comedy ipoker lesson applied well

Comedy iPoker - A Lesson Applied Well

Here is a funny hand from a recent session. At first it might seem I

played it terribly post-flop, but there was method to my madness....

Seat 1: Iceage12122 ($89.85 in chips)

Seat 2: jimboyo ($20.81 in chips)

Seat 4: snipxx ($162.65 in chips)

Seat 5: sigge79 ($138.03 in chips)

Seat 6: VILLAIN ($142.58 in chips)

Seat 7: FRIDENISFRI ($49.40 in chips) DEALER

Seat 9: HERO ($95.00 in chips)

Seat 10: oakesee ($98.70 in chips)

HERO: Post SB $0.50

oakesee: Post BB $1.00

*** HOLE CARDS ***

Dealt to HERO

Iceage12122: Fold

jimboyo: Call $1.00

snipxx: Call $1.00

sigge79: Raise $4.00

VILLAIN: Call $4.00

FRIDENISFRI: Fold

HERO: Raise $20.00

oakesee: Fold

jimboyo: Fold

snipxx: Fold

sigge79: Fold

VILLAIN: Call $16.50

*** FLOP ***

HERO: Check

VILLAIN: Check

*** TURN ***

HERO: Check

VILLAIN: Check

*** RIVER ***

HERO: Check

VILLAIN: Check

*** SUMMARY ***

Total pot $45.60 Rake $2.40

VILLAIN shows

VILLAIN: wins $45.60

The Villain is an ex-Tribeca player I've spent many hours at the table

with. He's not the worst I've ever seen, but he does struggle to put

down any sort of half decent hand.

The raise from the other player pre-flop looked suspiciously small,

and I didn't want to play an out-of-position pot against four or five

players, so I re-popped it more than usual, hoping the other guy had

KK or QQ and would move in on my apparent AK.

I was somewhat surprised when everyone folded to the Villain who took

an eternity to call. Based on our previous history, I immediately put

him on an upper middling pair.

When he called, if I had to stake my life on it, I'd have said he had

Jacks. AA/KK/AK and probably QQ I reckon he reraises. Middle pairs

down he folds. He's not the sort of loon who turns up with KQo in

these situations.

All said, it's not a bad spot to get over 1/5 of my chips in pre-flop.

Until the damn flop comes J high. I actually swore out loud at this

point.

Any meaningfully sized bet from me here pretty much pot commits me, so

checking seems the lesser of two evils.

When he checks behind and the turn brings the Q I mentally give it up,

as I am convinced he has either a set or an open ended straight draw

and there's no way of telling which.

The river is a laugh out loud moment. By now I'm sure he must be

seriously considering I've got AK, which would mean I've backdoored my

way to the nuts against what I am absolutely convinced is a set.

The thought of representing AK does cross my mind. But recall my

earlier words - 'he does struggle to put down any sort of half decent

hand'.

Is he 'good' enough to fold a set here? No. Is he cautious enough to

take a free showdown? Yes.

In retrospect a flop bet might have taken down the pot, or at least

scrambled the RNG enough to bring about a different card sequence, but

based on my read I'm not unhappy with how I played it. Especially

resisting the temptation to bet my 'straight' into an unfoldable set

on the river.