NLHE T&P - Week 1 Discussion p. 1-32

Please read this before posting: http://www.flopturnriver.com/phpBB2/forum/poker-48750.htm

This is a great intro section, imo. Even just the pot size philosophy changed the way I think about the game. Here are a few questions to get us started:

1. Sklansky emphasizes manipulating pot size as a key skill for success in NLHE. What strategies do you use for this? In position, out of position? Hand histories where you did a good or bad job of controlling pot size are welcome.

2. On p. 21-24 there's an example of calculating EV when bet sizing with the nuts on the river. How much can we generalize from this example? How would having the second, third, fourth nuts affect your decision? How about reads?

3. Sklansky makes a minor but interesting point in the footnote on p. 23. How does BR size affect your EV decisions?

Note: Sorry for the super-long post, it's my first time participating in a group book study. Any comments/criticism are most welcome. (That's what we're here for right? To learn Wink

)

1) Here's a HH of where I did a bad job of controlling pot size:
Poker Stars
No Limit Holdem Tournament
Blinds: t25/t50
7 players
Converter

Stack sizes:
UTG: t1630
UTG+1: t1030
MP1: t1810
CO: t3655
Button: t1305
SB: t2265
Hero: t1805

Pre-flop: (7 players) Hero is BB with 4 Spade

A

UTG calls t50 (pot was t75), 2 folds, CO calls t50 (pot was t125), Button folds, SB calls t25 (pot was t175), Hero checks.

Flop: 9 Club

T

A

(t200, 4 players)
SB checks, Hero bets t125, 2 folds, SB calls t125 (pot was t325).

Turn: 5 Diamond

(t450, 2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets t200, SB raises to t400, Hero folds.

I probably should have checked behind on the turn. This guy hadn't played a lot of pots. He flipped QT on the button once when we all checked it down 5-handed and min-raised pre-flop with AKs once and proceeded to get all-in. Here I'm beating is a lower Ace, 2nd pair, or an OESD (I don't think he's a fish that calls down gutshots or bottom pair w/ Ace on board). Otherwise, he has a set, two pair, or an Ace with a better kicker. My TPNK can't stand any heat really. I can see myself building a big pot on the river with an average hand and a dwindling stack (blinds going up next hand). If I check behind he has 5-8 outs. If he hits his draw (or I induce a bluff) then the pot is still 200 and I can swallow a PSB.

2a) Different boards will affect how much an opponent is willing to pay off big.

e.g. (K-8-4-2-9)
Let's say you have the nuts with KK. Your opponent doesn't have many big second-best hands. A set and possibly two pair (TP any kick if you're playing against fish, but so far Sklansky refers to 2/5+) are about the only hands that can call a big bet and it's much harder to hit a set than an OESD. Thus, I'd be more willing to go with a suck bet to drag in calls from 3rd or 4th pair who might think I'm just trying to buy the pot with Ace-high. This of course depends on reads (like zook pointed out). If the opponent will call a big bet because "strong = weak" then by all means make a PSB or overbet with the nuts.

Sklansky's e.g. (9-8-6-2-5)
There's an obvious second nuts here which the opponent could hold. IMHO, I like Sklansky's bigger bet here because, IMHO, it's hard for weak hands to call even a suck bet here without the straight. However, IMHO, the straight will pay off a big bet much more often here than some middle pair in my previous example. Thus, you should try to get the most value out of his call which means the big bet.

Therefore, IMHO, when there are big second-best hands visible on board, be more willing to bet big. Why? Because your opponents want to maximize their big hands too.

