Jason Somerville

Four years ago I wrote this:

[S]ooner or later, inevitably, somebody that we all recognize from televised and/or online poker events (even if it's somebody who is not currently well known) will out himself. Every time this little curiosity has occurred to me, I've wondered how this incredibly macho, sexist, swaggering, "I am the MAN" poker world will react to the news. My guess is that there will be a lot of public quoting of the famous Seinfeld line (a la the title of this post), accompanied by a lot of quiet, private, nasty bashing. You can imagine the kind of things that will be written by the scads of anonymous contributors to the poker forums--those who can't make a comment about a female professional player that doesn't involve judging her attractiveness or lack thereof. I don't envy whoever it is who takes on (voluntarily or otherwise) the role of the first openly gay poker pro. I think it will be a difficult mantle to wear.

It appears that now we get to see if my predictions will come true with respect to Jason Somerville, who today publicly announced his sexual orientation.

(An unstated but obvious assumption in that old post was that I was referring to men. Since writing it, Vanessa Selbst burst on the tournament poker scene, apparently perfectly comfortable with everybody knowing that she has a live-in girlfriend. It's not like I didn't know that lesbians existed in the world, but my focus was on gay men, first, because there are so few women among the top tiers of the poker economy, and, second, because my impression is that gay women are less likely than gay men to elicit cruelty and bigotry from Neanderthal poker players.)

I hope my worst fears prove to have been wrong.

Josie has a very important message for you all

Go see it here.

G. Gordon Liddy sets an example

I was playing at the Luxor tonight. A guy joined the table that looked so much like G. Gordon Liddy that I had to stare for a while before I could convince myself that it wasn't actually him.* He not only had the same build and facial structure, but he had the shaved head and Tom Selleck moustache, too. I was tempted to challenge him to a contest of who could hold his hand over a candle flame for the longest to find out if it was him or not. You can see him (sort of) on the right in the photo above.

I don't remember playing with him before, but he is clearly a local nit--the archetypal nut-peddler that everybody warns you means serious business when he bets or raises.

I had A-A under the gun and raised to $10. One caller, then Liddy raised to $35. Hmm. This was the first three-bet he had done in the two hours or so we had been playing--and he was doing it against my UTG raise. All by itself, this fact narrowed his hand range incredibly far: About 90% chance he has aces or kings. The other 10% (and that's being generous) is queens and A-K, both much less likely than the Big Two. I could narrow it even further, in fact. Given that I had two of the four aces in the deck, it was six times more likely that he had kings than aces.

A fourth player called the $35, so this was starting to look like we were going to have a big, multiway pot. I started salivating. After nonchalantly wiping the drool from my chin, I slid forward two stacks of $50 each to add to the previous $10. A bet of $110 was not only conveniently about three times Liddy's bet, but had the added advantage of being about half of his remaining stack. (I started the hand with about $320, and had him covered.) I hoped that he would decide that if he was going to put in half his stack, he might as well put in the whole thing--or, alternatively, that he would just call and then feel pot-committed when I moved in on the flop.

First caller folded. Liddy thought for a bit, counting and stacking and restacking his chips. I couldn't tell if he was considering a shove or a fold. He well might have had both in his mind as legitimate options. He finally settled on a call. Fourth player dropped out.

As the dealer scooped the chips into the middle of the table, I was exerting my mental powers on him: Don't flop a king, don't flop a king, don't flop a king. I really wanted there not to be an ace, either, so that Liddy would be more likely to commit his stack, but that plea to the universe was made with an order of magnitude less intensity than the no-king one.

The flop was 3-3-4 rainbow. Of all the flops that do not improve pocket aces, that may be the very best that one can see. Absolutely perfect, utterly nonthreatening. "I'm all in."

And now the sweat began. Liddy was quiet and still, but obviously in some psychological distress. After a minute or so he broke the silence: "I know that you're good enough to know exactly what I have. So the fact that you go all in while knowing that means that you can only have one hand." Neither I nor anybody else at the table responded to this observation, and his silent vigil resumed. His only other sound was quietly adding up what the pre-flop bets had been to get an estimate of the pot size, then counting his own remaining chips--about $135.

Finally he let out a big breath and said, "You have aces. That's all there is to it. I have to fold." And with that, he turned his kings face up and slid them back to the dealer.

To his left was a young stereotypical European internet player, who had been waiting out this drama with obvious impatience. The kid's eye bugged out of his skull, and he said, "You're folding?! How can you fold that?"

Liddy was unperturbed by having his decision questioned. Matter-of-factly, without defensiveness or irritation, he replied, "He has aces. I have two outs. I'm not going to put in another hundred dollars drawing to two outs." Eurokid smirked and said, "You have to call there." Liddy brushed him off. "I know you couldn't fold here, but it's the right move. In fact, I was close to throwing it away before the flop." I believe him 100%. His tone was not defiant or argumentative--just supremely confident. It was the voice of a man who had made a difficult decision, and didn't like having to do it, but was at peace with what he had done.

I was seriously impressed. I don't know if I would have saved my last money the way that he did, after investing half my stack. I think coming to the conclusion that I had pocket aces was relatively straightforward for him, as was arriving at the obvious implication that that conclusion required a fold. But actually carrying out what he knew needed to be done was agonizing and took some mustering of his considerable internal fortitude.

