How to avoid major mistakes part 2

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How to avoid major Mistakes part 2

from firsttsunami

The number 1 in front of the first column suggested that there is at least one other part to this column. In fact, there is a third one as well. The second part is published today.

When we speak of major mistakes, we mean very severe and costly mistakes. By looking at the sample hand forums three of these mistakes stood out. Both the frequency and the implications of these mistakes were considered. If you find yourself making one of these mistakes, you should try to eliminate them as soon as possible.

MISTAKE 1: PUTTING TOO MUCH EMPHASIS ON POKERTRACKER STATISTICS WITH A LOW SAMPLE SIZE

Pokertracker statistics that we have on the table are important and help us to determine which kind of opponent we are up against and also help us to make assumptions about his style of play.

• Is he aggressive / passive (AF)?
• Do his stats deviate a lot from the "optimum" and does this suggest that he is unreasonable?
  • How often does he see a show down?
  • Does he only play quality hands or weaker ones as well?

You should always use these statistics with caution. The accuracy and therefore the significance of these statistics are very much dependent on the number of hands we have on a particular opponent. The less hands we have available, the bigger the variance to the real value.

The VPIP becomes significant after only a couple of hands because it just deals with how many hands a player plays preflop. The value of a 30% real VPIP after 100 hands could range from 30% to 39%.

The significance of the AF in dependence of the number of hands hasn't been researched yet, but a very important value is the "Went to show down". Two very important questions depend on this value:

• What range can I value bet with on the river (how loose / how tight)?
• Is he able to fold better hands and is it therefore profitable to
  • bluff?
  • play your draw aggressively?

How large can the variance get?

A real WTS of 34 in 125 hands ranges between 17 and 52 with an accuracy of 96%. 68% accuracy equate a range between 25 and 43.

This means that we should take every opportunity to bluff someone that has 25 WTS and play our draws passively against someone with a WTS of 43. Furthermore it wouldn't be advisable to bluff him.

Only when you have around 2000 hands of an opponent the variance reduces to +- 3%. We obviously need a lot of hands of our opopnents.

What do we mean by overrating and misinterpreting ?

Example 1:

Preflop: Hero is SB with 6, 7
4 folds, Hero raises.

According to the open raising chart we have to fold this hand. We have collected 60 hands from the opponent. We notice that he has a "fold to big blind value of 80%. He defended his blind too rarely in the past. The more the opponent folds, the looser we can be with our open raises from the small blind. If we assume the value from above, we could definitely open raise with 67o.

We should consider that we are sitting on a 6-max-table though and that the opponent will only be in the big blind every 6th hand. We only have 10 hands from this guy where he was in the big blind (60/10). In these hands there probably wasn't always a steal raise. Someone could have raised from the CO or someone might have limped or everyone might have folded. The 80% are often made up of only 5 hands so that the display would say: folded big blind to steal 80% (4/5)

There is no way to make significant assumptions on the basis of 5 hands. We shouldn't focus too much on this statistic and play by default at first.

Example 2:

Preflop: Hero is BB with Q, 9
MP2 folds, MP3 raises, 3 folds, Hero calls.

Flop: (4.40 SB) J, T, 6 (2 players)
Hero checks, MP3 bets, Hero calls.

In this example we defended the big blind with Q9  against an MP3-open raise. We hit an open ended straight draw and we still have one over card with our Q.

We have collected 90 hands from our opponent. His stats are the following: (35/27/2.8/44)

These statistics suggest that our opponent is a very aggressive LAG. Against this oppoent, who is very aggressive and basically doesn't fold any better hands due to his high WTS of 44 and who would also call down very loosely with ace and king high, it would be correct to play the draw passively in this situation.

The amount of hands we have on this opponent is very low though. This could mean that our opponent  just seems to be a LAG right now but could well be a TAG who is just hitting really well. We should therefore play our draw aggressively and take the chance to make our opponent fold hands like pocket pairs: 44, 55, 77, 88 or hands like: K9s, A7s,
A8s A9s, A8o, A9o.

As long as these stats aren't backed up by several hundred hands, we shouldn't deviate from our standard game.

Can I check these assumptions myself?

If you have several databases and statistical values on your opponents you will notice that the same opponent in two different databases might have very different stats.

Conclusion: It can be very dangerous to overrate the PT-stats while having a small sample size. You should always consider your opponents behaviour on the table in order to extract information from this and use the PT-stats as an additional source of information always considering the sample size as well though. If your sample size is large, the stats are an important indicator enabling you to reach the right decision in marginal situations.

Many players tend to always bet the turn against a passive players with high went to show down values when they have the initiative.

When we are dealing with passive players, we call them calling stations who...

• play strong hands passively.
• hardly ever - never bluff.
• take legitimate hands to the show down through the high WTS.

Stats from a calling station could look like the following: 40/03/0,5/46

In poker you have to adjust to your opponents as well as you can. Just because the opponent is acting passively doesn't mean that this is a weakness. If we are animated to play aggressively by passivee plays, we would make the same mistake a maniac does when he bluff bets three times out of position and we show him ace high after having called him three times to win the show down.

I definitely don't want to suggest that we should assume to be behind against such a player once they have called. You should just try to use your aggression sensibly and check the turn in situations where you have show down value and where no better hand would fold. You would thankfully take the free card out of position. We can exploit the opponent's mistakes the best way by doing this. We play passively as well causing him to get no value for this made hands.

