Poker Question/Thoughts

Donald3

Afternoon all, quick simple poker questions for you, 2 hands that were played last night that I lost. Just interested to see if anyone thinks I did anything wrong.

 

Hand 1:

I'm small blind and get A J suited, everyone limps in, I raise (it's £1, £2) to £7 pre flop and I get called by 2 people (8 players on the table). Flop is 3, J, 6 (rainbow board), so I flop top pair with top kicker. No flush or straight draws. Both check, I think I bet about £10, one player folds, the other calls me. Next card is a 5 but I'm not putting him on a straight or flush draw, player checks and I bet £12 (perhaps I should of bet more), he calls me. Last card is a K, he checks and I just get the feeling he's going to call anything so I check behind.

He has K, 3.

Can't see how he would be callin pre flop and then with bottom pair, but should I of bet bigger??

 

Hand 2:

Again I'm small blind, everyone limps in, I have A A and raise to £20 (big raise but I'm trying to isolate) and get called by the button. Flop comes down, Q, 4, J - Jack and 4 are spades so I'm very conscious of the straight and flush draw and bet £25, he raises me £50, I go all in and he has J 4 and I lose.

I was dumbfounded the guy called my £20 raise pre flop with J 4 off suit.

A bad bet or should I of been weary and got suckered in with the Aces??

 

Genuinely interested in what people think, cheers.

Donald3

Sorry, first post and put this in the wrong thread - apologies!

LawrieAbrahams

It sounds to me that you were playing with people who didn't have a clue what they were doing and one just got lucky in the second hand. 

sadiejane1981

Sounds like bad luck, if you had gone all in pre-flop with the bullets you would have undoubtedly taken the pot but wouldn't have got paid much, however the call by J 4 was a bad move shows amateur play (reason I am not a fan of table games and prefer tournaments). A re-raise after the flop with a flush and straight draw was however a sign of strength and I personally would have cut my losses, folded my aces and lived to fight another day.

The first hand shouldn't have been limped after the flop, you had top pair with top kicker but the fact he called you pre-flop you should have put him on ak or aq or possibly a pocket pair, bet medium size on flop if he calls you know he has a draw so should have folded him off on the turn and never let him see the river. But again you were unlucky as he shouldn't have called you really.  

Macronate

Sounds like Gus Hansen was at your table.

JiMMy 85

I think Lawrie nailed it. They were bad calls. But that's the problem with poker. If you're playing with beginners, they will not do what they should, nor what you would expect them to do. You can't predict a beginner.

For instance, I recently went on a stag do that ended with a poker session in a bar. I was the only player who had a clue what was going on, apart from one of my mates who insisted he knew the score. I believed him, until he called my all-in bluff (a straight draw, flush draw etc.) with a pair of twos.

A combination of a bad temper, lots of alcohol and his refusal to acknowledge his good fortune, led to me being... somewhat unpleasant.

MrLargo

Was this online poker Donald3? If so, you get loads of that sort of thing on there and it's effing irritating when you lose significant money to people who clearly don't know what they're doing and just get lucky.

Also, have come unstuck loads of times with pocket Aces, Kings, Queens, etc on William Hill - about every 50 hands on there it deals high pocket pairs to 3 or 4 players so you'll be sitting there with pocket queens feeling smug and then find out that there's pocket Aces, Kings and 10s out there as well. Don't use Wil Hill anymore as a result. 

Jints

You got unlucky. You'll win in the long term but you lost this time, If poker wasn't like that bad players would never play for money.

  

 

sadiejane1981

next time play with us on Poker Stars the next CL game is on 22nd of this month (Sunday night) it's $11 buy in and a good laugh. 

Donald3

Thanks SadieaJane, I'm getting internet at home soon (new flat) so I'll be in. I've seen it mentioned on here and will get involved!!

To answer MrLargo, it was a cash game at Tottenham Court Road. I started with £150 and got up to £300 through careful play, playing tight (I think I know the basics and can get by with good cards!!), hit a couple of nice straights and decent top pairs. These 2 hands just stick in the memory as I don't really think I did anything wrong but lost badly (lost £280 on my Aces). I walked away feeling like I should of won but that's poker eh! The one doubt I have is the Ace hand, I bet £25 on the flop, he raised to £50 and perhaps I should have laid the Aces down, but it's so hard to lay Aces down. Tough, but you only learn by your losses - FACT.

Anyway, when I get internet access at home, I'll get involved with PokerStars - cheers.

Thanks guys, good to hear some feedback.

COYR

Leroy Ambrose

The posts above are correct in sentiment - with one small detail. Most of them say you got bad luck. That isn't strictly true. In actual fact, saying they had good luck would be more accurate - but even that isn't really correct. What would be more correct is to say that they didn't have a f***ing clue what they were doing, watch too much hollywood poker on telly and think they're Phil Hellmuth. If you played well, remember what you did and keep doing it. The dichotomy of poker is that the longer you play against morons, the more you will win in the end - but you need to realise that, along the way, you'll bump into fish who just get lucky. That's the greatest test of you as a poker player - maintaining your cool when some smug prick sits opposite you without a Danny how to play the game, yet hits miracle hands to take your money.

It's true that you only learn from your losses - but that only holds true when you're playing against people who know how to play the game. When you're playing against people who don't, all you're learning is how to maintain discipline.