The best episode of the World Poker Tour I ever saw was in the first season, with Paul Phillips heads-up against Mel Judah. Judah had fought back from a short stack to have a small chip lead. Then in the decisive hand they both had straights on the river, but Judah's was the nuts. Phillips had the dummy end. Judah moved all in, which was a massive overbet to a small pot. Phillips deliberated for several minutes, and they did not edit the tape. You see him talking to himself, trying to get some read off of Judah, sweating profusely, debating whether Judah would have taken the line he did if he had the only cards that beat him (Phillips). Meanwhile, in the voiceover, Mike Sexton ticks off for Vince Van Patten (and for the home audience) all the clues that Phillips has that Judah has him beat. It was one of the most cogent and insightful pieces of analysis I ever heard him do, and he was exactly right. Van Patten was much more sympathetic with the dilemma Phillips was in. He acknowledged Sexton's points, but then said, "But how do you fold a straight when you're heads-up?" Sexton's response was classic, and I've never forgotten it: "It's easy, Vince. You just pick up your cards and throw them in the muck." (Phillips didn't see it that way. He called and the tournament was over.)

Many times I've been faced with the painful conclusion that I'm beat and have to fold, abandoning some small fortune in chips in the pot. In such situations, Sexton's words come back to my mind: "Just pick up your cards and throw them in the muck." It hurts, but you make that one small physical motion, and it's done, like ripping off a Band-Aid.

It seems to me that this is a lesson that Mr. Liddy (or whatever his real name is) has learned well. He didn't care what anybody else would do, nor what anybody else thought of his decision. He simply was not going to throw good money after bad, once he convinced himself that his read of my hand was correct.

I did not show my cards. I thought it was strategically better to let Liddy, the kid, and the others continue to wonder if his certitude would have been vindicated. As a general rule, leaving opponents feeling psychologically off-balance and unsure of themselves is more effective than satisfying their curiosity.

But an hour or so later, after I racked up my chips and bade the table good night, I stopped by Liddy's seat and told him, sotto voce, "You were absolutely right. Very impressive laydown." He gave me a quick nod and a terse, "Thank you." I thought he deserved to know--though his confidence in himself was such that I'm not sure it really added anything to his perception of what had transpired.

*It has absolutely no connection to the poker tale, but I'm suddenly remembering a funny moment from the real Liddy. Many years ago I saw him on a late-night TV talk show. He and the host (Carson? I can't remember for sure) somehow got talking about guns. The host asked him if he owned any guns. He said, "As a convicted felon, I am legally prohibited from owning firearms. [Pause.] Mrs. Liddy, however, has an extensive collection."

Addendum, February 11, 2012

I found that World Poker Tour episode online here. The final two hands start at about the 37:00 mark. It's been years since I watched it, so this gives you a chance to see whether my memory of the action and dialog in my description above was accurate. (I got some details wrong--e.g., it was early in the second season, not the first, and Judah's straight was the second nuts rather than the nuts--but the general flavor of it was about right, I think.

Poker gems, #448

Gavin Griffin, in Card Player magazine column, February 8, 2012 (vol. 25, #3), page 36.

The Omaha table at your local casino is usually populated by the oldest and crankiest individuals in the room. I'm not sure whether Omaha draws these types or if you just age faster and get crankier the more you play the game.

Royal

I think it's completely unfair that with all the hands of cards I've played over the years, I've never managed to make a Royal Fizzbin. Live poker is so rigged.

Attention, readers in New York

Ira Glass is hosting a charity tournament Saturday. See details here:

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/blog/2012/02/nyc-come-beat-ira-in-poker

The min raise

Last night I was playing at the Golden Nugget with the visiting Lightning36. He lives in my hometown and works at one of the colleges I attended, so it's always good to catch up a bit with him when he's in town.

So I have Ah-Ks in early position and raise to $8. Three people call me. The flop is all hearts, Q-8-3. With the nut flush draw, I like how this looks. I bet $20, about 2/3 of the pot. One fold, then another player raises to $40. Another fold and it's back to me, heads-up.

The pot is about $90, and it costs me only $20 to call, giving me 4.5:1 pot odds. There are nine cards that the dealer can find in the deck to make my flush, and 47 unknown cards, so the probability of hitting on the turn is 9/47, or 19%, which is 5.2:1. Even if I have no implied odds--i.e., my opponent won't put in another dime if the flush comes and it scares him--I have favorable odds to make this call correct.

As soon as I have put in another $20, the dealer peels off the 4 of hearts. Nutterific! I had a feeling that that was going to be an action-killer, because his raising range probably did not include any hands with which he would have liked to see a fourth heart come. I was right--he checked it back to me.* That pretty much sealed the conclusion that he hated that card.

Fifth street was a blank. I led out for $55 into the $110 pot, hoping that it was small enough to tempt a call. But he thought long and hard, in apparent agony, before finally mucking face-up his pocket 8s (flopped set).

And thus we see the chief problem with the minimum raise: It almost never accomplishes whatever purpose the raise had.

Here he presumably wanted me to fold, but the size of his raise actually meant that a fold would have been mathematically incorrect.

Let's consider some other reasons that one raises.

1. As a bluff, when you sense weakness. But a min-raise also looks weak, and may just induce an over-the-top re-bluff.

2. To price out draws. But as this example shows, a min-raise often fails to accomplish that, because it sets the price of the draw temptingly low.

3. To build the pot when you have the best hand. But if that's your goal, why be so chintzy? Put in some serious money instead and hope for a call.

