Playing marginal hands from the blinds

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ComplexPlaya

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So, in this thread https://www.cardschat.com/forum/cash-games-11/long-ok-awful-variance-terrible-play-173415/ everyone hammered me about playing too many hands from the blinds.

I like to play stuff like SC's, small pairs, even double face cards esp if a LAG raised (or TAG with SC's)

I get what everyone is saying, but I am wondering if it really is bad at 20NL, because out of 14K hands in my poker tracker, I have :

Amount Won : Without Blind :

BB -43.40 494.60
SB -147.23 120.47

Which means that excluding the amount that I am forced to pay by default being in the blinds, I am actually making profit with my playing style. And amazingly the profit in the BB is biggest than in any position.

Am I crazy, or seeing/thinking something wrong in here? I don't want to contradict much better players than I, but those are the numbers I see....

P.S. : BTW, my fold to steal is : 81.53% in SB, 69.75% in BB, and only 58% fold BB to steal HU (tho that stat is only for 212 hands)
 
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I looked at this thread yesterday and earlier today and didn't know how to respond. I was hoping someone else would, but I hate to leave a thread unanswered...

212 hands is a relatively small sample, but if you are making money at it, then any advice I give you can be dismissed.

Playing suited connectors OOP and making a profit pretty much breaks all the rules and theory of poker with 100bb NL poker. However there are some conditions we can put on this that might make this fesible.

-Weak opponents, that let us dictate the size of the pot
-short effective stacks
-short term luck

These three things can really mitigate position, and if I wan't tired I could probably think of a few more things. However while you are making money in the blinds, I would seriously consider making it a habit now of taking the others people's advice because some day when you move up I can gurantee taht you will bleed out money from these positions like the rest of us.

As they say though, "Ball til you fall". GL!
 
c9h13no3

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C9's guide to playing marginal hands from the blinds:

Don't play marginal hands when you're out of position.

K, now go out and improve your win rate by 100bb/100.
 
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ComplexPlaya

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I looked at this thread yesterday and earlier today and didn't know how to respond. I was hoping someone else would, but I hate to leave a thread unanswered...

212 hands is a relatively small sample, but if you are making money at it, then any advice I give you can be dismissed.

It's actually 14K hands, that number is for calls HU, so PFR from SB only.

Playing suited connectors OOP and making a profit pretty much breaks all the rules and theory of poker with 100bb NL poker. However there are some conditions we can put on this that might make this fesible.

-Weak opponents, that let us dictate the size of the pot
-short effective stacks
-short term luck

You can discount luck for that sample I think, I'm going through a huge variance-led downsing (I'm doing mistakes too, but variance is awful) losing multiple size-stack pots when I'm WA on the river every session.

I guess I try to do it against weak players that do not c bet many times and are easily folding to bluffs. Also with implied odds, people I think would pay me off if my SC's or small PP's hit

These three things can really mitigate position, and if I wan't tired I could probably think of a few more things. However while you are making money in the blinds, I would seriously consider making it a habit now of taking the others people's advice because some day when you move up I can gurantee taht you will bleed out money from these positions like the rest of us.

I do lose a bit in absolute values, although just 2 buy-ins over 14K hands on the BB. But if you take out the value of the blinds paid I've won alot, ironically that probably let me still have a bankroll with all the bad beats I'm hammered with lately.

You may be right about higher limits, I will probably have to adjust there.

As they say though, "Ball til you fall". GL!

I was thinking just that, but wanted someone else's opinion. Thanks!

C9's guide to playing marginal hands from the blinds:

Don't play marginal hands when you're out of position.

K, now go out and improve your win rate by 100bb/100.

K, thanks for the quote, next time maybe you'll want to add some thoughts of your own (if possible) and answer the specific subject instead of being ironic...
 
c9h13no3

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K, thanks for the quote, next time maybe you'll want to add some thoughts of your own (if possible) and answer the specific subject instead of being ironic...
Funny how I give people legit advice and they think I'm messing with them.
 
CerberAcE

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I'm seeing similar stats at 2NL and 5NL however i cannot comment on 20NL as I imagine there is alot more raising and 3 betting preflop.

I am probably playing too many hands in the blinds mainly because of limpers at the micros. You might have 3-5 limpers and you are often priced in at the SB to see a flop. You can also be priced in alot from the BB when someone makes a raise and a few fish call him.
 
