Biggest hand I played was this one. I was in late position with AK and raised to $15. I had about $1000 in front of me (bought in deep, wasn't up at all). A guy across the table in the big blind raises to $50. He had a monster stack as well so we had about the same effective stacks. I call.
Flop is J-8-7 with 2 hearts (I have the ace of hearts). He checks and I check. Turn is a king. He checks and I check again. River is an offsuit 5. He checks a third time. At this point I figure I have to have the best hand and I decided to overbet it. I bet $125 (5 green chips). He calls and has pocket aces. :P
This hand pissed me off at the time. I was just super annoyed. However, when I thought about it later I think it was OK. His range preflop for reraising is pretty tight which makes this one tough. Probably TT+ (maybe even JJ+ or QQ+), and AK. Maybe AQ, the widest range I can really give the guy is AQ+/TT+. I felt like when he checked it THREE freaking times though, he had to have a pretty weak hand.
My problem was in the sizing though, I think. The only hand I realistically beat is QQ. AA beats me, KK beats me. I tie with AK. I beat TT and AQ too if they are in his range I guess (and lose to JJ). I think that all of the hands that beat/tie me would have bet at some point (JJ, KK, AA, AK). However, the hands that are left are really weak. I'm not getting a call from AQ probably. QQ and TT might call but it would have to be a really small bet. So in retrospect I should have went with a $35 bet or something on the end, maybe $25, to try to get a crying call from QQ/TT and maybe AQ. Not a huge deal though, a lot of those hands might call the overbet as well (especially QQ which seemed very likely).
One thing that was pretty funny was my interaction with the other big stack at the table. He had about 1000, won the AA hand, and I immediately put another 500 on the table. A seat to his left opened up. He was in the 8 seat (10 handed) and I was in the 3 seat. I said "I'll take that seat" and moved over. I had all green chips, with a stack of red and some bills so it was really easy for me to pick up. As soon as I got there he said "I'm taking that seat" and pointed to my old seat. So we were just going to flip flop. He had a ton of chips and started to load them up. My positional advantage was gone though, so I just said "You know what bro you don't have to move, I'll just move back". So I moved back. It was pretty funny. He didn't acknowledge it at the time but we talked about it later. I told him that was the first time anyone had moved when I moved to their left. He said it was the first time he had someone move back when he moved away! So it was pretty funny and the guy seemed cool enough. Older guy named David.
My focus at the table hasn't been great, but I'm starting to see some improvements. I'm starting to put people on ranges during hands and narrow them down. Definitely not every hand, and I wish it was more than 1 hand a round, but I bet it's less. It's SOOOO easy for me to lose focus and forget what I need to work on. My goals at this point are to always count the pot, and always pick one player (when I'm out of the hand) to assign a range to and narrow it down as the action unfolds. Yesterday I was doing this more frequently and although I can't do it perfectly in realtime, I can see it's improving dramatically just from me putting the mental effort in.
One thing I started telling myself yesterday (acknowledging the focus issues) is that at this point, my hand really needs to begin after I fold my hand. It sounds crazy but with my poker goals as it stands now, most of them are based around focus when I'm out of the hand. So as long as I'm playing solid preflop, who cares what I do in the hand. I care more about what I'm doing when I'm out of the hand. Here are my current poker goals (which I review every day before the session, on each break every 2 hours, and after each session):
- Count the pot before acting after the flop.
- Ignore all physical tells and other non-betting information.
- Make consistent physical movements.
- Play solid preflop.
- Pay attention to one player during each hand when out of the hand (focus on narrowing ranges from preflop on, not physical tells).
I probably should change my "count the pot" one to say I should count the pot every hand. But you get the point - the most important one IMO is the last one and that takes place when I'm out of the hand. I can do that when I'm in the hand too, but I'm not practiced up on it so I really need to work on it when I'm out of the hand. And I'm out of most hands, so that's the majority of the work I'm doing in the session.
One hand where this paid off and I was SUPER confident in my read is this hand. I call $1 more in the small blind with A9o. Flop is AK9 rainbow. There are 5 people in and I bet out $10. Girl in late position calls me. At this point I'm putting her on Ax, Kx, K9, or a set of 9s. AK/AA/KK are also possible but I think less likely because she didn't raise preflop. Turn was a 6. I bet out $30 and she called again. At this point I was really heavily weighing her range as Ax and K9. AA/KK/99 seemed way less likely since I haven't gotten raised. River was a 3. At this point I was 100% confident I had the best hand. Yes, I did have a big hand but less experienced people might still be worried about AK, 99, or even more ridiculous possibilities like 66 and check. I bet out $50 and got called. She didn't show but I'm still super confident she had Ax or K9. Narrowing down her range in realtime really helped me nail exactly what she had. It also helped me tailor the bet size to one that I thought ace rag could call.
My confidence is soaring when I see myself do things like this. I have NEVER done that before even though I've heard of things like ranges, etc for years now. The information is out there but I haven't practiced it and applied it at the table. Now that I am, it's very exciting for me.
Interesting acknowledgement in my dreams of becoming a poker pro as well. I'm going to shoot for a money goal. If I hit that amount, I can just straight up quit and play for a living (if I want to do that). Right now I'm thinking that goal is $50,000 more than I currently had in my bankroll at the time. In my personal blog (which most of my readers aka Johnny and Mike have access to) I dig more into it. It's something like $63,000 total. I go into it in more detail in that blog, but I think this is a great number and works just as well if not better than something like $100k or $200k. $60k or so would give me a good bankroll to play 1/2 - 5/10 NL comfortably and endure some tough times while siphoning off $4k or so per month at first to support the family. If it starts going downhill (get down to $20k or so), I'll have to seriously start looking for a job but I'll still have enough money to get by for months in the meantime.
If I started with $100k or $200k obviously the comfort level would be higher. However, my contention is that I'm either going to make it or not. I personally think with 60k, an excellent work ethic, and continuing to improve my game via studying, I would be OK and hopefully it would take off. In that case, the additional $40k or $140k really isn't doing much besides delaying me from giving the dream another shot. And if $60k won't work for me, neither will $100k or $200k. I'll just be delaying the envitable failure and re-entry into the workforce. If that is going to happen, I should make it happen sooner than later in order to reduce the amount I'm screwing my life over by trying this out.
That's it for me today. Hopefully I'm getting out tonight to play some 2/5, possibly at Wynn. With the big boys. :-)
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