going to dinner in an hour. relatively unsuccessful experiment since I took a long nap and the games were pretty terrible for most of the afternoon. Did clear some bonus though so it wasn't a total loss.
having fun debating someone in the SSFR forum on 2p2. I haven't done debate in a long long time, but I was pretty good at it and breaking down someone's argument point by point and blasting it away is something I take a little bit too much pleasure in. I guess it's my douchey side.
later
jim
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
3.7k hands in, things not going great
Played a long session and got about 3.7k hands in. Down about $900, pretty much broke even in BBs but most of my losing came at 2/4 and my winning came at 1/2. I definitely think I made a lot of mistakes, but I also didn't run great. I managed to get all-in against AA probably 8 times preflop which always sucks. Especially with my image I just can't fold QQ, KK or AK for 100bb preflop to a shove against guys that I know have more than AA into their 4bet and 5bet range. oh well. I think JJ was the worst hand I shoved preflop into AA and it was a BTN vs BB situation at a FR table that had broken down to 5 handed. Also got set over set, and lost a huge pot where I shoved a big draw on the flop and ran into top set and my turned flush got boated on the river.
Going to take a couple hour break, eat some food, watch the Duke-Maryland game that I recorded, and then come back for a grind. I may have to play .5/1 at that point if the games are mostly dead, which they may be.
Going to take a couple hour break, eat some food, watch the Duke-Maryland game that I recorded, and then come back for a grind. I may have to play .5/1 at that point if the games are mostly dead, which they may be.
getting ready to start a 24 hour grind
cleaning my work station and finishing up some chores around the house. have a work dinner with the wife tomorrow night in 24 hours. need to get in a bunch of hands to get to monthly hands goals. Going to try and stay up and grind the whole time. Got a half a pot of coffee and will probably brew another in 8 hours or so. Hoping to get in 15,000 hands in 3k increments, but 10,000 in 2.5k increments would also work.
Will try and update with progress every 3-4 hours. Hopefully making the public will keep me motivated.
Also other updates:
- took a job as an assistant baseball coach at a local D3 school. It doesn't really pay any money, but I was surprised they were going to be paying me at all. My good friend is the pitching coach so he was interested in me helping out and I was excited for the chance to add something to my plate.
- started outlining a movie script with a good buddy in town last night. It was his core idea for the script, but we tend to have good brainstorming sessions and as soon as he brought it up we started coming up with funny ideas and bouncing them back and forth. It's a romantic comedy in the vein of wedding crashers or 40 year old virgin.
- lastly if you read the MHFR FTP regs thread on 2p2 or Dfly's blog you'll get the reference: In a post-apocalyptic type scenario guns are your best investment. Better than gold, food, or your IRA. Fly makes a good point that a house could be valuable, but I'd suggest that the need to continually move and forage (assuming you don't have farm-able land) would actually hurt the value of the house. A house full of guns on farm-able land would certainly be a great investment. Just something for you young kids with lots of money who think the world's going to end to think about.
later
Will try and update with progress every 3-4 hours. Hopefully making the public will keep me motivated.
Also other updates:
- took a job as an assistant baseball coach at a local D3 school. It doesn't really pay any money, but I was surprised they were going to be paying me at all. My good friend is the pitching coach so he was interested in me helping out and I was excited for the chance to add something to my plate.
- started outlining a movie script with a good buddy in town last night. It was his core idea for the script, but we tend to have good brainstorming sessions and as soon as he brought it up we started coming up with funny ideas and bouncing them back and forth. It's a romantic comedy in the vein of wedding crashers or 40 year old virgin.
- lastly if you read the MHFR FTP regs thread on 2p2 or Dfly's blog you'll get the reference: In a post-apocalyptic type scenario guns are your best investment. Better than gold, food, or your IRA. Fly makes a good point that a house could be valuable, but I'd suggest that the need to continually move and forage (assuming you don't have farm-able land) would actually hurt the value of the house. A house full of guns on farm-able land would certainly be a great investment. Just something for you young kids with lots of money who think the world's going to end to think about.
later
Thursday, January 19, 2012
a libertarian advocates for socialized medicine...
We've been discussing doctors, their salaries, and the health care system in the US in a thread on 2p2 and here is something I thought about posting there but decided to put in a blog:
if you really want to improve medical care and patient doctor relationships in this country start with the biggest criminals involved in the economy: 1) Insurance companies and HMOs and 2) lawyers/laws that take advantage of malpractice insurance to reap huge rewards due to to mistakes that doctors will inevitably make.
