Cash game review

Replay Poker Hand Review
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I’ve been getting back into some online cash games recently. So far, over a ridiculously small sample size, it’s been going ridiculously well. Unfortunately, it’s not because I’ve been playing amazing - for whatever reason, the pool right now is just incredibly soft. That means there’s still plenty of room for improvement, and all input is welcome.

I was hoping to capture some interesting hands, but there really haven’t been any so far, so here’s my stats for Nov currently instead:

Seat Hands Profit (bb/100) VPIP PFR Showdown (bb/100) Non-Showdown Won at SD (# hands) Lost at SD Won w/o SD Lost w/o SD
Small Blind 92 -118.2 28 28 8.8 -127 5 2 13 6
Big Blind 91 60.1 39 16 159.3 -99.2 10 7 21 16
LJ 48 -101.5 31 31 -6.2 -95.2 0 1 5 9
HJ 65 9.4 33 33 -17.5 26.9 1 1 11 9
CO 89 130.7 20 19 158.9 -28.2 3 0 8 7
BTN 89 423.5 29 20 285.3 138.2 5 4 9 8
Total 474 83.7 29.8 23.5 112.7 -29.0 24 15 67 55

Most of those stats are pretty meaningless at the moment. Still, the small blind seems like a problem - I would have been better off just folding every hand. As it happens, there’s only really two hands that are contributing to that. Still, I’d be interested to know if anyone would have played either of these hands differently:

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There’s one street for sure I would play slightly differently if I could rewind.

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I was observing the elite cash games recently and noticed your play.

How quick you casually were up 100 million and called it a day.

Your above post mentioning the soft field lately is no surprise.

What’s trending is a bluffing contest.

Heavy on the bluff which is the reason of the perceived softness of the games.

With the amount of chips at risk, the player better have something to continue!

It seems lately, the above, surprisingly is not in their equation.

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I wasn’t talking about the field here, I’ve basically only been treading water playing here lately. Players bluffing puts more chips in play, which is good if you have an edge, but it makes the decisions in each hand more challenging.

Anyway, this is from micro-stakes cash. Everyone in that pool was probably always making fairly big mistakes, but you used to find only 1 or 2 players whose mistakes were obvious and easily exploitable. Right now, it seems to be at least 3 players at every table, and they all seem to be playing exactly the same way.

There’s probably some exploits I’m making that might not be obvious to everyone and could be instructive - if I can find them I’ll post them - but really I’m not doing anything special or getting put in tough spots.

I’m sure that will change, I’ve been on huge downswings in this game before, so for sure there will be hands that are more useful to review in the future.

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My redline from Lojack (UTG 6-max) is also pretty bad, and I’m mostly losing out folding on the turn. That turned up these two hands which might be interesting:

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This can’t be solved as a 4-way spot, but if you change things up a bit and just have the button calling, solver says I should pure fold on the flop. I don’t think my opponents’ range is going to be anywhere near as strong as what the solver thinks, but it’s important to remember that folding earlier improves our red line too when we’re in spots where we have very little chance of improving and are likely to face further barrels.

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This one plays out very similarly, in that I continue on the flop and then end up folding out the best hand on the turn, but I think this might be ok for several reasons. Haven’t checked what the solver thinks yet, but I’m more interested to hear other people opinions on if they think either flop call is good/bad anyway - my opponents are obviously not playing GTO.

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Your preflop sizing should be bigger when 3 betting OOP, around 4.5x-6x.

on your first hand
Flop we should be checking more often OOP with that board especially vs 2 opponents, size is fine but ideally we want to c bet into 1 opponent.
Turn again that board does not connect with us, we are going to have too many bluffs. The sizing is too big, don’t know your strat but if we must bet I would had like to see another 33% or a 50% bet. Also try to manage your stack for potential shoves on the river, with your 72% bet on the turn you left yourself an 80% bet on the river.
River was the big mistake, after betting 72% on the turn a 30% seems too weak, block bets are great when you understand your opponents. I have no problem with your fold. pretty gutsy villain play.

Anyways, good job mate. Just need to fine tune some small aspect of your game but keep on crushing them!