4. As a probe, to "see where you are." But a min-raise often doesn't clarify the situation for you. In this case, a fold would have told him that I completely missed the flop and had nothing, but my call left him in the dark as to whether I had an overpair with no heart, or was drawing to the flush. That uncertainty is what gave him the agonizing decision when I put him to the test on the river. Had he made his raise more substantial, the first advantage is that I might have given up the hand, knowing that he was unlikely to stack off if I hit. The second advantage is that he could be more confident that I was not calling with, say, pocket kings with no heart, making his later decision much more clear.

Like any poker move, the min-raise has a place. But it's really a very small niche. It's a specialty tool to be used in a few specific, rare situations. For example, you have a monster hand, know that an opponent is weak, and a minimum raise is the most you can possibly hope to squeeze out of him. Or you have an overly aggressive opponent whom you have reason to believe will read a min-raise as weak, when you actually have him crushed; the min-raise in that situation is a trap that you hope will induce a reraise that will get him pot-committed in bad shape. Or you have a lock on the hand and a whole raft of callers to somebody's initial bet; a min-raise may be the best way to swell the pot by giving every single one of those callers temptation to put more chips in when they're drawing dead.

How often do situations arise in which the min-raise is the optimal move? In my view, it's rare. I doubt I put in a min-raise more than a couple of times a month.

Imagine that you've produced a gadget that you want to sell, and you have to determine the price. If you set it too low, you'll sell a ton, but you might actually lose money if revenues are below your costs. If you set the price too high, you'll make a handsome profit with each sale, but sales will be slower than they would be if the price were lower. There is a perfect price somewhere in the middle that optimizes your profit, at the top of a bell-shaped curve of price versus profit. Finding that sweet spot is the key. Large corporations have whole divisions of financial wizards whose only job is finding optimal prices for their products.

When you bet and raise in poker, you are, in effect, offering your hand for sale. You need to set the price to maximize profit. Sometimes the way to do that is by going all-in, if you think your opponent has a second-best hand and can't get away from it, or is unusually loose and calls anything. But if you made every raise all-in, you'd lose your shirt, because most of the time worse hands won't call you and you'll make zero, and once in a while you'll get called by a better hand and lose everything. So that should not be your default or most usual raise strategy.

Similarly, if you habitually min-raise, you're setting your price much too low. Sure, you'll get called a lot--but that includes spots where you really don't want a call, and it leaves money on the table in most of the spots where you do want a call.

For any raise you make, you need to have in mind a clear purpose. What are your goals? What better hands do you think will fold? What worse hands do you think will call? Most importantly, what raise amount will make the most money? I think you'll find that the smallest raise is almost never the right tool.

Min-raises do not lead to max-profits.

Oh, about that image above: It's Min, an Egyptian god of fertility. I did an image search for "min," having no idea what I might find. When I saw that phallic image, and paired it in my mind with the concept of "raise," well, my 12-year-old self took control and decided that had to be the illustration of the day. It is, quite literally, the Min raise.

*One could certainly argue for a lead-out bet on this turn. After all, I have a big hand and want a big pot. The obvious, straightforward move is most often the right one, and putting more money into a juicy pot when one has the best possible hand is certainly the obvious play. My instantaneous analysis, however, was that calling the flop raise and then leading out was too transparent for having the flush. My plan was to let him bet at it again and check-raise; if he didn't bet, then having passed on the turn, a bet on the river might look like I'm working a non-flush overpair. That is, if there is X amount that he's going to be willing to call, he might be more prone to do so on the river after a check-check turn than immediately after the scare card hits. That was my thinking at the time.

However, there is this strong counter-argument: If he has a set or two pair, he will actually be more willing to put in his call of X amount on the turn than on the river, because he can still hope to improve to a full house, a possibility that is foreclosed after the last card is on the board. Furthermore, if the board does pair on the river, I'm suddenly in a very awkward spot. I will have missed my chance to win the pot when I had the best of it, and will kick myself for giving him the free card. In retrospect, I'm inclined to believe that leading out on the turn probably would have been better, but I think the pros and cons come out close enough that if it was a mistake, it was a relatively small one.

Candidates on poker

The Epic Poker web site has put up two pieces in recent days about the presidential candidates' positions on online poker (and/or online gaming more generally).

First is Jen Newell's short assessment of where the candidates stand. Not surprisingly, Ron Paul is, as always, for maximal personal freedom, so he opposes not only prohibitions on online gaming, but any governmental attempt to control the Internet. Also not surprisingly, Mitt Romney is opposed to any expansion of gambling. Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum have not taken official positions. Which, if you ask me, means that they can't be counted on to be supporters. Also, given their naked appeals to hard-core religious conservatives, who think they are tasked by God to impose their moral values on the rest of the world by force, it's hard to believe either one would ever come out in favor of online gaming.

Last in the "not surprisingly" category is candidate Barack Obama, who has never lifted a finger to help poker players or even bothered to promise that he would. (Not that his promise means anything, given the appalling rate at which he breaks them.) And if you think he gives a rat's ass about personal freedom as a general principle, well, you just haven't been paying attention the last four years, have you?

Second is Dan O'Brien's opinion piece, explaining his support of Ron Paul. He nails the reasons that poker players specifically, and fans of personal liberty generally, should vote for Paul.

