Odd Situation

JonathanLB · #1 (**permalink**) 03-18-2008, 11:40 PM

In the last two days, I am really angry about how I played two hands, and yet I won a good amount of money (I mean relative to the blinds, chunk change in reality) on both hands.

First situation, A-Q, flop gave me top pair. Both players left had about $2 left, one $1.75, $10 maximum buy-in at the 5-10 cent table. I idiotically called the first player's all-in, the other player called behind me, and just as I had read I was losing, KK and two pair Q-8, and I hit my ace on the turn and won. I read correctly that the all-in had two pair, and yet I didn't trust my read and just stupidly called anyway. It made me angry for the rest of the night. I mean that kind of bad play will cost me in the long run, and because he had a smaller amount of money I just made a dumb decision anyway. Win or not wasn't the point, I was angry enough at that hand to sit out for about 5 minutes at all of my tables and just think about what I had done, haha.

Then tonight, early raiser minimum raises, I re-raise 3 times his bet with QQ, he re-raises all-in for $4. I request time and let my hands at the other tables sit, and I think to myself ok a lot of times players here min. raise AA to make the pot a bit bigger then trap on the flop. I somehow stupidly called anyway, my read was dead on, he did have AA, and I hit my set on the flop and won. I think I'm even more angry about that hand because I made such a good read and like a moron I acted against it and just called anyway. Grrr...

I have to start trusting my reads better even when it hurts to lay down a hand. I've lost plenty of other hands in the last few days yet I'm most angry about two that I WON, does anyone else have this happen? I mean I care more about how I play than just the results of the actual hands and those were just in my opinion really bad calls, so it frustrates me that in both cases I was smart enough to figure out I was probably beat and just ignored that and called anyway. I have to get better at following through with what I think instead of just hoping that my opponent actually doesn't have what I think they do, haha.

Pinguaq · #2 (**permalink**) 03-18-2008, 11:50 PM

Was there a question there? Not sure how to respond... holding... the... sarcasm..... (ouch!) I'm asussing you're new to the game, but I suggest get use to this happening from both the winning and losing side.

One of my favorites was in a NL200 game. After calling a raise to $12 with KQsuited, I called a push of $60 on a flop of 238 (or something like that) thinkng he had a mid pair and I wanted to gamble. He had AA and I caught runner/runner Queens for trips and even though it was online I could see him breaking stuff at home.

RuClown · #3 (**permalink**) 03-19-2008, 01:11 AM

Damn you my tv is still broke!!

JonathanLB · #4 (**permalink**) 03-19-2008, 02:27 AM

Ouch runner-runner queens, ouch!!! Wow. That's a tough beat dude, lol. I'd feel really bad honestly.

Haha, Clown that was nice, I was going to write to him, "Wait THAT WAS YOU?! YOU SOB I HAD BULLETS AND YOU DONKED ME LIKE THAT!" haha

No, I'm not at all new to the game. I've been playing very actively for 7 years and been a winning player online for all 5 since I started playing on Poker Room. At the time, I was a really mediocre player, I mean honest assessment of myself looking back, but I did quite well not exactly sure how. I guess at the low limits I played I was just better than the other donks.

I'm relatively new to playing cash games, though, I am a tournament player and that takes a bit more gambling at the right situations, so in those situations my tournament mind thought, "Well they have many fewer 'chips' than I do, and if I lose I'll still have money but they will be gone if I win," well that's irrelevant in a cash games. You can rebuy. You have to make good decisions no matter whether your opponent has $1 left or $10 left. Like I called this guy's all-in the other day because he had only $1.50 left and I had something marginal like A-J suited, and I ended up winning but he had pocket 10s I think and it was a silly call. Would I normally call a raise of $1.50 with A-J suited? HECK NO. So why call an all-in? Because I was thinking like a tournament player. So I'm still learning that kind of thing, I just haven't played enough cash games yet to take in all of the nuances.

I'm doing very well so far, though, really really happy with it! I think I'm beginning to enjoy this a lot more than tournaments. For one I can four-table, instead of only two at tournaments (too many tough decisions, I found three tables or four tables at tournaments, tried both, to be exhausting mentally and with no breaks, you can't just get up when you want, I found that even harder and I had to hold in the, ahem, needed bathroom break for a long time, hehe). Also the beats don't seem AT ALL as bad, I mean I take a bad beat every once in a while but I manage to avoid most of them. It's just a lot more fun so far. I love huge tournaments, but the SnGs were killing me. The profit I was eeking out, 15-20% usually, 22% on Poker Room over about 400 tournaments, was solid but the daily swings were annoying me, like up $50 one day, down $20 the next, the next day play 8 hours up $2. Ugg, I mean what the heck. With cash games if I just play four tables for about 5 hours I seem to always finish up so far, it just is a matter of how much. Plus the bonuses clear FAST!!! Wow. It would take me 5-6 times as long to clear bonuses at tournaments, I didn't realize this until I started playing the cash games.

I made a really bad decision tonight with A-K, flop came A-2-2, I knew he didn't have the 2, and there was not much else there by the turn and river. He had pocket aces. Uhh... whoops. I'm retarded. I should have folded that. Oh well it hurt the night pretty badly but not even close to bad enough to ruin my night, I mean, god, I had pocket aces like 10 times no joke and won EVERY TIME, some of them HUGE pots, like full house on the river and I got a guy to call my re-raise all-in for $10, which on a max buy-in $10 table is really a massive pot. He was money leader at the table before that. My pocket kings hit a flop of K-9-9 won another great pot. Another time my AA ran into KK and I took down another huge pot, actually there was someone else in there with something stupid I can't even remember what, but they got owned too.

The poker gods were so kind to me with AA the last few days, I've had that hand a remarkable number of times, I don't even know, 15-20 times, and I haven't lost one time with it. That's really rare.