Poll of The Week

Time for something totally different for this week’s poll. I noticed the old classic “McVicar” was on ITV4 last night. I love that film, in fact I’m a sucker for most prison films. I’d missed the start where he tells the screws his classic line, so I found a little Youtube clip to atone for that .

“I’ll be the best second you’ve ever seen” is the kind of line Phil Hellmuth would utter before losing a heads up match against pocket aces on the final hand, but McVicar does it better. Here he is giving to the screws:

This week’s question is: what is your favourite prison film?  Answer this week’s poll and leave a comment with your Twitter username to be in with a chance of winning an Irish Winter Festival satellite token. I am certain to have missed your favourite so let me know in the comments and I can put a torrent site to good use . 

Congratulations to @fiercelyacute for winning last week’s poll.

Hand of The Week – Week 88

Here’s one of those frustrating hands that you just “can’t possibly be winning”. I’ll start with a picture of the final board:

It’s your typical scenario really:  stick a raise in with pocket Kings, get three callers, flop an ace and watch helplessly as four to a flush come down. Of course you don’t have any of that suit but that’s probably a good thing because if you DO happen to have the King of spades you can guarantee the ace is out there as well.

If you were the owner of those pocket Kings right there, how much would you sell your hand for? (Just so you know, there was no betting after the flop. At all. After my 3-bet to $1.80 got called thrice it went checkity checkity check check on flop, turn and river.)

There’s a mighty $7.20 in the pot.  So what is that hand worth in cash moolahs right now do you think?

Personally, I reckon it’s about 20 cents, or one big blind. In fact I’m probably exaggerating. I wouldn’t even expect to win this once in 36 attempts.  It’s worth bugger all.  The absence of betting might suggest there’s no ace out there but it’s very possible someone does have one but sensibly won’t bet into 4 spades because they don’t have a flush.

This kind of thing happens all the time in poker.  You just check it down and move on – no dramas. Except there was a mini drama – I won the pot!  I couldn’t believe it. Have a look what they all had:

I managed to win the unwinnable pot!

I love it when poker throws up these little unexpected bonuses. Seven dollars is 7 dollars right

(Just to explain the small stakes, I’ve got a bit of a Speed Poker obsession at the moment.  I got beaten up when I started because others were more adept at the game than me so I dropped right down in stakes. Leave the ego at the door, like Joe Kinnear .  My mission now is to grind 100k hands of Speed Poker at a 5BB per 100 hand win rate and it’s proving harder than I thought!  I’m up to 62,000 hands but I’m right on that 5BB/100 line so I could easily fail.)

A couple of tangentially related things came to mind after this hand.

Firstly, just how frustrating is it when your 3-bets don’t clear out the field?  You want one opponent but they all come along to spoil your plan and outdraw you.  This used to happen absolutely all the time when I played in the casinos in Australia and it drove me nuts.  It didn’t matter if you sat there for two hours without playing a hand and then suddenly stuck in a big re-raise preflop – three or four players would come after you guaranteed! The key was getting that first caller. Once he called you’d get them all coming along.

The other thing I realised was that having played so many hands of cash poker over the past couple of months it struck me just how often you get to see a four flush on board where your opponent doesn’t have the flush.

There’s only one sensible conclusion I could draw from that. Get bluffing !

Catching Fish In Troia

Tróia is a bit of a ghost town. And when I say a bit, I mean if it weren’t for the poker players here there would be no one at all at this remote little part of Portugal.
That being said, it is a beautiful little part of Portugal. It’s a tourist resort that is almost finished. I get the impression we have just arrived before the holiday season really starts. Everything in the hotel is brand new and there are diggers and some minor building works going on in and around the complex. When it is finished it’ll be tops.
Unibet are running a good series here. The hotel have put us in is brilliant. Breakfast and dinner is included every day for the players even on days where you aren’t playing, like day 1b for me. I may have had 3 puddings since I didn’t have to worry about being too full at the table. On top of the good food the rooms are huge. I’ve got my big brother with me on this trip since the package allowed me to bring a guest who also gets to enjoy the free breakfast. We have a big double room and en-suite each and a fully functioning kitchen. I love to cook so I’m very happy to make lunch for me and my big bro.
Unibet has a well-deserved reputation for a light hearted and more of a partying atmosphere at their tournaments. However this didn’t seem the case at the start of day 1a. I think a lot of the players were satellite qualifiers so they were a bit nervous at the shuffle up. But as the day progressed they loosened up and got much chattier and lively which is just my kind of poker.
I had huge stack fluctuations on day 1. We started with 20k and I dropped to 12k and bounced back up to 80k. I hovered between 30k and 50k until the close of play when I ended day 1 with 38k in chips.
On one of the first hands of day 2 I was the second caller of a raise with AJo on the button and both blinds come along too. The board is A54 with two diamonds and the small blind goes all in for around 10 big blinds. Everyone folds to me. He can’t really check raise all in with fold equity here as his stack isn’t big enough to make anyone fold if they bet, so I figure he can do this with a straight draw, a weaker ace (although that probably should have been all in or fold pre flop, but I’ve seen stranger things) or a flush draw. I make the call to close the action and he shows me the bad news. He had 54 for flopped two pair and I couldn’t improve. The very next hand a lady shoves all in for about 12bbs and I reship my 99. She held A6 and I go to shake her hand after I turn a set only for everyone to point out that she just made a flush draw. I hold my breath and fade the river to get myself onto about 40k.
After losing a few small pots and a blind level increase I find myself on about 20bbs again. I moved all in vs Gary Clarke’s UTG+2 raise as I suspected he has looser early position raising requirements than a standard player (he had stolen successfully from this position numerous times on day 1). Unfortunately his AKs insta called me and my 87 needed to improve. The board gave him a flush draw, and me an open ended straight draw. I spiked an off suit 8 on the river to double my 20bb stack to 40bbs.
However the blinds went up again to 800/1600 I lost a pot or two leaving me back on 20bbs. I face a minimum raise from the button and so ship all in with my A9 knowing I’m ahead of his range. He makes a reluctant call with KJo and flops a K. I shake hands and wish everyone the best as I head back to the hotel.
Unfortunately I won’t be bringing home my second trophy from this trip. I still feel I played well. The trip as a whole has been a really enjoyable one and I look forward to playing more UniBet events in the future.
I lost one other bet worth mentioning, and I’m sure I made the right play. I love a bit of side action and my brother gave me 10/1 that I couldn’t catch a fish in the marina bare handed. Despite there being hundreds of the slippery little blighters all I got for my trouble was a wet arse. Can’t win them all!