LuckyChippy

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Lol, C9, i've seen you post in 2 of this guys threads with serious advice only to recieve some sarcastic bulshit, give up IMO, he has an answer for everything obviously.

Dude, you need to listen to people who are clearly much better than you rather than this silly attititude. Btw i'm not saying i'm better than you, but C9 most definately is.

Oh and playing marginal hands oop sucks. BB to a SB open is different though, now you have position.
It's very difficult to get value when you hit, and when you flop something marginal -marginal starting hands tend to make marginal hands post flop- you never quite sure where you are, plus you're oop and you're gonna be given difficult decisions to make.

At 20nl, it's not necesarry so you should really stop doing it.
 
Wes747

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Why are you trying to advocate playing OOP when it has been proven over and over and over again that it is unprofitable over the long run?
 
tomh7795

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So, in this thread https://www.cardschat.com/forum/cash-games-11/long-ok-awful-variance-terrible-play-173415/ everyone hammered me about playing too many hands from the blinds.

I like to play stuff like SC's, small pairs, even double face cards esp if a LAG raised (or TAG with SC's)

I get what everyone is saying, but I am wondering if it really is bad at 20NL, because out of 14K hands in my poker tracker, I have :

Amount Won : Without Blind :

BB -43.40 494.60
SB -147.23 120.47

Which means that excluding the amount that I am forced to pay by default being in the blinds, I am actually making profit with my playing style. And amazingly the profit in the BB is biggest than in any position.

Am I crazy, or seeing/thinking something wrong in here? I don't want to contradict much better players than I, but those are the numbers I see....

P.S. : BTW, my fold to steal is : 81.53% in SB, 69.75% in BB, and only 58% fold BB to steal HU (tho that stat is only for 212 hands)


Your always going to lose if you keep playing from the blinds. The only way i see any decent +EV from playing from the blinds is by being the aggressor. Fold all marginal hands simply because you will lose $$. example- You have j10 and a mp lag player raises 3x the bb. Firstly your out of position against an aggressive player who will almost always bet the flop or the turn. j10 is a hand that is crippled against AJ KJ QJ JJ 1010 QQ KK AA. Even if your opponent has a hand like AK your still an underdog and out of position. Only good situation is if your opponent has 78s or something like that but even then those sc are very playable on the flop and your opponent will be in position and have the betting lead. If you re-raise your opponent might fold, or if he does call and you can cbet the flop and your opponent could fold to that and j10 isn't the worst hand to play. If that happened to me and i had j10 i would probably fold. If you do re-raise make sure your opponent knows the fold button.
 
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mariginal hands out of positions will get you in trouble over the long run, decent starting hands I would prefer to raise from the blinds and try to steal. I think once you move up in stakes playing too many hands from the blinds you would get eaten up.
 
tomh7795

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C9's guide to playing marginal hands from the blinds:

Don't play marginal hands when you're out of position.

K, now go out and improve your win rate by 100bb/100.

This guy is probably better then you. that's gotta be the longest guide i've seen and i'm liking it :)
 
ericgarner118

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Seems like everyone has hit the nail on the head. If you play marginal hands OOP a lot, you will lose in the long run. There is always a time and a place for everything in poker (even playing a few hands OOP), but if you consistently and regularly play bad/marginal hands OOP you will loose.
 
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I don't play them all that much, if you look at my fold to steal 69% from the BB which is pretty normal, a bit on the low side but within the acceptable range.

I do play them sometimes, and I know I'm not supposed to and why (as you guys explained) the point of this thread was to ask about my stats, as they seem out of whack in the blinds over 14K hands, it's the position I've won the most (if you disconsider the blinds themselves) so I was trying to find an explanation for that.

So, that was what I wanted to find out really, not why you shouldn't play them. Didn't mean to offend anyone but that post was besides the subject...
 
thepokerkid123

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I don't play them all that much, if you look at my fold to steal 69% from the BB which is pretty normal, a bit on the low side but within the acceptable range.

I do play them sometimes, and I know I'm not supposed to and why (as you guys explained) the point of this thread was to ask about my stats, as they seem out of whack in the blinds over 14K hands, it's the position I've won the most (if you disconsider the blinds themselves) so I was trying to find an explanation for that.

So, that was what I wanted to find out really, not why you shouldn't play them. Didn't mean to offend anyone but that post was besides the subject...

