4Get24BetMe in the Blue Room - Poker Strategy - Poker Forum

Post edited 3:29 pm – October 20, 2009 by 4Get 2 4Bet Me

Allow myself to introduce…… myself.

The details of my life are quite inconsequential… very well, where do I begin?

cprpoker said:

Q: Where did your name come from? Did you get picked on much in elementary school with that name?

A: Yes. No, ever since elementary school all the kids were always very jealous of my name.
When I was creating my name, I wanted something that let everyone at the table know that I was not someone to be fooled with. I wanted them to know I meant business. I wanted them to know that I am a solid, tight player and that, if I am 3-betting, I obviously have the stone-cold, uncrackable, nuts. So, if I 3-bet, you can simply forget about 4-betting me, unless you hate your monies.
Also, I am a big Modest Mouse fan, and I always listen to them when I play poker. When I was thinking of my name, the chorus of the song I was listening to said "I want to remember to remember to forget you forgot me." So I thought, "I want these fish to remember to remember to forget to four-bet me." (But due to space limitations I just went with 4Get24BetMe).

Shakespeare said:
What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet.

cprpoker said:
Q: How long have you been playing poker?

A: Back when I was in High School (circa 2000 AD) I had a friend who suggested that I start playing with him on http://www.pokerroom.com (soon to be defunct) for play money.

Back when I first started, I was the worst player you had ever seen. I never folded a hand before the river. I believed Q high had a decent chance of winning. I was unable to even read my hand half the time. I would often win pots without knowing why, and I never understood why I lost them. Luckily this was only play money.

cprpoker said:

Q: Do you play cash, SnG or MTT mostly and what besides NLHE do you play?

A: After 2003, I heard all the hype around PokerStars and their sponsorship of players in the WSOP, so I began playing there as well, for play money. I soon maxed out my play money account (25 million) at the time, and found a way to sell my play chips online for $15/million. From there, I played endless $5 1/2 table SnGs. I had a negative ROI for a very long time. I would soon go broke, then go back to the play money tables and rebuild.

Finally, I was able to win a few $4.40 180-man SnGs. When that happened my bankroll exploded (from $20-$30 to $200+). That is when I started playing $3 MTTs. It wasn't long before I final tabled a fairly large $3 MTT and took down a prize of ~$250, then I won another for ~$750. A day or 2 later I played a $55 MTT and was second for ~$2,200. Then finally that same month, I ended up taking 3rd in the Daily 80K on Stars for over $8,000, which put my total bankroll over $10,000.

After that, I also started playing on Full Tilt when I heard about Rakeback. I discovered then that I could play cash games, and win $30/hr while playing 4-10 cash games at the same time, and also receive a rakeback check for as much as $300/week.

In the beginning, like most players, I played NLHE exclusively. Recently though, I have began playing mixed games like H.O.R.S.E., and thanks to @mcmac51 I have also developed a love for RAZZ. But I am familiar with the rules and almost always willing to give action in any game.

The rest is history.

cprpoker said:

Q: 14 + 27 = ??

A: 0×3B

ldo

Now, hit me with your best shot…

I am '4Get 2 4Bet Me', 'The Poker Man', with all the right answers to your gambling queries.

Street3 said:

Okay. Here's a another question from a live Turbo today. I have TT and i am UTG+1, 10 handed. Blinds are 200/400 and i have around 8K. I open for 1200. one caller plus BB. Flop is JJJ, BB checks, i check other dude checks. Turn K. BB checks, i check, other dudes moves all in for 4250. BB folds. I say i don't think you'd move all in with the nuts, so i called. He flips over A2. River A. I lost over 1/2 my stack. Good play on my part or what could i have done differently? Thanks!

Excellent question (again) Street3. Everything you did was fine. Up until the flop. With a flop of JJJ, you need to realize that there are very few hands that currently have you beat. These hands are AA, KK, QQ, and Jx. There is only one J left in the deck, that is 1 out of 47 unknown cards. So, as a general rule, you should never give anyone credit for quads. If someone flopped quads there, you just have to pay them off. And with the action you described, it is unlikely that anyone smooth called with AA, KK or QQ. So there is a very high probability that you have the best hand on a JJJ flop. Your job now is to make sure you get paid with the best hand, and make sure weaker hands pay to out draw you. When the flop comes JJJ, you should have bet an amount that would give anyone with Ax, Kx, Qx or a smaller pocket pair pot odds that would prevent them from calling, without making a mistake. What I mean is, more than what they would be justified in calling with they draws. If you do that, and they still call, then you have made the right play (according to Sklanky's Fundamental Theorem of Poker). Assuming no antes, the pot would have been 3800 after the flop. With a hand like Ax, or Kx, there are only 3 cards in the deck that can make help them. 3 outs, with 2 cards to come is only ~12%. That means they need to be offered at least 8:1 pot odds to call a bet on the flop. Therefore you should bet an amount that is > 12% of the pot. In this scenario, that is almost the min bet. So no one would have the correct odds to call any bet whatsoever. But, you didn't bet, you gave them a free card. That was your first mistake. What I would have done, is bet something slightly less than the bet you opened for. This is enough to induce a call, which you want, because you are so far ahead. But not enough where they are making the correct call, given their odds of improving. Any bet between 750-1200 would have been a good idea. That builds a nice pot while you have them crushed, and it also makes you look weak for betting less than what you opened for, and at the same time, it is enough to force your opponent into making a mistake.

