Session notes, Full Tilt Poker, 12/15/05, Early AM... AKA TT Quandry and Why He Didn't Have Two Pair

Ok, so I decided screw it, if I'm gonna every be good at this game, I can't give up. After a drunken talk with a friend from fulltiltforum.com, I decided that I need to start taking poker seriously and make my best effort to play up to my potential EVERY TIME I play the game. I took $50 and put it on Full Tilt. I had to redeposit because I donked off approximately $200 while drunk on 12/13 early in the AM. I have decided that until I build my roll, I will stick to .10/.25 NLHE rings and 10+1 and 5+.50 sng tournaments, with the occassional low buy-in MTT. This is because these ring games and SNGs are the best, while small profit, consistent money makers for me.

Okay so Session #1: Starting BR - $50.04 Ending BR - $70.04 +$20

This session I played a mixture of .10/.25 NLHE and three 10+1 Sngs. Sng finishes, 1st, 6th, and 3rd, net profit $20 which means I broke even on my ring games. I will get to the SNGS in a second but first I would like to discuss the ring play. I was stuck $20 early with a couple of tough beats. AA lost to 67os when the flop came 2,4,5. I throw out my standard flop bet and am immediately moved in on. At this point the hand 45s flashes through my head... the thing is I had sat at the table with $10 and $4.50 of it was in the pot. In addition, this was a huge overbet. Normally I will consider such an overbet a bluff, but I knew the player I was playing against was tricky and may be using the overbet as a ploy with a made hand, which made this call difficult. Honestly, it wasn't a read that made me call, it was the over 3:1 the pot was laying me that made me call. I call, the cards come up and the turn comes 7 river 8, giving villain a straight. Another hand involved me having KK against AQ, the flop coming under both of us. This time I used the overbet read to call with my KK, once again still and easy call, just needed to rule out two pair, but the overbet read helped me do that. I call, river A, and daddy's stuck $20 just like that... isn't this game beautiful?

TT Quandry
Ok this hand came up in an SNG and I boned it, so I'ma post it here and explain, in hindsight, how I fucked up. I don't have the hand history for this one, but I remember it pretty well. I have TT 1 off the button. Blinds are 100/200, I have approx 1600 in my stack. UTG miniraises to 200. This immediately flags for me. I put him on a monster, this is a bush league play that is common at this level. I read him on AA, KK, or AK, and somehow decide on AK. I call, flop comes K43. This is where I fuck up. My initial read is AK, when the King comes out I should be checking and ready to relinquish the pot at the first sign of aggression from my opponent. Instead, I'm a dumbass and try to (successfully might I add) convince myself that my opponent is not on AK, but AQ. This is a horrible move on my part because it doesn't jive with the mini-raise preflop, so basically I'm a moron. I bet out 350 into a 500 pot Mistake#2: This is where I marry myself to the hand, til death do me part from my money. I am immediately minireraised, ignore the giant fucking neon sign that says "YOU ARE CRUSHED YOU MORON LAY IT DOWN AND AT LEAST LEAVE WITH YOUR DIGNITY" that appears over my monitor and I move all in to... you guessed it AdKd... PWNED. This is a common problem I have in tournament play, talking myself into calls, hence I mention it here, so you can all publicly ridicule me for it so, hopefully, I'll stop.

Why He Didn't Have Two Pair
This is the hand that got me back to even in ring games. I have KhJh UTG, I limp, yeah that's right I said it, I limp, it's like 6 handed to the flop, Flop comes Kxx unconnected. I bet out my standard 60%-80% of the pot and I'm called by one player. Turn comes a 9, I once again bet out 60%-80% of the pot and this time the villain immediately moves all-in to me for around $13. This is a classic overbet play that I'm sure you'll hear me talk time and time again in low stakes NLHE. I call, he has K7, (one pair) river blank... PWNED. Now lemme tell you why I did it. First of all this table was pretty LAG as I was playing at around 5 AM CST, I saw a few huge pots won with just top pair... apparently these dudes drank too much Mountain Dew and watched too much ESPN and wanted to play BALLSY POKER... OMGWTF MORONS, ATMS, LOOSE/SHITTY... good times. But I digress... I lead out at this pot on the flop and lead out on the turn, it's painfully fuckin apparent that "Hey guys, my name's Huck and I'm an Aries and I'm very fucking interested in this hand." Now because this table was so LAG, aggression doesn't scare me, passivity does, because it's not in the flow with their usual play. Ok so when I bet about $4 at that beautiful turn 9 and this donk comes flying back over the top of me like Iceman is his fuckin wingman I get harder than a bucket of water in Alaska in December, because I know if he actually had two pair, he wouldn't be moving, he'd be trapping. He has a weak king at best, maybe even just a turned draw. What would've scared me on that turn? A smooth call has me checking the river unless I trip up or hit my J and a small reraise might get me to muck the hand outright right there.

So those are my notes/waxings/musings for this session... other random thoughts:

McDonald's should serve breakfast 24 hours a day.
Joe Jurevicius has the best hands of any WR in the NFL, that man could catch the clap in a convent.

That's what I got for now,

- Huck