Gulf Coast Poker Championship and Lessons Learned part two
Where was I? Playing Texas Hold em at the Beau, and I was in the middle of a hand.
A guy who didn't like to fold called from the small. I called too with QQ. Flop came AQx. The caller led out (donkbet). I smoothed, the black hair-dyed guy bumped it. Donkbettor got out of the way. I stewed.
At this point I didn't know much about the older guy (it's only in retrospect that I labeled him aggressive... I'll get to him later) so I tried to see what was on the board that could hurt me. Nothing really. If he had a set of aces oh well (obviously in poker tournaments you are going to go broke with second set if you are beat and most times you are not). I decided to call.
The turn was a brick. I hoped he had like AK or even better AQ and I wanted to build the pot. I thought if I led out weak I could get a raise out of him, maybe tie him to the pot, and get them all in. I did just that with some weak ass bet. He bit and bet the pot. Now there was about 8 k in there with each of us sitting on about 6k. I stewed.
If I called here and checked the river could I get another bet out of him? If I called here and led out the river I'd probably just get a call but who knows if he'd call all in. There wasn’t much room for him to maneuver at the end. There was also some backdoor draws that were unlikely but possible.
I decided to raise him about 2k more and watched (in sadness) as he folded.
I played that hand pretty badly, imo.
Why? I watched him later donk off his stack in a preflop raise war with Monkey's AA. He had KJ. Yeah. Prior to that, but after our hand, he made a series of All in over bets on the river. Had I not played unconventionally he likely would have tried to do the same to me but how was I know he was looking to play Santa Claus on every river.
Monkey said something like he did us a favor by knocking him out. By that point, the entire table was hoping to do exactly what Monkey walked into, and nobody thought it was a favor that he felted the biggest donator at the table.
Immediately after our hand I watched that guy then complain to the dealer about how aggressive the table was and how it was the "worst" he'd ever seen. Didn't realize aggression was a bad thing, especially coming from a guy that threw his chips around like they were Mexican pesos in North Dakota. True, at that time I was playing my hands pretty hard and the rest of the table were just firing with air, but I wouldn't call it the worst I had seen.
Afterall, Captain Tom was on my left tip-toe dancing through the early blind levels like a ballerina in a minefield. He was slyly, in and out of hands while watching his iPad, and seemed to be getting a lot of calling but not raising hands. Had to feel bad for him because his choice of TV shows that he was watching didn't look that interesting either, so it was a bad day on two fronts.
I also noticed when he got to below half the starting stack he kept both hands and arms cupped around his chips in a protective gesture. He didn’t move them and even feigned he didn’t hear Monkey’s request to see them only showing the dealer who was directly across from him.
To be continued...
A guy who didn't like to fold called from the small. I called too with QQ. Flop came AQx. The caller led out (donkbet). I smoothed, the black hair-dyed guy bumped it. Donkbettor got out of the way. I stewed.
At this point I didn't know much about the older guy (it's only in retrospect that I labeled him aggressive... I'll get to him later) so I tried to see what was on the board that could hurt me. Nothing really. If he had a set of aces oh well (obviously in poker tournaments you are going to go broke with second set if you are beat and most times you are not). I decided to call.
The turn was a brick. I hoped he had like AK or even better AQ and I wanted to build the pot. I thought if I led out weak I could get a raise out of him, maybe tie him to the pot, and get them all in. I did just that with some weak ass bet. He bit and bet the pot. Now there was about 8 k in there with each of us sitting on about 6k. I stewed.
If I called here and checked the river could I get another bet out of him? If I called here and led out the river I'd probably just get a call but who knows if he'd call all in. There wasn’t much room for him to maneuver at the end. There was also some backdoor draws that were unlikely but possible.
I decided to raise him about 2k more and watched (in sadness) as he folded.
I played that hand pretty badly, imo.
Why? I watched him later donk off his stack in a preflop raise war with Monkey's AA. He had KJ. Yeah. Prior to that, but after our hand, he made a series of All in over bets on the river. Had I not played unconventionally he likely would have tried to do the same to me but how was I know he was looking to play Santa Claus on every river.
Monkey said something like he did us a favor by knocking him out. By that point, the entire table was hoping to do exactly what Monkey walked into, and nobody thought it was a favor that he felted the biggest donator at the table.
Immediately after our hand I watched that guy then complain to the dealer about how aggressive the table was and how it was the "worst" he'd ever seen. Didn't realize aggression was a bad thing, especially coming from a guy that threw his chips around like they were Mexican pesos in North Dakota. True, at that time I was playing my hands pretty hard and the rest of the table were just firing with air, but I wouldn't call it the worst I had seen.
Afterall, Captain Tom was on my left tip-toe dancing through the early blind levels like a ballerina in a minefield. He was slyly, in and out of hands while watching his iPad, and seemed to be getting a lot of calling but not raising hands. Had to feel bad for him because his choice of TV shows that he was watching didn't look that interesting either, so it was a bad day on two fronts.
I also noticed when he got to below half the starting stack he kept both hands and arms cupped around his chips in a protective gesture. He didn’t move them and even feigned he didn’t hear Monkey’s request to see them only showing the dealer who was directly across from him.
To be continued...
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