Play a hand with me

It's pretty rare that I post stuff dealing with strategy and analysis of hands, because, first, there's about a billion other places you can go for those topics, so I have little new and original to contribute. Second, I just think it's usually pretty boring to read about somebody else's poker play. It's a "you had to be there" kind of thing. Besides, if you don't know the author personally, it's hard to care much if he won or lost on a given hand or in a given session.

But I've been musing today on a hand that I played last night in a $1-2 no-limit hold'em game at Harrah's, one that required more thought and finesse than usual, and I think maybe some readers might learn something from it. I'll warn you in advance, though, that it's going to take a lot of words to explain what on the surface was a pretty straightforward hand of cards, because all of the interesting stuff was going on below the surface. This is a hand that would have been totally different if played online. In fact, it illustrates perfectly, in large part, why I'm so much more successful playing in casinos than I am on the Internet.

When Greg Raymer won the main event of the World Series of Poker in 2004, he had to deal with the usual nay-sayers calling him a luckbox, and put up with critiques of some plays that seemed, well, a little crazy. But then ESPN did a special show where he got to comment on what he was doing, play by play, and it was eye-opening: The guy is very smart, highly analytical, and always, always, always, had a thoughtful, intelligent rationale for doing what he did. It was an impressive performance. (Had I been a follower of the http://www.twoplustwo.com/ forums, I would have already known that he had, long before the WSOP win, distinguished himself as a first-rate hand analyst.) I hope to do something similar here, in microcosm, because there is so vastly much more going on in poker than who has what cards, and this hand shows that abundantly, I think.

The nature of the opponent is absolutely crucial here. She is a classic tight-weak player, meaning that she plays very few hands, doesn't bet them strongly when she has them, and seems to be easier than average to intimidate. To make matters worse for her, she's playing in a seat next to a girlfriend, and they're openly commenting on the action as hands play out (not to the point of actually violating rules, but just things like "Wow," and "oooo" and "uh-oh" when unexpected things happen). In other words, she's spinning off loads of extra information about whether she likes the situation or not.

Conversely, I've been lucky enough to establish a highly tight-aggressive image, not showing any of my bluffs, showing down only strong hands, and making good laydowns when beat, all of which adds up to the table seeing my bets and raises as deserving healthy respect. It's just the way I like it.

I have only tangled with this young woman in one pot before. She folded to my raise on the river, and I showed her that I had made the nut straight on the turn and had trapped her for that last river bet. I have no doubt that that memory will influence how she plays against me in the future.

These facts are critical, because I'm about to do something unorthodox, and wouldn't attempt it without those circumstances having set it up.

I limp in from early position with Q-10 of hearts. It's not a hand I'm thrilled with, and I won't take much heat with it, but it does have potential. Ms. Tight-Weak raises to $10, which is a pretty standard opening raise for this table. Everybody else folds.

Normally I would fold here, too, and with good reason. As Dan Harrington points out in his essential treatise on tournament hold'em, you have four weapons at your disposal: your cards, your chip stack, position, and table image. You don't need to have all four of them going for you in any hand, but it's unwise to go into battle without at least two of them on your side.

Here I have only one: table image. I'm out of position. She has a few more chips than I do. And given the narrow range of hands with which she has been raising, she almost certainly is starting off with stronger cards.

It is terribly arrogant of me to think that I can outplay an opponent without the advantage of position, without an intimidating stack of chips, and with a weaker hand. It's really rare that I would attempt it. But, as I hope I have adequately established above, the peculiar mix of factors here seems just right that I might be able to negotiate an unusually dangerous situation. At the very least, I believe that it will be easy to determine if I'm beat and get away from the hand without too much loss.

So I call her raise, and we see the flop of K-Q-2 rainbow. I check. She bets $20. I think she probably has either pocket aces or a king with a strong kicker to bet into me here, and if she had aces, she likely would have raised more before the flop. But I decide to call, mostly to see what she does with the turn card, in the hope that a steal opportunity will present itself. Lots of players like her will fire on the flop, but not have the heart to keep betting if they are called. In her case, this could be because the flop missed her (e.g., she has pocket 10s or jacks, and really didn't like the flop, but was willing to take one shot at it), or because the flop helped her, but she's worried about being trapped by me slow-playing something like two pair or a flopped set of deuces. In addition to all of that, having made second pair here gives me outs even if she has the king; a 10 or another Q will likely give me a better hand.