My only disagreement with O'Brien comes at the end of his essay, where he says that if Paul is not on the ballot in November he won't vote. Hey, why not vote for Gary Johnson, who is likely to be the Libertarian Party candidate, and thus on the ballot in all 50 states? Sure, he's probably not going to win, but why not use your vote to show your enthusiasm for freedom, rather than sit out the election? Johnson is as good as Paul on leaving people alone to live their lives the way they choose to, which includes playing poker online. As Newell reminds us, Johnson was the only candidate to show up at the World Series of Poker to make an explicit appeal to poker players for their support. He's solidly, unquestionably on our side.

Addendum, February 7, 2012

One of my Twitter followers told me that Santorum was on local channel 3's show "Face to Face" with reporter Jon Ralston last week. I found the January 31 program online here:

http://www.mynews3.com/content/programming/local/facetoface/default.aspx

Ralston asks him directly about online gaming, and Santorum's response is completely negative. He is opposed to it, thinks it's "dangerous." The discussion starts at the 15:00 mark (note that the counter runs backwards), and goes on for about three minutes.

Santorum has gone on record as saying, "The essential issue in this race is freedom." By his own standard, then, he loses. He is decidedly not a champion of freedom. He has openly denounced the "idea that people should be left alone, be able to do whatever they want to do...that we shouldn't get involved in the bedroom (and) we shouldn't get involved in cultural issues."

So if you relish the thought of having the federal government force your most personal decisions to go just the way Rick Santorum thinks they ought to, by all means, throw him your vote. Me? I'd vote for a mummified Richard Nixon before I'd support a would-be tyrant like Santorum.

Two Plus Two involved in Gary Johnson campaign

I'm on the email list for Gary Johnson's Nevada campaign. In one I received just a few minutes ago from Jared Lord, the state campaign director, I noticed this interesting tidbit at the end: "Two Plus Two Poker has been very kind to donate office space in Henderson. Right now the space is being underutilized, as I've been working from home...."

I guess sharing office space is OK, but maybe I should warn him about looking in Sklansky's glove compartment.*

*If that reference is too obscure, see here.

Playing the 2-4 on 2/4

I'm writing at the close of February 4, a date traditionally abbreviated in the United States as 2/4. Naturally, it is the holiest of holy days on the liturgical calendar of the Sacred Order of the Deuce-Four.

I spent the evening playing at Hooters, and was disappointed that my faithfulness was not being rewarded with the sight of the Blessed Hand on its holy day. But in retrospect I see that the poker gods were merely testing my patience and resolve. I know this because of how my faith was rewarded in the end.

About 2 1/2 hours into the session, there it was: 2-4 offsuit. I was under the gun. I raised to $7 and got three callers. The flop came 4-7-K. I bet $18, and all three opponents folded.

Of course I don't usually show my cards if I don't have to, but a duty has devolved upon me to spread the Gospel of the Deuce-Four. On its special day, I would be unforgivably shirking my responsibility as an emissary of The Hand if I kept its light under a bushel, to borrow the biblical phrase. So I showed my hand, explaining that this was my favorite hand, and always a winner.

There were the usual scoffs and snorts that I have come to expect when I deliver this message in public--much like Noah's warnings of the impending destruction of the earth was dismissed and ridiculed. I'm used to it.

I composed a message on Twitter announcing that the prophecies had been fulfilled, and the Deuce-Four had prevailed on its appointed day. I had literally just hit "send" on my phone when I picked up my hole cards and there it was again, the loveliest two cards any dealer ever puts together.

This time I called a raise to $11. The flop was 2-J-4. My opponent checked. I bet $15. He called. The turn was another 4, and I lo I did see the heavens open and hear a host of angels sing. Yes, it was my sacred privilege to behold the Mighty Deuce-Four in all its glory making a full house against mine enemies. It's a humbling experience to be in the presence of a genuine miracle as it transpires.

My opponent checked again. I bet $30, and he called again.

Fifth street came a 6, and my opponent checked a third time. I bet $55, and he called. He flipped his cards over immediately after saying "call," showing me A-J. Top pair, top kicker. Nice hand, sir, but there's something you should know.

Another player had obviously believed my earlier speech, because as I was reaching for my cards, he asked, "You have your favorite hand?" Yes. Yes I do. I showed, and there was much rejoicing.

With this even greater proof now before the mocking fools, I reiterated my point about this being the most powerful hand in poker. This time, nobody snickered.

About five minutes later, the guy on my left was the only caller of a pre-flop raise (from, coincidentally, somebody who had already identified himself to me as one of my readers). He nudged me and quietly said, "I'm giving your hand a try here."

His faith was rewarded. The flop was 4-4-10. His opponent bet, my disciple called. I don't remember what fourth street was, but the original raiser now checked, and our new convert bet, triggering a fold. I told him, "You have to show it." He did. Now the former mockers had turned to admirers. I just smiled and told the table, "This is what I've been trying to tell you."

One orbit later it was time for me to rack up my winnings and head home. As my parting words, I reminded the players that they had only about two more hours to play 2-4 on 2/4, when it has extra-special powers. I can only imagine what interesting play occurred after I left.

Strange ultimatum

In the January 30 issue of Poker Player Newspaper, publisher Stanley R. Sludikoff has an editorial about the Full Tilt Poker mess that has been dragging out for almost a year now.

The principal players--Ray Bitar, Howard Lederer, and Chris Ferguson--have, of course, remained essentially silent, undoubtedly on the advice of their legal team, given the hefty criminal and civil penalties potentially hanging over their heads.

