|
|
$5,000 Trump Taj Classic report
Monday, December 19, 2005 I'm just going to list as many hands as I can remember for this one, with not too much detail. I don't promise that all the numbers are 100% accurate, but they're close enough. Day One: 25-50. Two limpers, I limp in small blind with QT. Flop ATT, two spades. I bet 75. BB makes it 275. I make it 700. Big blind calls. Turn blank. I bet 1100. Big blind calls. River blank. I bet 2100. Big blind calls. I table my hand, he shows an ace and mucks. 25-50. Same opponent as previous hand. Folds to me in SB, I make it 125 with K7o. BB calls. Flop comes 752 with two hearts. I bet 200. Big blind makes it 500. I call. Turn pairs the deuce. I bet 700. BB makes it 2000. I move him in for about 1200 more. He calls with 42o. I don't spike. 75-150. Loose/aggressive player opens UTG for 525. I call in the next seat with JJ. Flop comes Q75 (two clubs?). UTG bets 900. I call. Turn is a 4. UTG bets 2700. I fold. He shows me QQ!!! 100-200. I open UTG for 400 with AdJd. I get called in two spots. Flop comes QJ7, all clubs. I bet 1100. Next player moves in for 1600 more. Fold. I grumble and call the 1600. He has Ac9c. I don't hit any runner-runner stuff. 100-200. Bizarre hand. I open for 400 from EP with AK. I get called in two spots. Flop comes 952 with two clubs, one spade. Checks around. Turn is 3s. We're all staring at the big blind for a while. Finally he says, "I checked" and raps the table. I bet 900. It is then that the big blind realizes that there is a turn card on board. He had checked earlier, thinking we had all still been waiting for him to check the flop. Somehow, he missed that we had all checked the flop, and that the dealer had put up another card. Next player folds. The big blind thinks for a while and moves in for 1300 more. I'm not convinced I'm beat, and call the 1300. He has 73o, and I don't spike. This hand was especially annoying, because if this guy had been awake, he would've just bet the turn and I would've mucked, saving myself 2200. 150-300/50. I open in EP for 700 with 77. I get called in two spots (I seem to be writing that a lot). Flop T87 rainbow. Check, I check, other player checks. Turn 9. Checked around. River jack. Check, I check, last player bets 2000, we all fold. I play pretty good, huh? Day Two: 200-400/75. Seven-handed, I open UTG with T9o for 1100. I get called in two spots. Flop KQJ with two hearts. Check, I bet 3500. Fold, BB calls. Turn pairs the jack. Check, I go all-in for 12,500. Big blind calls with Ah2h. He doesn't improve. There was a reason I opened this pot UTG with T9o. 300-600/100. I open in cutoff+1 with T9o(!) for 1900. I'm called in two spots. Flop Q98 with two clubs. Check, I bet 5500. Fold, big blind makes it 18,500. I set him in for 11,000 more. He calls with JT (good read by me!). I spike a jack to chop (yikes). 300-600/100. Two limpers, I limp with 77. We end up taking the flop six-handed. Flop 732 rainbow. First limper bets 3000. Only I call. Turn offsuit king. Check, check. River pairs the deuce. He bets 3000. I move him in for about 15000 more. He calls with AA and I win. 300-600/100. Folded to cutoff+1 who opens for 1800. I call on the button with 99. All others fold. Flop comes Q42 with two clubs. Opponent bets 3500. I make it 10,000. He thinks for a while and folds. 400-800/100. Folded to cutoff who opens for 2400. I call on the button with JcTs. Big blind calls. Flop comes jack-high, all spades. BB leads out for 3500. Raiser folds. I make it 12,000. Big blind thinks long enough to have the clock called on him, and folds. 