Hi all. It's been a while since my last post. As some of you may know, I recently left my job to play poker professionally and one concept at the core of my game has been analysis of hands. For the sake of accountability and feedback I thought I would post these hands here.
Provided that the mods are okay with this format I'll post several hands each week that were interesting for one reason or another. For simplicity, I'll run through the action, then talk about reads and conclude with take aways.


Hand 1
$2/$5 NL 10 Handed $1600 eff
UTG AA Raise to $30
Folds to MP who calls
BTN Raises to $125
SB Folds and accidentally shows AQ
Folds back to me
Raise to $350
Folds to BTN
BTN calls

Pot $730 Flop J52
I bet $325
BTN raises to $1250 AI
I call
BTN shows JJxx board runs out blanks BTN wins.


Reads:
BTN is fairly loose pre, although conservative with 3bets. Value heavy otf.

Take aways:
4bet sizing slightly small preflop. Otf, Vil has some (I eventually settled on 3 out of 6 for this player) combos of KK, 3 remaining QQ combos, 3 JJ combos and possibly a couple combos of TT. We block Ax Heart combos or else this is a slam dunk call. Even with strength reads we have 925 into 2300 otf and likely must call off given his high frequency of dominated overpairs.
Make sure to take a break after a hand like this, reassure yourself and get back to playing your A-game in a soft game

Hand 2
$2/$5/$10 NL  10 Handed $1300 eff
UTG+2 Q7 Raise to $30
MP calls
SB calls
BB calls
Straddle calls

Pot $150 Flop 6 3 2
Checks to me
Bet $55
MP calls
SB calls
BB folds
Straddle calls

Pot $370 Turn 4
SB checks
Straddle checks
I checks
MP bets $125
SB folds
Straddle Raises to $450
I raise to $1215 AI
MP calls 52
Straddle calls 75

Pot $4.1k River 8 MP wins


Reads:
MP is same vil from AA hand. Now playing very loose from all positions. MP may be making a weak play at the pot. Straddle may see MP as weak ott with small bet and be making a play. Straddle unlikely to check nuts without redraw with wet board ott. In retrospect Straddle is solid and very unlikely to be making a play at high enough frequency for profit. MP unlikely to fold 5x combos at high enough frequency for profit.

Take aways:
Q7ss from UTG+2 MUCH too loose open. Watch tilt factor at this point in the session. Ambitious play with nut blocker and ideas of leveling +1 for creativity, -1 for not realizing that we need roughly 37% folds (roughly -550 when called and +950 when folded through) from the field to be profitable here AND unfortunately vs 2 players we just don't get that. Retrospect reads of relatively high nut frequencies here from Straddle (i.e. turn raise multiway, wet board, solid player) crucial.


Hand 3
$1/$2 10 Handed $140eff
A couple limpers
CO 97 Raise to $14
BTN calls
Blinds fold
One MP calls


Pot $40 Flop T92
MP checks
I bet $30
BTN folds
MP Raises to $126 AI
I call
MP shows KTxx (wins)


Reads:
MP typical 1/2 fish. Capable of jamming draws on wet boards, should also have most Tx (x=8+), 1 99 and all 22.

Take Aways:
97ss from CO still OK to raise over weak limpers pre.
OTF revise cbet strategy with very wet board i.e. two suit, two medium connected and vs shallow stack. We are NOT ahead of his shove range here even with high draw frequency. (most quick runs gave us around 35/65 with 40/60 being ambitious vs his range)
Cbets leading to call-offs like this are increasing variance and frequently getting me stuck. It is OK to check back this flop with relatively low pot-share and make turn and river decisions vs weak players.



Any feedback welcome. GL at the tables all!

Hand #1: Not sure what the right play is, I don't think I could fold there.
Hand #2: 4 bet shove on a draw with no fold equity?
Hand #3: If you're ahead it can't be by much. Best case is guy has 2 unders to the 9 with flush draw.

In both hands 2 and 3 I would say you take the wrong action at every step. If you want to be a pro, it appears you need to tighten up both how you play hands and how you think of your opponents. I would start by eliminating the word "fish" from your vocabulary. In both of these hands, it seems as though you use the fact that your opponents are "fish" to justify outlandish plays that are pure spew. On a basic level, you should be more focused on the errors they make (at the core, do they fold too often, call too often, or raise too often - at these stakes it's mostly calling too often). You can then think about your decisions in light of this categorization instead of what it appears you're doing: he's a fish, I call/shove. More on the hands below:

Hand 2 isn't creativity. It's complete spew.
Pre: Given table dynamics (extremely loose) you should be playing even tighter than normal in EP. Q7s is a fold without these dynamics but it's even more of a fold with them.
Flop: If you were thinking about shoveling it all in on the turn, then why are you only betting 1/3 pot on the flop? Notice how you get peeled by gutshots and bdfds. I get that maybe they would just "call no matter how much you bet" but still if you want them to fold you need to make an actual bet on the flop.
Turn: Complete spew. after a bet and a c/r on a 4 straight board with 2 flush draws you have ZERO fold equity. Getting it in here with a Qhi fd is a disaster.

The main issue in this hand is that you are incorrectly adjusting to your opponents. Maybe you were tilted, but the way you should be adjusting to a hyper-loose table is to tighten up, value bet huge, and bluff/semi-bluff never or almost never. In this hand you do the opposite of all of those.

