Can you fold a Full House?

After sleeping one night and reading an entry in an poker forum about a guy who had similar experiences I am re-thinking the way I played some hands yesterday.
Usually I would never fold a Full House because this hand wins more than it loses. And if the pot is big enough than you can afford to lose this hand from time to time.
That's the theory of pot-odds. But what's about the next stage of poker. I'm talking about combining the math with the actual situation, betting and your opponent. The basics of poker is still math and without the math you are gambling. But the math does only work in the long run. The big advantage to poker over BJ is that you can increase your odds in situations like that if you entered the next stage of a poker player...

As said before: In most cases a Full House is the winning hand. But next time look at the board for a second time before counting your money! An Ace hitting the board giving you a Full with 10's might give somebody else the Aces Nut Full House. Think again - how was the betting, what happend in the rounds before, who is your opponent. Being able to read your opponent might save you some money.
I never would fold a Full with 10's in a limit game if it cost me only a big bet. Usually pot-odds rule here. But I wouldn't re-raise. And I would consider folding against an All-In bet (or wouldn't go All-In myself) in a No-Limit game. Are you able to fold in that situation? To be true - I have no idea if I would. But in the future this option will be available.

I learned a big lesson last night. It was an expensive one but making mistakes can improve your game drastically. Just don't make them again - there are so many others still available ;-)))

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What is worse: good cards or bad cards?

After being card dead in Bregenz I had a night with great hands: Trips, Flushes, Straights, Full Houses (lots of them). All these Hand created big pots but unfortunatly I lost most of them. Losing a straight or a flush because somebody else has the nut straight or nut flush is one thing. But losing Full Houses is mean. I lost Full 9's vs. Quad 10's and Full 10's vs. Full Aces and some more I can't remember right now.
And more worse: Most of them had been rivered. And there was nothing I could do. How aggressive do you have to play a calling station to force a fold? I have no idea. At least not in Limit!

I'm not really angry or depressed. It just a little sad. I had my best month so far and now almost all of this month winnings are wiped out in one single session. I know it doesn't matter in the long run if you have a single losing session or a losing month. But it feels just better if you see a positive number at the end of each month.

Until now my first night at the Commerce was my worst night. Now I call this the worst. The people are much nicer here than in the Commerce but tonight I lost a big opportunity for a big win. Those cards usually should represent a huge win far on the positive side of Standard Deviation.

To answer the question in the headline: If you play good poker and make only minor mistakes than bad cards result in a small loss or a small win. If you have good cards they represent a big win or a big loss. At the end all evens out. So none of them is worse in the long run. But tonight (in the short run) the good cards hurt more than bad cards on any given night.

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Blogspam

I know email-Spam for a long time. I just configured our company mailserver to avoid most of the spam - and so far it works fine. Have you ever subscribed to a chatlist for AIM (AOL Instant Messenger)? Don't do it or you will encounter Chat-Spam. It seems every electronic publishing medium will be abused by spammers.

So it shouldn't really surprise anybody that there is blogspam, too. Since a while whenever I post a new blog entry I get one or two instant responses. They want to sell me something or advertise some obscure website. Those answers are generated by computers that get triggered by the arrival of a new entry.
I usually love all this computer stuff and what can be done with them but there are things that are just awful...

Blogger provides a solution for this. Unfortunatly this creates a little more work for those who want to respond to an entry. You now have to type-in a random text before you can publish your response. I'm sorry for that hassle but this is the only way I can avoid this awfull spam. If you prefer you may write any comment about an entry in Shadow's German Poker Forum. If you don't speak german just write in english (and of course we will keep your thread in english then).

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Blogger Championships on PokerStars

Result of the Blogger Championship @ PokerStars: Went out 593th of 1473 players.

Took a bad hit early in the tournament with KK. Played them aggressively but got called by one other player. The flop and the turn weren't scary at all. He didn't had anything until the river. The Ace there improved his AQ and I lost about half of my chips. I managed to survive the first hour (were we lost only about 400 people). After the break it was time for a move as I had only 1200 vs. 150/300 Blinds. Got two great hands: First 9-9. Went all in and got called by AQ. The 9's held and I doubled. Second hand QQ. Went All-In again and busted AK. Two hands later I got Q's again. Called a short stacked All-In bet, just to run into Pocket Aces. Again down to 1200 I was moved three times without getting dealt a single hand. It was amazing how fast we lost players now. About 5-10 a minute. I called with A5 of spades and the flop put me on a nice flush draw with two more spades. I decided that it was time for a decision as we had a nice pot due to several callers. Went All-In and it was folded around - except for JJ. To bad - my draw didn't complete and I was out of the tournament.

There are a lot of people around who may tell you that playing a tournament is similar to playing cash game. It isn't!
Harrington on Hold'em Part 1 and Harrington on Hold'em Part 2 helped me a lot to improve my game. There is a big difference if you play with a big, average or short stack. You have to play hands in different ways as well as you have to use different betting patterns. After reading Harrington's books I realized that I wasn't playing poker but shooting craps in my first tournaments.