400-800/100. I open in the cutoff for 2600 with A8o. BB calls. Flop 944 rainbow. Check-check. Turn 6h, bringing a two-flush. BB fires out 3200. I make it 9500. He folds. The situation for the next two hands is this: 19 players left. 18 get paid, there's one guy clinging to a ridiculously short stack (1.5 big blinds or so). Average stack at 18 players with be 70k. Blinds are 800-1600/200. Hand 1: Folded to Chris Bell on the button. For those who don't know, Chris is a highly talented player, aggressive but not crazy, and a friend of mine. Chris opens for 4800. I call in the SB with As4s. Flop 832 with two spades. I have 59k in my stack and Chris has me well covered. I lead out for 9000. Chris calls. Turn is an offsuit ten. I bet 18,000. Chris makes it 30,000 more (I only have 32,000 more in my stack). I fold getting 3-1 on my money. Chris showed me a ten, and told me later he had a set of tens. I believe him. I won't comment too much here, but I think this was an interesting hand that Chris played extremely well, and that I could've played better. Hand 2: Chris opens on the button for 4800. I move in for 25k on the small blind with Ah3h. Chris thinks for a while and calls with ATo. I bubble. I was going to title this entry "Anatomy of a Bubble"; but I didn't want to give away the ending. This tournament has a really great structure, with 90-minute levels and very slowly increasing blinds. I'll probably play it every year, which means there's a pretty good chance I'll bubble it again at some point. On a totally unrelated note, I'm thinking of starting a blog for American soccer fans and wannabe American soccer fans, during the runup to the World Cup (which begins in June). Anyone think this is a good idea? Not sure why I'm asking, since I'm probably going to do it anyway, but if you feel like sharing a comment/suggestion, please do. Next big poker tournament: Bahamas, 1/5 Where Have I Been? Friday, December 16, 2005 Israel! I was there for a college friend's wedding, which was a blast. Also in attendance was my former math professor, who confessed to having checked out this web site. He gave me the highest compliment a math professor can give when he referred to some of my mathematical hand analyses as "non-trivial." I'm playing the $5,000 No Limit Hold 'Em tournament at the Taj this weekend. I'll have updates on that event, and on my last quiz, soon. I just wanted to let my readers know I haven't forgotten them, and that I have a legitimate excuse this time. Weekend Update Monday, December 05, 2005 When I last left this journal, I was trying to win a seat in Paradise's million dollar freeroll. As I was trying to win that seat on Friday, I played a couple other tournaments, including the $11 rebuy tournament on Poker Stars. There are always a lot of fun hands in these low limit rebuy tournaments, but I particularly enjoyed this one. Table '15701087 36' Seat #9 is the button Seat 1: choir (24335 in chips) Seat 2: Sundace Kid (35408 in chips) Seat 3: MK12 (46860 in chips) Seat 4: Tensho (119513 in chips) Seat 5: Wizard_2051 (15000 in chips) Seat 6: theMFbat (50335 in chips) Seat 7: Tiger7210 (58499 in chips) Seat 8: BettyBoopAA (20858 in chips) Seat 9: jacksup (66779 in chips) Everyone antes 100 choir: posts small blind 1000 Sundace Kid: posts big blind 2000 *** HOLE CARDS *** Dealt to jacksup [4d 6c] MK12: folds Tensho: calls 2000 Wizard_2051: folds theMFbat: calls 2000 Tiger7210: folds BettyBoopAA: folds jacksup: calls 2000 choir: folds Sundace Kid: checks *** FLOP *** [Qd 5c Qs] Sundace Kid: checks Tensho: checks theMFbat: checks jacksup: checks *** TURN *** [Qd 5c Qs] [3s] Sundace Kid: bets 2000 Tensho: folds theMFbat: folds jacksup: calls 2000 *** RIVER *** [Qd 5c Qs 3s] [2c] Sundace Kid: bets 4000 jacksup: raises 34000 to 38000 Sundace Kid: calls 27308 and is all-in *** SHOW DOWN *** jacksup: shows [4d 6c] (a straight, Deuce to Six) Sundace Kid: shows [Qh 8s] (three of a kind, Queens) jacksup collected 76516 from pot And now, the best part--the ensuing chat. I normally never respond to the morons of the world, but this guy had been telling people how badly they played all night, and I just couldn't resist this time. Sundace Kid [observer] said, "ur an idiot but u beat me" jacksup said, "you beat