Pokerati game #2

Back in April I told you about my first attempt at playing pot-limit Omaha live--specifically the "Pokerati" game at the Palms, which alternates one round of no-limit hold'em and one round of PLO, each with $1/2 blinds. It was not exactly a raging success. But it was OK, because I'm learning, and losing some money is the price of achieving competence at a new version of poker. One just has to be careful to put limits on the losses along the way.

Last night I took my second shot at it. I had had a good night at my bread-and-butter games at the Rio, and several friends had decided to do a Palms Pokerati session. I agreed to join them, and a few random strangers sat down with us, too.

I was doing much better this time. I was much more selective about starting PLO hands, and paid more attention to using my table image and position as tools, rather than just making hands. (Personal triumph of the evening: Hearing Otis say, "I'm finding you kind of scary.") All was going rather well, and I was up about $150 over my $200 buy-in. And then I blew it with one bad decision.

In a PLO hand I was one of six who had put in $20 each pre-flop. I had KsKcJcX. The flop was something like Q73 with two clubs. Ryan (Absinthetics) opened with a pot-sized bet. I was next. My thinking was that with a re-pot (which would put me all in), I could represent top set, likely fold the field, and still have the flush draw as a backup plan in case I got called.

In fact, I did get called--twice. First by an unknown guy who had the ace-high flush draw, and then by Ryan, who actually had what I was trying to persuade him that I had. D'oh! I basically had only two outs--hitting a red king. That didn't happen. Ryan won an enormous pot. You can see the impressive chip stack that resulted here. Don't overlook the wad of Benjamins tucked in there.

It was a stupid move on my part. Committing one's stack with just an overpair and a non-nut flush draw in the face of another solid player's demonstrated aggression and desire to build a big pot is just suicidal. It was midnight, I was tired, had been playing for several hours, and just wasn't thinking clearly. I basically reverted to valuing hands as I might in hold'em, rather than adjusting to a game where it is always much more likely that somebody is already holding the nuts, and in which non-nut draws are hazardous to one's health.

I still ended up winner for the day, however, and hopefully had a painful lesson embedded further into my brain by the consequences of my error, and will be better prepared to skirt such dangers in the future. (I already knew these things in theory, but obviously hadn't incorporated them sufficiently deeply into my decision-making apparatus.)

The learning continues.