimate. There were two other things that caused me to call. The first thing is that with all that folding around almost to me, I'd had time to fall in love with my hand. I knew I was going to push as soon as it got to me and take my chances. When I got bet into I was already ready to leave the tournament with that hand. The other thing was that the player betting into me is a pretty pretty good player, and I knew for a fact that he was aware of the gap concept and would have expected me to fold anything but a very good hand to his bet, and he wouldn't expect a call with a middling ace. With that in mind I thought it was possible I might be ahead.

For The Greek, I'm glad to have you visit. I wasn't offended by anything you said in your comment, except maybe the snide bit about the rare occasion. I was under the impression that The Greek was Anthony, but maybe I was wrong. There are reasons why the losing hands are not as detailed, though I really hope the above hand satisfies you a little more. A losing hand often means a drop in my level of concentration and when I really screw up I'm often a deer in the headlights, and don't have a clue how I could have been so foolish. That really doesn't happen that often though. Most of the time when I lose money it's the simple things. Calling a raise pre-flop with a hand that I shouldn't have and not hitting. Calling the blinds with a hand I shouldn't have and hitting just enough to hurt me. Getting second-bested sometimes happens. Being outdrawn sometimes happens. I have a sense of pride in my ability to lay down a hand if I'm not getting the situational odds I need to call. That being the case, sometimes I'll call when I know I'm behind because the money makes it worth it, but I really don't get suckered in too often. The hand you mentioned was an exception since I'd have been better to fold but didn't and lost my stack, and the reasons for it were many. I was tired and not playing my A game. Our respective table images would indicate he was likely to bluff and I was likely to fold a sub-premium hand. Also I really just wanted that money. I hope all this explains why there aren't as many detailed losing hands. The hands I lose on aren't that interesting, and a lot of the time that they are I'm not even sure what happened after it's over since I've folded and my opponent has mucked. Where possible though I'll do my best to add more detail to the losers.

People say I never write about hands that I lose. Maybe that's because it's usually kinda of a letdown when superior play does not win out in the end. I'm mostly just kidding of course. I do get outplayed fairly often, but I like to keep the amounts small. Being pushed out of a small win by someone's auspicious bet always stings, but being drawn into a real train wreck thankfully doesn't happen too often. Since I lost what would have been a big pot to a possible outplay last week, I feel compelled to mention it, besides, I did tell the guy it was going in the blog.

I was significantly up in the Tuesday night game. Someone else wanted to deal so I decided to play a little while and see how things went. Daylan was to my left, and even though he was down some, he still had a fairly large stack as he was starting to make a comeback. He had $157. I had around four hundred. I get J8 diamonds, and being up I was being a little loose. I was in the small blind, and when Daylan raised five and got a couple callers around the table, I threw my five in too. The flop comes QT9. I've flopped a straight. Being first to act, I checked my straight, which is something I second guessed almost immediately because all three cards were clubs. I would have wanted to put in a significant raise to make letting opponents draw out a fourth club worth. When Daylan bet ten behind me I assumed he was making a bluff because of the three clubs on the board, possibly a semi-bluff if he did have a high club. After all, he had raised pre-flop. The others players folded around to me, so I raised twenty-five to get more value if if he was drawing or to force him out if it was a complete bluff. In my mind I was representing a made flush. He paused for just a second, and then went all-in. Obviously he was representing a flush. I started to call, just to see if was bluffing at me, thinking he had about seventy or eighty dollars left. I asked for a count. He had one hundred fifteen dollars left. It was just too much. I was considering call 115 to try to in a little less than 190 and there lots and lots of hands that could beat me. I just didn't think Daylan could bluff for that amount of money knowing that I had a pretty good hand, or at least having been given every reason to think I had a pretty good hand. I asked him if he would show me if I folded. He said that he would. Some might call just for that reason, but I knew my curiosity would be satisfied, and I really expected my fold to be vindicated. I threw away my straight. Daylan flips over two aces, neither of which was a club. Needless to say, I was still going over it in my mind many hands later. I've finally concluded that Daylan thought I was semi-bluff check-raising, which is an odd thing to put a man on, and he wanted to eliminate my draw to beat what he thought was his superior hand. Still, you never know, he might have put me on the better hand and just decided his aces would stand up, even if they had to stand up and go home. If that's the case, it was a brilliant play, and one that cost me.