I've argued this many times before, but I'm very much a libertarian in most of my political philosophy, but I've come to believe strongly in the need health care to be publicly funded and directed assuming that you place any faith or value in society as means to improve the condition of the individuals that exist under it's social contract. The medical system as constructed in our country has far more problems than the education system, the mass transit system, our court system, etc. However instead of looking to the people who do the work because they love it and it's important to them we continually allow politicians to influence the laws and system who are essentially bought and sold by private corporate interests who are simply looking to make a profit. While I have no problem with profit or even the greed that leads to such actions, you can't deny that due to the middlemen in the system it is antithetical to doctors providing quality services to their patients. Certain systems simply don't function successfully in a free market system because the services being provided to the customer are too complex for the customer to accurately assess their worth or value. Simply put regular people (myself included) have no idea what doctor to go to if something is wrong or how much we should be paying.
Free markets function efficiently on the idea that people can successfully evaluate the products and services they are paying for and accurately assess their worth. Health care doesn't work this way because the science and technology that we use to diagnose and heal patients has outstripped our basic understanding of the human body as well as our ability to financially plan for disastrous events. We're able to prevent and heal ailments that we didn't even have names for in the past, but all of that has comes with a price that is a result of countless hours of research, training, and work. Making treatment both more expensive as well as more confusing.
I have a lot more thoughts on the subject (mostly that insurance companies are essentially profiting off of denying you the service they purportedly provide) but I want to play a session and get some stuff done before the duke game tonight.
I'll try to revisit this topic another time as I find it interesting, but I have to stop after awhile because it's so tilting seeing as I doubt any of this is going to change anytime soon.
if you really want to improve medical care and patient doctor relationships in this country start with the biggest criminals involved in the economy: 1) Insurance companies and HMOs and 2) lawyers/laws that take advantage of malpractice insurance to reap huge rewards due to to mistakes that doctors will inevitably make.
I've argued this many times before, but I'm very much a libertarian in most of my political philosophy, but I've come to believe strongly in the need health care to be publicly funded and directed assuming that you place any faith or value in society as means to improve the condition of the individuals that exist under it's social contract. The medical system as constructed in our country has far more problems than the education system, the mass transit system, our court system, etc. However instead of looking to the people who do the work because they love it and it's important to them we continually allow politicians to influence the laws and system who are essentially bought and sold by private corporate interests who are simply looking to make a profit. While I have no problem with profit or even the greed that leads to such actions, you can't deny that due to the middlemen in the system it is antithetical to doctors providing quality services to their patients. Certain systems simply don't function successfully in a free market system because the services being provided to the customer are too complex for the customer to accurately assess their worth or value. Simply put regular people (myself included) have no idea what doctor to go to if something is wrong or how much we should be paying.
Free markets function efficiently on the idea that people can successfully evaluate the products and services they are paying for and accurately assess their worth. Health care doesn't work this way because the science and technology that we use to diagnose and heal patients has outstripped our basic understanding of the human body as well as our ability to financially plan for disastrous events. We're able to prevent and heal ailments that we didn't even have names for in the past, but all of that has comes with a price that is a result of countless hours of research, training, and work. Making treatment both more expensive as well as more confusing.
I have a lot more thoughts on the subject (mostly that insurance companies are essentially profiting off of denying you the service they purportedly provide) but I want to play a session and get some stuff done before the duke game tonight.
I'll try to revisit this topic another time as I find it interesting, but I have to stop after awhile because it's so tilting seeing as I doubt any of this is going to change anytime soon.
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Bet sizing in NLHE
quick thought of the day based on this exchange on 2p2:
original post:
a response:
my response:
further thoughts:
When determining bet-sizing in NLHE first decide what you want your opponent to do (aka are you value betting or bluffing). Then determine what your perceived range on the board will likely be to your opponent (does he think you're likely to be bluffing often or do you have a very strong range that will nearly always be betting for value even if it's somewhat thin). Then size your betting appropriately to manipulate your opponent into the action you desire with your given holding on the board.
Example 1: You have the nuts on the river in a hand where your range is perceived as full of bluffs (aka it is a board you would frequently barrel). You want your opponent to call off as much money as possible. Size your river bet sufficiently large as your opponent will likely call on this river against your perceived range. If your opponent is particularly suspicious an overbet might have the most value.