Here's how Mr. Sludikoff starts his editorial:

In this segment it is my intention to take up the issue of the alleged illegal activities of poker celebrities Chris Ferguson, Howard Lederer, et al. I say "alleged" because no indictments have been handed down, and everyone should be granted the supposition of innocence until proven guilty.

I pause here to note the wild factual inaccuracy of saying that "no indictments have been handed down," but let's go on.

On the other hand, Howard, Chris, and their cohorts have been publicly silent, apparently hiding from their usual public exposure. This activity tends to support the proposition that they are guilty.

Oh really? So, Mr. Sludikoff, if you are ever accused of a crime, and you heed your attorneys' advice not to make any public statements, we should take that as evidence of your guilt, right? To put it another way, the accused enjoy the presumption of innocence, unless they fail to issue statements to the press--is that your view, sir?

So in the interest of justice, I will delay subsequent editorials for two more weeks and invite the named parties to communicate with me, lay out their position, and tell our readers what happened. And I will print their statements exactly as rendered.

Wow. How big of you. Because, after all, these people surely would have spoken out by now if only they had some media outlet that would give them space to do so!

It's so ridiculous. I can't imagine why Mr. Sludikoff thinks that these guys will feel so threatened by the specter of his coming tirade against them that they will reverse course and suddenly open up in his pages. What could he possibly plan to say about them that hasn't already been said ten thousand times before over the past ten months?

To pick just the most recent example I've seen, earlier today Daniel Negreanu unleashed another torrent of hatred on the FTP gang:

They edited down my comments about Ray Bitar, Howard Lederer, and Chris Ferguson, but they definitely got the gist of my vitriol towards them. I'm disgusted by them and what they've done to smear the game with putrid decision making. Ray is a buffoon, Howard is arrogant, condescending, and incompetent, and Chris is a liar and has the warmth of a snow pea. These were never my friends, I never cared for any of them. I never trusted them for a second, and my "read" was always that these were not my kind of people. Why are they different from the rest of the group? These three were on the board, admittedly making all the decisions, and jeopardizing millions of dollars worth of players money that still hasn't surfaced. You guys suck. I hope to never see any of your faces at the WSOP anymore, and I hope you live with the shame you deserve for the rest of your lives. Your own personal, private hell. You deserve all the wrath you've received from the poker world, and much more. You are scum and each of you absolutely deserves a few swift baseball bat swings to the groin area, old school Vegas style.

Does Mr. Sludikoff have in store rhetoric that is so much worse than that that the possibility of seeing it in print will cause the accused to open up to him, with the risk of handing more ammunition to a federal prosecutor who has his missiles radar-locked onto them, just to avoid another round of name-calling? He might as well say, "Now go away or I shall taunt you a second time."

I am really baffled at what combination of arrogance and ignorance it takes for Mr. Sludikoff to believe that his pulpit is so fearsome that threatening to use it will pry an explanation out of defendants who are lawyered up six ways to Sunday.

As they used to say on Seinfeld, "Good luck with all that."

Another one bites the dust

The Silverton is the latest casino to close its poker room:

http://www.vegaschatter.com/story/2012/2/3/142946/9137/vegas-travel/The_Last_Cards_Have_Been_Dealt_At_The_Silverton_s_Poker_Room

While it wasn't as icky a room as the one at Fitzgerald's, I can't say I'll miss the place much. I played there only four times in my five years in Vegas, and it was always a nitty locals joint. Just not much reason to head out there, other than the cool fish tank (which I've heard has also gone away).

Chicken dinner

Mrs. Lederer had another of her almost-weekly AVP home-game tournaments on PokerStars tonight. This one was triple stud, i.e., a rotation of straight seven-card stud, razz, and stud high/low.

I winz it.

That is all.

Wackadoo hand

I've seen and written up my fair share of bizarro hands, but I think this story from Las Vegas Poker Dealer may top them all:

http://pkrdlr.blogspot.com/2012/02/train-wreck.html

Playing scared

Tony Bigcharles (TBC) recently posted this hand history on his blog:

the final hand i had aa and made it $12 in EP. 3 guys called, all of whom had a decent amount of chips, none had me covered. flop comes up JJ4 rainbow. well i figure im either behind or so far out in front im not worried about a free card, so i check for pot control. i did think the one young kid behind me with about $350 in chips liked the flop. we all checked. turn comes Q again we all checked, and this might be where i should bet, but probably too late to do any good. river comes Q, we all check to the guy in late position. i hate that river. he bets $50 and i pay him off, he has Q9, and i leave when the blind gets to me.

Here's the comment I left there with my first thoughts on it:

The AA hand was played really badly. It is admittedly scary to be out of position, and have to decide to lead out into three opponents. But a flop of JJ4 rainbow is about the most perfect kind of flop you can hope for in that situation. It cries out for a continuation bet. You will get called by only three kinds of hands: Exactly 44, any J, and some pocket pairs who are suspicious that you missed with AK or AQ. The last category will be much more frequent than the first two, and is, of course, exactly what you want calling you: players with only 2 outs to win. This is a 100% c-bet situation, and it was a bad mistake to check there. In fact, even with 3 opponents and out of position, there are very few flops that you should not c-bet with AA. Of course, once in a while you'll lose to somebody who called you with 44 or KJ, but the amount you win most of the time will more than compensate for those losses over the long run. At least it will if you actually win the pot when you're ahead.