But, once the turn comes with a card that could easily have made you drawing dead to 2 outs, and him shoving for over 4K, you probably don't want to call there. You made a good read in that he probably wouldn't have shoved with a full house or quads, but the chance was there. You only had 1200 invested, you probably don't want to risk half your stack in that spot. As it turns out, you made the right call, given the strength of your hand and your pot odds, but you got out drawn. There is nothing you can do about that. You got it in way ahead, with the right odds. If you made that same play every single time, against that same hand, you would show a profit in the long run.

Next time, protect your hand and don't give free cards. When you are playing against bad players, there is usually no need to slow play monster hands. If players like to call all the time and play hands like Axo, bet into them. They'll call, and they'll pay you off. It is best to stick to fundamental poker when playing against weak opponents. Nothing fancy needs to be done, because they wont understand it anyway.

Thanks again for your questions Street3

cprpoker said:

What would you recommend as the best way to improve hand range reading skills. Do you have or know of any tricks/shortcuts to narrow a players range down to a likely holding? What process do you use?

Good question cprpoker, and a difficult one to answer. Reading a players hand accurately (or as accurately as possible) depends on a lot of things. Most of which are difficult to obtain, especially with online tournaments.

You need a lot of information to determine the likely hand of an opponent. The most important thing is experience playing against that specific player. You need to have played against him enough to see how s/he plays all of their specific hands, and how they play each hand in each position. With thinking players, it would be more like how do they play a certain range of hands in a given position what percentage of the time. For instance a good player might open for 4BB UTG with AA 90% of the time, and 10% of the time the limp hoping to 3bet. Weak players are more likely to play the same hands the same way all the time, or at least the same way in a given position.

Obviously it is very difficult to play enough hands against the same people enough to make these sorts of reads. Especially when it is online and you rarely see the same players more than once. What I recommend is using a program like PokerTracker which will keep stats on every opponent you face that way if you ever meet again, you know how the played in the past.

Beyond that, the best you can do is observe how someone generally plays and then put them into a category as a loose outline of how they play. (PokerTracker can also help with this). This is because a lot of players have similar styles (either Loose-Aggressive or Tight-Aggressive). Then once you have determined what type of player they are, you need to think about how those specific players play certain hands in certain positions. There are loose-aggressive players like "durrr" who will open UTG with any two cards and play them as if they are the nuts every time. Other players like Dan Harrington are tight-aggressive, where they are only opening with high percentage hands in favorable position.

And when all else fails, I try to think about what I would do in their position, and what hand I would do it with. If someone limp/calls in early position, what would I do that with? I might have done that with a low pocket pair, or suited connectors. A lot of people will do it with those hands to see a flop as cheap as possible, and hope to hit a big hand and break someone, and fold if they miss. So if someone limp/calls early and then check raises the flop, you might be able to put them on a set or a flopped straight if the board comes 4, 7, 8 or something else seemingly benign.

You can't always assume everyone plays the same way you do, but if you have no other information to go on, it is usually the best you can do.

Also, you want to consider where you are playing, and what the buy-in is. If you are in a $3 donkament online, you can almost be certain that you are against complete fish, and base a lot of decisions on that, if you have no other info.

I hope this helped, cprpoker…

bump

Excellent questions rhoegg!

rhoegg said:

1. Do you put much thought into game selection? At whatever buy in level you are choosing, how do you decide which tournaments to enter on which sites?

When I am selecting a cash game, I have tons of information on all the players at the table. I have been at the same level for a long time, and have played thousands of hands against the regulars. So, before I jump into a game, I check to see who is at the table, and what kind of players they are. I often have notes on specific players. If there are 2 or three players with the note "avoid", I stay away from them. They are generally strong players that just cut into my profits. I don't like to fight over the fish money with more than 1 other skilled player. Sometimes 2 if my options are limited. But on FTP, there are generally enough tables to find a softer one. I use Poker Tacker 3 to keep stats on everyone. If there are new people, I quickly check PokerTableRatings.com to see how they do at cash games.

