What giving my best looks like [180man]

Hey Andrei,

Gl with it man. I'm mainly 27-45man SnG but I will be follwing this with interest.

Happy Grinding

Laz

Thanks for your support Lazza. The same theory should work between MTT formats.

I actually played more SNG's then MTT's for their lower variance and the "controlled experiment" feel of them, everything happens between the guys you see from the beginning at the table.

Good News: I did it and I actually enjoyed it more then I was expecting.

Bad News: Took me exactly 12 hours. I have doubts this is sustainable 5days/week. Dropped 40 BI. 90MTTs+10SNGs actually played. Didn't run that great, didn't play that great.

I think the didn't play that great part hurts the most. I'm not familiar with plays like 4players cold calling 3bets pre, 6way pots and getting 3bet shoved super tight at later stages.

My homework for now is to figure out how to exploit these types of games to the max. And maybe finally fund my account for 2.5s and play a few.

Spend some time today to think about when to play a smallball style. These are my conclusions, feel free to correct me.

U play smallball mostly IP to:

1. with good hands:
a) induce from wide 3bettors;
b) play boards against loose passive players that would fold to a shove;

2. with bad hands:
a) steal tight and low 3bet pre players;
b) Stop&Go.

+ balance a little

Might be obvious but took me some time.

Hey Andrei
nice blog wil be following

Originally posted by andreibalint
Spend some time today to think about when to play a smallball style. These are my conclusions, feel free to correct me.

I love the small ball strategy. Once I learn it I been a better MTT player.

You also play small ball strategy so you wont go card dead and get blinded out.

Stay Cool
Acespeci

@Acespeci , it's interesting you prefer smallball for not getting blinded out, I prefer shoving rather then minraising. I sometimes minraise first in, it looks really scary even if you are a shortstack.

As an update, funded account, played my first 6 2.5$ 180mans, definately juicy games, have to adjust though, some players are looser at calling all ins then what I am expecting.

Which leads to the following hands, for which I would like to hear your opinions:

PokerStars - $2.28+$0.22|75/150 NL - Holdem - 9 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 3

UTG: 4,905.00
UTG+1: 22.00
MP: 1,565.00
MP+1: 4,696.00 50/28/100(1)/14
LP: 3,515.00 66/16/0/6 (VPIP/PFR/Steal/Hands)
CO: 731.00
BTN: 1,615.00
Hero (SB): 975.00
BB: 6,584.00

Hero posts SB 75.00, BB posts BB 150.00

Pre Flop: (225.00) Hero has 7♣ K♣

fold, UTG+1 calls 22.00 and is all-in, fold, MP+1 calls 150.00, LP calls 150.00, fold, fold, Hero raises to 975.00 and is all-in, fold, MP+1 calls 825.00, LP calls 825.00

Flop: (3097.00, 4 players) 7♥ 3♦ T♣
MP+1 checks, LP bets 150.00, MP+1 calls 150.00

Turn: (3397.00, 4 players) 5♥
MP+1 checks, LP checks

River: (3397.00, 4 players) A♣
MP+1 checks, LP bets 300.00, fold

LP shows J♦ 2♠ (High Card, Ace) (Pre 24%, Flop 12%, Turn 7%)
Hero shows 7♣ K♣ (One Pair, Sevens) (Pre 47%, Flop 70%, Turn 81%)
UTG+1 shows Q♥ 3♠ (One Pair, Threes) (Pre 29%, Flop 18%, Turn 12%)
LP wins 300.00
Hero wins 3,097.00

PokerStars - $2.28+$0.22|125/250 Ante 25 NL - Holdem - 9 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 3

BTN: 2,485.00 21/17/60/47(VPIP/PFR/Steal/Hands)
SB: 2,610.00 19/0/0/47
Hero (BB): 2,770.00
UTG: 4,952.00
UTG+1: 1,975.00
MP: 2,615.00
MP+1: 2,435.00
LP: 2,600.00
CO: 2,950.00

