Both among other hands

Thanks for your reply OP.

Best of luck with this challenge. It's pretty ballsy to quit a 6 figure job and play poker.

How do you find yourself coping with all the annoying things that come with playing live?

*Working throughout the night
*Dealing with the horrendous players that play live and the plays they make

Do you find yourself feeling quite segregated and detached, or do you feel you fit in quite well with the live regs etc?

Hours: I just play whenever, honestly I don't notice much difference at all between friday nights vs tuesday mornings

I love watching live players flat the river with the nuts or raise 30bbs with AA pre, still cracks me up

Down $156 in 4 hours at 5/10 in St Louis, won... I think zero showdowns?

Troubling hand:
I raise pre from MP with AhQd to $30, erratic playing old man (bad overall, mucked river when other guy was playing the board in HU pot...) flats on button, OK-ish guy flats in BB.

Flop Ad 8c 4d, $90 pot
Checked around. I bet here almost always but happen to be mixing it up this hand.

Turn 8s, $90 pot
BB leads $50, call, call.

River 7h, $240 pot
check, I bet $125, BTN raises to $300, fold fold.

????

I used to do this kind of move until recently i realized it is almost always bad (i think its good only in HU games).

I think the worst of it is that you lose completely the read of the situation. Since you didn't represented any strength, what do bad players realize that you have? I guess you make them confused, and they start to play badly, but since they are playing so badly you have no reads anymore.

So, first thing here i think is to bet 100% of this kind of dry flops 3-way. Maybe you lose some value, but whatever.

Very probably you was losing by the river, but i personally hate this felling of didn't know what happened when i have a had that good. Funny tough (i imagine this man having A7 and hitting this "3rd" pair and felling so confident by the river. really having no clue about what he's doing)

ty for the comments. I was typing previous post from phone, so it was pretty abridged. I have reasons for checking flop.

I'm finally home in Little Rock!!!!!!!!!!!! No more poker for awhile (probably a week-ish). Visiting friends and family.

Played 2 hours in Tunica, lost $67. Hand 1: Checked my BB with 6h5h, then check/raised flop and barreled the turn all in on a As9h7h9d board, he snapped with A9. Derp, bad timing. Made some back by bluffing old guys.

Played 2 hours in Metropolis, IL, lost $76. Hand 2: Played a nice hand where I raised pre with KQo over a limper, only one guy calls behind me. Middle age guy dressed nicely, made some comments earlier using the words "equity" and "ranges" (they were totally wrong). Recreational fish who thinks he's a poker hotshot is my read. Flop Kd9s7s, check/check. Turn 2h, I bet 2/3 pot, he minraises. He's repping like nothing on this board, I flat. River Jh, I check, he bets 1/2 pot, I call. He shows 44.

Hand 3: Won some small pots with cbets, then lost a bunch when this guy shoves a 5d3c2c flop (raised pot, 6 handed so SPR is quite low) and I overshove with 5h5s. A guy behind me folds Ac9c face up and says "I would have called if you folded because I would have had implied odds", lol. I'm up against A4o and board bricks out. Hmm. Boring hand if it wasn't for that guy's comment.

Back "home" in Cleveland with my girlfriend. Not sure what city I call home these days, heh. Played 3 hours of 1/2 PLO8 and was up $74.

Hand 4: Main hand in question was a really marginal edge river situation that comes up every once in awhile, fishy guy pots both flop and turn with obviously a strong hand on KT75r (I'm guessing KKxx), I'm holding QJ86r in the big blind. I check called flop because it was like 5 handed going into the turn, but on the turn I check, he bets, everyone folds and I'm last to act. Table has been paying off river bets with trashy hands so I felt good about my implied odds to call here. River is the best card for me, a 9, completing my K to 5 straight. Now here's my question. Pot is $180, opponent has $115 behind. I bet $100 (one stack of red chips), he grudgingly calls. Has anyone ever found fish more likely to fold here if I bet $115 instead of $100? Not sure if people are 15% more likely to fold if I make it an all in bet. /shrug. It's small but it adds up.

also I don't know why I keep playing these stupid PLO and PLO8 games that I barely know how to play lol

So that you can get better at them. Duh.

Or so that you can keep the Cleveland games well fed for donk regs.

I guess people fold a lot more to all-in river bets than to almost all-ins.

Fish thinks if you bet all-in you have the nuts.

I think is +EV to value bet almost all-in and bluff all-in.

I would have bet $115 on the river vs the fish. I can't really see his decision changing in that spot if you bet $100 vs $115. Against fish I overbet with my nutty hands when they have a strong range and never bluff. Pretty sure thats optimal vs fish.

