My Ring is Broken...Can I have Yours?

[stewartkev]

I'm a tournament player, pretty successful although I've only been playing 2 months. I've decided to learn to play ring but I'm really struggling...think it's just a bad downswing as I'm well on the way to sorting my main leak of playing out of position. From PokerTracker I'm Semi-Loose/Aggressive/Aggressive (default rankings) during ring.

It's the variance and bad beats which I'm struggling with. Probably due to 0.05/0.10 limits I'm at. I'll spend a couple of hours playing well, picking up smaller pots with crap in position and catch a few monsters. Let's say I've doubled my buy-in (as I did last night). Then you get:

QJs on the button. Raise it up to 40c, get 2 callers. Flop comes Q J 2 rainbow. Pot is ~$1.60 so I bet $2.00, one call, one fold. A second diamond comes, so I push him AI (got it covered). River diamond...runner, runner flush with T 7 diamonds.

Make my stack back up to $15. Get KK UTG+1. Make it $1.50 to go. Get a caller. Flop comes A ( ) 9 3. He makes a min. bet and I go over the top to put him AI. Decided if it was aces then so be it, but had a read that put him on a smaller pair. He was...9s so he had a set. Obviously called and won.

Ready to quit for the night as I was down to $5 and seriously pissed off. Somehow get KK two hands later. Put in a raise of $1. 2 go over the top to $2.50 so I push. One fold, one call. He flips over ATs and gets a T on the flop and an A on the turn.

I'm seriously at the stage where:

1. I'll join the online poker is rigged camp
2. I need to fold monster starting hands. I make loads of cash of 56s (most profitable hand) and 7 4o (flopped a straight last night from blind!)

Aaaargh...help me please! A fresh insight into those hands would help. I realise I could have played a few things better, but I still think I should have taken down the pot in each of them. Any thoughts?

[poskid_1982]

Slow down. Have you read the Newbie Circle of Death in the beginners forum yet? If you have...read it again. Realize that everyone here goes through these stages. It cant hurt to take a bit of a break after bad beats. It sounds to me like you are a bit tilted. As far as your hands are concerned.

KK with an ace flop - bad idea to push him in unless you know it will force a fold...If he's got the ace the best way to make him lay it down is to continuation bet the flop and THEN the turn. Raising your turn bet...unfortunately the set hit and you were gonna lose the hand no matter what.

QJ - If you dont lose your stack here you played it wrong.

[stewartkev]

Wouldn't say that I was tilting. To me that is playing things I wouldn't normally play, with way too much aggression.

I've found after a bad beat that I can play my normal game and win back my losses. If I'm tilting at all it's in that I now dread getting AA or KK, because I KNOW that it's going to lose. And lose me big!

[dalecooper]

One thing I see immediately is that you do two things that will cost you a lot: 1. you bet big when a scare card comes along. Don't want to see an ace, an ace comes out, and you push all in? The only hand that will call you in that situation is going to beat you. So why make that play? 2. Related - you bet too fast. Aggression is often good but there is a definite place in hold 'em for probe bets. Bear in mind that any time you raise pre-flop, one of your most common calls will be from someone with a pocket pair. 1 time out of 10, roughly, they will hit a set on the flop. Other common calls will be from suited connectors and two high cards (AJ, KQ type stuff). Sometimes those hands will hit monsters, two pair or better. You have a good hand so you want to bet for value and to give a worse hand bad pot odds... but you also want to find out what they have. Give them a chance to raise you if they're going to, and that gives YOU a chance to fold without losing your entire stack. Those great starting hands are only great until someone else makes something better. Then you've got a two out draw.

[stewartkev]

I'm not sure if I understand what your getting at with point 2. I realise that I'll often get called with suited connectors, etc but surely if I have what I believe to be the best hand (i.e. top 2 pair, as above example) I should be making them pay big to hit their draw? I tend to be able to fold on the flop if I either don't hit, or catch a small part but face a large bet/raise. The only way I can see to play that 2-pair hand better is to have forced him to pay more for the turn card by betting even more aggressively, not less. With only one of each suit on the board at that point, though, I wanted to try and maximise the pot.

I think you have a good point with 1, though. Looking back on that play with KK, I see a lot of my SNG strategy coming through. I outstacked the player I'm up against and tried to put him to a decision for all of his chips. Bad play by me.

[stewartkev]

Just read the "Psychology of Losing". No idea how I missed it before. Feel much better now, but better go do some work before I get fired!

[Lucid]

Stewartkev, I'm going to help you out man. Admitance is the first stage of recovery. Repeat after me, "My name is Stewartkev and I am a maniac. I bet too hard and push too often at the wrong times for ring games." If you are going to be laggy and super aggressive then so be it. But in order to be succesful at it you will need to learn when to put the brakes on the aggression. You can only profit at this syle of play with supperior post-flop play. You must know when you come over the top, when to steal and when to fold. People will not fear your ultra aggression when they have a good hand because they know you are a maniac.

You have to play a game with them. You have to push them this way and that way, stealing lots of pots at the opportune moment and knowing when to fold.

Also, if ultra aggressive loose is your natural syle of play or simply the way you want to play then I recommend thay you try playing six-max. Ultra aggression has an advantage there. Look for a bunch of crappy campers and roll all over them but don't forget that sometimes you need to put the brakes on the aggression. Oh, and know your table. It doesn't make sense to try and steal from calling stations.

[dalecooper]

I'm not sure if I understand what your getting at with point 2. I realise that I'll often get called with suited connectors, etc but surely if I have what I believe to be the best hand (i.e. top 2 pair, as above example) I should be making them pay big to hit their draw?