Friday’s Caption Competition

Welcome to another Friday Caption Competition . First of all though, the password to tonight’s Freddie Mays Bounty tournament at 8pm is :

sharking

Always a sucker for a fish or a shark image,  I just spotted this little mis-match of nature.  What could the protagonists be saying in the picture do you think?  Submit your caption to @paddypowerpoker on Twitter for your chance to win a token to my bounty tournament.

Congratulations to @theblackrose84 for winning last week’s caption with:

“Carlsberg special brew don’t sponsor Daniel Negreanu but if we did he would be drunker than Men Nguyen”

Poll of The Week

It’s now 10 years since Chris Moneymaker won the WSOP main event. 10 years – can you believe that!  Would you also believe that in 2003 there were just 6 Texas holdem events in the WSOP (out of a total of 33 events)?

In this year’s event there are 34 Texas Holdem events alone – more that the entire number of events in 2003.  Granted there are far more events these days (62 bracelet events this year) but is this the right mix of holdem events – 55% in 2013 vs 18% in 2003?

Some might say that “the public gets what the public wants” but is this overkill? Answer this week’s poll and leave a comment with your Twitter username to be in with a chance of winning an Irish Winter Festival satellite token.

Congratulations to @BenBulben40 for winning last week’s poll

Hand of The Week – Week 87

Once upon a time I discovered an unlikely way to win a pot against an unsophisticated player.   I discovered it by accident and it made me laugh because the beauty of this move is that it cannot fail.

You will laugh when I tell you and ask “how could this ever work in a million years?” but you’d be surprised, trust me.  I have seen this work on more than one occasion so it can sometimes work (and never fail) but the key is that the player has to be very unsophisticated. It also helps if the hand is played online with a clock timing down so your opponent doesn’t have as much time to think.

It won’t work against anyone with even a modicum of talent or half a brain, so if you are one of those questioning how this would ever work, you will fall into this category, but don’t doubt that this can work.

So this was the hand from long, long ago.  All the cards were out and when it got the river the board was:

5-5-A-5-5

I went all in.

My opponent folded!

As it turned out I did have an ace but that’s irrelevant. It wouldn’t matter I’d I held pocket aces because I can’t beat the board.  It’s a split pot – quad fives with an ace kicker.  Of course, what he’d misread the board and made a disastrous error in folding.  That’s why it can’t fail: the worst thing that can happen is you get called and split the pot.

Ever since that pot I’ve been on the lookout for situations where there is any four of a kind on board, mindful that a bare ace equals the nuts.  Subsequently I’ve seen loads of times where players make these basic board reading errors – for instance calling an all in on a board like J-J-J-7-J with a hand like QQ or KK.

In one of Doyle Bruson’s books I remember him saying how he used to deal out hand after hand and work out which was the winner until he didn’t make a single mistake. Sounds ridiculous but if he’s prepared to do it I’m not going to criticise.

Anyway, there I was yesterday and I played this hand with pocket 5s. I raised preflop from the button and got one caller. I c-bet the 4-4-8 flop when checked to and my opponent called. The turn was a 4 and this time he bet.  It was a feeble little bet so threw in a raise, but I couldn’t shake him off. He kept calling.

I was pretty certain I was behind here. All sorts of hands were beating me.

The river was another four and the board was 4-4-8-4-4.