Example 1:

Preflop: Hero is BB with K, Q
4 folds, SB calls, Hero raises, SB calls.

Flop: (4.00 SB) A, 7, 4 (2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets, SB calls.

Turn: (3.00 BB) T (2 players)
SB checks, Hero checks.

River: (3.00 BB) 4 (2 players)
SB checks, Hero checks.

Final Pot: 3.00 BB

SB shows K7

We are in a classical situation here. The calling station limps from the SB and we raise with our equity edge with KQ. We miss the board, make our continuation bet and the calling station calls our bet.

We have king high and a gut shot on the turn. We will be ahead sometimes but a bet on the turn is not a good idea. Players would basically never fold a pair in such a situation and if he check raises with a stronger hand, we miss the chance to draw at our straight.

If the opponent didn't hit either we would have the best high card with the best kicker. We could make a good fold if he bets on the river. The opponent will often just have 6 outs against us. The pot is small and there aren't any over cards that could become dangerous. We have to invest 1BB in a 3BB-pot. This is a 25% investment to make 6 outs with an equity of 13% fold. You should abstain from doing this in this situation. A check would be much better because we could make a good fold if the opponent bets on the river.

Example 2:

Preflop: Hero is BU with Q, J
2 folds, CO calls, Hero raises, 2 folds, CO calls.

Flop: (5.40 SB) 8, 9, 3 (2 players)
CO checks, Hero bets, CO calls.

Turn: (3.70 BB) K (2 players)
CO checks, Hero checks.

River: (3.70 BB) 2 (2 players)
CO checks, Hero checks.

Final Pot: 3.70 BB

CO shows J9

This is a similar situation. The calling station plays check/call on the turn where a king hits the board. We have a gutshot and our outs for the Q and the J are mostly still good. However we won't be able to make a better hand fold by betting the turn. K high will have hit. An opponent like this one wouldn't fold ace high anyways and hands like QT have a gutshot as well and therefore want to see the river. We should thankfully take the free card and the show down if we are unimproved.

Conclusion: You should be very careful with your aggression against passive players. If you have a good high card that has show down value, you should exploit the passive player by playing passively yourself rather than making blind continuation bets on the turn.

Many players aren't aware of how much show down value they really have with ace high. They fold ace high on the turn if they are unimproved even though they could easily call considering the equity.

Example:

Preflop: Hero is BU with A, T
3 folds, Hero raises, SB 3-bets, BB folds, Hero calls.

Flop: (7.00 SB) 9, 9, 4 (2 players)
SB bets, Hero calls.

Turn: (4.50 BB) Q (2 players)
SB bets, Hero folds.

The pot is 5.5 BB. We have to pay an additional 2BB to see the showdown. The following applies:

EV(call down worst case) > 0 , if EQ > losses / (winnings + losses)

Worst case = The opponent plays smart on the river and we don't get another bet from a worse a hand.

Therefore the maximum we could win would be the size of the pot. 5.5 BB in this case. If we loose the costs would equate the losses from the turn onwards = 2 BB. The following results:

EV(call down worst case) > 0, if EQ > 2 / (5,5 + 2) = 26%

If the opponent plays the river perfectly, 26% equity would be enough to call down. We used a relatively plausible 3betting range from the small blind: 55+,A6s+,KTs+,A8o+,KJo+

As the preflop aggressor would bet the turn as a standard play after having 3-bet from the SB, we can assume that the bet on the turn didn't affect the range from the opponent.

Result:

Board: 9s 4s 9h Qd

Dead:

equity win tie pots won pots tied

Hand 0: 69.485% 61.86% 07.63% 3892 480.00 { 55+, A6s+, KTs+, A8o+, KJo+ }

Hand 1: 30.515% 22.89% 07.63% 1440 480.00 { AsTh }

Even though a picture cards that our opponent could have hit with hands like AQ or KQ hits the board on the turn, we still have 30% equity enabling us to make a call.

Assuming a 2 hits on the turn

Board: 9s 4s 9h 2d

Dead:

equity win tie pots won pots tied

Hand 0: 61.081% 55.73% 05.35% 3752 360.00 { 55+, A6s+, KTs+, A8o+, KJo+ }

Hand 1: 38.919% 33.57% 05.35% 2260 360.00 { AsTh }

We have a stunning 40% equity. Folding to a blank on the turn would be a great mistake.

Assuming a K hits on the turn

Board: 9s 4s 9h Kd

Dead:

equity win tie pots won pots tied

Hand 0: 78.113% 69.81% 08.30% 4239 504.00 { 55+, A6s+, KTs+, A8o+, KJo+ }

Hand 1: 21.887% 13.59% 08.30% 825 504.00 { AsTh }

The king is the only card to which we would have to give up our hand. Any other cards force us to call without exceptions.

You can find more on this topic in the following platinum article: Heads-up on the flop OOP: C/C flop without initiative - with show down value

Conclusion: Even though you didn't hit a pair with ace high, you could think about seeing the showdown when you are playing against loose ranges (3bet situations, steal positions CO/BU vs. SB/BB). This is because the opponent often holds worse hands that missed the board too.