February 2011 Monthly Digest

Thread Contribution of the Month

This Month's Winner is:

ramdeebam (http://www.cardschat.com/members/ramdeebam/)
of England
member since Aug 2010

ramdeebam is keeping us all entertained as he shares his experiences with learning poker!

See thread here:

SnG Grinders, please give me some tips and fix my leaks. STT Video.

Honorable Mentions Go To:

Liveone1, for Being result oriented. Embrace it and win!

marginal, for Beginning PLO, Some Very Basic Ideas and Thoughts

forsakenone, WiZZiM, and cjatud2012, for VIDEO stt 2 tables.

c9h13no3, for What's your "Position Percentage?"

bgomez89, for Short stack all in. Do we raise to iso or flat? A Discussion

marginal, for We are all donks, let do something about it. (http://www.cardschat.com/f6/we-all-donks-let-do-something-190389/)

A review of the winner and nominations can be found here:

A new year, a new January TCOTM thread (http://www.cardschat.com/f6/new-year-new-january-tcotm-thread-192248/)

Cardschat News and Updates:

We hope all of you have gotten off to a great start this year on the tables!

Our Cardschat Hand Converter is now linked on the toolbar for your convenience.

Thanks to all of our new Twitter followers - we will be makely weekly updates now!

New Facebook and Tweet buttons (http://www.cardschat.com/f6/new-facebook-tweet-buttons-189824/)

Upcoming Events:

Calendar (http://www.cardschat.com/calendar.php)


3 x$1k CARDSCHAT TRIPLE REWARDS Freeroll Series at Pokerstars:

• The first freeroll was a hit with F1rs7onflop taking down the first place.
• Edmundspinki won almost $200 by taking down our 2nd freeroll on Jan 15th!
• The 3rd and final freeroll in this series on Feb 12th was won by DZM77.

3 lucky Cardschat members each won a $100+9 tournament ticket in the drawing that was held for Cardschat members who qualified for and participated in this event. Congrats to NineLions, BluffYou123 and ben-rhyno for winning those tickets!!!

Cardschat Triple Rewards - 3 $1k Freerolls at Pokerstars (http://www.cardschat.com/f31/cardschat-triple-rewards-3-1k-freerolls-185784/)

Stay tuned for another exciting event at Pokerstars!!

Winter League:

The Cardschat Winter League is underway:

Cardschat Winter League 2011 - The Schedule, Teams and Standings (http://www.cardschat.com/f39/cardschat-winter-league-2011-schedule-teams-190132/)

As of today "Team MVP" is in first place.

The league games are now scheduled as Home Games at Pokerstars. Sign-ups for the Spring Session will begin in March.

Last Month's Big Winners:

Rldetheflop: just took 2nd in the 30k silverstar freeroll!! (http://www.cardschat.com/f46/just-took-2nd-30k-silverstar-freeroll-190653/)
GoBilliards: I just won my first ever Bodog (http://www.cardschat.com/f46/i-just-won-my-first-ever-191210/) 100K event
appaz86: Just chopped the $20k gp on Fulltilt! (http://www.cardschat.com/f46/just-chopped-20k-gp-fulltilt-191561/)
JoeShowdown: Joe Showdown 180 of 288 in 1.5 Million (orig. 14,409 entrants) (http://www.cardschat.com/f46/joey-showdown-180-288-1-5-a-191633/)
BEERM4N: See his brag and all of the big winners at Cardschat in this thread:

Record of Big Wins (http://www.cardschat.com/f46/record-big-wins-127354/)

Adventures:

KingCurtis's Deployment (http://www.cardschat.com/f4/kingcurtiss-deployment-189367/) - KingCurtis
Vegas Adventure Jan 2011 (http://www.cardschat.com/f4/vegas-adventure-jan-2011-a-190282/) - dakota-xx

Strategy Article:

Excerpt from "Hole Card Confessions"