When I am choosing a tournament to play in, it's nearly impossible to decide based on who else is in the tournament. So I just choose ones that have long levels, deep fields and large overlays. I strongly prefer Pokerstars tournaments for these reasons. But, for the time being, I only play on FTP, so I generally just stick to tournaments with guaranteed prize pools.

If you are asking how I choose a tournament based on buyin according to my bankroll, that is a whole different conversation concerning bankroll management. If you would like to discuss that, I would be happy to.

rhoegg said:
2. Assuming you multitable, how many tournaments do you play at once? Do you make any attempt to keep them at similar stages? If not, how do you give the appropriate amount of attention to the ones you are deep in, while maintaining your A game in the early stages of the others?

I generally prefer to play 4 or more tournaments at once. Any less and I become impatient and/or distracted by other things. I'll start checking my e-mail or reading ESPN.com or something like that and completely lose my focus. I know that seems ironic, but the more tournaments I am in, the more focused I stay and less bored I become.

I normally draw the line around 12, but on FTP it is difficult to find that many at all, so usually not a problem unless I decide to play a bunch of SnGs, which I rarely do.

As far as the stages go, and what I devote more attention to, I don't care if they are at different levels. I try to prioritize my attention and effort to whichever I am deepest in.

Normally in early levels, you have such a huge M and there is no ante so you don't need to get too antsy. You can just sit back and wait for a big hand. In early stages the tables shuffle so much that you don't even need to pay as much attention to your opponents because odds are, they wont be with you for long anyway. So, I focus on whatever I am deepest in. With large antes, it is important to loosen up and play more pots, so you really need have a good feel for your position and who you are up against. When you are approaching the bubble or final table, the tournies that are in early stages really become an after-thought. You just fold in those tournaments until you get a must-play hand.

rhoegg said:
3. Do you work on your game outside of actually playing? How do you do it: videos, books, forums? How much time do you spend doing that vs. the amount of time you spend playing?

For me, my primary resource is books. I have a ton of poker books and I constantly re-read all of them. I spend a lot of time commuting back and forth to school, so this is a perfect time to read books. I carry a poker book with me at all times, and read it while I am on the subway or on the bus.

Beyond that, I do check out PocketFives.com a lot to read the latest articles. They always have a lot of great information on strategy and it is typically more up to date on how the game is changing. Sometimes books written in the 70s just don't mesh well with the hyper-aggressive state that poker is currently in.

Also, I have won subscriptions to DeucesCracked.com, and they have a ton of great videos by great players showing how they play in real live (online) tournaments and cash games. A lot of useful information is there.

But if nothing else, I highly recommend that everyone reads the poker classics. With them you will gain a super solid foundation and from there you can form your own game and your own style through experience.

Nothing is more valuable than experience. Play tens of thousands of hands, even at micro levels and you will become a better player.

Here is a list of books that I highly recommend:

http://twitterpokertour.com/fo…..ad-1/#p471

and I would like to add one to the list, thanks to the suggestion of @_Desperado. The Psychology of Poker by Schoonmaker.

Post edited 8:38 pm – November 3, 2009 by 4Get 2 4Bet Me

Thanks CoolWhipFlea. Before I answer your question, I would like to congratulate you on becoming a Twitter Poker Tour Forum Moderator.

As I mentioned before, I started with zero bankroll. I actually played hours and hours and hours of poker at the play money tables on Pokerstars. Eventually I accumulated a large amount of play chips and found out that sites online would buy them for $15/mill. So that is how I first got a bankroll.

As far as how I determine which level I should be playing at, I follow a fairly loose set of guidelines.

My rules are as follows:

• You should have at least 2000 BBs for NL cash games
• You should have at least 50 buy ins for SnG tournaments.
• You should have at least 250 buy ins for MTTs.

So in order to play in .5/$1, you should have at least $2,000 in your bankroll. You shouldn't move up until you have $4,000 which would give you 2000 BBs at a $1/$2 table.

This also assumes that you are playing normal tables, not deep stacks. Deep stacks would require a little higher bankroll. I generally like to buyin for 100 BBs at cash games.

The MTT and SnG criteria are self explanatory. But, the reason for the difference is, it is much more difficult to cash in a MTT, than a SnG. Therefore, the variance is going to be much higher.

Also, I don't keep one general bankroll for all playing. I have a specific cash game bankroll, and MTT bankroll. Sometimes I borrow from one or the other, but I try to keep them separate and follow the rules based on the specific bankrolls.

Occasionally it is fine to take a shot at a level above the one you normally play. That is what makes poker more fun. But never play in anything that you cannot afford to lose in. And don't move up to try and get even. That never works either. Ever.