$2 NLHE 6-max: 99 vs fish

[ksandr010]

Hi, everyone

Winning Poker, Hold'em No Limit - $0.01/$0.02 - 5 players
Replay this hand on CardsChat

x_taypoker (UTG): $2.31 (116 bb)
MonkberryMoon (CO): $2.00 (100 bb)
wally g (BU): $0.48 (24 bb)
backst0p (SB): $6.52 (326 bb)
ksandr010 (BB): $2.21 (111 bb)

Pre-Flop: ($0.03) Hero (ksandr010) is BB with 9♥ 9♦
2 players fold, wally g (BU) calls $0.02, backst0p (SB) raises to $0.06, ksandr010 (BB) 3-bets to $0.24, wally g (BU) calls $0.22, backst0p (SB) calls $0.18

Flop: ($0.72) 5♣ 8♣ J♥ (3 players)
backst0p (SB) checks, ksandr010 (BB) bets $0.72, wally g (BU) calls $0.24 (all-in), backst0p (SB) folds

Turn: ($1.20) 4♥ (2 players, 1 all-in)

River: ($1.20) 6♦ (2 players, 1 all-in)

Total pot: $1.20 (Rake: $0.06)

Showdown:
ksandr010 (BB) shows 9♥ 9♦ (a pair of Nines)
(Equity - Pre-Flop: 84%, Flop: 81%, Turn: 80%, River: 0%)

wally g (BU) shows 5♠ 7♥ (a straight, Four to Eight)
(Equity - Pre-Flop: 16%, Flop: 19%, Turn: 20%, River: 100%)

wally g (BU) wins $1.14

Is it true they are going to play?

 

[fundiver199]

Preflop you could consider to just call, but I dont hate 3-betting either, because all the action is BTN vs. blinds, and you have position on SB. Your 3-bet was pretty large, but at 2NL I dont hate it. On the flop your C-bet is to large though. Something around half pot is enough to put BTN all in and define your situation against SB. By potting it you are mostly just boning yourself, when SB has you beat.

The runout is, what it is. The only important thing here is to not tilt. Nathan Villiams (blackrain79) call this "the fish tax". Just as normal taxes we dont love paying them, but they are nessesary to make the world go around. If bad players could never experience a winning hand or winning session, chances are they would stop pretty quickly. In a situation like this I also appreciate the fact, that he now has a bigger stack, and I still have position on him most of the time. Poker is more than a single hand, and maybe he is just borrowing your money, until you stack him later, and he either reload or leave.

 

[Aballinamion]

Line: polarized c-bet flop oop 3-handed.

Hi, everyone

Winning Poker, Hold'em No Limit - $0.01/$0.02 - 5 players
Replay this hand on CardsChat

x_taypoker (UTG): $2.31 (116 bb)
MonkberryMoon (CO): $2.00 (100 bb)
wally g (BU): $0.48 (24 bb)
backst0p (SB): $6.52 (326 bb)
ksandr010 (BB): $2.21 (111 bb)

Pre-Flop: ($0.03) Hero (ksandr010) is BB with 9♥ 9♦
2 players fold, wally g (BU) calls $0.02, backst0p (SB) raises to $0.06, ksandr010 (BB) 3-bets to $0.24, wally g (BU) calls $0.22, backst0p (SB) calls $0.18

Flop: ($0.72) 5♣ 8♣ J♥ (3 players)
backst0p (SB) checks, ksandr010 (BB) bets $0.72, wally g (BU) calls $0.24 (all-in), backst0p (SB) folds

Turn: ($1.20) 4♥ (2 players, 1 all-in)

River: ($1.20) 6♦ (2 players, 1 all-in)

Total pot: $1.20 (Rake: $0.06)

Showdown:
ksandr010 (BB) shows 9♥ 9♦ (a pair of Nines)
(Equity - Pre-Flop: 84%, Flop: 81%, Turn: 80%, River: 0%)

wally g (BU) shows 5♠ 7♥ (a straight, Four to Eight)
(Equity - Pre-Flop: 16%, Flop: 19%, Turn: 20%, River: 100%)

wally g (BU) wins $1.14

Is it true they are going to play?

Hello there ksandr010, thank you for sharing!

The Preflop

Your 3-bet preflop is a little bit high. This kind of exploitative game, when it works, it is beautiful, but the math is very simple here:

A) For the times we are ahead versus fishes ranges, we win a huge pot (no rake or fees)

B) For the times we are behind versus fishes ranges, we lose a huge pot (no rake or fees)

C) Consider A and B and then discount the rake percentage

So, it is easy to see how this idea of "I polarized my range because the opponent was a fish", does not agree with the idea of playing a balanced range in the long run.
This is very poor excuse of weak players to put money on the pot, the excuse that they put money on the pot not because they believe they have the best hand, but because the opponent is a fish.
As poker players, we should already be aware of this simple statistical data, that 70% of our range will not hit, and the 30% we hit we are not even winning 100% of them, so we must play the finest game as possible, consider that we are more missing than hitting, considering that we are bluffing much more than value betting, and the difference amongst those is very subtle.
Having said that, it is okay to be flatting here with 99(flatting in a X frequency and 3-betting in a Y frequency and folding in a Z frequency, this is balance), since the CO/Villain is broken stack and it is the least of our concerns.
The 3-bet/Squeeze is also fine, but never protect our range versus fishes when we do it, because we are 3-betting/Squeezing 100% of times 88+ and AT+ in spots like this, thus our range reading becomes much more easier.
I see that many good regulars of cash game these days don't even think about a check-folding range. Awesome for us.

