PokerStars 50NL 12/2/09 (Cash vs Heads-Up)

Last night was pretty productive.  I got in a great workout and a solid poker session at night.  I started off 4-6 tabling 50 NL.  At one point during the night I was down about $115.  I ran pretty atrocious at some points, typical raping by the ways of 2 outers and such.  The low limits on PokerStars seem barely profitable.  I mean you really have to pay attention to your table selection at all times.  The low-limit cash full-ring game play on that site has to be the tightest in poker’s history of existence.  Sure you are going to have really tight games more and more, but you shouldn’t have to sift through tables almost an hour.  On PokerStars not only do you have to worry about getting sucked out, but there’s a good chance even if you get dealt a monster you are going to only win the blinds.  You really have to stay focused, try to not get pissed off, and keep up with your table selection.  Tough to do when you are already pretty damn exhausted.

After a while I started playing 50NL head’s up at the same time.  I think heads-up is really the way to go if you’re going to play a cash game for money low-limit on Stars.  I’ve just been getting into heads-up more the past few months, but I really enjoy it.  It’s a great change of pace from ring game or even 6-max.  I prefer a sit-and-go heads up format, but the problem is you don’t receive any FPPs unless you play with straight-up cash.

Last night (or a few hours ago) I eventually ditched the ring games, and transitioned into playing just one 50NL HU table with an opponent I played with about 2 hours.  He really had my number at first.  I was actually somewhat confused on an attack plan.  Basically he would raise my blind 95% of the time, and usually follow up huge.  When I raised pre and followed up, he would often unleash a massive 3 bet.  This guy ate aggression for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  He invented his own liquid RAGE, which he injects into his bloodstream before he plays online poker.  This mother fucker did not let up, EVER.  The problem was he raised my blind $3-4.50 every-time.  It’s not fun having to pay 8 TIMES the blind to even see a flop.

He made some really questionable plays with mid pair and such, so I felt like discipline could beat him eventually.  He had the aggression down, but I felt he didn’t have a great concept of what a solid hand to put up a massive amount of chips with would be.  My suspicions were confirmed as I became border-line fed-up and pushed all in over the top preflop with A9 making it $15 more for him to play.  He called with K7.  I somehow held on and won that pot.  So after that I felt I could just push all in preflop with nearly any ace and he would stupidly call while having the worst of the situation.

The plan soon back-fired as I pushed all in $35 preflop with 10-10.  He thought about it a long time and called with J-J absolutely crushing me.  I’m not sure what the hell he was thinking about, but he got my number there.  I soon re-bought $40.  During the next big hand I went all in for about $35 preflop with AQ, he called with 77 (he snap called it here.  So he thought about a $35 call preflop with JJ until the time bank ran out, but with 77 he SNAP CALLS.  Maybe it was because he was already up at this point).  Well luckily I spiked an ace on the flop and doubled up there.  I realized my strategy really wasn’t giving myself a substantial edge.

From that point on I shifted strategy and never let him bully me again.  I would fold 6 times in a row if I had to.  I simply wasn’t going to put up $4.50 preflop on my blind with hands like A 3, and I wasn’t going to push it all in either.  I was content playing my game, not his.  I started playing only bigger hands (A9+).  I felt fine doing this since I realized with any hand he basically proved he would CALL my preflop raise, and unleash a massive 3 bet on my follow up.  An interesting trend soon developed; he would continue the aggression train and get himself in huge trouble.  His steals were not balancing out the enormous pots he would eventually lose, not even close.  I doubled up once when I flopped a set.  He turned a top pair 9 and tried to drive out huge getting smashed.  Another hand I took a full buy in when I top paired ace and out-kicked him for a huge pot.  I soon doubled up again, as I realized this guy was completely fine putting up $20 total to fight, even with AIR on the flop or turn. 

He kept re-buying and I took further control.  I won over 3 full $50 buy-ins from him.  At the end I had about $220 in front of me, and he had $0.  I would have played until he left regardless of the fact that it was 2:30a.m and I had to be at work at 9a.m this morning.  I knew my advantage over him was enormous at this point.  I wanted to keep pounding him, like I would do too this 20-year old I invited to my moving away party this weekend (I don’t care if she’s 20, mother of god she is cute), but he left and I logged soon after that.  On the session I was up $50 total, which I was really happy with since I was stuck $120 at one point.

There are a lot of regulars on the heads-up scene, but all it takes is the one right person heads-up to make ridiculous profit margins on low-stakes.  My opponent last night really wasn’t that bad, (I’ve seen much worse heads-up) he had the aggression part down which I feel is usually the most important starting heads up concept.  However, he just had no discipline or even worse really didn’t understand hand values incredibly well.  Crazy aggression works great in no-limit heads-up, but you have to know when the hell to back off. 

In a full-ring game, you are going to find targets even on a super tight site, but you have to deal with 7 other opponents.  Chances are he’s going to quickly leave after he busts to some stupid rock/nit player who happened to find a monster hand at the right time. 

However, in the world of heads-up the weak really don’t have anywhere to hide.

I’ll be so tired tonight that I won’t be able to do much productive, certainly not play poker well.  I have to prepare for big party Friday, but won’t have time to go out.  So hopefully I can get in an online session later Friday before my Saturday massacre.

On the “corporate” front I have a pretty cool new strategy.  Whenever something happens that really pisses me off I don’t do anything work related for an hour.  I use the hour to either apply for jobs in Vegas, write a blog entry like now, (this entry is approaching 2 hours, since I’ve been pissed off twice today so that works out well) or do something fun.

Neat right?

-bag



Comments

[Laz]

Hey Bag,

This is very quickly becoming my favourite blog... You have a brilliant writing style and you leave me laughing out loud every time!

What happened with the girl, by the way?

[Baglife]

Laz,

Thanks so much for reading, glad I could somewhat entertain you. One person enjoying makes it worth my time. Hope you keep the feedback coming. I think my problem is that sometimes I don't feel like writing as much. But I've recently been in somewhat of a writing mood.

Nothing happened with the girl. We have just been exchanging texts the last week or so. It's not like I can set up a dinner or something, I mean she lives 3 hours away. I invited her to my moving out party, but that would be tough for her to do (That's 6 hours of driving total and what if I'm an asshole? Well then she wasted 6 hours. And if she came it kinda implies that she would be staying over, which implies something else, but she isn't like that. I absolutely know she isn't like that, but she doesn't know that I know that. So she would basically have to be as crazy as I am to come).

I also mentioned a 20 year old during a line in this recent post. I met her 4-5 weeks ago, but we haven't met up yet because I've been so busy, but for some reason she agreed to come to my party. I'm really attracted to her, but I can't pretend like anything meaningful would develop out of that. Also invited a girl I used to sort-of date who is coming, but has a boyfriend now (then why would she come?). So I figure one out of the three should show up.

-bag

[Laz]

Haha, 1 out of 3 aint bad!

The first one's the most interesting though... and you're the last person I would expect to be shying away from doing something crazy!

Really pleased I found this blog when you are still early on in your journey and rest assured, I'll be following you all the way to Vegas!

[baglife]

Laz,

I totally agree the first one is by far the most interesting. It's the kind of impossible challenge I like. The other options are just to easy right? And yes it is the beginning of a long journey.

Will post again soon, somehow crammed in a decent win over the weekend.

-bag