After thinking about this some more today, I want to add some further observations.

I was trying to figure out what Tony meant by saying he checked "for pot control." That made no sense here. I finally decided that it doesn't mean anything in this specific context. It's just a phrase that Tony tosses out when he doesn't bet in order to justify his action by making it sound as if it was a purposeful tactical decision. But it wasn't in this case.

For those of you who don't follow Tony's adventures, one of his prime characteristics is that he can't stand quitting for the day when he's stuck. A losing day is an intolerable concept to him. That means that if he is way behind, he starts playing more recklessly, gambling it up in an effort to get lucky and get back to even. If that fails, he goes in search of a video blackjack machine and tries to recoup his losses that way. It's a terribly destructive behavioral pattern, and he well knows it, but he continues to do it anyway.

Conversely, if he is doing well, he will often go into lock-down mode, playing in a miserly fashion because he doesn't want to put his winnings at risk. I think this is the factor most at work in the hand posted here. Elsewhere in the post he notes that he was about $280 up for the day when this hand transpired, and I get the feeling that he was planning on wrapping it up soon.

The reason that the phrase "pot control" sounds so out of place in that spot is that it is not what a skilled player should be thinking about. It is a spot in which AA will be the best hand the great majority of the time, so the focus should be on building and winning the pot, not on preventing it from growing unmanageably large.

Similarly, Tony's argument that he was either way ahead or way behind so he didn't mind giving a free card--well, that's just plain odd. It's a non sequitur. There certainly are way-ahead/way-behind situations, but one does not resolve them by taking or giving a free card. That just gets you deeper into the hand with no additional information, like wandering farther into a wilderness without a map.

In truth, there is only one plausible explanation for Tony checking both the flop and turn into three opponents in a situation where he should know that most of the time he has the best hand on both streets, and it's one he didn't admit to in his post: He was afraid. Specifically, he was afraid of getting sucked deeply into the hand, being put to a decision for his stack, and losing all of the profit he had accumulated through the session. That fear paralyzed him into inaction. My guess is that if this hand had played out early in the session, he would have bet into the field, knowing that it was pretty unlikely that anybody had outflopped him, and hoping for a call from worse hands. That is unquestionably how the hand should be played.

The reason I'm posting his description and this comment here is because I think it serves as a beautiful illustration of what's wrong with playing scared: Fears become self-fulfilling prophecies. Tony was afraid of losing more money, so he played passively, and the result was that he lost more money! Had he played it aggressively, he would have avoided the outcome he feared. Ironic, isn't it?

Back in the early days of this blog, I posted these two paragraphs from Antonio Esfandiari's book, In the Money: Strategies for Winning Texas Hold'Em Cash Games, page 15. I think they bear repeating here:

What's the best way to play fearless? First and foremost, you have to divorce yourself from how you traditionally think of money. Money outside of the poker room is different. That is money to be spent wisely or invested discriminately. The money you bring into the poker room is your means to winning. Do not think of this as money. Think of it as the tools of your trade. You should no more think about the dollar cost of an individual chip than a carpenter thinks about the cost of the nails he's driving. That carpenter will drive all the nails he needs to in order to do the job. That is what I am going to do at the poker table, and that is what you should do as well.

Consider your chips to be the cost of doing business, nothing more and nothing less. As with any buiness, you will have overhead. Think of bad beats as your overhead. Furthermore, as Doyle Brunson once wrote, when you make a big bet, you cannot think, "Oh man, I'm betting a Cadillac." Even if you're a recreational player, if you're thinking of the steak dinner you could buy with the chips you're betting, you're dead money. So look at those chips as the tools of the trade. You will free yourself from the fear of losing them, and then you can go win more.

I believe that Tony had mentally already locked up his win. The chips had ceased to be tools with which to win more chips, and had already become mentally and emotionally transformed into cash in his pocket. That mental shift meant that it was far more difficult to put them into the pot when he needed to. There is a crucial mental distinction between betting seven red chips from your stack and betting $35 from your wallet, and Tony had fatally crossed over from the former to the latter. As a result, he couldn't pull the trigger when it was the obviously correct thing to do.

Scared money loses. Fearless money wins. If at any point in a poker session you are no longer willing to risk losing all the chips sitting in front of you whenever you can get them in with an advantage, then that is the moment when you need to stop playing. Right then--not when the blinds next come around, not when the football game is over, not when your chip stack gets to some predetermined amount, not when you've finished putting in the hours to qualify for the weekly freeroll tournament. Those chips are far more at risk from your timidity than they would ever be from smart, aggressive play.

Tony didn't set out to remind us of that lesson, but I believe that when we read between the lines, that is what his story teaches us.

Snowing in Vegas

Last night I made one of my occasional ventures into the Imperial Palace Sunday night 10-game mix. On my immediate right was a player there for the first time. He openly admitted that he had played some of these games for microstakes a few times online, but never live. That this was true was confirmed when he made common rookie mistakes (the same kind I made the first few times playing the unfamiliar games), such as getting confused between the betting rounds and drawing rounds. In the first hand of 2-7 triple draw, he announced his hand prior to the third draw, thinking the action was all over with. Oops!

On the next hand, I started with four strong low cards (don't remember exactly what they were) plus a jack. (The goal of triple-draw is to get five unpaired cards as low as possible without a straight or a flush.) I raised and drew one--a king. I bet again when the two remaining players checked to me. The only one who called was the guy on my right.

