Hey guys,
First of all, happy New Year to all of you !
So I've been thinking a bit during my week away from the tables, and I feel like I'm getting exploited pretty hard by all kinds of random fish :-(
This happens in two different situations:
a) It seems like I can't let go of strong hands, especially QQ and KK pre-flop and things like bottom set / lower full house post-flop.
Most common problem here is when I get 3bet with QQ and can't let it go - I always end up shoving and put my money in dead.
What's a decent enough sample size to know that he's 3betting light, ie. how often do I need to see him 3bet me before I can go broke with JJ or QQ ? At the moment, I'm just burning money with these hands - especially QQ - early in the match.
Fish just plays perfectly against me and exploits me the most efficient way - we move some tiny litte pots around until he gets KK/AA - and then he wins the match.
If I played him a bit longer, I'd know that I have to fold QQ to his 3bet, but these situations just happen so often early in the match, without having any accurate reads.
b) I see fish do something 2-3 times, and then I adjust - but my adjustment is horribly wrong.
Most common case is fish check-raises me 3-4 times with very weak holdings on drawy boards, so I start adjusting by playing top pair for stacks - just to run into sets or two pairs the next time he's doing it.
Another example is where fish is donking into me for full pot on the turn - these guys just drive me nuts. They start with this strategy while we're deep, so they're not committing too many chips into it - and once the blinds got higher, they only need to wait for a hand and win the match if I only have something like top pair decent kicker.
This makes me think fish is doing it just often enough to make me *think* he's doing it late - and then he's waiting for a hand to get my stack.
I have the impression that these fish aren't willing to risk their entire stack on a bluff (or calling me down super light), they rather create this maniacle image early in the match and then exploit me really hard once the blinds are higher and I'm willing to go broke with top pair.
These are all losing players on the $20-$30 level, which makes me even more frustrated.
And help would be greatly appreciated,
Jack
As far as not being able to lay down hands like QQ, these hands are strong preflop because they are very strong relative to hands that your opponent can have. If you flop 765ssx and your opponent is throwing tons of chips into the pot then you need to recognize that your hand is no longer a monster compared to what is within his range.
"Most common case is fish check-raises me 3-4 times with very weak holdings on drawy boards, so I start adjusting by playing top pair for stacks - just to run into sets or two pairs the next time he's doing it."
This sounds pretty standard. You need to be estimating what portion of the fish's range is weak holdings versus which portion is monsters. It sounds like he probably has a lot more weak holdings than strong ones, so folding top pair here would be insane.
I really don't think that many fish in the $20-30 games are going to be trying to outlevel you. It sounds like you have just run into some fish that have caught hands and have somehow convinced yourself that they are doing it as some sort of balance-play against you. Most of these guys are just going to be playing their own cards however they feel like. They aren't going to be thinking about adapting to you or exploiting your hand ranges.
Well, regarding JJ-QQ, I seem to be running into players who either only 3bet Aces or Kings or don't call a shove with anything less than that.
Maybe I should flat their 3bets with these hands and see a flop rather than shoving, to keep some weaker hands in ? But with JJ, I'm also a bit scared of seeing any overcards.
Regarding the check/raising game post-flop, my problem here is getting accurate reads on how they play on later streets, when the pot is bigger. After folding to their first couple of check/raises, I know that my top pair is way ahead of their check/raising range, but I don't know how light they're willing to stack off.
If I can play them long enough before they hit their miracle cards, I often see that they're check/rasing the flop super wide and then shut down unless they hit big. Once I got to showdown a few times, I usually get a pretty good idea how to play against them - but my problem is when I'm in a huge pot the first time, being faced with aggression and no idea what they're doing it with.
Maybe I should lower my opening size or limp a few hands, then try to get to showdown cheaply to see what they're doing ?
I think that you are really overestimating how often you are getting into trouble by getting in with JJ/QQ against people who are 3betting only AA/KK. For starters, I think that at most maybe 1% of players are 3betting this tight. Beyond this, the chances of them being dealt AA or KK is 110:1. For this scenario to line up and cost you money, you will have to be playing against one of these particular players, have them be dealt AA or KK, and have you be dealt QQ or JJ. Beyond this, you will still have 20% equity against them. You are losing a fraction of a buy in when this happens and it is a huge cooler when it does.
The bigger mistake you are threatening to run yourself into is playing too passively and either folding these hands because you are assuming your opponent's range is stronger than it really is, or just flat calling these hands and allowing your opponent to take a flop when his hands have very good implied odds against you. You really shouldn't be scared of getting JJ or QQ in against anyone unless you have some sort of ridiculous metagame against them. Pot controlling these hands preflop should not even be on your mind.
Well, as much as I'd like to trust that math part of it, after today's session I feel like I'm either running horribly bad or this TT-QQ vs. KK-AA thing happens a lot more often.
I played a bunch of different opponents today and they all exploited my weakness perfectly fine, making me lose another 10 buy-ins.
All that fish has to do is wait till he has AA or KK, then 3bet and I will have JJ or QQ more than often enough to make this extremely profitable for him.
I think I have lost some 25+ buy-ins in January alone with JJ and QQ pre-flop - especially QQ is a huge losing hand for me since all I can hope for is getting a chop against AK.
Maybe I should just quit poker - this is just getting too much frustrating, fish can do whatever he wants and he always wins against me.