2b) With the second nuts, in the example, I simply call for the exact opposite reason as I said above. It's equally hard, IMHO for an opponent to bet into this board without the straight. With the 3rd/4th nuts (a set in this example), I will either call or fold. Once again, zook mentioned reads. If your opponent is a rock I can laydown here (unless I have good pot odds). On the other hand, if I'm playing a maniac or someone who will bluff into scary boards then I'm more inclined to call

3) Play at the stakes you're BR'ed for and it won't Twisted Evil

I don't know exactly how limited a BR Sklanksy is referring to in the example, but assuming it's 2/5 (thus, 100x BB stacks) if you're worried about actually getting something (the min-raise = $50 = 10BB) you're probably playing over your head IMHO.

lightningfast: Nice post. Glad you're participating. I'm not sure that the turn is an easy check behind... a tight player is unlikely to have a worse hand than you, but you may be able to push him off a weak kicker (like A8) by following through on the turn. On the other hand, since this is a tourney and chips are precious, a turn check-behind is appealing. Makes it really tough for you to win the hand if villain leads river though. Difficult hand.

HalvSame: Good to see you here. You ask good questions, but as I think about them, I keep coming back to "it depends". Hand histories maybe?

I realize that question 2 is pretty vague. What I'm trying to get at is that Sklanksy gives us a very cut-and-dried situation where you have the nuts and there's an obvious second nuts that you want to get maximum value from. In this situation it makes sense to go all-in because you're not getting many calls from less than the second nuts, and the second nuts will very often call an AI. But, how much does this situation generalize? Is it usually the best decision to push with the nuts? Here's an example from a session I played a couple of nights ago:

Villain is loose passive pre-flop, passive post-flop and shows down a lot of hands.

Full Tilt Poker - No Limit Holdem Ring game - Blinds: $0.50/$1 - 9 players - Converter

Stack sizes:
UTG: $119.30
Hero: $147.25
MP1: $83.65
MP2: $59.60
MP3: $188.35
CO: $100
Button: $89.50
SB: $53.15
BB: $68.60

Pre-flop: (9 players) Hero is UTG+1 with 8 Heart

8

UTG folds, Hero raises to $5, 4 folds, Button calls, 2 folds.

Flop: K Spade

8

($11.5, 2 players)
Hero checks, Button bets $6, Hero calls.

Turn: 3 Club

($23.5, 2 players)
Hero bets $12, Button calls.

River: 6 Club

($47.5, 2 players)
Hero bets ???

One more hand history, because I think it nicely demonstrates two ideas from this section of NLHE T&P: 1) Pot control. I checked behind turn because a Q was definitely a possibility and if he has AK a check might induce a bet, or call, on the river. My hand is vulnerable, so I want to keep the pot small. 2) Bet sizing with the nuts. Villain does a great job.

Villain is 23/8 over ~400 hands, no real reads but he seems tight/solid post-flop. I haven't seen him show down a hand or get out of line at this table. (Already posted this hand here and got advice.)

Full Tilt Poker - No Limit Holdem Ring game - Blinds: $0.50/$1 - 9 players - Converter

Stack sizes:
Hero: $192.90
UTG+1: $99.70
MP1: $74.75
MP2: $100
MP3: $98
CO: $48.50
Button: $194.95
SB: $135.55
BB: $51.20

Pre-flop: (9 players) Hero is UTG with A Spade

A

Hero raises to $5, 6 folds, SB calls, BB calls.

Flop: Q Club

3

K

($15, 3 players)
SB checks, BB checks, Hero bets $12, SB calls, BB folds.

Turn: Q Diamond

($39, 2 players)
SB checks, Hero checks.

River: 8 Diamond

($39, 2 players)
SB bets $59, Hero calls.

Results:
Final pot: $157
SB showed Kh Ks
Hero mucks As Ad

I know this is a terrible call, but in my defense, my gf called at the beginning of this hand from the store and needed me to find a recipe for her Smile

Answering phone calls while playing poker is definitely -EV. On the other hand, not answering a call from my gf when she's shopping for food she's going to cook for me might be even more -EV Very Happy

Deal or No Deal is the second best poker show on TV right now.

A few points i noticed also after reading it again last night and this morning were;

1 - hand reading (in his points on what makes a good player) is that i dont do this if at all. I know mine, put him on a range but dont really think how im perceived by opp. i think i may be losing some value by not considering it. i do think hand reading is easy to begin but hard to master.