He discarded two, which meant that the chances of him improving to a really strong hand by the end were rather small. I didn't really want to turn in my king and get another bad card in return, because that would then compel me to either get lucky on the final draw or try a desperation bluff, which could easily get called by an opponent suspicious that I had tried and missed all three times.

So here's my situation: I had position, I had just one opponent (and an inexperienced one at that) who had drawn two cards on the second drawing round, I had raised and drawn just one card, then bet again, so I was telling a consistent and presumably believable story. I decided the situation was right to try snowing instead of drawing.

The "snow" is a form of bluffing unique to draw games. It means that you stand pat without having made your hand, in order to falsely project strength. It basically forces an opponent to get lucky enough in his draw to make a very strong hand, or else abandon his hand in the face of your confidence. You can do it on just the third draw, but it looks even more convincing if you do it on the second draw. You are declining two chances to improve your hand, so you must like what you have a lot, right?

I patted the table. Predictably, my opponent checked, so of course I bet again. He called and drew one. I patted again. He checked on the final betting round, and I bet once more, hoping he would fold--because I couldn't beat any hand with which he would call. He shook his head and said, "I only improved to a ten, and I'm sure you must have better than that." He indeed showed his made 10, then mucked. I.e., he had five different cards, the highest of which was a 10--only a mediocre hand in this game. He knew it was good only as a bluff-catcher, and I had given him no reason to think I was bluffing, even though I was.

My friend Troy (dealer at TI, excellent player) was on my left in the 10 seat, which made it easy for me to be sure that he--but nobody else--caught a glimpse of my king before I passed my cards back to the dealer. He caught my eye and gave me a half smile and an approving nod after realizing what it meant I had done.

I'm happy to have left back in Minnesota the cold, white powdery stuff that falls from the sky in such prodigious amounts there. But just a little snow here and there at the poker table can still make my day.

What the hell is the problem at Bluff magazine?

A few weeks ago I poked fun at Bluff magazine for having this mess of a headline in the December issue: "IF YOUR GOING TAKE MONEY, IT MAY AS WELL BE FROM THESE GUYS."

Little did I know that this was just the beginning of an epidemic of bad headlines in that publication. The three images above are scans of pages from the January, 2012, issue. If one wanted to be picky, one could gripe about a couple of others, too, involving the use (or lack thereof) of a comma here or a hyphen there. But I'm not including those, since they are arguably correct, depending on the exact sense that was intended, and they are at worst small errors.

These three, however, are just glaringly wrong. The first say, "...A COUPLE MORE TO ON THE WAY." My guess is that this originally read, "A COUPLE MORE TO GO." Somebody then decided to alter it to "A COUPLE MORE ON THE WAY," but failed to delete the now-unneeded "TO."

The second and third examples are even more embarrassing, because they obviously result not just from a bit of oversight, but from some chucklehead at the magazine who actually does not know the difference between your and you're. I hope it's the same lamebrain who was responsible for the error in the December issue, as I'd hate to think Bluff has two such sixth-grade dropouts on its paid staff.

Hey, Lance Bradley: You are listed as the editor-in-chief. Do you know what it means to edit?Here's the most relevant portion of Merriam-Webster's online dictionary definition:

1c : to alter, adapt, or refine especially to bring about conformity to a standard or to suit a particular purpose

(Emphasis added.)

Is this not your job? Do you have any idea how unprofessional this makes the magazine look?

I like Bluff. I really do. I read it faithfully and look forward to new issues hitting the poker room stands. But jeez, guys, this is really terrible work.

What else would a tournament-winning hand be?

Thanks to reader Big Tikit for pointing this out to me:

http://www.commercecasino.com/images/uploads/TournamentResults/Event%201%20Final%20EVENT1.pdf

Up, up, and away

I'm off to visit the family in Salt Lake City for a few days.

Good read, good call, good courage

My friend Poker Lawyer (PL) is in town. She came with her friend, Texas Cardslinger (Terry). Yesterday all three of us were playing at the same table at Imperial Palace, when an interesting hand came up.

Terry raised preflop to $12. PL called. I folded. Seat 1 was a middle-aged Asian gentleman, extremely quiet, pretty tight. He reraised to $35 on the button--the first three-bet we had seen from him in a couple of hours of play. Both Terry and PL called.

The flop was uncoordinated, 10-high and rainbow. All three players checked. Seat 1 hesitated a while before checking, whereas he usually acted quickly. I thought he was having trouble deciding whether to bet.

Fourth street was the jack of spades, the second spade on the board. Terry led out betting--I'm thinking it was small, like $20, but I don't remember for sure. PL folded. Seat 1 rechecked his hole cards (about which more later), thought about it a while, then called.

Let's pause here a minute and see if we can figure out what Seat 1 has. His very rare three-bet, even with position, drastically narrowed his range: A-K, or pocket jacks or better. Maybe 10s, but that was less likely. The check behind on the flop was a complete surprise. It seemed to me inconceivable that he would check there with any overpair, giving two opponents a free card, when there was already over $100 in the pot that he presumably would like to move to his stack. The only possibilities, really, were A-K that had missed, or, much less likely, pocket 10s slow-playing top set. His call on the turn strongly suggested a draw--either A-K with the gutshot or a flush draw, possibly both.