yourself" jacksup said, "I had very little to do with it" Sundace Kid [observer] said, "u played that crap hand and hit 2 running cards" jacksup said, "dude, I limped on the button" jacksup said, "and I called the turn getting 6-1" Sundace Kid [observer] said, "and called 10,000" jacksup said, "um, 2000" jacksup said, "but close" Sundace Kid [observer] said, "like i said u got lucky" Sundace Kid [observer] said, "ur an idiot" jacksup said, "here's a tip" jacksup said, "instead of calling people idiots" jacksup said, "learn how to play poker" jacksup said, "just an idea" Later in the tournament, I lost a T400,000 pot with QQ v 66, all-in preflop, and a T700,000 pot with AK v AJ, all-in on a flop that contained no ace, king, or jack. Despite these two beats, I actually caught really great cards in this tournament and went to the final table with the chip lead. It got down to heads-up at 4:46 a.m. (the tournament starts at 10:15 p.m.). I didn't win the sucker until 5:38 a.m. I thought it was a great heads-up match, and here are some of the hands from it. They'll serve as the latest quiz. As usual, email answers to jacksup@mattmatros.com. Seat 3: jacksup (4483052 in chips) Seat 9: JMSiwik (3523448 in chips) jacksup: posts the ante 3000 JMSiwik: posts the ante 3000 jacksup: posts small blind 30000 JMSiwik: posts big blind 60000 *** HOLE CARDS *** Dealt to jacksup [???] jacksup: raises 60000 to 120000 JMSiwik: calls 60000 *** FLOP *** [2h 5s 2d] JMSiwik: bets 120000 jacksup: calls 120000 *** TURN *** [2h 5s 2d] [Ad] JMSiwik: bets 120000 jacksup: raises 340000 to 460000 What should JMS call with? What should he raise with? What's my range? Seat 3: jacksup (4846052 in chips) Seat 9: JMSiwik (3160448 in chips) jacksup: posts the ante 3000 JMSiwik: posts the ante 3000 JMSiwik: posts small blind 30000 jacksup: posts big blind 60000 *** HOLE CARDS *** Dealt to jacksup [??] JMSiwik: raises 120000 to 180000 jacksup: calls 120000 *** FLOP *** [Kc Js 3c] jacksup: checks JMSiwik: bets 120000 jacksup: raises 300000 to 420000 JMSiwik: calls 300000 *** TURN *** [Kc Js 3c] [5c] jacksup: checks JMSiwik: bets 300000 jacksup: raises 2700000 to 3000000 What should JMS call with? What's my range? Seat 3: jacksup (4266604 in chips) Seat 9: JMSiwik (3739896 in chips) jacksup: posts the ante 3000 JMSiwik: posts the ante 3000 JMSiwik: posts small blind 30000 jacksup: posts big blind 60000 *** HOLE CARDS *** Dealt to jacksup [??] JMSiwik: raises 60000 to 120000 jacksup: calls 60000 *** FLOP *** [7h 8s 7d] jacksup: checks JMSiwik: bets 60000 jacksup: raises 120000 to 180000 JMSiwik: calls 120000 *** TURN *** [7h 8s 7d] [Kh] jacksup: bets 360000 JMSiwik: calls 360000 *** RIVER *** [7h 8s 7d Kh] [6s] jacksup: bets 960000 What should JMS call with? What should he raise with? What's my range? Seat 3: jacksup (1771332 in chips) [don't ask] Seat 9: JMSiwik (6235168 in chips) jacksup: posts the ante 4000 JMSiwik: posts the ante 4000 jacksup: posts small blind 40000 JMSiwik: posts big blind 80000 *** HOLE CARDS *** Dealt to jacksup [??] jacksup: raises 80000 to 160000 JMSiwik: raises 160000 to 320000 jacksup: calls 160000 *** FLOP *** [Kc 2c 5d] JMSiwik: bets 240000 jacksup: raises 1207332 to 1447332 and is all-in What should JMS call with? What's my range? Seat 3: jacksup (4539332 in chips) Seat 9: JMSiwik (3467168 in chips) jacksup: posts the ante 4000 JMSiwik: posts the ante 4000 jacksup: posts small blind 40000 JMSiwik: posts big blind 80000 *** HOLE CARDS *** Dealt to jacksup [??] jacksup: raises 80000 to 160000 JMSiwik: raises 80000 to 240000 jacksup: calls 80000 *** FLOP *** [4c 8s Qs] JMSiwik: bets 240000 jacksup: calls 240000 *** TURN *** [4c 8s Qs] [6h] JMSiwik: bets 160000 jacksup: calls 160000 *** RIVER *** [4c 8s Qs 6h] [Jh] JMSiwik: bets 160000 jacksup: raises 842000 to 1002000 What should JMS call with? What should he raise with? What's my range? Seat 3: jacksup (5307332 in chips) Seat 9: JMSiwik (2699168 in chips) jacksup: posts the ante 4000 JMSiwik: posts the ante 4000 jacksup: posts small blind 40000 JMSiwik: posts big blind 80000 *** HOLE CARDS *** Dealt to jacksup [??] jacksup: raises 80000 to 160000 JMSiwik: calls 80000 *** FLOP *** [8s 6d Ts] JMSiwik: checks jacksup: bets 220000 JMSiwik: raises 220000 to 440000 jacksup: calls 220000 *** TURN *** [8s 6d Ts] [9c] JMSiwik: bets 320000 jacksup: calls 320000 *** RIVER *** [8s 6d Ts 9c] [Qc] JMSiwik: bets 480000 What should I call with? What should I raise with? Seat 3: jacksup (5783332 in chips) Seat 9: JMSiwik (2223168 in chips) jacksup: posts the ante 6000 JMSiwik: posts the ante 6000 jacksup: posts small blind 60000 JMSiwik: posts big blind 120000 *** HOLE CARDS *** Dealt to jacksup [??] jacksup: raises 120000 to 240000 JMSiwik: raises 240000 to 480000 jacksup: calls 240000 *** FLOP *** [Qh Kc 7h] JMSiwik: checks jacksup: bets 620000 JMSiwik: raises 620000 to 1240000 What should I call with? What should I raise with? And finally, Seat 3: jacksup (4677332 in chips) Seat 9: JMSiwik (3329168 in chips) jacksup: posts the ante 6000 JMSiwik: posts the ante 6000 JMSiwik: posts small blind 60000 jacksup: posts big blind 120000 *** HOLE CARDS *** Dealt to jacksup [??] JMSiwik: calls 60000 jacksup: checks *** FLOP *** [Tc 6d 2c] jacksup: bets 120000 JMSiwik: calls 120000 *** TURN *** [Tc 6d 2c] [2d] jacksup: checks JMSiwik: bets 240000 jacksup: calls 240000 *** RIVER *** [Tc 6d 2c 2d] [5h] jacksup: checks JMSiwik: bets 2843168 and is all-in I've tried to give enough hands so that you all have a feel for how my opponent was playing. Based on that limited information, and the action above, what should I call with? In other news, I got to the Sunday Paradise final table with the chip lead (who's surprised?), before I ran JJ into KK, and then opened with 98s and called an all-in reraise getting 2.2-1 and again ran into kings, and then lost a coin flip, and lost one more showdown as a short stack to finish sixth. Man, you gotta love the jump from 6k-12k blinds to 10k-20k blinds. Dise!!!! Anyway, my December is off to a great start. Hope all of my readers get off to a great start this month as well. I know of at least one reader who already is having a sweet December--Jodi, who won a 1,065-person deep stack tournament on PokerStars on Sunday. A hearty congratulations are in order. To everyone else, the best of luck. The Catch-Up Post Friday, December 02, 2005 Between the Thanksgiving holiday, and CardPlayer magazine asking its columnists to write not one, but two columns before December 1, I haven't gotten around to updating this journal lately. So here's a catch-up post. First, the quiz. The question was: Blinds are 500-1000. I'm the big blind. I have T34,947 in my stack before posting. Folded to the button, who has T25,356 in his stack. The button makes it T2,000. Small blind folds. I call. Flop T83 rainbow. I check. Button bets T2,500. I make it T5,500. Button calls. Turn ace. Board is a badugi (complete rainbow). I bet T7,000 into the T15,500 pot. Button has T17,856 in front of him. What's my range here? What should my opponent call with? What should he raise with? My answer: Based on the preflop action, I can't have a big pair, AK, or AQ. I'm capable of having pretty much anything else, but I'm unlikely to have 72o, 92o, 83o, etc. Based on the flop action, I'm likely to have a pair, a draw, or overcards. I could also have two pair or a set (though not top set). And a draw could mean something as weak as 76o. So, the flop action really doesn't narrow my range that much, but you can probably throw out hands like K6s, Q4s, K7o, 65o. Based on the turn action, you can throw out my weakest semi-bluffing hands. It's very unlikely I'll have 76o or K9o after I make that bet on the turn. My most likely hands are a pair or an open-ended straight draw (although again, two pair and a set are still possible, as is