2 - on the set vs AA. i think its pretty much dependent on opp whether he's agg or passive tho i dont like the way i may bet out 70 into 40 pot. tho having just wrote that, i guess we have weaker holding not stay around but get even more off AA,AK or other strong holding. ie we dont bother looking for crap to stick around in order to get a few more chips from them but instead play it strongl;y to confuse AA,AK etc into miss reading us and pay us off. that make sense lol

3 - nut str8, i dont think i do this enough (shoving). personally in the past ive probabky just bet 2/3-pot. ill adjust now.

i guess with board 88TTJ and we held JJ we shove easy, also 88TT4 we hold T we shove (not the nuts but shove is good, lets say given action your ahead 100%)

4-Deal or No deal, probably the jammyist game around.

Diction jammyist-contains ridiculous amounts of luck

One thing I definitely took from this is the shove with the nuts. I looked at each hand in a vacuum and told myself I would lose value if I didn't value bet every river. I rarely shoved the nuts. I have even posted a couple of hands where I shoved hands on the river and was told I shouldn't shove as a massive overbet, which still may be true. However, I got out of the mindset of shoving AT ALL. I think I left some money on the table by doing that. Since reading this book, I have shoved the best hand at the river and gotten several calls......

Also, I confirmed that my pot control sucks....I still get in the habit of building too big a pot with top pair type hands because it has been beaten into my head not to give free cards........I am at work so I don't have hand histories, but I will try to dig some up.

I have an issue with expected value.

EV = (Pcall)(SizeBet) right? simple formula but...

Now, as a beginner, I find myself putting opps on a range of hands, and loosely associating probabilities to those opps' willingness to call particular bets. I'm sure I'll develop this skill.. however, how on earth could you possibly know your opponents' proabability of calling a specific bet within +-20%? That margin of error alone can mean all the difference between which bet size to choose. It's hard enough to put an opponent on one specific hand at any skill level imo.

So my question is, in real-time play, you're utg pondering a bet size, is it really useful to even try this calculation? Or is this just to prove a point, and help with post-play analysis?

Thanks, I really like that you're doing this book club, very helpful to us rooks.

great i hand a hand today which i can post here, i think this is close to a hand like this as i can get. DO you think this is equal enough to a similiar hand in the book or not, if not why not?

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em, $0.25 BB (8 handed) Hand History Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com (Format: FlopTurnRiver)

BB ($18.35)
UTG ($24.90)
UTG+1 ($49.95)
MP1 ($6.50)
MP2 ($30.30)
CO ($27.95)
Hero ($25.10)
SB ($23)

Preflop: Hero is Button with 9

, T

.
UTG calls $0.25, UTG+1 calls $0.25, MP1 calls $0.25, 1 fold, CO calls $0.25, Hero calls $0.25, SB completes, BB checks.

Flop: ($1.75) 7

, 5

, 8

(7 players)
SB bets $0.25, BB folds, UTG calls $0.25, UTG+1 folds, MP1 calls $0.25, CO calls $0.25, Hero calls $0.25.

Turn: ($3) 6

(5 players)
SB checks, UTG bets $0.25, MP1 folds, CO folds, Hero raises to $2.5, SB folds, UTG calls $2.25.

River: ($8) K

(2 players)
UTG checks, Hero bets $22.1 (All-In)

Raise the turn bigger.

just to answer Fnords reply above. I think you defo right, its too small. any hand that wants to play that baord will probably call a bit bigger plus it would help pot become bigger for a good river shove.

this is the type of hand i was trying to picture in my longer post above.

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em, $0.25 BB (7 handed) Hand History Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com (Format: FlopTurnRiver)

MP2 ($16.65)
CO ($27.25)
Button ($25.70)
Hero ($38.55)
BB ($27.15)
UTG ($16.60)
MP1 ($7.75)

Preflop: Hero is SB with J

, 9

.
UTG calls $0.25, MP1 calls $0.25, 2 folds, Button calls $0.25, Hero completes, BB checks.

