Micro-Limit Players
You know, after playing $25NL, it really amazes me how players over-play and under-play hands. I may have actually just gotten it. Was I aggravated at virtually back-to-back straight suckouts cracking AA? Yes. Pissed? Yes. What is my long-term outlook? Positive. Why? Because I know these players are there, and that taking my money will keep bringing them back. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, I will make serious money against the fish. In the meantime, I'm going to give a short-form primer into the mistakes that low-limit players make at the NL tables:
1) Fish overplay TPTK on small boards.
Here's the setup: You're in LP with AJo. An tight aggressive EP player makes it 6BB (NL, obviously), and a MP player (let's call him Fishy) cold calls. You fold, and it's heads up on the flop. The flop is 9-7-4 rainbow. Fishy has J9o, and bets into the flop with TPTK. Now what intelligent good player does that? The TA player in EP obviously has a premium hand (AA, KK, QQ, AKs), and Mr. TPTK is dominated. He's dominated pre-flop, post-flop, and right down until he ships his chips to the TA player (or he runner-runners him to win), he's a HUGE dog.
Look at yesterday's first hand carnage--I had AA (75.46%), Fishy had AQ (6.76%), Lucy had T8o (16.63%). On a flop of Q-J-2, all Fishy has done is make himself a very expensive second-best hand. He has 2 outs, the remaining 2 Qs. Lucy, with his T8o, actually has 4 outs, the 4 9's in the deck. The pot, after the flop, is $4.75. Percentages? My AA (70.54%), Lucy's T8o (20.04%), Fishy's AQ (8.08%). I bet $2 into it, not wanting to scare anybody away, but making an effective bet. Lucy is next to bet. He has the gutshot draw, betting into a $6.75 pot. He raises it to $8.25, and I put him at best on QJs, not having a great read on him, or maybe an openend draw based on the rainbow flop. Fishy then calls the $8.25 with TPTK into a $15 pot. He's getting only 1.8:1 to call. For him, this is crazy. His odds of winning (unknown to him, though he should have had a read on me, since it was the first flop I had seen in almost 3 orbits) were 22-to-1. He was screwed. Lucy went all-in with 10.5:1 odds to win. Also crazy. I called the remaining $6.25, getting 3.72-to-1 odds to call with what I assumed (except for QJ) to be the best hand on the table. We checked down to the river, where Fishy bet $2 into me, and with turn and river cards like a 9 and a 6, I knew he wasn't calling with Q9 or Q6, and that he might have had QQ or JJ, but I didn't figure him for it. I was right when he turned AQo. I insta called, and expected fully to have this $31.90 pot pushed to me, when Lucy turned over his straight. He was going all-in with anything post-flop. It wouldn't have mattered. I played the hand well, but he drew out. If he wants to play T8o against my AA, he can do that any time. The board wasn't small, but when the all-ins started coming, Fishy should have thought--hey, maybe I'm beat here. But he didn't. The love affair between fish and TPTK is eternal.
2) The Rules of Poker Club:
Rule #1: You do not give a fish a free card.
Rule #2: You DO NOT give a fish a free card.
So what did I do? I gave a guy who was actually fairly tight a free card on a decent flop. I didn't learn my lesson. AA with a flop of K-Q-2 rainbow (how similar--see--online poker is rigged) is a no-brainer bet. I've raised from the SB, he called from the BB. I had him beat. I bet into him, he doesn't hang around. Instead, I checked. Checking and small-bet cold calling is the fish and/or calling station's raison d'etre. It's what they live for. You can't make them think about calling a bet you never make. I'm not sure what I was thinking, maybe waiting for a check-raise, but as Miller, Sklansky, and everybody else says, a check-raise situation without a bet after you is dangerous. Very dangerous indeed. The turn was a 7, a blank, but a card that I should NEVER have let him see. It goes to prove how different a game limit is from no-limit. A $1 bet in 1/2 limit would not discourage a player from chasing a gutshot. A check? It is a truly free card. Major mistake. I bet the turn, but only $1 into a $2.50 pot. I gave him 3.5 to 1 to call. Not good enough to call for an 11-to-1 gutshot, but it is only a dollar, and the fish don't know pot odds either... He then rivers his straight, gets me all-in with a second best hand that tilt kept me from laying down, even though I tried to push him off with a raise to make him think that I had made the Broadway straight. He was pot committed, and would definitely call, and definitely win. Bad play.
3) Never cold-call pre-flop raises with crap, even in LP.
In disaster hand #3, I cold-called a PFR with KQo. Blame it on tilt. I did the exact thing that #1 says NOT to do. I fell in love with TPTK. Three players, I saw two pair on the river and called an all-in. Big mistake. Another second-best hand costing me. The BB called a MP raise with a small pair, hit his trips, then filled up on the river. He played it well, I was on tilt--buy-in gone.