The Bell-Shape Range by Owen Gaines, DragTheBar coach

We already discussed what the bell-shaped range is all about. Our opponent's range is almost completely comprised of what he perceives to be marginal hands with little to no weak or strong hands. Let's look at the bell-shaped range verses different player types.
As I've discussed, you'll have higher steal equity against players who like their money and need a good hand when the pots get large. These players are normally the nits and the TAGS. These types allow us to quickly identify a bell-shaped range. Most of the time when these players have a bell-shaped range, they are going to be playing quite passively. The exception would be if the stack to pot ratio is very small; in that case, many players will play aggressively with marginal hands. Outside of that exception, most of these players are trying to control the size of the pot by keeping bets smaller, checking on a street or two. Generally, they hope to show the hand down and perhaps get a little bit of value from their marginal hand. They're trying their best to follow the mantra "Big pots for big hands and small pots for small hands." This is even more reliable on very wet boards since most players want to charge draws, and build pots quickly with very strong hands on wet boards. So, when they're playing more passively on wet boards, it's even easier to identify their range as bell-shaped. Let's look at a couple examples of identifying a bell-shaped range and how to respond.
It's a $1$2 NLHE game and everyone has $200. A nit player opens from early position, and you decide to call on the button with 7♦8♦. The flop is Q♠7♠6♦. Your opponent checks the flop, so you decide to bet $10 into the $14 pot. He calls. The turn is the 5♣, and he checks. You decide to check as well. The river is the 2♥, and he checks again. Let's pause for a moment and shape his range.
Without even going street by street and chiseling his range, it's easy to see he's not proud of his hand. As I told you, nits like to get the money in quick with their big hands, especially when the board has draws like this. They wait and wait for the monster hands and they do their best to get paid when they have one. He's done nothing but check, check, check. He did check/call your flop bet out of position, so it's likely he has some sort of hand. These types rarely raise in early position with suited hands like T9s, so he really has very few flush draws. Most of the time, you'll see a nit take this line with pairs somewhere between the 7 and Q. I'd bet he has a hand like 88-JJ.
Now, stop and think about your hand.
Inexperienced players look at their hand here and think, "Well, I have a pair; let's check and see if it's good." Let me save you the suspense. It's not. Of course, sometimes you'll check and be surprised this player went outside his normally tendencies and check/called the flop with something like AJ. However, that will certainly be the exception and not the rule. The point is, your hand is trash against virtually his entire range.
What should you do?
The answer is to bluff. Yes, turn your pair into a bluff.
How much should you bluff is the next question. Well, the pot is $34 right now, and you both have about $180 left. How about a $20 bluff? He'd need to fold to your bet about 40% of the time. Will he do it? Maybe, maybe not. But, let's dig further. Here's what his hole cards are confessing.
"Dear opponent. I really want to show this hand down. I like it, but not that much. I'll go ahead and play a small pot. Please, let's just play nice, keep the pot small and turn the cards over to see who has the best hand."
This should be your reply.
"Dear opponent. I appreciate the fact you're out of position and have a marginal hand. That is always a tough spot. I also appreciate you want to just keep the pot small and see a showdown. However, that's just not going to happen. This is going to get very expensive for you, if you want to see a showdown."
How about betting $100 into the $34 pot? That sounds about right to me. That's the way you attack a bell-shaped range that’s begging you to keep the pot small. Use your stack like a weapon and crush their hopes of getting to showdown cheaply. The nit will likely fold 100% of his range to this bet. You can run the math as long as you like, but it's hard to beat having your opponent fold 100% of the time. In these situations, I would say your $20 bluff is a losing bluff. The hand has really played out just the way he would like it. Only two streets were bet and the bets weren't that large. You're probably going to get called by a hand like TT quite often, especially if you're viewed as an aggressive player.
Now, some players get concerned here and say "But, what are we really representing?!" My response is this. When a nit gives you his story, you don't need one. He just loves his stack too much to make a huge call with his bell-shaped range. He'll fold and wait until he has the nuts next time. Only thing he doesn't realize is we know he never has the nuts in that situation.


Review the videos and discuss this article here:
QTip (OwenGaines):The Bell Shaped Range

About the author:

Owen is a coach at DragTheBar and the author of 2 books "Poker Math That Matters" and "Hole Card Confessions

Very helpful. I wish i could think this way.

Never heard of overbetting the river in NL cash games. Why does it have to be $100? Won't $50 do as well? I'd probably be the nit you're referring to. I've never seen anybody play that way before...wouldn't you be enticing a curiosity call?

$100 is a very expensive curiosity call. I like that article and the whole way of thinking. Good post.