Need LAG training

I watched the final table of I think it was the US poker Championship last night.

Final table, and what I noticed was the hands that these guys would open raise, and reraise with were hands I would nearly always trash. Two possibilities here;

1. I really don't understand position betting.
2. These are all the LAG maniacs we all fear to tread near.

I think I have a grasp of position betting sufficient to let me notice a variety of known, and unknown position plays. So unless there are levels of position play that are secret society gems, I have to discount this explanation.

LAG maniac's? Really hate to consider this. Perhaps PF TAG, PostFlop maniac PFTAGM, or maybe TAM. FOR the most part if these TAG got any piece of the flop, they went maniac. This is classic Doyle Brunson style, according to his SuperSystem.

These folks were at the final table, and every other final table seems similiar.

SO, given that scenario, it seems that to be the winning players we want to be, we seems to be lacking in the gambling agressive arena.

In which case JJ becomes the monster PF, and unless you are dead sure of your read on villian, the play seems clear. More agression post flop.

Do I like the implications here? NO. In my example above, we don't get to share all the stuff that went on with this group to get to the final table. I would guess they were mostly TAG, but only maniacal when short stacked.

The other implication is we probably should all learn more about LAG style and play. Know thy enemy.

So we need some better info on just what LAG is, and some insight into how and when to incorporate it into our games. We all know a way, seems to be the only way, to take on a LAG maniac, but the maniac is in almost every hand, the good LAG is not.

Any comments from LAG, maniac or not, would be real helpful. Please label yourself if you can.

Whenever you watch poker on TV, keep in mind that the shows are - usually - produced in a way to show spectacular hands. Weird but successful plays tend to make it through the filter.

Secondly, a final table of a tournament often has a couple of distinctive features:

1. Blinds are high.
2. They're shorthanded.

The game of poker is often reduced to a game of chicken at that point. "I raised. Do you dare call me?" You don't need to be short stacked yourself to be engaged in this, but the effective stacks are short; the big stack can raise with a lot of stuff because the small stacks are putting their tournament life at risk if they call. You mentioned this implicitly already.

If you need to work on areas where you should open up, examine some shorthanded high-blind situations. Like when there's four people left in an SnG. Post a few hands where you think the preflop decision was borderline.

On a sidenote, I have yet to meet a small stakes player who overvalues position.

F Paulsson said:

On a sidenote, I have yet to meet a small stakes player who overvalues position.

Click to expand...

Hey, I like this comment. Can I quote you on this?


Oh, I guess I already did.

They're professionals. Don't try this at home.

Seriously, this is power poker, for huge stakes, under enormous constraints of time and chip stacks. You're playing the people around you much more than the cards at this point.

BTW, I often think this may be the cause of a lot of the seemingly honehead play you see in low stake tourneys. An inexperienced player will think, well this or that play worked for Matusow on ESPN last week, so I can do it, too. 'Tain't so.

I understand what each of you has said about the conditions of those TV final tables. I have been to enough final tables myself, all online. I also know they edit out the boring fold downs. This is fine, cause if they didn't, I'd be out of the room gettin a beer anyway.

What I was hoping to elicit was some comments from folks who are LAG with maniacal tendencies. What those thought processes are, and how and what they think when confronted.

As for position play, like any sophisticated poker play, it only works against players sharp enough to know it is a play. Fish seldom recognize them, and most LAG's tend to ignore them. And all maniacs laugh at any position play.

So, I want to be able to vary my play, change gears, into LAG or maniac when it suits me, or the time seems right. Problem is understanding just what it is I am doing then. I have a pretty goood grasp on TAG now, still perhaps a wee bit south on the agressive part, but close to what might be considered standard TAG. But in order to make TAG work right, one must not become predictable.

Nearly every tourney, during the meaty middle of it, I will choose to lose a few hands cheaply. CHEAPLY being the all important mantra. This serves me well, or has so far. I will chase a cheap hand, and show if I got some piece of it. This seems normal to me, and gets me better action later.

What I would much rather be doing is shifting into LAG, and having the best grasp of just what I was doing. I do the things LAGs do now, but not with the confidance I watch others pull it off with.

