New Blog / 1st Hand

New Blog / 1st Hand

Welcome to my blog that I'm calling 8BitPoker. I've started playing poker a whole lot more again recently and I decided I wanted to start a blog for two main reasons:

• I want to share my poker journey, especially particularly entertaining or interesting parts, with friends, family, and whomever else might be interested.

• It's probably a good idea to give myself yet another reason to do my best to remember as many details as I can about impactful hands and analyze them after the fact - look for misplays, opportunities for improvement, etc.

What to Expect

I expect my primary focus to be on sharing No Limit Hold 'Em cash game hands - one per session that I find particularly interesting or fun. If this gains any sort of popularity and people want something else - More or less context on hands, Q&A, thoughts on different parts of the game like bankroll management and game selection - I'll do all of the above. But enough talking about what I'm going to do, how about we do it, huh?

$1,2,2 Spread Limit at Garlic City Casino in Gilroy ($40-$400, $2-$200 Spread)

First off this is a super weird structure at a very unique card club, but I think the level of play is so low that I'm 100% OK with it. What they mean by spread limit is that the maximum bet/raise is $200, plus there's a 4-bet (1 bet, 3 raise) maximum on every street unless the hand is heads-up - kind of a mix between limit and no-limit betting structure. $400 buy-in is fairly deep and they take $4 per post-flop hand, so the structure is actually pretty decent overall. Anyway, here's the hand I played last night:

A♣, 5♣ in Small Blind ($2) - ~$190 effective stack

There are severally limpers (players just calling the minimum bet) in the field, I check my option, and our villain in the hand - the BB (big blind) - raises it up to $17 in something like a $10 pot. He's been raising fairly often pre-flop, but typically for smaller amounts.

3 people call in the field, I call.

~$90 flop (5-way): 2♦6♥3♣

I have a gut-shot straight draw (any 4 hits a straight), a back-door nut flush draw (any 2 clubs for flush), and a single over-card that may or may not be good if I hit (pair of Aces).

I check, villain makes it $20, 1 player in the field calls, I call.

My thinking is that there's a high probability I'm good with anything that hits me and that I can pick up the club draw on the turn and keep playing even if I don't get exactly what I want, and I will probably get paid for whatever I hit. Getting 6.5-to-1 on my money, yeah...call.

$150 turn (3-way): 2♣

the board now reads 2♦6♥3♣2♣

I still have the gutshot, I still might be ahead if I hit an A, and I now pick up the nut flush draw. Not the best card, but I'll take it. I check. Villain bets again for $65, the 3rd player in the hand folds, and it's back to me.

Now I'm in a kind of weird spot. To make the call I have to put in $65 to win a pot of about $215, which is about 3.3-to-1. If I still think I'm good with any 4, A, or ♣ (which I do), then I'm about 32% to win the hand and need a little over 2-to-1 to call, which I'm getting the right price on. If we assume our A is no good because our opponent has A,6, or a pair of Aces here fairly often, then we're about 26% to win or need 3-to-1 to call, which we're also getting.

But apparently I'm bad at math at the table. I thought I wasn't quite getting the right price to call, but I assumed he'd pay me off for the little left in his stack ~$80 if I hit. At this point I mostly put him on Jacks through Aces and figured there's no way he's folding based on how he and I both played earlier in the session. Anyway, after a really long time miscalculating the pot odds and some guy that's not in the hand getting mad at me about thinking super long over a $65 bet, I call.

~$280 river (heads up): 6♠

the board now reads: 2♦6♥3♣2♣6♠

There's no way I'm good here. GG. Hand over... HOLD UP. I think for a second, realize he's going to have a really tough time calling here with a single pair, and I throw enough chips in to cover what he's got left (~$80) in, fairly quickly. He immediately makes an audible upset grunt-type reaction, says "You have a 6, huh?", takes about 30 seconds to psychologically get over the fact that he's lost, then folds.

I am actually pretty darn proud of my river play here, even more-so than I am embarrassed about not being able to do the math on the turn. I correctly put my player on a big pocket pair most of the time that we're in this situation, though he should show up with a pair of 3s, A6, or AK a bit of the time as well. I realized with a double-paired board that his most likely holdings would have a tough time calling AND my line looks super strong. I called pre-flop, I called on the flop, I called on the paired turn, and I fairly quickly and confidently bet out all-in on the double-paired river. I'm representing AT LEAST a 6 here.

Not only was it a great feeling scooping a pot where I was clearly behind, but it was a confirmation of my progress as a player. I started playing poker fairly seriously when I was 18, and in the last 10 years I've been very on-and-off and just haven't played a ton in between. I would never have made this play any time in that period until maybe a few weeks ago because I just wasn't reading hands that well or making decisions based on as much information.

Feel free to comment below or send any questions, comments, ideas, or w/e in to dj8bitavenger@gmail.com, and I'll make sure to incorporate the feedback into future posts.

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