This is where I was glad to have position. He bet a measly fifth of the pot and I read that squarely as an attempt to get away with a cheap showdown. If he had an ace surely he’d bet more for value?  So of course I disappointed him and I raised the entire pot back, telling him in no uncertain terms that I had an ace, he was beaten and so just give up it up son. (Of course I’ve got quads with a 5 high and there was no possible way I had the best hand here unless he was holding 22 or 33. I had to either surrender the pot….or bluff. And I wasn’t planning on surrendering to a show of weakness like that)

He called. Darn!

Showdown time!

He had J-8 offsuit.  Can you believe that?

Eurgh!  Everything about that was so disgusting I wanted to puke.  Does he realise he doesn’t have a full house – he has a poxy Jack high?

What’s worse is that he actually thought about it. A reflex call I could understand but this was actually after thinking. So as well as giving me a sweat – with that little buzz as I thought I’d made a winning bluff cruelly snatched away – his total lack of board reading skill had actually WON him the pot.  (If he had correctly worked out that quads with Jack high was in fact the best hand – then I will eat my own head! River bluffing is very rare in Speed Poker – in fact bluffing is quite rare full stop in Speed poker.)

Right move – wrong player! That is all.

Times Are Hard!

Poker can be a joyless old game sometimes.

Last night I was getting the worst of it in all sorts of tangles. On one hand I  flopped bottom 2 pair and lost to top-pair-crap-kicker which turned into a better two pair when the river paired the turn. Then I flopped a straight and lost to a poxy overpair when the guy called my all in check-raise on the turn – beating my 56 with his pocket tens on a 7-8-9-2 board with a six on the river.  Disgusting stuff.

And blah blah on it went, you don’t wanna know about my bad beat stories. Suffice to say, as you all know, in poker it never rains it pours. So after about 7 such incidents I snapped when a player 3-bet me for about the 10th time in a row. I over-shoved with a mighty K-10s to let him know I wasn’t having any more of his stealing (tilt – who me guv?) and of course he called with A-K.  Whoops! But this time it was my turn to inflict the bad beat.  I felt a bit embarrassed as I rivered a 10 because my opponent is a solid player and would have been shaking his head at my erratic play.

So the luck evened out that time, but my point is – in almost every pot of over 50 big blinds, the bad play won the pot. And that’s no fun, is it?  All this misery being spread around….like I say, it’s a joyless old game sometimes.

So being the miserable sinner I am, I was heartily cheered to read about players who have had what we would all consider great WSOP success – yet still are pissed off with their lot.  Most people probably think that the pros at the WSOP all live high on the hog, driving fast cars and counting money all day in a state of natural euphoria.

Not a bit of it!

This morning I heard an interview with Justin Bonomo as he looked forward to his semi final in the WSOP $10k heads up event.  When asked about potentially winning his first bracelet he said:

“I think I’d look at it differently from other people. For me it’s like: it’s not so much that having a bracelet is awesome, it’s more that NOT having a bracelet really sucks. I want to get out of that list of people that have played a million WSOP events and still not have a bracelet to show for it”

How’s that for a slice of fried joy?

If he were to have won he could…well he could have been a little less joyless but unfortunately he lost so he’s still on that dreaded list.  (To be fair he is such a good player it is ridiculous that he hasn’t won a bracelet, but I have a theory. When he first turned 21 and became eligible to play live tournaments in the States he made four final tables in his first four events and wrote a ridiculous, bragging blog modestly titled “HEAR ME ROAR”. Not winning a bracelet is God’s revenge on him for being a twat.)

And do you remember Phil Ivey coming 7th in the 2009 WSOP main event?

He was so utterly devastated he refused to do his post match interview. Allegedly he’d backed himself to win the main event at three figure prices and lost additional millions in side bets. Nothing but first place was going to do.  It’s tough at the top eh?

But the  best one I read this week was about last year’s 9th placed finisher Steve Gee.  The headline was ridiculously titled “Steve Gee Trying To Recover From World Series Of Poker Main Event Disaster”

Disaster? He won $754,798!

In his interview he was going on like winning 3/4 of a million was the worst thing that could ever happen to anyone. Seriously, you wouldn’t believe how tough it is only winning 750 grand according to this bloke.

“In my mind, it was like I lost $8 million,” Gee said. “It was also that I was eight players away from being the world champion. How many chances are you going to get to do that?”

“He still thinks about the failure months later, admitting that it’s on his mind before he goes to sleep at night. It has also been tough for him to play cash games like he used to, because he had previously grinded out the mid-stakes no-limit hold’em games”

Ah, can’t go back to playing $5-10 can we. Times are hard.

This was the bit that really got me:

“Gee said that he erroneously didn’t consider the massive money jumps. He thinks he probably would have moved up on the pay ladder had it not been for his reckless play.”

Well he only had four months to study to pay out table I suppose. Easy mistake to make really. We’ve all done it

So when you’ve lost a couple of hundred at the tables just spare a thought for these poor souls who have made the final table in the WSOP won’t you?  It’s a tough old life.