Last week I played a couple of games against a good player – the first game was difficult, and he was clearly thinking much more than the average fool at the $10s. It went my way and I figured that while I had a small edge it might be good to rematch just for the experience. Apparently he was thinking exactly the same thing, except he thought he had the postflop edge. The second game was a complete disaster, so he was probably more right than I was

We agreed to swap HH, and had a small email exchange talking about some of the hands. I figured out how to edit the HH files so that HEM would load both hole cards up. I was quite surprised at how much thought this guy put into his play – more than me I suspect. Also, although this might be just because of the hands we talked about, he seemed to think a lot more about what my thought processes were, while I was thinking more about how I was being perceived – that sounds like I’m outlevelling him, but it wasn’t really. It was more the case that he was evaluating how much value he could get out of me, while I was looking at how effectively I could bluff him.

And that last point could be a leak for me. I’m always working on the bluffs, making them and catching them. It appeals to me because it’s all about the player, rather than pot odds and getting thin value. Very satisfying when it’s working, very expensive when you get it wrong. If on the other hand you’re working on getting value, then it’s rarely expensive when you get it wrong – you just get less value than you hoped, or maybe at worst accidentally value town yourself when something was just a bit too thin.

Anyway, it was really interesting to be able to talk about those games with him. I wish it happened more often. To quote the level we talked about; ‘the only reason I called was that I knew you knew I pretty much can’t have a strong hand’ – which is awesome that we could even have a game where that came into play.

It’s awesome because today I’ve played people who do this;

There’s no sense in that. You can’t play someone like this and say ‘if he’s calling there, then he’s thinking xxx’ etc. The easiest way to beat them seems to be to just chip away with small flop cbets, and get as much value as you can from strong hands. How exciting.

It wouldn’t be so bad if he hadn’t gone on to beat me as well (of course, lol).

Well, maybe not totally true Looking back over the hands I was definitely running hot on the upswing, although did really well at keeping myself out of trouble. For the games I lost, the errors I made stood out a mile;

That guy was chasing draws all over the place and as soon as he raised the river I just knew it was QT (but I still called). I then looked back at the hand and realised how terribly I’d slowplayed it and let him draw out cheaply. FFS, such an idiot, yet at the time I thought I was being smart. Seems it takes quite a few smacks in the face before I can learn a lesson.

Shouldn’t complain though, as still plenty of that heater left in the account.

So far so good, more or less. Had one bad beat where my KT 2pair hand went all-in against their T8 2pair, and of course an 8 rolled out on the river – however need to put in loads more hands so those beats merge into the noise.

Anyway, if I’m supposed to be playing totally ABC, then what’s the move on this hand. Assume no history or stats (it is rush poker after all);

Stacks:
Hero ($12.27)
UTG+1 ($10)
CO ($10.15)
BTN ($10)
SB ($12.19)
BB ($14.98)

Pre-Flop: ($0.15, 6 players) Hero is UTG 10 3
Hero folds, 1 fold, CO raises to $0.40, BTN raises to $1.10, SB calls $1.05, BB calls $1, CO calls $0.70

Flop: 10 K A ($4.40, 4 players)
SB checks, BB checks, CO checks, BTN checks

Turn: 2 ($4.40, 4 players)
SB checks, BB checks, CO checks, BTN checks

River: 5 ($4.40, 4 players)
SB checks, BB checks, CO bets $1.50, BTN calls $1.50, SB folds, BB folds

Final Pot: $7.40
CO shows a pair of Queens
Q Q
BTN shows a pair of Kings
K Q

BTN wins $7.05 (net +$4.45)

CO lost $2.60
SB lost $1.10
BB lost $1.10

Most of it is shitty win one, lose one zigzagginess. None of it seems to bear any relation to whether my opponents were any good or not, even the fools who check every button won their fair share. One of them today made an awesome laydown though;

Admittedly shoving that river seems remarkably spewy since there aren’t many hands that would call, and he was also extremely passive – but that passivity was so extreme that I was convinced he really really liked his hand (I know turn bet was small, but *any* turn bet after he called was big strength from this guy). He tanked for quite a while before folding. I dunno if I would have had that strength…

That game was annoying in the end because I had him pinned down to < 500 chips for ages and he kept on clinging on, winning some flips back to equal stacks and then my 66 lost to his AK.

Here's another hand that shocked me. Different player, this time someone who raised their buttons and you'd expect more regular lines. Maybe flat calling a 3bet pre with aces is a much better move that 4betting or shoving?

Anyway, to the point of the title of this post – essentially I had two heaters this year, one at $10 games and the other at $30. The money from the $30s is blown away now, and my wins show I’m back to the point after the 4man $10s heater. It’s a pretty solid decline for the last 3 months. Those heaters raised my expectations, and it’s painful facing the reality that I’m not really winning at heads up.

I wish I knew where the holes are in my game. It was a lot more fun when I was winning…

Sooo, what can I post about? Not much I guess. Full Tilt is still proving to be the best site to play husngs – plenty of players and not much waiting for a game. Tonight I’ve been playing on Cake (under the alias ‘Rolf Lmao’ – geddit? ), but it takes too long to sit and wait for someone to join you, so I’ve been joining anyone waiting on a game $25 or less (not many $25s, although the one I played I won – whoohoo!). So far been doing ok, but not getting many games over $10.

Here’s a great hand though – I love bluffing, but when someone showed me that they folded top pair it makes it well worth the many, many times that I get called down;

There is some history on that hand – I’d played the same line of cbet, check turn, fold river about 3 times, with him making a PSB on the river each time. So I was actually waiting for a hand to have some value to take this line anyway, but I figured he’d also give the click-it-back action some credit on the river anyway, and a bluff would work just fine too (which it did lol!). However I had been putting that PSB of his as a stone cold bluff to simply buy the pot, and to see him fold away a hand with decent value really surprised me. I guess those other PSBs weren’t bluffs at all (maybe).

Oh, and here’s another one (different opponent);

Possibly a bet for value more than a bluff, but very thin really…