We need a Proffesor LAG at this place.!

Again, asking LAG players to reply.

NineLions said:

Hey, I like this comment. Can I quote you on this?


Oh, I guess I already did.

Click to expand...

Heh.

Feel free.

dj, have you seen this thread where I asked about LAG players? Some good responses there:

https://www.cardschat.com/forum/cash-games-11/what-defines-good-lag-player-80867/

And again I recommend joose's tourney vid.

Also, keep in mind a lot of the TV games are short handed, and, they've played each other many many times so they can be making moves against moves they've seen before. I think there are a lot of levels of thinking going on as a result, meaning sometimes a lot of chips have to be played just to test what moves are actually going on.

Thanks 9, good thread, but I want more. Storms post was great. 8 or 10 more of that calibur and I may get a clue!

I have ventured into LAG play, but not with anything close to the understanding I saw Storm express. As with any knowledge, when you truly understand it, you can dance it.

I want to dance it.

When I am in LAG mode, I used position and the gap concept. I will steal the button by raising in late position so I can be the last to act. I raise to try and push out the blinds (free money) so I can isolate any limpers who want to call.

The gap concept is basically it takes a better hand to call with than raise with. You can raise in late position with KQ suited. Would you ever call a raise in late position with the same hand. My raise is a sign of strength and can win hands post flop because I am the aggressive one.

I will take advantage of my position and the fact that 50% of the time you are going to miss the flop anyway. You can blow your way through hands with crap just for those two reasons. It takes practice on when and who you can do this to.

A LAG player knows which hands are just given to you. I play a lot of tourneys LAG in the beginning and then tighten up towards the middle. Final table is just a waiting game. When you get to HU, its back to LAG. You want to take down a lot of pots on the flop. For example, say you have J,10, raise 3-4x the BB. If all plays out right you will be left with maybe 1 or 2 people left with you. Now here is a key to LAG playing. When the flop comes, no matter what it is, pot raise. 9 out of 10 times the others will fold. If you get that one caller take a good hard look at what flopped. If it is a rainbow flop, you have a player with maybe AK, two suited cards,a flush chaser. The same if you have a str8 chaser. Most players when they have something will come over you. Then you dump your hand and play the next.
If you have a chaser stay with your pot bet. They will usually wait for the turn then it gets too pricy for them. You can build a nice base for the middle part of the tourney.
There is a lot more to it. You can get burned pretty bad at times. And you have to know when to let go of your hand when the betting isn't going your way.

Had not heard of the GAP concept before. Thanx.

As I have of late been experimenting with LAG, I sort of gleened most of the rest of what is here. But gleening doesn't always mean understanding.

Once I developed past the minraise stage, all sorts of doors opened up. Learning position was natural, then I read the books and articles. But I still havn't found that quintesential description of the LAG method. LAG is sort of easy to spot, and label, but the method and the understanding is what I want.

If you have ever listened to one person tell you something, have it go right over your head, and then listen to another say the same thing differently, then you can appreciate just where I'm at, and why I am asking this. It may take 10 different ways of perception to finally get the point. I don't think I am alone in this deficiency. Maybe I am though. Even though I sort of knew most of these things, it sometimes doesn't cement in till someone tells it just so.

So keep em coming folks, if I don't get it this try, probably someone else will.

LOL so that's what it is called. Titans and I are on the same planet.

Gap concept came from SKlansky's Tournament Holdem for advanced players

I've asked this before, but does anyone with a statistically significant number of PT stats care to give a vp$ip for TAG vs LAG, or to venture a guess? How about post flop aggression numbers?

Just read FPaulson's reply in the other thread:

"I only play shorthanded, so keep that in mind. I'm 23/14 in NL, and 26/18 for limit. I've played a decent amount of hands HU at limit as well, so the numbers are skewed up a bit from that. I consider a VP$IP below 20% to be tight in a 6-max limit game. I consider a VP$IP over 30% to be loose. The sweetspot is somewhere in the middle, but table conditions and postflop skills affect the more precise location."

Anyone else have opinion/numbers?