BTN posts ante 25.00, SB posts ante 25.00, Hero posts ante 25.00, UTG posts ante 25.00, UTG+1 posts ante 25.00, MP posts ante 25.00, MP+1 posts ante 25.00, LP posts ante 25.00, CO posts ante 25.00, SB posts SB 125.00, Hero posts BB 250.00

Pre Flop: (600.00) Hero has 3♣ 3♦

fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, BTN calls 250.00, SB calls 125.00, Hero raises to 2,745.00 and is all-in, BTN calls 2,210.00 and is all-in, fold

Flop: (5395.00, 2 players) T♠ Q♥ 8♠

Turn: (5395.00, 2 players) 2♠

River: (5395.00, 2 players) K♣

Hero shows 3♣ 3♦ (One Pair, Threes) (Pre 52%, Flop 43%, Turn 55%)
BTN shows K♠ J♥ (One Pair, Kings) (Pre 48%, Flop 57%, Turn 45%)
BTN wins 5,395.00

No other info on villains.

Also, made some plays like shoving K4s, J6s from EP into big-stacks nearing bubble with 4-5BB, I would have zero fold equity if the blinds would hit me. I'm 99% they are -$EV but I don't know if I should do them or not.

And in case you're wondering, out of 6MTTs, cashed in 2 of them, mincash and next step. Made back like 2.5BI.

Won my first 180 man, I'm standing on 680$, after 19 games.

Felt like sharing the story, had some sick swings. I cleared everybody on my half of the final table with not that good hands, had a good chunk of luck there.

Ended up 3handed, with me up to 150k, some passive guy 60k and a shorty of 20k. In the first 3 mins after the break i quatrupled the shorty and doubled the other guy and was down to 10k which was 1.5 blinds.

Fun part was they were both pushing so tight into me that I managed to get back to 100k and managed to get HU with the passive guy.

Doubled again the passive guy who had the dumb luck of winning with A3o vs my A8, but again I pushed the hell out of him till I chipped him down and finally won.

Oh, and Merry Christmas! May Santa bring you lots of fish.

So who the hell am I?

I'm a romanian ex-almost-poker-player and small trader/investor. I actually don't know which one I like more. I started playing in 2009 i think, by Black Friday I had 1800$ frozen and probably cashed out about that amount as well (from the 50$ from ps.com).

Started playing again when ps.com gave free bankrolls for the "victims" of Black Friday, something changed, couldn't shoot up as before. Trying to get my self on the feet.

After working for almost 2 years as a day trader in a prop shop I decided to give my best to erase a regret I have for not playing enough poker during university. I was having like 20% at 12$ FTP on demands and 40$ at 4.5 and I played on average of 1-2 hours/day. Also had some hope for 12$ 6max turbo with about 4%ROI. An amount such as 1k/mo would have been mind blowing at the time. Of course I protected myself from that.

Anyway, since my schedule was 10hours long no exceptions, most of which was incredibly tense and frustrating (I think I can keep swearing different things for an hour now) I figured 10 hours of variance killer 180s would be a picnic.

While I was there I also raised a bit of money so now I'm "in position" to play poker, I have no excuse or concern about the future at least for a few months. I have the pressure for doing something because I could again get hired and make some money, even if I don't want this.

So while keeping this about poker, if you have questions about trading I might be able to help. I am also a big fish in guitar playing, just started out, I really enjoy it and I feel like I'm learning fast.

Hey,

What did u trade at the prop firm ?

Originally posted by andreibalint
@Acespeci , it's interesting you prefer smallball for not getting blinded out, I prefer shoving rather then minraising. I sometimes minraise first in, it looks really scary even if you are a shortstack.

Dont get me wrong I play small ball with around 20bb so am not card dead and blinded down to 10bb push or fold mode.

How many games before you got your 1st 180man 1st place cash?
I cant wait til I cash there more so getting my first 1st place.

Acespeci, I was thinking more towards minraise-call and minraise-fold in the 8-15bb region. Moshman is my hero in doing these kind of plays. However, I see that in 180s they don't work that great since people are to in love with calling, both pre and post flop.

There's little sence in minraising with 10bb when 4 big stacks call pre, that is if you are not unlucky enough for some random guy to shove on you, which I think happens way more often then in a SNG.