Flop: ($1.25) 9

, 2

, 5

(5 players)
Hero bets $0.75, BB folds, UTG calls $0.75, MP1 calls $0.75, Button calls $0.75.

Turn: ($4.25) 9

(4 players)
Hero bets $4, UTG folds, MP1 folds, Button calls $4.

River: ($12.25) 2

(2 players)
Hero bets $33.55 (All-In)

Hero's play is much beter with quad 2s.

Also, I have mixed feelings on your flop bet.

As far as 3.) goes, in my day to day poker world, my BR doesn't affect my EV decisions. On the occasions where I would step to the next level and try it out, I would find myself playing much more passively because OMG!!!! It's 2 #!%!! buyins I would lose!!! Bad way to think about it. As long as you are playing in your roll, and practice good BR mgmt, I don't think this is too much of an issue. The issues would be found in extraordinary circumstances (ie in the WSOP and having a chance to make the money/move up vs busting out on a call you have the odds to make profitably). Or playing in a game at the casino that is bigger chipwise than you are used to, but the same level of player. Example, you play a $2-$5 and buy in for $500, which may be 5-10 buyins at your online stake, so you consider a call differently than you might if you were playing online, because after all it would only be one buyin as opposed to 5. Once again, not the ideal way to think about it, but I am sure it happens.....

I tend to agree that this is probably the single most critical section of the book. Upon analysis, I've left a lot of money on the table trying to get "paid off" with my big hands. The other day, I held Q10, and was in late position...

Board comes QTJTK with a big flush draw. I made a strong raise on the end, but I clearly should have shoved. I'm stacking someone on this board and they're not getting away from it. Don't have the HH available to me... but I left a lot of value on the table.

BTW: I've recently been on an Omaha kick. Small stakes Omaha is all about pot control.

I wasn't going to read this book until I finished some fiction novel that I'm trying to get done, but with the great discussion here, I decided that I'd at least keep up reading with you guys... man am I glad I did.

I think that these first few pages emphasized pretty much everything I was doing wrong, and oddly enough I was losing.

I was looking at my HH's the other day and found that I was losing $20 pots (at $25NL) with hands like QT, 98s, KJ, etc. I was losing those hands because I was getting involved in big pots with bad hands... I just didn't see it as it was happening, but after analyzing my losses and reading out my hand selection aloud to myself it hit me. Since that change alone, I've won about $200 in the past week.

I also coupled it with pushing my big hands. I've pushed AT on a TT3 flop and got paid off by JT. In fact, I would say that ~40% of my over pushes are getting called at the $25NL games on Poker Stars. The example was on the flop, but there were 3 other players in the hand and I felt safe that I would be called.

That being said, you still need to diversify, just like you would in a sound investment plan. One one table I had already made the over-push and double through JT. I was playing at a particularily juicy table and I kept pushing hard with my made hands. The problem was that even those fish were able to pick up on me. I didn't vary my play enough and I'm sure I left a lot of their money on that table. I think as your stack grows and your pushes work, the likelyhood of them being called goes down fast and the EV of value bets goes way up.

I had posted a similar question a few months ago and made the same observation about going all-in on the river in the following post...

http://www.flopturnriver.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=40956&highlight=chriscroz

I didn't get a lot of discussion about my bet sizing but I think the hand applies to this discussion.

I like the river push in that hand Khabbi... it's unlikely that any river bet is being called by hands worse than trips. And trips or better are probably calling a push, so that's the best way to maximize value.

Hey, I have never posted in the book club forum but I thought I'd check it out and post my views. thought I would start at the beginning and work through.

Manipulating pot size in NLHE is an important, firstly you need to decide what your objectives for the pot are and act accordingly. You may want to:

a) Make the pot as big as possible
b) Make the pot as small as possible.
c) Win the pot without a showdown.

You objective may change on each street, but it is important to decide what exactly your aim is.