The turn card is an offsuit 6. I like this, because there are no flush draws to complicate the analysis. It's possible that she has a straight draw with A-J, but it's only a one-way if so, and I really don't think she's the type to have bet just a draw. If she had J-10 for the open-ended straight draw, I think she would have just limped in before the flop.

On the other hand, the turn card obviously didn't help me. I'm going to check, and basically if she fires again, I'm bailing out.

At least, that's the plan.

But then she does something unexpected: she bets $20 again. A larger bet, and I'm convinced she has a king, I'm beat, and I'm outta there. But repeating, rather than increasing, a bet size on a later street is a tight-weak player's classic scream of fear. My assessment of her is that she has sufficient experience to overcome her fear if she had two pair (especially king-queen here) or pocket kings or queens for a flopped set, and she would be confident enough of her hand to bet strongly. On the other hand, if she had missed completely, I think she wouldn't be putting in another bet at all. That means that I can narrow down her hand possibilities with almost laser-like precision: She has A-K, K-J, or A-Q. Nothing else fits the pattern here.

Repeating the same bet size after the pot has grown larger isn't quite raising the white flag of surrender, but it definitely changes my plan. I now think there's a good chance I can steal it from her. So I calmly, quietly, deliberately put two red chips on top of a $50 stack and push it forward--a check-raise, tripling her bet.

She and her friend instantly go into frenzy mode: "Uh-oh." "What did I get myself into?" "What does he have?" I like this. Unless my radar is way, way off, this isn't acting to fake me out with a monster, but is genuine concern on her part. She cuts out the additional $40, moves it back and forth between her hands a bit, looks at what is left of her stacks if she calls and loses this, but then finally puts it in. But she is definitely rattled.

I now believe that I can eliminate A-Q from her range of possible hands, because she wouldn't call a check-raise with second pair. She's just got to have a king for top pair, and most likely A-K to be willing to call my check-raise.

Well, basically I'm done with this hand. I gave it a good try, but it didn't work. I'm beat and I can't push her off of her hand. Time to cut my losses and look for a better spot.

But wait--did the dealer just put out a third queen for me on the river? Why yes, he did! Thank you, Mr. Dealer! I am about as certain as I can be that I now have the best hand. What's more is she can't think that I have a queen, because nobody would be stupid enough to check-raise with second pair (hee hee!). So I move all-in for my last $106.

She again goes into talk-out-loud mode. It takes her at least a full minute, but finally she says, "OK, I call." She then gets the bad news, and shows me her A-K. She crabs a bit with her friend about how lucky I got--which there is no denying. I hit one of five cards that would make me the winner, without which it probably would have gone check-check at the end.

Her mistakes were excessive timidity and transparency. If she had put in closer to a pot-sized bet on the turn, I would have scampered off with my tail between my legs. And consider her call of my check-raise on the turn. She should have thought something like this: "If I call here and he pushes all-in on the river, I'm going to call that. Since I'm going to be willing to risk nearly all my chips anyway, it would be smarter to push now, because if he's just trying to bully me, he might fold, but if I wait until the river and he goes all-in, it will be too late to push back against him, and, besides, that last card might help him. I can't expect my hand to get any better than it already is, so now is the time to make my stand." If she had re-raised me there, again I run away licking my wounds. Her weakness cost her nearly her entire stack.

The transparency cost her money, too, because without making herself so easy to gauge, I would have been concerned that she started with K-Q, flopped two pair, and make a full house on the river. I might have still tried the check-raise (I honestly can't say for sure), but if she had called it without fuss and drama and emotion, I would have been seriously worried that I was beat even after making three queens, and would have checked it down with her, cutting her losses. She virtually allowed me to play as if her cards were face-up on the table, which let me extract maximum value when I got more than a little bit lucky.*

So today's lessons, kids, are these: When you have a good hand, playing it timidly will cost you money. And whatever hand you have, the more you talk and react and scrunch up your face and fiddle with your chips, the easier it will be for an opponent to deduce what you're holding, and adjust his play optimally against you, which will also cost you money. That's not what you want, is it?


*Of course, these things can go the other way, too. Just a few days ago, also at Harrah's, I made the nut straight on the turn, put in a pot-sized bet, and had an opponent move all-in on me with two pair. I called, of course, and he hit one of four cards on the river to make a full house. Nothing you can do about that except roll your eyes and pull out more cash.