Fifth street brought a blank--3 of diamonds, or something equally inconsequential. Terry again bet, and this time I'm sure it was $20. Seat 1 again pondered, then raised another $80 to $100.

Huh? That move surprised me even more than his check on the flop had. I was pretty thoroughly convinced that he had A-K and would fold if he failed to hit an ace, king, or spade. What in the world is he doing? And what is he doing it with? And why so much? His bets and raises had usually been on the conservative side--2-3x (though not always--once he had shoved about $55 into a $15 pot). I don't think we had seem him bluff even once, but because I could not come up with any hand with which he would plausibly take this bizarro line, I ended up concluding that my previous assessment was probably still correct, and he was bluffing a busted draw. The sealer on it was a raise size that was screaming "Go away!" rather than "Please call."

I hoped that Terry would call, both because I thought it would be correct with even weakish made hands, but also so that I would get to see whether my read of the situation was correct. I was afraid that she wouldn't, though; what I had seen of her play had been fairly timid unless she had a very strong hand. But after a little thought, she quietly told the dealer, "OK, I call."

Seat 1 said, "Good call," and flipped up his As-Ks. Terry's A-J won the pot.

A little quiet exchange between the three of us (all on one end of the table) confirmed that Terry was not just blindly looking at top pair/top kicker and deciding that was a hand she had to call with. She had followed essentially the same reasoning process I'm describing here. The inconsistency in Seat 1's pattern of betting had definitely caught her attention.

I may be making it sound like an easy call, but I don't think it was. When a player as tight as Seat 1 three-bets for the first time in hours, you naturally assume he has either aces or kings, even if he subsequently plays the hand in a way that would not be expected for those holdings. Also, the flopped top set remained a viable candidate. (10s are, along with jacks, in that range that people hate to have to play post-flop with the nearly inevitable overcards, so some players will three-bet with them in an effort to end the hand early.) A one-pair hand, even if it is TP/TK, is at best a medium-strength hand, and it would take screwing up some courage to call a big river raise. I was genuinely impressed with and proud of Terry's call.

What lessons can we learn from this hand? At least three.

1. A bluff has to tell a consistent story. His river raise was pure desperation, when he realized he had missed his draws and had only one way to win the pot--steal it. He did not stop to consider how his line would look to an opponent. Before you bluff on the river, you have to ask yourself what it is, exactly, that you want your opponent to believe. Once you've settled on that, then you have to review how the hand has been played and see if the hand you want to represent having would have been played this way. Finally, you have to assess whether your opponent is savvy enough to read the (false) clues you are giving to reach the conclusion you wish to suggest. If the story you're telling is not consistent from beginning to end, thinking players will call you from confusion, curiosity, or both. People don't like to fold, especially after they have put a lot of money into a pot. They have to be pretty thoroughly convinced that putting more chips in is throwing good money after bad. An inconsistent story will not accomplish that persuasion.

2. Consider the power of the continuation bet. Had he simply pushed out a stack of, say, $50 when both opponents checked to him on the flop, he would have seen two folds followed by the dealer pushing the pot his way. I would have concluded that he had aces or kings, and I suspect that both PL and Terry would have done the same.

3. The third lesson is about a very specific but useful tell. Note that I said he rechecked his hole cards after the second spade hit. What I didn't tell you was that on two previous occasions I had seen him do the same thing.

The first was soon after I joined the table. I bought the button, paid a little more to call a small raise, and was pleased to see a flop of K-8-8 (with two hearts), which nicely fit my 8-9 in the hole. I bet, original raiser folded, Seat 1 called. He clearly had either a king, an 8, or a flush draw. The turn was another heart. Before I acted, I noticed that he rechecked his hole cards. Aha! That strongly suggested that he had not had a flush draw that had just come in.

Here's why. Most recreational players don't memorize the suits of their cards. They retain a visual memory that they have either two red cards, two black cards, or one red and one black, but they don't know the suits with any confidence. If he had had two red cards, he would have rechecked them on the flop to see if he had a flush draw before deciding whether to call. But he didn't. He only rechecked them on the turn, suggesting that he had one red card and one black card, and wanted to see if he now had a backdoor flush draw that he might make on the river.

I had been planning to check if a heart hit, thinking that the draw was his most likely hand, but when I saw him check his cards again, that changed my mind. I bet and he folded. I think he probably had a king and nothing else.

A while later, PL had been in a hand with him in which she similarly had to decipher whether he had a flush, but again he didn't check his cards until the third spade came, implying that he did not have a made flush at that point. I don't remember enough details of that hand to recount it, and we didn't see his cards, but his subsequent fold again proved that he did not have a flush.

In the hand that is the subject of this post, his check of his hole cards on the turn implied that he had two black cards, though if a third spade had hit the river, it would have been difficult to know whether he had seen two spades or a spade and a club.

This tell is very common among recreational players, but it is by no means universal, so you have to act on it with some care. Some players do memorize their suits, but when their flush comes in they want to reassure themselves that they didn't misread their cards, so will recheck before committing a lot more money to the pot. Others, of course, are aware of this common tell and are smart enough to use it deceptively against you. Such players will check their hole cards when a third suited card hits the board in order to make you think they only now have a draw, when their flush is actually made. Or, conversely, they will check their cards when the flop has two of a suit in order to make you think they have the flush draw, so that they can bluff when the third suited card comes. But both of these species of player are much rarer than people like Seat 1 in low-stakes games.