How to reach these targets is different depending on many situational factors, but I think there are general principles that we can keep to on a general basis.

a) The stronger your hand, the bigger you want the pot to be.
b) The better your position at the table, the bigger you want the pot to be.
c) The worse your opponent is, the bigger you want the pot to be.

Point A
This is far and away the most important point and a point which most NLHE players understand and put into effect, apart from you slowplaying n00bs lol. When you have the nuts your aim should always to be to take the Villains entire stack, or as much as you think is possible.

Point B
It is important since with position you have a better chance to win the pot without a showdown than you do OOP.

Point C
The more your opponent is prepared to pay you off with bad/marginal hands, the more big pots you want to play against him.

As for controlling pot size to keep it small.....Let’s take an example to look at how controlling pot size can work in your favor.

No Limit Hold'em CryptoLogic ($25NL)
Converted by FTRConv
6-handed

StacksSB: $23.38
BB: $16.38
UTG: $5.08
UTG+1: $45.38
CO: $44.53
Hero: $39.74

Pre-Flop: Hero is BTN with A Heart

K

UTG folds, UTG+1 calls, CO calls, Hero raises to $1.50, SB folds, BB folds, UTG+1 calls, CO calls

Flop:($5.40) 3 Heart

9

A

(3 players)
UTG+1 checks, CO checks, Hero bets $3.00, UTG+1 calls, CO calls

Turn:($14.40) 7 Spade

(3 players)
UTG+1 checks, CO checks, Hero checks
River:($14.40) 10:heart: (3 players)
UTG+1 checks, CO checks, Hero bets $10.00, UTG+1 folds, CO folds, Hero doesn't show hand
Final Pot: $14.40

This seems like you hit a huge flop as you have top pair top kicker and a backdoor heart draw. Both limpers check and you lead out for a 2/3 pot sized bet of $3. Both of the limpers call making the pot $14.40. Here is where controlling the pot size comes into play.

The turn card is what appears to be a complete brick; the 7s.

You have around $35 left in your stack. The limpers check again. At this point you can start to narrow their range of hands. They could have a weaker aces which is very likely since they limped and then called a raise (AJ, or something like an A4 suited). Or, they could have limped with a pocket pair, flopped a set and are now trying to trap you.

If you decided to bet the turn, it would have to be a bet that would define your hand. A good sized turn bet would be about $10, which may make a weaker ace fold. If you are raised, there is the likelihood of being up against a set. After the bet of $10, the pot has now climbed to $24 and you have $25 in your stack. We could get called by one villain or even both, perhaps we could get c/r with a set here. We would be pretty much playing for stacks on the turn/river if either happened

Instead of betting the turn which appeared to be a complete brick, checking the turn in order to control pot size might be a wiser option. Keeping the pot small since you only have one pair will allow us to keep hands in the pot that you still have beat. If we check the turn, there will only be $14 in the pot going to the river. If you were already beat on the turn, we will lose the minimum when we just call the river if they donk. If we were ahead, we may have earned some extra money by keeping a weaker hand in there on the turn.

Assuming that the river card falls and your opponent checks to you again, you should assume that your AK is good right here and must put in a value bet. My personal opinion would be to bet about half/two-thirds the pot, most likely the bet that you were going to make on the turn. By checking the turn, you are more likely to make your opponent think that you are bluffing the river. You can get called by a wider range of hands thus making it a very profitable play.

It is much easier to control the pot size when you are in position against your opponents because you always have the option to check behind them. But as we know, position is important in all aspects of poker, not just in controlling the size of the pot.

You may get outdrawn, but in the long run, opponents won’t draw out the majority of the time. Players get caught up in protecting their hand but they forget to protect their stacks of chips in front of them.

Thanks for dropping by PokerMuzz, nice post. Feel free to keep posting and bumping!

np Zook

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NLHE T&P - Week 1 Discussion p. 1-32

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NLHE T&P - Week 1 Discussion p. 1-32