Example 2: You have a weak holding on a board where your range contains mostly very strong holdings and your opponent's range is likely weaker than your perceived range. Something like you were the pfr in MP with 22 and your opponent CC in the SB and the flop came down AKKr. You'd like your opponent to fold and he likely will with the vast majority of his range. You should bet as small as possible to get the likely fold so that you'll save the most possible money the times he has a Kx or Ax hand and decides not to fold. If villain is the kind to call once and fold to future barrels you also create a situation where you are actually creating value by inducing single street calls planning on barreling most turns to get folds from his medium pair or QJ type hands.
I'm not going to edit the above and it certainly isn't a complete or exhaustive treatise on the subject. But I do think there is some value in what I wrote and if you're a new or struggling player I'd suggest reading it and digesting the thoughts and thinking of how it might apply in some further examples.
original post:
Stingers thoughts on value betting/bluffing released a gem of information, but i am having trouble processing it.
Can anyone provide some examples of what stinger was talking about with his thoughts here:
"If theres a spot where im going to be bluffing a lot, or at least my opponent perceives me to be bluffing a lot, you should be betting bigger. Thats why the over-bets are so good. Over-bets gives your opponent worse odds to call, which allows you to bluff more often, profitably...
...If its going to be a spot where you're going to be value betting often, and your opponent knows that, then you should be betting less to give your opponent better odds, tempt him into calling. The key there is all about what your opponent perceives. Its not about how much you are value betting or bluffing, Its how much your opponent expects you to be value betting or bluffing. You want them to be calling at a frequency that is profitable for you."
a response:
his reasoning is completely wrong, you could even say backwards, in both cases
a small bet should be made by a higher fraction of value hands than a big bet, yes. but that does not mean that you should bet big when you want to bluff a lot, or that you should bet small when you have a lot of value hands. not at all.
my response:
I agree that he hasn't full explained the concept but I wouldn't say he has it backwards. Basically there are 4 variables to consider:
1) your holding and it's relative strength to the board.
2) your opponents range and it's relative strength to the board.
3) your perceived range.
4) what you'd like your opponent to do with his hand.
If you know the answers to all of those questions (or can at least approximate them) then you can determine the best (or close to it) bet-size in relation to the pot to attempt to manipulate your opponent into the desired action.
I guess at it's heart it's basic theory and math of poker. But it is certainly always good to think about it and remember why we bet certain sizes in certain spots.
further thoughts:
When determining bet-sizing in NLHE first decide what you want your opponent to do (aka are you value betting or bluffing). Then determine what your perceived range on the board will likely be to your opponent (does he think you're likely to be bluffing often or do you have a very strong range that will nearly always be betting for value even if it's somewhat thin). Then size your betting appropriately to manipulate your opponent into the action you desire with your given holding on the board.
Example 1: You have the nuts on the river in a hand where your range is perceived as full of bluffs (aka it is a board you would frequently barrel). You want your opponent to call off as much money as possible. Size your river bet sufficiently large as your opponent will likely call on this river against your perceived range. If your opponent is particularly suspicious an overbet might have the most value.
Example 2: You have a weak holding on a board where your range contains mostly very strong holdings and your opponent's range is likely weaker than your perceived range. Something like you were the pfr in MP with 22 and your opponent CC in the SB and the flop came down AKKr. You'd like your opponent to fold and he likely will with the vast majority of his range. You should bet as small as possible to get the likely fold so that you'll save the most possible money the times he has a Kx or Ax hand and decides not to fold. If villain is the kind to call once and fold to future barrels you also create a situation where you are actually creating value by inducing single street calls planning on barreling most turns to get folds from his medium pair or QJ type hands.
I'm not going to edit the above and it certainly isn't a complete or exhaustive treatise on the subject. But I do think there is some value in what I wrote and if you're a new or struggling player I'd suggest reading it and digesting the thoughts and thinking of how it might apply in some further examples.
Monday, January 9, 2012
BCS championship game I have two words for you...
shit sandwich.
I think this was actually worse than the NCAA Basketball championship game last year. And that game was truly atrocious and an insult to the sport.
GG Alabama, LSU, and most importantly the NCAA in continuing the tradition of terrible games coming a month too late in a system that everyone hates. College football has never been more lucrative and never been more disappointing. It's a cynical sports writers wet dream.
I think this was actually worse than the NCAA Basketball championship game last year. And that game was truly atrocious and an insult to the sport.
GG Alabama, LSU, and most importantly the NCAA in continuing the tradition of terrible games coming a month too late in a system that everyone hates. College football has never been more lucrative and never been more disappointing. It's a cynical sports writers wet dream.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)