Altogether last week I won $634, but in Thursday, the last day I played, I dealt with considerable disappointment. I played in the early game and through stealing some early pots and then getting some terrifically bad calls from one particular callign station, I was up exactly $260 for the night. Class let out early, so I was able to make it back for the late session. Almost immediately my cards did not look so good. I began chipping off quickly, even re-buying once, but then finally hit a big hand and got up about one hundred twenty on the session. At that point I'd made over 1100 for the week. Unfortunately it was all down hill from there. I chipped away some more not hitting flops with decent hands, or worse yet, hitting flops with second rate hands. On a couple occasions I made huge calls with big hands after the blind was straddled and multiple players went all-in and I didn;t hit anything. The last hand of the night for me was pocket kings. I called all-in. An ace fell on the flop, and there was a big bet, after which everyone folded. I said, "Well, I guess I need to see a king, if you got an ace." He turned over J9, for which he'd risked fifty dollars before the flop. The flop had contained a 9 and the turn was a 9, so I went away. Oh well, they were suited.

I've made two great plays in the last two weeks. They were both moves that I'm glad to have in my arsenal but are what I would consider special plays. I used to get a lot of mileage out of the first one, the check-raise bluff, but its usefulness has been limited by the high-action games that I've been involved with lately. The second, the value bet bluff has never been anything but a specialist play for me, only useful in extremely specific circumstances, but I happened to find one of those circumstances on Saturday night.

The check-raise bluff at High on Main is almost an insane play. Most any player in attendance will protect his raise with an automatic call. I was able to take one of those action players out of the action with it. There were a few factors involved. First, it helps to have a reputation as a tight player, at least in that particular venue. That reputation hurts a legitimate tight player because he doesn't get a lot of action on his legitimate hands when he finally makes his moves. The reason that I play so tightly there is that my bankroll is more limited than most of the players I play with. They can make big wins by not being afraid of some really terrible losses, losses that might make me quit poker for good if I had to bear them. I play carefully, trying to get what bankroll I have in on premium hands, hoping to make big scoops once an hour or so. On this hand I was dealt 87 suited in the small blind. The flop came 853. Being in first position, I checked the flop prepared to let the hand go unless some special circumstances go. After all I'd missed completely on my straight and flush draws and though I had top pair, it was weak top pair and from first position I would find it difficult to capitalize. The action checked around to a fairly decent player who plays extremely aggressively. He bet twelve, into about a twelve dollar pot. There were two more players between us, and at some point while these two were deciding they were going to muck, a plan entered my mind. If they both mucked, I would raise an amount that I thought would be called. I chose to fill in to twenty-five, making a check raise in hopes that he would fold a weak hand. That got his attention in a way that it might not have if made from another player, or if made to some of the other players at the table. He thought about it but then called. The flop was a 9 and I immediately bet thirty dollars. He thought about calling but elected to fold, voicing his thought process about the check raise that had been put on him, and about my reputation for playing tightly. I think he put me on 89 possibly, so the 9 could have helped a lot more than I realized. I showed him my 8 and he winced and said he thought he had me out-kicked. I told him he probably did.

The value bet bluff came in a hand of five stud low. That particular game probably presents an opportunity to do that more than any other. In this game I was ahead all the way, with my opponent dominated, though he couldn't know that from the boars we were both showing, and he hung around all the way to the river, calling increasing bests so that around one hundred thirty dollars were in the pot when we received our last cards. My opponent received a king, and I received a five, pairing my hole card. He looked pretty disappointed to see the king and checked it. I considered for a couple seconds. I knew I couldn't possibly just forfeit the hand by just checking, because I was sure the king had not paired him. On the other hand, I didn't want to bet so much that he perceived I wanted him to fold. I managed to come down to twenty dollars. I think it was enough that he would think that I thought he might call it in hopes that I had paired. He thought about it a long time. I was wondering to myself how deeply he would read me, and what kind of act I was best to put on. Obviously I shouldn't care too much what he did if I knew I had the lock, but on the other hand I didn't want to act too much like I was begging for a call because after all it was just a little more gravy for me. I decided perfect calm and a healthy interest in his own play would be just the right method. Apparently it was. He decided not to throw good money after bad. I debated whether to show, but he seemed to want to know, so I showed him. His tilt got a little worse I think.