the postflop

The Flop

This is a very prepotent c-bet flop out of position. On this flop we can get easily called by the two players and both holding a Jx and then we are never winning. If you wanted to take all the stack of the broken stack fish, a smaller bet sizing would work just fine.
The problem here is that you are turning a fragile value hand into a poor bluff, since we only have odds here for a set and a weak RIO, BDSD.
Summarizing: we only polarize our range when we are very strong 99+ and AT+, and for the times we are wrong we end up losing a very deep pot and then we come with the excuse that "it was a cooler", when it was simply misplayed or overplayed.
This is not wrong by itself and by any means, but even some fishes are capable of comprehend that when we do polarize our range we only do it with very strong hands, giving the fish the possibility of folding 100% of its losing range and keep paying only with stronger hands than ours, when it is the case.
I say that because I am a fish, and I use to think about this basic things as bet sizings.
I know when a player comes raising from UTG 3.5x or 4x it has much more strong value combos than semi-bluffs combos, period.
When we do polarize our range (with no logical reasoning behind it) we are just giving a piece of sweet information for even Level 0 and Level 1 players to gather this data and use against us.

Regards;

Carlos 'Aballinamion' Barbosa

 

[Aballinamion]

Sorry?

Preflop you could consider to just call, but I dont hate 3-betting either, because all the action is BTN vs. blinds, and you have position on SB. Your 3-bet was pretty large, but at 2NL I dont hate it. On the flop your C-bet is to large though. Something around half pot is enough to put BTN all in and define your situation against SB. By potting it you are mostly just boning yourself, when SB has you beat.

The runout is, what it is. The only important thing here is to not tilt. Nathan Villiams (blackrain79) call this "the fish tax". Just as normal taxes we dont love paying them, but they are nessesary to make the world go around. If bad players could never experience a winning hand or winning session, chances are they would stop pretty quickly. In a situation like this I also appreciate the fact, that he now has a bigger stack, and I still have position on him most of the time. Poker is more than a single hand, and maybe he is just borrowing your money, until you stack him later, and he either reload or leave.

Hello fundiver199, thank you for your analysis and allow me to respectfully disagree of Nathan Williams here: we should not give up our equity and give pots to recreational players so they would keep paying us on future hands! They don't have a future playing poker, sometimes these kind of fishes have only 3, 5 buy-ins and when they lose they never come back to the cash tables.
Bad players will never stop playing because of a bad session, because they don't observe the game as regulars do, they simply want to have fun and feed their own egos.
We put money on the pot for value, when we believe we are beating the fish's range or for bluff when we believe we can make fish/nit to fold, we are not vomiting chips around so fishes keep playing with thus, this "fish tax" is unscientific and seems pretty much non-sense to me.
If you believe fishes have bankroll and are always playing, okay, do what you believe it makes more profit for your own game.

Regards;

Carlos 'Aballinamion' Barbosa

 

[fundiver199]

Hello fundiver199, thank you for your analysis and allow me to respectfully disagree of Nathan Williams here: we should not give up our equity and give pots to recreational players so they would keep paying us on future hands! They don't have a future playing poker, sometimes these kind of fishes have only 3, 5 buy-ins and when they lose they never come back to the cash tables.
Bad players will never stop playing because of a bad session, because they don't observe the game as regulars do, they simply want to have fun and feed their own egos.
We put money on the pot for value, when we believe we are beating the fish's range or for bluff when we believe we can make fish/nit to fold, we are not vomiting chips around so fishes keep playing with thus, this "fish tax" is unscientific and seems pretty much non-sense to me.
If you believe fishes have bankroll and are always playing, okay, do what you believe it makes more profit for your own game.

Regards;

Carlos 'Aballinamion' Barbosa

This is not, what Nathan mean either. Please watch his videos on Youtube to understand. Basically "fish tax" is a way of looking at the situation, when a fish gets lucky against you, which will prevent you from tilting and better see the larger long term picture.

 

[Sidetracked]

I agree with fund. Just calling preflop is OK, but 3 betting isn't bad. After that...you just got very unlucky. I would think, that as badly as villain plays, you may have got your money back.

 

[jaworek1405]

Hello, I agree with guys that pre flop better just call with 99. It is hard to play pocket 99 OOP. Besides one opponent is a big stack and he usually will call your 3bet pre flop and sometimes you will have some problem with 99 on the flop vs two opponents. When you 3bet pre flop this hand you have to continue aggression with medium pocket pair on the flop OOP if you want win this hand on the flop. As played - If you had some informations that one of opponent is a fish I think you played very well, but in this situation player from the small blind looks better player than fish and sometimes you can have some problems with him. This time you had big unlucky and you lost this hand.

 

[maxi_j]

You overplayed your hand preflop and postflop.