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Card Dead in Bregenz

Well, let's start with the ups before I tell you about the downs.
Bregenz was my first tournament after I started playing poker and I had good memories and was in a good mood on my drive to the Casino.
The tournament had a 40 player max and was a smaller event than that in March. They have this small one again on Nov. 19th and two bigger events in early December and beginning of 2006.
Again the two organisers Joe Fuchshofer & Edgar Stuchly ran the tournament very well. No big trouble and small incidents were handeld very professionally. They offer free juices, water and snacks during the tournament. After about 3 hours there was a break and they offered a full meal in the restaurant. A computer displays the current blind level, remaining players and average Stack.

The EUR 100,- buy-in with rebuys and one add on after the first hour created a prize pool of little over EUR 10.000,- (1st got about 3.500,- and 6th about 500,-). First 3 level were 20 minutes each. After that 25 minutes. 2000 chips with blinds of 25/50 in the first level. Add-On got you 4000 chips.

They had a lot of "newbies" there so I thought it could be a good tourney. Unfortunatly I was sent to the most difficult table: Three or four players that are tournament regulars. One of them even cashed more than once at this years WSOP. I don't like him and his style but he definitly is a difficult opponenent. To make things worse I was card dead from the beginning. Execpt for two or three All-In-Semi-Bluffs that went well I had seven hands that had been really playable. And I'm not talking about tight play - I'm talking about hands that could be played only by a maniac (e.g. 7,2 or 9,3 unsuited of course). Four of them went well: Two times queens held against weaker opponents, one time I didn't had two show JJ's on the river. The last I can't remember right now. The three others became crucial for my result: First I overplayed AJs. I had to go All-In after the flop with a straight draw but run into AA's. No nine on the river and I had to rebuy early in the tournament. After about 3 hours into the tournament I was down to 2.600 (average was 7.000) but managed to get back to average due some well timed all-in-bluffs with semi-valuable cards (e.g. K9s). I could even follow the average up to 10.000 were I reached my peek. With Blinds of 400/800 my stack started to decrease fastly. Down to 5.000 a good situation came up: It was folded around to my small blind. The big blind was the short stack with 2.600 at our table and I raised all-in with 10,10. I was sure he would call and he did. I expected him calling with a medicore hand and was reliefed to see 2,2. Unfortunatly the turn brought a 3rd two and no help on turn and river. Crippled after that bad beat I was able to steal some blinds and be back to around 5.000. With blinds of 800/1600 it was now time for a big move again. Average stake was about 16.000 at this time. Again I got a playable card at the right time: A,10s I went all-in and got one caller. Unfortunatly I ran into AQs and the Queen-Kicker held and I was out on 16th place.

Am I disapointed? Yes, somewhat. I felt good before the tournament and there was a lot of fresh fish. With average to good cards it should have been easy to get into the money. But with the awful flow of cards I should be happy that I managed to make 16th place. I even survived the "WSOP"-Guy who was chipleader during the first 90 minutes.
I told you in an earlier blog that I feel that my cash game has improved. This tournament showed me that my tournament game has improved as well. Two or three months ago I would have been out much earlier...

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Preparation is the key for success

Does it matter if you're in a good mood while playing? Sure it does!

During my blackjack times I tried to find a good balance between playing time and free time. In Vegas I played about 3 sessions (1 hour each) before I took a break (a nap, something to eat, other relaxing things). And I played about 6-8 sessions per day. Cardcounting is mainly mechanics but you're playing better if you feel better. Less mistakes, better coverplay, good focus on opportunities.

In poker I started to play sessions of 12-18 hours. It was fun but I'm now sure this is a big mistake. In poker it is much more important than in blackjack to be focused. Less mechanics and more borderline decisions. Nowadays I stop if I start getting tired, feel bad or hungry. Usually this happens at least after 6 hours.
And more important I try to start the game in a good mood. In the past my local game went like this: Work the whole day, take the 1-hour drive, start the game ... and lose (often), drive home late night.
After I realized that I could get a train ticket and a hotel room for the same cost like using the car I changed this behavior. I still work the whole day (can't change this). But now I have a relaxed train ride (only a little longer than by car). Check in to the hotel and take a nap, take a shower, relax a little. The result: I feel better, I'm more focused and I play much better. Nice addition: I have W-LAN acces for free. So I can write that blog entry directly after the game. :-)

Todays game was nice - in addition to the regulars we had some "guests" that could easily be found at any PartyPoker table ... took full advantage of that opportunity ;-))

For those who are interested how am I doing since I started playing poker: I have to confess that I'm still down. Had several bad sessions in the past (some bad beats and several bad plays). There was a time I seriously considered quitting poker. But I felt that I improve more and more so I added a chart to my calculations. I compared the overall result to the results of the last nine, six and three months. And I was right. My results got better and better. And no I won't quit in the near future. So stay tuned for more blogging from Shadow.

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That's cool...

... PokerStars is holding a Freeroll Tournament with great prizes for any Blogger on the web. Just register your Blog at Pokerstars and paste the code that you get on your Blog:

I have registered to play in the
Online Poker Blogger Championship!

This event is powered by PokerStars.

Registration code: 1203122

That's it - and you're almost in.

Addition on Oct. 11th:
Yes, I'm in - 11 days before the start they have more than 1100 players. So I would estimate that it will be over 2000 before the start. This may become a long tournament. The prizes are cool and with that number of players you might get a feeling of how it might be to play something like a WSOP event.

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