Won my first after 19 games, ended on a 3rd place today, I guess after another 20 games. I was surprised to see the chip leader was a really solid guy, won like 150k overall (search fidel1976), he stole blinds like I've never seen before. Had 95% steal and I really regret not jamming into him 60% of hands or something...

He busted me on what I think was a clear bad play from my part, after thinking a little about the hand it was really clear what he had:

PokerStars - $2.28+$0.22|2500/5000 Ante 500 NL - Holdem - 3 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 3

SB: 146,809.00 VPIP42,PFR38,Steal 93 i think, 54 hands
Hero (BB): 78,909.00
BTN: 44,282.00

SB posts ante 500.00, Hero posts ante 500.00, BTN posts ante 500.00, SB posts SB 2,500.00, Hero posts BB 5,000.00

Pre Flop: (9000.00) Hero has 5♣ T♣

fold, SB raises to 10,350.00, Hero calls 5,350.00

Flop: (22200.00, 2 players) T♠ Q♥ A♥
SB checks, Hero checks

Turn: (22200.00, 2 players) T♦
SB bets 11,100.00, Hero raises to 68,059.00 and is all-in, SB calls 56,959.00

River: (158318.00, 2 players) J♦

SB shows T♥ K♣ (Straight, Ace High) (Pre 72%, Flop 84%, Turn 86%)
Hero shows 5♣ T♣ (Three of a Kind, Tens) (Pre 28%, Flop 16%, Turn 14%)
SB wins 158,318.00

I did not know at the time he was a solid player, though. I had to know this in order for my line of thinking to work, so this is seriously cripled by hindsight bias:

unshpe, traded nymex natural gas futures and just a little bit of gasoil where I basically always got killed. Both spreads and outrights.

Hey

I was playing the $2.50 180man turbo I got my first ITM, first Final Table and first 2nd place after playing it 4 times.

check my Torny blog for a screen shot of the torny I was playing in.

Hey guys, Happy New Year!

Started to play for real, I'm down like 20$ for the day which is ok. Felt like I ran pretty bad, I have 23% ITM and made like 6 final tables, highest was second place.

Players are really weird, they limp tight and call everything, and if they shove or 3bet you better have QQ+ or else you're screwed. I'm slowly getting used to it.

I watched my chart for last few months, looks pretty funny with these 2.5$'s in it

Oh, and it's been 11 hours of poker today and I'm down to my last 2 tables. I'm started to think about the wonders of 20-30tabling.

Regs in these are pretty strange. They play Nash always against anybody from what I've seen. My general aproach to Nash ranges is:
-If I have suspicion a guy is a reg and i have at least 100 hands on him I play pure Nash.
-I call way tighter pushes and push almost anything from SB into players I've never seen at my tables, unless they are like 40/30 and a lot of chips.

Now I'm having a revelation thinking if all the players after me are unknowns, then I can push wider then Nash no matter my position right? So I'm saying that it's MANDATORY to push AT LEAST NASH first in from any position everytime.

And if others push into me, if they are regs i call nash if not i'm going tigher but it's
MANDATORY to call AT MOST NASH when being pushed into.

The hypotesis of course is that regs play nash and unknowns push and call tighter. If there's a player for which this isn't valid it's ok since i'm within nash and he can't exploit me. Hopes it makes sense.

Running "meh". BTW, I no longer have lunch and dinner breaks and play continuous, i shorten my schedule to about 9hours/day which is a breeze compared to the original.

1001 Reasons Why Poker is Just Like Life:

Because the less chips you have the more you're willing to take marginal spots and even -EV plays, while if you're a big stack new money is worth less so you just kinda settle down.

Even if this is common knowledge what looks interesting to me is that this actually means as a big stack you need to be chill and not go bullying everyone everytime.

This feels really counter-intuitive to me, I miss the good old days in like 2009 when I was playing 9mans and enjoyed hardcore abusing the bubble so much. By my new discovery going over the board is not such a smart thing to do.

Other then that, running at 10% ROI, wish me gl in the sunday storm.