Just the 2nd hand of the night, I am dealt 5-8 off-suite, and I'm BB. UTG raises a standard raise, everyone else folds, and I decide to call. Already, I have made a bad play here with a very weak hand, can't justify this at all. Miraculously, the flop is 8-5-8, I flopped the boat, and I'm feeling pretty good about my bad decision to play rags.
I check, and my opponent, who is known to make continuation bets, does exactly that. He makes another pretty standard bet. I can't seem too eager, and now have to try and make him think I'm on a draw of some kind, but obviously I make the call.
The river brings a Q, and I'm pretty happy about that, because it may give him another excuse to bet. I check again, and this time he checks too. I figure that we probably has nothing. If he had A-Q, he would probably try to win the pot right there after he got called on a bluff on the flop.
The river is another Q bringing 2 pair on the board. I decide I have to try and make some money off this pot, as he likely has Ace high, and would check it down if I were to check here. I bet, not real big tho, hoping he'll call with Ace high and the 2 pair on board. Instead, he raises, about 2 times my bet.
I didn't see that coming at all. He's an aggressive player, and has be known to take risks to win big pots before, so I certainly considered the possibility he had nothing, not even Ace high. He could also have A-Q, but I rule this option out, because he didn't bet on the turn when he hit his card. He could also have a medium-high pocket pair, making his hand better than the 2 pair on board.
Risking about half my remaining chips, I make the call, feeling my flopped boat is still probably miles ahead. I push the chips in, and as I do so, I see him reach for just one card, and I immediately get a real bad feeling in the pit of my stomach. He flips over a Queen, and I realize I'm now severally crippled just 2 hands in. I still can't understand how he didn't bet on the turn, unless he though he was beat, which would have been one hell of a read.
I managed to rebuild my stack not too long afterwards, and was even the chip leader at my table for a period of time, but didn't manage to win my table due to another weirdly played hand, playing against the same guy.
With 4 players left at the table, and the chips moving steadily from one person to the next, I was now the short -stack, but still had almost 80% of my starting stack. I find 10-10 with my hole cards, and I raise it up to about 25% of what I have left. The same guy as before, from out of position, thinks long and hard, asks me for my chip count, counts out that many chips, then after about 2 minutes of deliberating, he decides just to call.
The flop is 4-8-J, not a terrible flop for me, and with enough money already in the pot to almost double me up, I push all-in hoping he doesn't have the Jack. He does, of course, with a hand 10-J. Again, I have no idea how he even called my raise, let alone considered pushing me all-in. I guess this was a lesson that successful poker doesn't always make sense to me. This guy went on to win the tournament, in relative ease.
4 comments:
Without seeing how you played the rest of your hands, I think you played too passively in these two cases.
On the first hand, you kept checking and calling, never raising. You gave your opponent a chance to make his hand, especially on the river, where he got to see the last card for free.
As for the final hand, depending on what the blinds were and how much you had, you probably should have went all-in preflop. Maybe the guy would have called, but it would have been harder to call an all-in than the raise. Especially with 10s. I treat them the same as pocket 9s and 8s. Almost any over card, and you're screwed.
I don't think the way you played was bad, because it's smart to try and trick your opponents. But it seemed like you were passive (especially on the first hand).
Again, I say this without knowing what the blinds were at any point, or how everyone was playing.
I agree with Tom, you played this hand a little too passively. i think the play here was to bet the turn strong. You've flopped the nuts, but its only the flop, when hitting lucky with bad cards, I generally try to make my money and get out before any trouble hits the board. You trapped on the flop which anyone would do but after that try and take it down. It's better to make a small amount on a lot of hands instead of trying to hit the proverbial grand slam with 2 rags.
This is more of case of your opponent knowing you to well!
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