You're going to make a lot of money from the blinds (without blind) purely because you're going to see flops for nothing or have at least have a free .5-1bb per player in the pot when you do play a hand.

As for what your stats should be, put it this way, folding non-premiums is never going to be a big mistake. Folding marginal hands is almost never going to be a mistake at all (when in the blinds, chant the mantra "reverse implied odds are bad, reverse implied odds are bad" and profit).

I personally completely suck at a lot of things in poker and spew chips all over the place (most of us do, but that's besides the point) but the main thing that makes me profitable anyway is that I am more focussed than anyone else at the table on exploiting the blinds. When I'm in LP, it's a gold mine. When I'm in the blinds I'm aware that I'm completely screwed and am completely at the mercy of BTN/CO/anyone else who raises and I run away like a scared little girl. However that I'm minimising my losses most of the time and playing premiums when I do play makes me a lot of money from those positions, also, you'll find that even at 20 or 25nl people suck at blind stealing and either give you a walk too often or are really vulnerable to light 3bets which again adds to your profits.
In short, play from the blinds should be profitable; if villains aren't complete idiots then maybe you should be in the red, but your without blind stat should ALWAYS be positive.
Never play marginal hands OOP unless you're bluffing (almost always only against someone who's stealing wide, or who views you as a nit). When OOP you're at the mercy of the guy in position, when in position then you can start playing your marginal hands, hell, play your junk hand IP before you play a SCer OOP.

/rant
 
No Brainer

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Correct me if I am wrong but I think a better way to look at how much you are winning/losing from the blinds would be to look at your positional stats, the add the filter VPIP=True. This will give you all the hands that you have put money into the pot on top of your blinds and may be better then looking at your total amount without blinds.
 
Stu_Ungar

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I don't play them all that much, if you look at my fold to steal 69% from the BB which is pretty normal, a bit on the low side but within the acceptable range.

you have a fold to steal of 69%. You do play them a lot thats why your fold to steal is low.

I do play them sometimes, and I know I'm not supposed to and why (as you guys explained) the point of this thread was to ask about my stats, as they seem out of whack in the blinds over 14K hands, it's the position I've won the most (if you disconsider the blinds themselves) so I was trying to find an explanation for that.

You wont like the explaination.

The explaination of why you are winning more from the blinds than other positions is that you are playing badly. There must be some very big flaws within your game. I would suggest that there may be a lack of understanding of position, so you may be overplaying the blinds but also underplaying the CO and Button.

But you have to realise that the reason that you are making more money ion the blinds than the button isnt that you are playing the blinds better than anyone else on the planet, the most likely reason is that you are playing the button and CO significantly worse than everyone else.

You may find that as you understand position more, your blind play tightens up and you winrate form the blinds further increases.

Also your 14K sample size is low. The money made in the blinds may just be an anomaly. You may find that profit turns into a loss by 100K hands (14K is a very very small sample).

From your reaction to C9 I guess you wont like this very much... but it is the explanation of why you make more from the blinds than all other positions.

Best course of action would be to post individual hands in the HA section and have people criticise them.

So, that was what I wanted to find out really, not why you shouldn't play them. Didn't mean to offend anyone but that post was besides the subject...

Not entirely sue what you wanted in that case.. the thread is about playing marginal hands OOP.. the advice is dont do it unless you have a plan to make the villian fold when you hold air.

..
 
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Why are you trying to advocate playing OOP when it has been proven over and over and over again that it is unprofitable over the long run?

I am not trying to advocate that, I'm just trying to understand my stats from the blinds, that's all :)
 
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Your always going to lose if you keep playing from the blinds. The only way i see any decent +EV from playing from the blinds is by being the aggressor. Fold all marginal hands simply because you will lose $$. example- You have j10 and a mp lag player raises 3x the bb. Firstly your out of position against an aggressive player who will almost always bet the flop or the turn. j10 is a hand that is crippled against AJ KJ QJ JJ 1010 QQ KK AA. Even if your opponent has a hand like AK your still an underdog and out of position. Only good situation is if your opponent has 78s or something like that but even then those sc are very playable on the flop and your opponent will be in position and have the betting lead. If you re-raise your opponent might fold, or if he does call and you can cbet the flop and your opponent could fold to that and j10 isn't the worst hand to play. If that happened to me and i had j10 i would probably fold. If you do re-raise make sure your opponent knows the fold button.