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Thanks @Punlsher

Completely agree. I can’t have been paying attention because I’d be bumping this up to at least 9bb normally. Hand probably ends preflop if I use the correct raise size.

I think this board is actually pretty good for us, given it’s a 3-bet pot. There are no straights available, and we actually have more sets than either caller (I wouldn’t be surprised to see either one show up with pocket 3’s, but it would be a weird way to play 7’s or 8’s). I’m not range betting that board, but I think the only hands it makes sense to check back are those with showdown value, or pure give ups. The c-bet folds out a lot of offsuit broadway and random Ax that is ahead of us right now.

On the turn, I actually like my size. I don’t know why I’ve clicked it down 1bb from 75%, but I think we do want to go roughly geometric here, setting up for an equal sized river shove. I just think this hand doesn’t fit into that size and plays much better as a check. Turn going check/check would be ideal, but check-raising all-in has to be better than bet too. This is the street I most want to replay.

On the river, I like block, I just should have gone much smaller. There’s still a lot of random junk in their range that will call a small bet. It’s going to induce random bluffs sometimes too which is why I usually don’t like going less than 1/3, but realistically it doesn’t happen often enough to worry about. This pool will mostly just call with pocket 5’s/6’s. I don’t think this player has raised top pair as a bluff.

Anyway, thanks for the feedback, it did definitely make me think about the hand much deeper than I had before.

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Oh yeah man no problem!
Although this is why I personally don’t like analyzing other players hands too much anymore because A) I lack context, B) I don’t know your strat, and C) The only way to properly analyze is to rely on GTO but solvers trivialize that for us. Also as you can tell by your opponents limping and min opening, GTO is null in these type of fields.

With that being said, whenever you do a play with a reason like you just describe I consider it to be good. anyways I was interested into what the solvers say so I plugged it into one as SB vs BTN 100 bb eff. 3 bet spot and these are the results if you are interested.

PREFLOP: vs a BTN 2.5bb open the solver on the SB 3 bets 12 bb 203.25 combos of his range
(BTN should be folding QJo to a 12 bb 3 bet / QJs is a great hand to 3 bet with)

FLOP: SB is checking 63.5% and betting 36.5% of the time (33% bet size)
Your specific hand actually bets 50.5% and checks 45.5% on that board.

TURN: SB is checking 86.5% and betting 13.4% (60% bet size)
Your specific hand is checking 98.2%.

RIVER: SB is checking 37.4%, Betting 3.8% (30 bb) and shoving 58.8% (54.85 bb)
Your specific hand is not on the range.

As you already know, this is just a baseline and not the absolute. I agree with your river block bet reasoning, I just personally preferred more info before deploying a block bet.

Don’t worry about being perfect with your sizing. honestly as long as you are in the ballpark it is all good.

Yeah man, the solver is checking pretty much 100% of the time with your hand, great hand to either x/c or x/r.

No problem mate, Good luck with your sessions!

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Thanks for running that through the solver, that was incredibly useful. FWIW, when I first reviewed the hand, my thoughts were basically the same as yours - that I should have bet smaller on the turn and then either checked or bet larger on the river. It wasn’t until you pointed out the pot percentages that I remembered I’d gone (roughly) geo for a reason, and then realized I’d picked the wrong hand to do that with.

Matching the solver doesn’t matter at this level, but being able to make the same decisions in game as those I would make on review (and reviewing hands thoroughly) sure does. I missed the mark on both of those in this hand, so the real lesson here is that I need to take more time and better compare all the options in complicated spots like this - and that’s something I can apply broadly.

Oh yeah, I get it. There’s not much point in me posting hands where I’ve made obvious, undeniable blunders, so I’m going to be able to push back against almost any points you raise (and likely will because how many poker players do you know that aren’t ego driven?). Fact is, you highlighted a hand where I didn’t think I did that much wrong at first, but you correctly identified as misplayed, so your input is greatly appreciated.

@Pos111 @Younguru @Asuronetorius I’m hoping to get your input on these hands too at some stage. Well, maybe not these hands, but I’ve been in some interesting spots since this that I’ll post shortly. I’m not really interested in what the “correct” play is, but any spot where you’d do things differently has to be a learning opportunity for one of us.