The bottom line is that the low-limit fish will give you their money. The combination of their bad plays with your good ones will make you money in the long run. After analysis, I am still mad for losing my buy-in (even if it WAS only $25), but I only have one person to be mad at--me.
To solid play!
1) Fish overplay TPTK on small boards.
Here's the setup: You're in LP with AJo. An tight aggressive EP player makes it 6BB (NL, obviously), and a MP player (let's call him Fishy) cold calls. You fold, and it's heads up on the flop. The flop is 9-7-4 rainbow. Fishy has J9o, and bets into the flop with TPTK. Now what intelligent good player does that? The TA player in EP obviously has a premium hand (AA, KK, QQ, AKs), and Mr. TPTK is dominated. He's dominated pre-flop, post-flop, and right down until he ships his chips to the TA player (or he runner-runners him to win), he's a HUGE dog.
Look at yesterday's first hand carnage--I had AA (75.46%), Fishy had AQ (6.76%), Lucy had T8o (16.63%). On a flop of Q-J-2, all Fishy has done is make himself a very expensive second-best hand. He has 2 outs, the remaining 2 Qs. Lucy, with his T8o, actually has 4 outs, the 4 9's in the deck. The pot, after the flop, is $4.75. Percentages? My AA (70.54%), Lucy's T8o (20.04%), Fishy's AQ (8.08%). I bet $2 into it, not wanting to scare anybody away, but making an effective bet. Lucy is next to bet. He has the gutshot draw, betting into a $6.75 pot. He raises it to $8.25, and I put him at best on QJs, not having a great read on him, or maybe an openend draw based on the rainbow flop. Fishy then calls the $8.25 with TPTK into a $15 pot. He's getting only 1.8:1 to call. For him, this is crazy. His odds of winning (unknown to him, though he should have had a read on me, since it was the first flop I had seen in almost 3 orbits) were 22-to-1. He was screwed. Lucy went all-in with 10.5:1 odds to win. Also crazy. I called the remaining $6.25, getting 3.72-to-1 odds to call with what I assumed (except for QJ) to be the best hand on the table. We checked down to the river, where Fishy bet $2 into me, and with turn and river cards like a 9 and a 6, I knew he wasn't calling with Q9 or Q6, and that he might have had QQ or JJ, but I didn't figure him for it. I was right when he turned AQo. I insta called, and expected fully to have this $31.90 pot pushed to me, when Lucy turned over his straight. He was going all-in with anything post-flop. It wouldn't have mattered. I played the hand well, but he drew out. If he wants to play T8o against my AA, he can do that any time. The board wasn't small, but when the all-ins started coming, Fishy should have thought--hey, maybe I'm beat here. But he didn't. The love affair between fish and TPTK is eternal.
2) The Rules of Poker Club:
Rule #1: You do not give a fish a free card.
Rule #2: You DO NOT give a fish a free card.
So what did I do? I gave a guy who was actually fairly tight a free card on a decent flop. I didn't learn my lesson. AA with a flop of K-Q-2 rainbow (how similar--see--online poker is rigged) is a no-brainer bet. I've raised from the SB, he called from the BB. I had him beat. I bet into him, he doesn't hang around. Instead, I checked. Checking and small-bet cold calling is the fish and/or calling station's raison d'etre. It's what they live for. You can't make them think about calling a bet you never make. I'm not sure what I was thinking, maybe waiting for a check-raise, but as Miller, Sklansky, and everybody else says, a check-raise situation without a bet after you is dangerous. Very dangerous indeed. The turn was a 7, a blank, but a card that I should NEVER have let him see. It goes to prove how different a game limit is from no-limit. A $1 bet in 1/2 limit would not discourage a player from chasing a gutshot. A check? It is a truly free card. Major mistake. I bet the turn, but only $1 into a $2.50 pot. I gave him 3.5 to 1 to call. Not good enough to call for an 11-to-1 gutshot, but it is only a dollar, and the fish don't know pot odds either... He then rivers his straight, gets me all-in with a second best hand that tilt kept me from laying down, even though I tried to push him off with a raise to make him think that I had made the Broadway straight. He was pot committed, and would definitely call, and definitely win. Bad play.
3) Never cold-call pre-flop raises with crap, even in LP.
In disaster hand #3, I cold-called a PFR with KQo. Blame it on tilt. I did the exact thing that #1 says NOT to do. I fell in love with TPTK. Three players, I saw two pair on the river and called an all-in. Big mistake. Another second-best hand costing me. The BB called a MP raise with a small pair, hit his trips, then filled up on the river. He played it well, I was on tilt--buy-in gone.
The bottom line is that the low-limit fish will give you their money. The combination of their bad plays with your good ones will make you money in the long run. After analysis, I am still mad for losing my buy-in (even if it WAS only $25), but I only have one person to be mad at--me.
To solid play!
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