Yes, good points. I probably do play them too much against aggros.
What about a nit player that plays fit or fold? They more easily fold to a bluff than lag players, do you think your J10/similar might be a good hand in that situation?
 
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You're going to make a lot of money from the blinds (without blind) purely because you're going to see flops for nothing or have at least have a free .5-1bb per player in the pot when you do play a hand.

As for what your stats should be, put it this way, folding non-premiums is never going to be a big mistake. Folding marginal hands is almost never going to be a mistake at all (when in the blinds, chant the mantra "reverse implied odds are bad, reverse implied odds are bad" and profit).

/rant

Thanks for the rant :) it was useful. I was dumb enough not to think about the free flops I'm seeing as a big part of the profit. Now that I think of it, I have won a few large pots in unraised pots pre-flop, people are willing to get their chips in in unraised pots sometimes where I play it seems. I find they do that more than they used to a few years ago...

They are still profitable for me though when I VPIP in them as well tho.
 
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Correct me if I am wrong but I think a better way to look at how much you are winning/losing from the blinds would be to look at your positional stats, the add the filter VPIP=True. This will give you all the hands that you have put money into the pot on top of your blinds and may be better then looking at your total amount without blinds.

Thanks, hadn't thought of that. I am pretty new to tracking software and it's stats so any idea helps.

Still profitable, albeit alot less with VPIP in them but 7 buy-ins over 17K hands is still good I think
 
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You wont like the explaination.

Au contraire, I like all your explanations. They're logical, easy flowing and have the feel of a guy that knows what he's talking about.

The explaination of why you are winning more from the blinds than other positions is that you are playing badly. There must be some very big flaws within your game. I would suggest that there may be a lack of understanding of position, so you may be overplaying the blinds but also underplaying the CO and Button.

There are big flaws in my game. Mainly because I've barely read any good solid poker theory so far, discounting the bit that I've learned years ago. That's all changing now though, I've decided to take poker seriously and as a full time job. I guess the huge bankroll losses I took in february and march were the good kick-in-the-ass type that make you do stuff.

With all that, I'm still a winning player for the levels I've played since I've re-started playing after a 2 year break, and withdrew some nice cash that helped me alot in real life when I needed it most. And doing that without much knowledge gives me confidence enough I can do alot better with knowledge.

But you have to realise that the reason that you are making more money ion the blinds than the button isnt that you are playing the blinds better than anyone else on the planet, the most likely reason is that you are playing the button and CO significantly worse than everyone else.

The button and MP are ok, however I've been losing from the CO which is obv not ok. I'll have to look very closely at the hands I play from there to decide if it's mostly because of bad play or mostly because of the awful variation I've hand for a straight week (not an excuse, it actually happened)

You may find that as you understand position more, your blind play tightens up and you winrate form the blinds further increases.

Well my VPIP and PFR do go up nicely with every position closer to the button. Except for the blinds of course, hence this topic. My BB VPIP is higher than UTG and equal to MP, while my SB is off the charts, 27% when the button is 30%, and average VPIP is 24 lol

Now I just filtered some stats and found that I do steal ALOT from SB, and most of my profit is from that - ~5 buy ins, while when I'm just calling/limping I lost ~1/2 buy ins.

SO there you go, you made me find the reason for profits from the SB at least. I'll have to dig deeper for the reason for BB profits.

From your reaction to C9 I guess you wont like this very much... but it is the explanation of why you make more from the blinds than all other positions.

I do like it, as I've said in the beginning. I just felt C9 was being ironic that's all, guess I was wrong
so I apologize to him.

The end.
 
Stu_Ungar

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SO there you go, you made me find the reason for profits from the SB at least. I'll have to dig deeper for the reason for BB profits.


So can you see that this profit is not coming from your fold to steal of 69% and that figure is at 69% because you are calling with too many marginal hands. Your own observations in your DB show this to be a losing situation.
 
dwolfg

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Overall, one should expect to lose money in the blinds because you are forced to put money in the pot regardless of the quality of your cards. Since there are more hand combos that are negative ev, especially out of position, that losing money in the blinds in the long run is just mathematical fact.
 
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If the button is not your most profitable position, you are doing something seriously wrong.
 
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ComplexPlaya

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So can you see that this profit is not coming from your fold to steal of 69% and that figure is at 69% because you are calling with too many marginal hands. Your own observations in your DB show this to be a losing situation.

Yep of course, that's why I've made this thread, because I didn't understand my own results. Now I do better...
 
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