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We all makes mistakes, doubt there is anyone who doesn’t blunder here and there. But it is always good to be aware of the situations at play and correctly rectify them on the go.

It was more of a general rant, I understand you have your reasoning’s of why you took those lines, and I expected you to provide them after I quickly analyzed your hand. It is just my perspective of how I view hand analysis in general. They are great exercise but at the same time feels impossible to correctly assess for the points I provided.
and plenty of poker players have big egos, which I honestly believe is a blessing lol
though you didn’t come across with an ego and you understanding that you made some mistakes proves that you are ahead of the curve.
and my pleasure, It has been awhile since I analyzed a hand lol so this was a great exercise for me.

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Well cash games is not my specialty Lihiue. Tournaments and Sit N Go’s are more my specialty. In Microstakes Cash games I’m ok. I agree with Punisher that I would 3 bet 4,5,6 x preflop, because in micros, micros tend to call too light vs 3 bets, and get too many callers if 3 bet too small of size.

Another thing to keep in mind at micro cash games, is that micro’s are what they are until, unless they prove, show otherwise, and that is semi tight, semi straightforward, underbluffing, overvaluing hands, etc. And as Younguru says, they will tell you what they are, and what you should do, if your paying attention. And because of that, playing in position is better then out of position, and if gona play out of position, gotta thin the field more, bet size a little bigger, 3 bet a little bigger out of position.

And since Micros like to incorrectly slowplay more, then postflop it’s better to check out of position, in multi way spots, against micros. And I wouldnt use GTO, solvers, even as a baseline in micros, as GTO, solvers are pointless in micros, and exploitative play is better in micros. And betting for thin value on turn, river in micros is not as good, because Micros are less likely to make thin value calls, and usually only call if they have better and have you beat.

As far as block bets. Block bets are ok, semi good in micros, because they usually only either fold, flat call block bets, and don’t usually raise block bets like they do at higher stakes.

Of course this is generalities at the micro stakes, as I don’t see your hand histories posted, with the context, etc.

Younguru is the 1 that you really want to talk about cash games, as he plays cash games at casinos

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QJs small blind - I am check-calling this river as I think many villains will overbluff/overplay quite a bit. As played, tough spot. Can’t honestly say what I’d do facing the big river raise. Flip a coin?

QK small blind - lol ggs

AJ lojack - agree with solver, I fold flop against a rando. I don’t much care if I’m leaving a sliver of equity on the table; we have way too many better hands and their range is probably a lot narrower than it should be here.

AQs lojack - preflop obv. standard, though I wonder what your 4bet frequency/range is here? AQs seems like a decent candidate vs. CO squeeze. As played, personally I am much more likely to c/r than c/c flop. But I definitely have a tendency to polarize more than I’m supposed to in these kinds of configs. I just hate tough turn decisions, and calling flop will overwhelmingly lead to a tough turn decision here.

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Updated stats:

Seat Hands Profit VPIP PFR Showdown Non-Showdown Won at SD Lost at SD Won w/o SD Lost w/o SD
Small Blind 1560 -12.1 26 25 33.9 -46 48 35 239 96
Big Blind 1371 -50 39 12 7.1 -57.1 131 102 213 204
Lojack 698 54.7 24 24 54.8 -0.2 12 14 81 63
Hijack 1153 6.8 21 21 -16.5 23.3 22 24 123 81
Cutoff 1362 39.1 22 21 25.8 13.2 29 25 164 90
Button 1532 50.5 27 23 26.3 24.2 47 53 208 108
Total 7676 11.6 26.9 20.9 20.5 -8.9 289 253 1028 642

Still a very small sample size, but these look mostly as expected and much more sustainable.

The redline isn’t quite where I want it, but what I’m doing to address that is a lengthy topic all of its own. Things have been going well enough regardless that I’ve been able to move up stakes. That’s been going quite well too, though honestly mostly due to this one hand…

First some context. There are 2 villains in this hand. The villain in the big blind we played this hand against previously (where they were also the BB):

Lojack limps
I raise to 5 in the CO
BB calls
Lojack raises to 20
I call with AA, hoping BB comes along
BB jams for nearly 100bb with Kh6h, way better than I could have hoped for

So clearly BB isn’t afraid to get the money in with pretty marginal holdings, but not total garbage, and everything I’ve seen since then backs that up.