Yea it's marginal anyway since it's a rare spot and a low amount of money. FWIW I almost always do the all in bet here (leading the river and expecting a call is why I called the turn!)

Played 3 hours of 2/5 NLH today, up $89. Won money on 3 hands. Hand 1: preflop squeeze for $115 from BB with QTo vs a guy who declared he felt like his next hand would be good for raising before being dealt in CO, he makes it $30 and gets 1 loose caller on button

Hand 2: Vs a supermaniac who raised pre pretty big (which he does with almost ATC), I flat on button with 66, he checks flop dark, I'm debating whether to call his 3/4 pot turn bet with 4th pair and a straight draw, and he announces that he'll check river dark if I call. Good enough for me. I call and check behind river (board is something like Jc8d7d4s7c) and I'm good. He doesn't show.

Hand 3: My first hand at the table, I make it $15 from EP with AQ. Only a half-stack calls me on my immediate left. He seemed like the kind of guy who likes action based on some of the stuff he's said after I sat down.

Flop J52, check/check.
Turn T, I check/call a pot sized bet.
River 9, I check/call a 1/2 pot bet. He shows 64 and talks about how bad I am at poker for awhile. I just smile.

Oh, I almost forgot. Hand 4: Immediate next hand (my 2nd at the table), I make it $15 with 55. He shoves for $75 total. I meh fold because although I think that while villain is both obviously super gambooly and tilted, he's also never expecting me to fold here as I've raised both hands I've played and called down with A high so I'm guessing he has a hand he just can't wait to get his stack in with. He doesn't show but FWIW he seems very disappointed that I folded and claimed he had 64s again.

I know it hasn't been that long in terms of hours (like 10-15ish), but since I've been playing poker sporadically it's felt like forever since I have been insanely card dead at NLH in St. Louis, Tunica, Metropolis (IL), and Elizabeth (IN), and now back in Cleveland. Haven't had JJ, QQ, KK, or AA a single time, only flopped a set once and lost a buyin on it, meh. I understand variance ofc but it's annoying.

Only solution is to play more poker

Played 3-ish hours and lost $77. Still annoyed at not really getting any real hands. Lost money on a hand where I raised to $45 with KJo pre over several limpers, some guy who seemed reasonably tight jams for $80 more. ~$80 for me to win $190, I need 29.6% equity. Close spot, I have 30.2% against TT+, AQ+. I called and lost vs QQ.

Won a couple hands where it went small bet, call, call, me c/r squeezing with a hand like bottom pair + backdoor flush draw on my big blind (once with A3s on T73r, once with J9s on A94r) and everyone folding. Doesn't matter what hand I have much, but doing so only when I have a tiny bit of equity auto-balances my frequency without me having to think about it.

Made me really think about preflop tightness vs. postflop tightness and how correlated they are in a player. Because I had hardly played any hands preflop at all, the table had barely see me win any pots so they gave my bet respect despite the fact that my AF was absurdly high. I used my table image to play like a maniac post-flop.

I'm curious how I should react when I see this pattern in other unknown players- the example that stands out in my mind is when I played against a lady who was extremely inactive in Metropolis, then minraised my large leadout (we are very deep) when I held AT on AT3hh. I didn't know what to do. I flatted, turn completed hearts and she bet again and I folded. Later, she had still won only that 1 pot by this time so still very inactive, I raised pre, she flatted OOP HU, and led out on a K33r board. I called with AQ, and bet a blank river and she folded (my bet obviously targeting small-ish pairs). But yea, in that first hand example, I felt like she was repping exactly 33, but since she hadn't won a single pot up to that point I thought there was a good chance she could have it. That's the same reason people folded to me yesterday. Perhaps bad to assume so!?

I dont like sitting at PLO or PLO 8 with you are your GF... I dont think anything shady is going on but I dont like to take my chances. Its also weird when she leaves the table bc its a horrible game but you stay and grind it out.

I personally feel that you are weak-tight but we havent played much together so dont take it from me. Just throwing it out there to let you know someones perception of your game as a player at the table. Now, your GF I have some respect for her game but I havent ever been involved in anything with her either.

PS, I dont play NL at all... Very rarely.

Been in Chicago for vacation, haven't played poker in awhile. I really want to play tonight though.

Hmm, nothing even resembling this that I can think of has ever happened. Not sure what instance you're referring to. Also we're not together anymore (but still on friendly terms). I might be leaving Cleveland fairly soon too. Possibly visiting east coast since I've never been there, possibly home to Little Rock to relax for awhile, possibly going to try living in west coast for the winter because screw cold weather.

Thanks for all the comments!