Maybe I Should Play More Garbage

Replay Poker Poker Strategy
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These are 7 hands in a row where I was dealt garbage.

fold 74 ~ board 83947 (A8 won) pair
fold 76 ~ board Q9637 (KQ won) pair
play 77 ~
fold K4 ~ hand did not reach turn
fold 64 ~ board 93J57 (won without showdown)
fold K9 ~ board TJ992 (QJ won) 2pr
fold 65 ~ board 4K728 (A3 won) air

Okay, the 77 wasn’t garbage. I actually had the butt end of 89TJ but when the J hit the river Villain jammed. I wasn’t about to lose to Qx.

My folded garbage absolutely smashed 5 out of 7 straight boards with a minimum 2 pair and all 5 would have beaten the winner at showdown. (shakes head)

I did almost cash though. I won some big pots and climbed to 5th out of 21. Then jammed AJ on a AA8 board an ran into … A8 (and he called a large pre bet to hit it too). Felted 20th. No money.

But the next tournament I finally made a huge cash, 2nd place! First one in weeks. Funny story form this tournament and it relates to the topic of garbage hands.

I had a prime hand maybe AQs or something. there are like 5 or 6 limpers so I count 'em up and open 9x or 9.5x or something huge. I get 3 calls. I eventually end up heads-up with I think 2-pair. A 3 pairs the board and Villain bets kinda large. I debate folding, but ultimately I call. He has … 73s.

I’m like “yup, gratz,” or something. Then I say “that was a terrible pre call tho ;)”

He says, “I got yur chips.”

Then I say, “keep calling 9x with garbage. : )” and I meant it.

Soon after that he gets sent to another table. An hour later he shows up at my table again, either last 2 tables or final table. He says “hey napkin, with your rank u shouldnt be telling ppl how to play.” and then he said “u play as bad a u look … BAD.”

Well, his avatar is a big salivating dog so I said “you play even worse than you look.” Then I said “if you want to get into an insult war with me you’ll lose.”

He said, “i don’t wanna try, u win”

So I said, “that was easy.”

He laughed and then he got kinda friendly. Then 10 mins later I took a big pot from him and he gratz’d me and I thanked him. And when he finally felted he good gamed everyone. It was so weird.

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You should never get to the river with the first three of those hands though, and you have trash up to that point. There’s only 1 hand where you should be winning a decent sized pot, so even in this stretch it’s not clear you’d actually come out ahead overall.

I’m sure you realize this, just pointing it out for those who don’t.

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Never delete your account and your posts, I honestly believe you have the drive to be a great player one day and look back at yourself with humility I hope.

anyways, the best tip I can give you is that those pots were never yours because you don’t play those hands, so don’t be sad or mad about it.
I have been in the same situation playing live poker and folded some trash hands only for it to flop quads and I don’t really care or get sad that I could have won a lot of money.

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Games in which you win with garbage are garbage games. I like pot limit because it prevents the dramatic shove-in that makes everyone else fold. However, it seems lots of people enjoy no limit in the free games just because it enables all-in without losing anything really. When it comes to real money games, I would never play garbage except to confuse my opponents about my game. Its not bad to dilute the impression that you play only when you have a good hand – but really, you should only play good cards seriously and need to cultivate the endless patience it requires to quietly wait for those cards. They will come and then my problem is to not shout for joy. :slight_smile:

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This. I dont care what happens on the flop and if I would have won, if I had not folded preflop. All I care about is if I made a right decision, and correct either fold, call, bet, raise, etc.

If I make a wrong decision, play, read, etc, and if I get lucky and win, and win a lot of chips, win a tournament, etc. I am not happy with my wrong decision, play, etc.

It’s all about making right decisions, not about winning or losing.

If you make enough right, correct decisions. you will probably win over the long term.

If make enough bad decisions, you will probably lose over the long term.

So the winning will take care of itself. So dont need to worry about winning, losing, and only need to worry about making enough right decisions, and let the chips fall where they fall.

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It is a well known fact that the poker gods love to tempt players into playing garbage with runouts like those. Those garbage hands are 95% more likely to hit if you have folded than if you stayed in the hand. The only exception is if you are playing the 7-2 game; because the poker gods have a sense of humor and love inflicting max pain to the rest of the table.

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Oh I agree. This isn’t a complaint. It’s more of a humor thread. I just thought it was pretty remarkable that I’d hit THAT MANY almost in a row, and not just a pair, like they all came in strong and all would have won showdown. 5 hands out of 7 and 4 in a row, although very little on the flop so I would not have been able to reach showdown excpet for 1 or mmmaybe 2 unless checked streets which would have made for meh pots.

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And right after I posted this, the guy sent me a friend request. I accepted and he sent me a friendly PM. : ) Nice.

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He was probably trying to get your goat, hoping you’d tilt.
Playing garbage is certainly risky, I know I hit my garbage with huge hands all the time, probably like most, but usually I’m not in the hand:( Once I start playing garbage, they quit hitting, of course.

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One can play semi garbage semi marginal hands quite wide in late position, if done selectively, in moderation, if have a good table image, depending on players, situations, spots, in a semi limited basis.

If everybody is limping, then its ok to splash around early tournament by limping 64 suited on button, cutoff, SB, etc, to try to monster hand mine, if you can fold if a 4 or 6 hits top pair crappy kicker, mid pair, bottom pair, etc, and not overvalue your hand postflop.

Mid to late tournament you can occasionally on uncommon occasions Squeeze steal limp ins, by raising 6.5,7,7.5,8,8.5,9,9.5 x bb preflop from SB, Button, Cutoff, with : K9 suited, K8 suited, Q9 suited, JT suited, J9 suited, T9 suited, 22, etc, to try to scoop limps preflop.

Can also raise 64 suited from button, cut off to try to either steal blinds, or show that your not a nit.

Very very late tournament you can shove all in preflop:

With KJ, KT, QJ, QT, JT suited, T9 suited, 22+, A2 suited+ When:

Have good image.

when short enough stacked.

When on SB, Button, Cut off, and trying to steal limps(uncommonly done)

When on blinds, button, and a hyper, over aggresive, semi maniac, with a semi fold button, raises for the zillionth time trying to bluff, steal blinds. In that situation, can, should occasionally 3 bet reraise all in preflop to resteal.

Can on extreme rare occasions raise 64 suited from UTG+2, Low Jack, Mid position, semi early position to semi balance, mix up game, be less predictable, so that not playing with your hole cards face up, so that they know that you dont always have 99 to AA, AT suited to AK, KQ suited, etc.

All, any other time, garbage should be folded preflop. Does not matter what flops after fold, and what flops after folding preflop is no legit reason to play garbage outside of the limited times I specified.

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Of course. I do that all the time, but I’m not going to call 9x. I’m not going to pull a LostHwy and limp-call a strong open with 52s. : P

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Make sure you go all-in on a 4 flush, paired board with a counterfeit 2-pair. You won’t be able to claim the site is rigged otherwise, and everyone loves those posts :wink:

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3A3 flop with cowboys. 2-pair! Can’t lose! Let’s get that money in - cha-ching!