Archive for October, 2006

What Would You Do?

October 27, 2006 at 9:14 am · Filed under What Would You Do?

You are in the early stages of a 60 seat tournament. Blinds are low at $25/$50 and from your starting stack of $800 you have $620 left and the button is the next seat to your left. This hand you are dealt Ah6s. UTG calls, seats five and six call while the rest of the table folds. You decide to call for a bit of value. The button folds, the SB calls and the BB checks. The flop comes down Qs Qd 6c. First to act is the SB who gathers up the remains of his chips and lumps all in for $450. The table all fold round to you. What do you do? Fold or call?

The correct move here is to call the bet because you are in front. And this is the reason why.

First of all you have to put your opponent on a hand. Lets look at the possible winning hands he could have for making such an all in move.

- AA or large pocket pair? Not likely as there was no raise pre-flop. This rules out pocket Queens (giving him quads)  as a possible hand.

- AQu? Not only was there no pre-flop raise, if this guy hits trips and is first to act then the sensible move would be to check in order to trap opponents betting into his hand. He does not want to scare anyone off if he has flopped a set. I think we can rule out QX as a possible hand.

- Pocket sixes or Q6u (flopping full house)? For the same two reasons above, I doubt it very much as this would give him such a monster of a hand he would not be betting this big. This guy is first to act and is lumping all in, he is showing strength in order to disguise his actual weakness.

It is most likely that this guy also has a 6 and has flopped two pair. However, as there are no straight or flush draws on the board, and as you hold the ace kicker you are most likely to be winning. This bet is definitly a call.

- Vster

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Don’t Dismiss Pai-Gow – It’s a Quality Game

October 9, 2006 at 12:51 pm · Filed under News and ramblings

I have introduced both Barry and V to the delights of Pai-Gow Poker (the version played with cards rather than the domino tiles that are used in the Original version of the game) – At first they both claimed that they didn’t like it and that it was boring, however now after playing a fair few hours they absolutely love it and prefer it over blackjack (as do I)

Pai-Gow is a table game much like blackjack and means that you are playing against the dealer (or banker as it’s called) – You get dealt 7 cards and have to make this into a 5 card hand and a 2 card hand. The real beauty about this game is that the dealer has no real advantage over you, and you have to win both hands to win or lose both to lose – so therefore you can play for much higher stakes without having to sit down with much money! (you can get away with only having four times your bet when you sit down, unlike blackjack where you’ll need at least ten times!)

So next time you’re in Vegas, (did I mention that I’ll be there in a week!!?) find yourself a table and sit down with $100 and see what happens – I guarantee that after a good few hands you’ll love it and will never look back.

- Duff

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The Great Lay-down

October 3, 2006 at 8:07 am · Filed under Tip of the Day

The Great Lay-down (or was it actually obvious!)

We’ve all had it – you know you’re beat but you still carry on anyhow! Like the robber or the joy-rider trying to evade the police, it’s nothing but a lose/lose situation. The truth can hurt sometimes and even when you think it’s totally unfair and “why should it be happening to me?” it still does. Honesty is ALWAYS the best policy and whether you are lying to yourself or to someone else it will only get you further into a pickle that you simply can’t win.

A very good example of this was yesterday. BazzyG and I hit Gutshot for some cash game action. We were playing £25-£50 pot limit and had gone with a mission “to punt”. So we had been playing happily for a few hours when the above mentioned “great lay-down” happened. This guy, Dave*, had clearly been playing very well indeed for about the last 20 hours. He had started on Saturday with £30 and now had over £500!, he was fairly loose-aggressive, seeing lots of flops and doing lots of continuation bets.

So to the hand in question: BazzyG looks down to find the big slick! (AK) and decides to raise “pot” – Dave then re-raises “pot” again. A few others fold and then another guy Michael* re-re-raises!! “pot” again!!! Seeing that Michael had been playing pretty tight – BazzyG correctly opts to fold as he’s either in a coin flip or worse he’s up against two opponents (AK is only a drawing hand and it’s strength drops with more players in the pot). It’s not nicknamed Anna Kournikova for nothing, as it too “looks good, but doesn’t play all that well”.

Dave thinks about it for only a few seconds before folding and turning over pocket queens!! – everyone at the table seemed mesmerized by the fact that this guy had just laid down pocket ladies pre-flop!!! However, if you look at it there are only really two possible hands that Michael could have to re-re-raise, he would have to have either pocket kings or pocket aces. Michael after seeing this great lay-down did indeed turn over aces and congratulate Dave on a great play.

So was it amazing or was it obvious? Michael could easily have been playing “the squeeze” effect. Michael was clearly well aware of this play as he mentioned after that he “either had to have Aces or six two offsuit”! (the six two offsuit is a reference to an amazing squeeze effect play that Dan Harrington pulled off on the final table of the 2005 World Series.

So be honest with yourself – if you’re beaten …. lay it down!

Your thoughts ?

* Some names have been changed to protect the innocent.

Cheers

Duff

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