Call ins considered harmful

The play I made the session before last, which gave me my 18th best cash game no limit hold'em hand, was quite a risky one. I called a big bet from a player who had me covered, and had to go all in to do it. I hereby dub this play a "call in", short for calling all in. You need a stronger hand to call in than to go all in before anyone else has entered the pot. I learned why from one of Dan Harrington's poker books; here's the relevant passage:

The Gap Concept was first defined by David Sklansky in his excellent book, Tournament Poker For Advanced Players. If you're thinking of entering a pot that has already been opened, you need a stronger hand to call than you would need to open the pot yourself from that position.

Dan Harrington;Bill Robertie. Harrington on Hold 'em Expert Strategy for No Limit Tournaments, Vol. 1: Strategic Play (p. 188). Kindle Edition. 

Unfortunately, I don't have the Gap Concept completely ingrained in my thinking. Last night, I made two disastrous call ins. The first time, I was on an open-ended straight draw, and lost $11,054. The second time, I'd flopped a flush, but lost $35,399 when an opponent made a fatty on the turn. He raised to $30,000 on the river, and I called with my remaining $6,999. Part of me knew at the time of making each of these call ins that it was the wrong thing to do, but a bigger part of me was ignoring that knowledge. After my second reup, I was able to recover some of my losses.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 133 hands and saw flop:
 - 11 out of 18 times while in big blind (61%)
 - 9 out of 19 times while in small blind (47%)
 - 50 out of 96 times in other positions (52%)
 - a total of 70 out of 133 (52%)
 Pots won at showdown - 13 of 19 (68%)
 Pots won without showdown - 6

delta: $-53,663
cash game no limit hold'em balance: $4,891,074
balance: $7,340,482

A probe bluff gone horribly wrong

Lately, I've been dusting off an old and reliable poker tool, the probe bet. I first learned about it in "Harrington on Hold 'em, Expert Strategy for No Limit Tournaments, Vol. 1" by Dan Harrington. Actually, I've come up with a variation on the probe bet which I'll call the probe bluff. The basic idea of the probe bluff is that when you have cocktail napkins (a colorful name for two worthless cards) and the flop has scare cards in it, it's worth a small bet just to see if you can steal the pot. You say to yourself, "I have such a shit hand, these are the definitely the last chips I'm putting into this pot. If everyone folds, good on me, but if anyone raises, I'll just fold. I'm totally prepared to fold; I just want to see if this probe bluff will take the pot."

The danger with probe bluffs is that if nobody raises you but at least one opponent calls, then you'll get to see another card. That other card can put you in a world of hurt. You almost shouldn't even look at it; by rights, you should honor your probe bluff philosophy by just folding on that street. Last night, in the first tournament I entered, I lost $800 on the penultimate hand because I didn't honor my probe bluff philosophy. I probe bluffed the flop, then liked the card I saw on the turn and decided to stay in the hand. Bad dog! :-)

buy_in entry_fee num_players num_hands place winnings

 50000       800           6        53     4        0
 50000       800           6        67     2   105000
 50000       800           6        57     4        0

delta: $-47,400
tournament balance: $1,097,890
balance: $6,228,621

The texture of the flop

In his two awesome books on tournament hold'em, Dan Harrington brings up the concept of the texture of the flop on several occasions. In a nutshell, the texture of the flop is an indicator of what kinds of hands your opponents may have hit, particularly hands that would be big favorites to beat yours. For example, it's never a good sign to see a pair in the flop, unless you happened to hit trips yourself. That's a bad texture, because the odds are excellent that one of your opponents hit trips or a two pair. I've seen players fold when there's a pair in the flop, even when no one has opened the betting; my guess is that they've been burned too many times in the past by this dangerous texture.

Last night, I hit the felt when I didn't give credence to a texture which made it possible that someone had hit an ace high straight on the flop; one contributing factor to my disbelief was that I'd hit a great hand myself, top two pair. You just don't expect someone else to have hit the flop harder when you've hit it so hard yourself. I wasn't discouraged, though; I reupped for the max, and ended the night with a profit when I won a monster pot worth $103,700 with three of a kind, kings. That's the first pot over $100,000 I've had in quite a while.

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 70 hands and saw flop:
 - 7 out of 11 times while in big blind (63%)
 - 5 out of 10 times while in small blind (50%)
 - 25 out of 49 times in other positions (51%)
 - a total of 37 out of 70 (52%)
 Pots won at showdown - 3 of 6 (50%)
 Pots won without showdown - 7

delta: $23,500
balance: $4,233,916

Great poker read

I recently purchased and read "Harrington on Hold 'em, Expert Strategy for No Limit Tournaments, Vol. 1" by Dan Harrington. I found it chock full of poker wisdom. It turns out that my apprenticeship on PokerStars laid a great foundation for truly appreciating his advice; I discovered that a lot of what he talks about I'd already discovered "on my own", as it were.

One of the most valuable parts of the book for me was his lucid explanation of pot odds, and emphasis on how important they are to calculate and use as a guide at every decision point. I realized I'd never formally calculated them, but had been going by gut feel alone. Sometimes, a call would just feel too expensive to me, but I never knew there was such a simple formula to give credence or put the lie to such feelings. Last night, I calculated pot odds for the first time; not at every decision point, mind you, but you have to crawl before you can walk!

Another extremely valuable part of the book for me was his explanation of how to use bets to buy information. It's all too easy to think of bets solely as attempts to win the pot; I confess I never formally came up with the concept of using bets to gain information. Last night, I consciously used bets in this fashion on four or five different hands, and ending up winning three of them.

Needless to say, I highly recommend Dan's book; I'm looking forward to reading Volume 2!

During current Hold'em session you were dealt 14 hands and saw flop:
- 1 out of 2 times while in big blind (50%)
- 1 out of 2 times while in small blind (50%)
- 8 out of 10 times in other positions (80%)
- a total of 10 out of 14 (71%)
Pots won at showdown - 3 of 5 (60%)
Pots won without showdown - 1

delta: $20,600
balance: $1,261,910