Yes, sorry, I should be more clear. I don't mind the play with the two pair at all. In fact I think it's perfect. I was referring the kings hand again. If you are in a pattern of pushing all in on the flop when you think you have the best hand, but are holding something that's actually not that great - like an overpair or top pair top kicker - you may be costing yourself money. Your ideal bets with those kinds of hands should be strong (to discourage drawing hands and get value for your hand) but not out of control. You want to give yourself the opportunity to bail out if need be. The perfect bet with most made hands is one that gives your opponents bad pot odds to draw, gives you value if your hand is best, and gives you information about your opponents' holdings. An all-in bet or any similar megabet (like 2-3x the pot) will do #1 certainly, but puts you in a bind with regard to #2 and #3. Specifically, you'll usually get folds from all but better hands, and the information you end up getting is where your chips are going next (hint: away from you).

[stewartkev]

Probably haven't posted a representative selection of hands as I don't consider myself a maniac. Maybe I am, I'll refrain from judging yet. Had quite a good showing at 6-handed today, though. Thanks.

Another question, as I'm not sure how to make the crossover from tournaments when I'm in the small blind. Obviously I'm not going to "defend" my blind, as in the late tournament sense. What hands do you play from SB into an unraised pot? What would you raise with?

Cheers

[Lucid]

6-max or full-ring? I play twice as many hands in 6-max as I do in full ring games. I will fold alot of hands in a full-ring game that I would play in 6-max.

Here are my full ring selections:
You only have to pay half as much to see the flop but you are totally out of position. If you call with a hand like K10o and flop a king you can't even bet on it like you would in late position. I would limp with pocket pairs 22-99, normally limp with TT unless there is only like one limper and then you would raise, raise with JJ if there are a few limpers, limp with JJ if the whole table has called, raise with AA,KK,QQ, and AK, limp with AQ, KQ, AJ, limp with AT, QJ, KJ, being more likely to limp with few players and if they are suited and depending on the other players, limp with some suited connectors. The exact cards and amount of cards you play with depends on your style and the other players at the table.

[stewartkev]

6-max, sorry. Single-tabled for about 2 hours tonight and I'm up about $60. Not too shabby for $10 buy-in, 0.05/0.10 blinds. It certainly suits my style of play. Thanks for the advice...I'll let you know how I get on.

[jmontis]

one of the biggest things that will save you $$ in the ring game

huge scare card hits, they bet big, don't friggin call unless you have some exceptional read or reason to.

[stewartkev]

This hand came up yesterday...how would you play it?

I'm in BB and there are no raises, 3 limpers. I get Q8o, so I check.

Flop comes Q Q 9. SB min. bets, I bet half the pot, player comes over the top with pot bet. The other two fold. I called. Turn was T, no flush possible. I bet the pot, he pushed me AI. What to do?

The player in question was loose and aggressive. He played A9o out of position to a large rise from my KK. When the flop came rags he called my AI and rivered an A. Was seeing 50%+ of flops. I couldn't decide if he was representing the Q or had it. My kicker bothered me. The possible straight was also an issue, but I thought he'd raise with KJ, not sure about J8.

Any ideas on how to play this or is it an automatic call with trips?

In the end I called and he flipped over Q6o. River didn't help so I took the pot.

[poskid_1982]

Sounds to me like you played it right according to your read...I would have to say well played

[DBL0SVN]

I'm a tournament player, pretty successful although I've only been playing 2 months. I've decided to learn to play ring but I'm really struggling...think it's just a bad downswing as I'm well on the way to sorting my main leak of playing out of position. From PokerTracker I'm Semi-Loose/Aggressive/Aggressive (default rankings) during ring.

It's the variance and bad beats which I'm struggling with. Probably due to 0.05/0.10 limits I'm at. I'll spend a couple of hours playing well, picking up smaller pots with crap in position and catch a few monsters. Let's say I've doubled my buy-in (as I did last night). Then you get:

QJs on the button. Raise it up to 40c, get 2 callers. Flop comes Q J 2 rainbow. Pot is ~$1.60 so I bet $2.00, one call, one fold. A second diamond comes, so I push him AI (got it covered). River diamond...runner, runner flush with T 7 diamonds.

Make my stack back up to $15. Get KK UTG+1. Make it $1.50 to go. Get a caller. Flop comes A ( ) 9 3. He makes a min. bet and I go over the top to put him AI. Decided if it was aces then so be it, but had a read that put him on a smaller pair. He was...9s so he had a set. Obviously called and won.

Ready to quit for the night as I was down to $5 and seriously pissed off. Somehow get KK two hands later. Put in a raise of $1. 2 go over the top to $2.50 so I push. One fold, one call. He flips over ATs and gets a T on the flop and an A on the turn.

I'm seriously at the stage where:

1. I'll join the online poker is rigged camp
2. I need to fold monster starting hands. I make loads of cash of 56s (most profitable hand) and 7 4o (flopped a straight last night from blind!)

Aaaargh...help me please! A fresh insight into those hands would help. I realise I could have played a few things better, but I still think I should have taken down the pot in each of them. Any thoughts?

I also started off in SnGs and then tried my hands at ring games. Same results as you - I'd win for an hour or so then lose it all and more in a few bad plays or suckouts. Finally realised it was because there is a big difference between SnGs & ring. In SnG, you only have to be tight for so long , then the blinds go up and you have to LAG it up. In rings, you have to maintain the patience you started with, hour after hour - with no letup.