something like KJ). My opponent has several options: 1) call, planning to reevaluate on the river; 2) call, planning to call again on the river; 3) move all-in; 4) fold. First, notice that if he moves all-in he'll be offering me 3.7-1 on my money, meaning I'll be pretty unlikely to make a big fold. So he probably shouldn't move in unless he thinks there's a reasonable chance he has the best hand. That said, a lot of hands could reasonably be the best hand here. In fact, if he moves in knowing I will call, he still only needs to win 35% of the time to show a profit. PokerStove tells me he has that much equity against my range with a pair of eights or better (even with something like 87o he has 39% equity). 77 or below, he should probably fold (77 has 28% equity). He is also not getting the right price to call with a straight draw, but he might consider a semi-bluff raise with that hand. Although there is something to be said for flat-calling and trying to gain more information and/or induce a bluff on the river, I think he's better off jamming. This at least gives him some fold equity, as I might lay down a hand like JT or an eight to his all-in raise. (He can't count on it, but it's certainly possible.) I think the call vs. raise decision is fairly close in terms of EV, and I'm willing to hear arguments for calling if people want to make them. Your answers: I think you folks were trying to make up for the overly tight ranges you gave me on the last quiz, because if anything the ranges you gave me this time were a little too wide. But overall, you gave pretty good answers, prety much all along the lines of "you could have a lot of hands, he doesn't necessarily need an ace to continue." That answer is right. The first answer I received, from another Yalie Matt, was certainly among the best: "So getting 3-1 your opponent really needs to play on here with anything better than a pair of 8's, and definitely anything better than a pair of 10's. I think he should raise all-in here or fold. Calling here basically means calling all-in if the river is a blank, and probably otherwise anyway. I'd trade the possibility of check-check on the river for the fold equity on the turn. You could have made two pair on the turn, but i think you're more likely pushing one pair here. Opponent should raise all-in if he can beat a pair of 8's." Nice work. I agree. Result: My opponent folded. I had 55. Tomorrow is Day One of the Paradise Million Dollar Freeroll. I don't have a seat yet, but I'd really like to play--not because it's a great money-making opportunity (your equity is only around $200 even if you're lucky enough to get a seat), and not because I really want to win a trip to some tropical location (I'd actually just as soon play the final table online), but because playing a two-day internet tournament with 5,000 people for a million-dollar first prize would be fun! Unfortunately, I found out about this thing somewhat late in the game, so I've only had two shots at a seat. The second shot came half an hour ago. I got all-in on maybe the fourth hand with 22 against KQ and Q6 on a board of Q62. Queen on the river and I'm out. Hey, I'll take all-in against two people with three outs between them every time. So now I only have two shots to try for a seat, at 9 p.m. and 1 a.m. tonight. I'll give them both a shot, and post about my progress later. Wish me luck.  September 2004 | October 2004 | December 2004 | January 2005 | February 2005 | March 2005 | April 2005 | May 2005 | June 2005 | July 2005 | August 2005 | September 2005 | October 2005 | November 2005 | December 2005 | January 2006 | February 2006 | March 2006 | April 2006 | May 2006 | June 2006 | July 2006 | August 2006 | September 2006 | October 2006 | December 2006 | January 2007 | April 2007 | May 2007 | June 2007 | July 2007 | October 2007 | January 2008 | |
Poll
|
Copyright
© 2004-2006 by Matt Matros | All Rights Reserved |