Villain #2, who is in the small blind, seems solid, likely on the tighter side, but not a complete nit from what limited info I have so far.

Anyway, for the interesting hand, it’s very important to note that BB is sitting on 200bb, small blind on 100bb, and I cover.

I open to 2.5 from the HJ with Ad8d
Small blind raises to 11.5
Big blind calls
I’d be folding if the BB hadn’t called, but this deep with a suited A, call seems mandatory

Flop: JsTd5d

Player Bet Total Pot after bet
SB 33% (11bb) 45bb
BB Min raise 67bb
Me Call 89bb
SB All-in (77bb) 166bb
BB Min raise (132bb) 298bb

BB is actually leaving 30bb behind, but essentially, I think we need to consider them all-in.

So, it’s basically 160bb to call with just a flush draw and one over.

The ace pair outs might be good against the small blind, but the odds of them having anything worse than an over-pair have to be close to zero, so we’re very likely behind them.

I don’t think the big blind has air, but they could have a mediocre pair or a draw. They could also have every JT combo, every suited 2-pair combo, and probably a set of 5’s as well. We’re probably behind a lot of their range too, but not all of it.

What do you do here and why?

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We jam because of pot odds? Edit: maybe not I misread what you had behind.
Edit2: I am back to shoving, it is 110 to call, 160 on a shove so you need ~33% and I think you have 35% to hit the flush(?) with 2 to come and if you hit an A you might be good or possibly running 8’s, I think lol.

Should you be reevaluating your SB range? I don’t think I personally would want to play the largest percentage of my hands from the least advantageous position. :face_with_raised_eyebrow:

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That’s a very good question. A few points though - I haven’t filtered for hands where there 6 players, so some of these are short, even heads up, which will obviously skew the SB numbers a bit. You might also think that over a thousand or so hands the card distribution would even itself out, but our actual VPIP can still be a few percentage points out from what we should get based on our opening range.
So, I’m not actually playing a wider range from the SB, it just looks that way. What I am doing a lot of is 3-betting against Button opens, so my VPIP is still higher than it should be in theory. The intention is never to play these hands though - note that I’m winning a lot of pots uncontested, and hands rarely go to showdown.
Also note that if I just folded every hand in the small blind, I’d be losing at -50bb/100, so going at -12 is actually quite a lot better than expectation.

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Right, call or shove are the same thing. You’re also right that we have the equity to shove. I wasn’t quite sure in game though. Having only invested 33bb it felt like I might be punting putting in 160 more when I think I’m likely behind both players. Just based on the math I have time to do in game, I might bottle it and come back to fight another day.
My draw is to the nuts though, and there has to be a chance that at least one of them has a worse draw, and I only need to beat the big blind to break even. Given that, and knowing that I must have close to right equity, I think I have to shove.

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When you are HU does the sb count as sb or as button? It is sb pre but last to act post flop so it makes me feel like HU should almost be broken out of any statistic gathering.

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It should really count as the button. There are other edge cases I’m not handling ideally either, like when no-one actually posts the small blind. I can filter out those hands fairly easily, but things will still be fairly noisy at this stage with so few hands, so there’s not too much point in being that precise.

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I bet you could be punishing capped ranges more on turns and rivers.
But I’m biased, as a lot of my theory study lately has ended up emphasizing the availability of those plays.

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I don’t think bluffing is my problem. I looked at all the hands where the river checked down, and I’m only winning about 46% of those, so I’m not getting there too often with too much value. Of course I missed some bluffs, but most of my give ups were reasonable.

What I think is making a difference to my redline is not value betting rivers thinly enough in certain situations. There are lines I identified where hands that would mostly check in theory are winning at least 90% of the time in practice. I don’t think I win much more by betting, I mostly just get folds, and the times I get called are at least partially offset by the times I value own myself, but it would certainly improve the redline.

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