I really enjoy the forums, but I’ve come to realize that I don’t learn all that much from posting hand histories. It’s not my style. I read them and absorb the lessons slowly but surely, then something clicks one day and I start recognizing the theory when I’m in the game and take a step up off whatever plateau I’m on. I took a big step a few months ago, so I thought I’d try to relate it to others.

If you watch Survivor, then you know who Russell is. What a player. The guy was always scheming. Time after time, he would just head into the jungle and find an immunity idol without even having clues. He was a bully, but a really smart one. One step ahead of his rivals and 2 steps ahead of his allies. If you like watching Survivor, he was the man to watch… until it was time for a final tribal council. Suddenly, he was just a lonely dude without a leg to stand on.

At final council last season, Candice (or maybe Danielle, doesn’t really matter) gave him a lecture about how his moves weren’t that great because he was making moves he didn’t need to.

Cue the music, I had an “AHA! moment”. Wow, she was right. His moves were great, but the game is Survivor, not Aggressor. This was me at poker. My preflop game was pretty solid. Appropriately aggressive, not afraid to 4-bet light sometimes, played position well. Squeezing, punishing limpers, restealing. The problem was, I kept my foot on the gas postflop. Sometimes 3-barrel bluffing into the nuts without stopping to think about what villain would keep calling with. At showdown, I was too often like Russell at final council. I had run off everyone I could beat without thinking about what would happen at the end. After that, I changed it all up and realized post-flop is where the real money is. Here’s 3-months of graphs leading into that show, and 3 months since. What a difference. There’s no feeling like getting to the river out of position but knowing you have the best hand, thinking to yourself “this is a check-call” and then having villain bet pot after calling you on 2 streets and you call with a winner.

Before things clicked...



And after...
(beating NL25 for 4.37 PTBB/100 over 66k hands, beating NL50 for 3.22 PTBB/100 over 31k hands)


Cliffs: Too often you get so aggressive postflop that you fold out all worse hands and only get called by better. Work on postflop so that you fold to better hands (or run believable bluffs) and get value from worse instead of running them off.

Nice AHA moment, congrats

i can't believe pavarti didn't win over sandra

what spots were you makin unnecessary moves?

how did you find this?

2 main times I was making unnecessary moves.
1) I was playing my strong hands TOO strong and losing value on them.

Here's a good example of a change to that. Before I would have probably said "woo-hoo, 2 pair" and led pot on every street. Instead, I thought, hmm he didn't 3-bet me pre so he probably isn't too strong. No way he had a set, so I couldn't see him calling a 3rd barrel on the river, so I planned a check-call.

Full Tilt Poker $0.25/$0.50 No Limit Hold'em - 6 players
2+2 Hand Converter Powered By DeucesCracked

CO: $67.90
BTN: $19.00
SB: $69.10
BB: $67.25
Hero (UTG): $50.00
MP: $52.80

Pre Flop: ($0.75) Hero is UTG with K Q
Hero raises to $1.75, 1 fold, CO calls $1.75, 3 folds

Flop: ($4.25) Q 4 K (2 players)
Hero bets $4.25, CO calls $4.25

Turn: ($12.75) 7 (2 players)
Hero bets $8, CO calls $8

River: ($28.75) 7 (2 players)
Hero checks, CO bets $17.25, Hero calls $17.25

Final Pot: $63.25
CO shows 9 8 (a pair of Sevens)
Hero shows K Q (two pair, Kings and Queens)
Hero wins $60.25
(Rake: $3.00)

2) I was playing my AIR too strong too often. After a big raise pre-flop or a big c-bet I felt like I had to continue on, sometimes I would shove the turn for a bluff for example.

I found it two ways. I was sort of aware of it from session reviews and things like that, but I didn't see how bad the problem was. I really had a serious AHA moment after survivor. I thought russell was a great player. When he lost on the finale for a second time, and Candice made that statement, something clicked. I really realized that he was missing the main point of the game; winning the jury. So was I at poker, getting max value from your winners and losing the min on your losers. So, I was aware of it but suddenly I realized the importance of it. Then it was a matter of starting to work on post-flop skills...

Real good post, describes where I'm at right now.

I really agree. I think a lot of people go down Russell's road. They feel like they have to make moves. But they don't know what or when, so they start spazzing out making moves. Cbetting, double barreling boards they should c/f on. C/R in spots where they can't represent more than a set. Cold 4betting against 2 guys who aren't goin to fold ever. Squeezing 2 fish, etc, whatever. It's like when Russell hid the knife for no reason. Or when he gave out both idols at the same time.

He's really the poker player who has a redline that goes up and his blueline goes way down. But he's just getting lucky because nobody adjusts to him. Then, finally, people figure him out, and all of a sudden, all his lines go down.

Wow, this is a great analogy you came up with.

Hi uNL forum, I haven't posted here in years, but I do browse occasionally. I still struggle with this concept. My biggest losses are when I keep betting with air because I feel I need to keep representing my hand. I don't watch survivor but I really like the analogy.

nice post dude

lol I could never bring myself to c/c that river for fear of losing value from KJ, wp

cliffs: value bet, don't spew, win?

The way I learned to c/c thick (cause it's the opposite of value betting thin) is that if they check behind, they wouldn't call a bet with most of their range. But, if you check, you let them bluff a part of their range they wouldn't bet.

Sure, sometimes, you miss value from KJ, KT type hands. But it's more than made up for the times you get a bluff from missed draws. He has more missed flush draw combinations than KJ/KT combinations.

You let the reg make the mistake. Because they bet the river, instead of checking. Like they planned to fold to a 3rd barrel, but villain checks to them. They resort to betting a hand with good showdown value, where worse c/f and better c/c.

Solid post sir

Good post.