Hand 3
Pre: I don't really like this raise in a vacuum at these stakes. yes it's sexy to iso-raise SCs, but you should only be doing it if you can maximize value with middle pairs (didn't happen here), pick up dead money (we went 3 to the flop), or have a reasonable expectation of being able to take down a lot of pots with cbets (typical 1/2 fish call too much). In essence all you are doing is building a pot with the worst hand and hoping to outflop your non-folding opponent. this is fish thinking.
Flop: The argument for c-betting is something like: a few better hands will possibly fold, we want to charge draws, but mainly we want to deny equity/bluff equity to worse hands who will be able to improve and/or effectively bluff future streets against our vulnerable holding. Still this is a very wet board and we often have the best hand but can't take any heat at all. We can't get 3 streets of value or play for stacks. The smaller the pot is, the more likely it is we will win it. This is a spot not to bet and to go for 1 (maybe 2) streets of value or to bluff catch.

After villain crai we have to fold. As you mention, it's a losing play to call this flop raise, and in general a bet/fold strategy is a winner at these stakes. The fact that vill crai the flop with just KT should be a signal that iso-raising with 97s is not going to be a profitable play.

anyway, congrats if you're still reading. hope this wasn't too harsh. I've made some of these same mistakes before; I would urge you to take the idea of playing like a professional seriously if you want to make your money at poker.

Hand 1: calling the shove is fine
Hand 2: Is not so good throughout
Hand 3: I don't think raising with 97hh is a very good idea in that spot.

Playing for a living sounds risky.Are the games in your room that inconsistent that you have to jump around from 1/2 to 5/5 to 2/5/10?

Some good points here for sure. Keep in mind that I'm deliberately cherry-picking some of the highest opportunity hands throughout the course of a 40 hr week in these posts. With that said, I really don't have any defense for Hand 2; it is among/the most spewy hand(s) I played this week. It came at a time when I was down around $2k and had been for most of the night. I mostly wanted to note it to reassure myself not to push to get even; but rather to make correct plays. I also made some poor assumptions in this hand; and obviously paid the price.

In Hand 3 I'm confident that with the dynamics in that particular game that 97ss is still a solid open preflop; albeit I would prefer it more against deeper opponents. For instance I do think that on a board like JT7 against the said villain that I end up finding a profitable spot. The overall takeaway from this one, in my eyes, was that commonly in these spots giving a free (acknowledging that my opponents range has a ton of value) card and making decisions on a more developed board>cbetting and having to make very close, high variance decision otf.

The games here are reasonably consistent from week to week; however I'm only getting in around 30hrs/week at 2/5+ (2/5 runs two days a week and 5/5/T runs another day) so I'm supplementing some 1/2 hours at the moment.

Hand 1: Sizing is just correct. (4bet sizing correct but not lower : I d rather go for 20-40 more to cut more odds but well it s ok
the preflop 4bet denied correct implied odds and AQ might influence the play. whatever he is calling 225 to win his 125 back +MP 30+ your 1600

Hand 2: horrible, everyone called the flop : a 5 is very likely somewhere and turn is full of actions

Hand 3: after thoughts it s a fold because if we are not WB we are usually not WA.
However like you I used to run between 5/5 ans 1/2 games (now more 5/5 and 5/10), I find myself make some more calls in those "close spots" in lower stack games because of the face value of the bet...

Understood. I think my point here is that for all the grinding, hands like these are the difference between break even/losing and winning. When that's how you pay the bills it really matters!

They say it's a hard way to make an easy living, and this is why. If you lose your professionalism for even 1 hand, it can cost you dearly. I think it's worth emphasizing that point, since while I like the strategy aspect, the mental and emotional part of the game are what is most important to making a living at it.

The results on this hand make me question it for 2 reasons:
1. if your opponent is getting it in here with TPGK on a very wet board, then you don't have enough FE in general to iso-raise it. iso-raising hands like this is profitable against fit/fold players or loose/passives, not players who are going to be jam happy with intermediate made hands.

2. most of the situations you are going to be put in with 97s (and similar) are relatively tricky: you're going to have medium strength hands, draws, and air. in this case, you had a medium strength hand and ended up getting stacked with 5 outs. consider how many single-raised pots you have to take down in order to break even on that hand. sometimes it is theoretically fine to play a hand, but your actual skills are not polished enough to maximize your theoretical value expectation.

there should be no shame in playing tighter to avoid mistakes on future streets, and often trying to be too fancy and play too many hands is the downfall of skilled players. only you can judge the actual state of your game; I can say that very few players at these stakes adjust to your actual raising frequencies and sometimes the game can get a lot easier when you always have it.

Mate, so much spew in here. I'm sure you posted your worst hands but they make me scared for your future in poker

Hand 1 is kind of tough. It really depends how we think V would play QQ here and if he always 5! KK here or not. If he would 5! KK then KK is less likely and he can almost only have QQ/AK/JJ I guess maybe TT. And if he has QQ, does he really ship it after we 4! and bet 1/2 pot on the flop?

Hand 2 is a disaster though. Q7s is way too light to open or call anything. And once we go 5-way, I'm kind of over it.

Hand 3 pre is totally fine so as we're confident in our post-flop play. I'm not sure I want to c-bet here. Hitting 2nd pair with 9h7h is usually not what we're hoping for with SC... we will need to fire multiple barrels to even try to get V to fold AT/KT/QT/JT. Hardly a turn card that we like a ton. I typically like to c-bet with this type of hand if we have at least like a pair/BDFD - at least. Or A-high/K-high flops.

AP though hand 3 is a super easy insta-fold to the x/r. I probably take 10 seconds acting like I have a decision and then fold.

Hand 1 - seems standard. v might not jam top set here in position. he also might overplay qq, kk

hand 2 - fold pre, especially if this is how many callers you typically get. bet at least 1/2 pot on flop. can double barrel turn or x call turn. as played wtf just fold.

hand 3 - pre fine, fold flop you have much better hands to call wit