I was in a home game last week and one of the players proudly announced that he folded AA preflop in a tournament because 3 other players were all in before the flop.

When I asked him why he did this he said " I dont have the time to explain it right now, but it was the correct play".

My three favorites (among many).

1. Guy wins a massive pot with 86o. Action PF was straddle, I 3! AKs, LAG reraises, this guy CC 4. Flop is something like K82 and the turn is a 6. After the hand, he comments that he only plays "middle cards" when it is raised and reraised PF. That way, it is clear that everyone else has big cards and his hand will be good if he hits. This was 8/16 FWIW.

2. Heated argument erupts from a guy who claims Js4s is better than KsQs on a three spade, J high board. Come to find out that he had learned poker from his nephew, who had told him that a "flush pair" is better than a regular flush. This was also 8/16.

3. Old timer #1 sucks out on old timer #2 by making trip 2s with 23o. Old timer #2 berates him. OT #1 contends that it is more common for 2s and 3s to come on the river, which is why he stayed. OT #2 of course goes nuts. I actually see some grain of logic in this and attempt to intervene. Not all hands go to SD and those that do are more likely to have big cards in hands. He dismisses this and references something about the "luck" of 2s and 3s. I shut up.

-HF

Easy solution. Ask the QQ which 5 cards he would like to play.

Please no more derailing the thread with this conversation. It is being moved to a "Pot Odds" thread in another forum.

Any more posts on the subject will be removed.

LOL.

There is a situation where this applies, but I've never heard of it happening. Let's say you are down to 4 players, you have 2BB and the other 3 have, let's say, 205BBs. You are the BB, and get AA. All 3 players move all in. You should fold. Your chances of winning a 4-person all-in are not worth an almost guaranteed shot at 2nd place.

But that's just a silly situation.

Most commonly heard around my charity room: Multiple limps, SB or BB raises, folds around to late position who sighs and states "Just you and me? I fold." And reminds everyone that if there were more people in the pot, it would have been worth playing.

One hand in particular: $1/2 NL. Young villain and competent hero in pot. Board reads A A 6. Pretty obviously by flop action that both have an Ace. Turn is blank coupled by large bet from hero and call. River is a 6. Table relaxes as we all fully expect a chop. Hero fires medium sized bet at pot, obviously expected a call/chop. Villain tanks. Eyebrows are raised. Finally, villain mucks. Hero looks surprised and rakes in pot. I comment to villain that I thought for sure he had an Ace, and others around me agree. Villain looks at me and states "I did, I just thought he had a better kicker than me."

When kindly informed that full houses do not require a kicker, villain looks confused.

I immediately get up from the table and add $100 to my stack.

wish every player i went up against was this bad. once this happened with me but it the board read A.A.10.10.2. i bet, other guy raises, im all-in he calls expecting a chop, i turn over pocket tens and pick up a very big pot. nice

My previous post got moved to calculating pot odds (I blame Stevie G). Here it is again, maybe not right for this thread but the story is too good to pass up.

At a local Indian Casino a new player sits down at a 1/2 NL table (max $300 buy in) and buys in for $100. Multi-way pot and the new player is involved right away. Flop is 8 9 K rainbow and regular leads out for $15, dealer turns to new player and says $15 to call sir, new player calls. Turn is a 6, regular fires out $35, dealer turns to new player and says $35 to call sir, new player calls. River is a 4, regular debates for a bit and decides to bet $50 or so and put the new player all-in, dealer turns to new player and says all-in to call sir, new player calls. The regular sheepishly turns over J10o for the busted straight draw, new player flips over 23o. Jack high scoops. Befuddled the dealer asks the new player why he didn't fold, the new player flips out on the dealer and yells out "YOU DIDN'T TELL ME I COULD FOLD!". When the dealer kept asking him to put money in the pot he didn't know he had an option to fold out. I almost felt sorry for him, almost ..

I've LOLed through this entire thread.

I remember one time an old man hit a 3-outer on the river against this guy who sucked. The guy who sucked started to bitch and moan about how badly the old guy played the hand. So the old guy said in an abrasive, threatening tone "I won the pot. You don't criticize my play and I won't criticize yours."

Edit: Not really a "thinking" part in the story, but still kinda funny justification. "I won the pot so stfu" is basically what the old man said to justify his horrible play.

Sry it took so long to reply:

I was playing in a 100NL game in SoCal and it was about 5 regs and 3 guys I never played with. They were all pretty bad players, but this really solidified my reasoning for it.

A hand begins where I'm in EP I think and fold with something like 6 limpers to the flop. Flop comes K65 two spades. BB leads out for 25 into pot of 13 and gets raised all in by BTN who has him covered. Pot is now 163 as BB has ~100 behind. BB tanks for literally 2min and then mucks face up 78 spades. He had probably 15 outs twice and says "I wasn't getting the right odds to call that".

I'm slightly tilted, but ask, "But if you have 15 outs then you're mathematically ahead and odds wouldn't matter, right?" And he explained how I just didn't get it and you ALWAYS need pot odds when on a draw. I was slightly more tilted.
Another man who wasn't involved then chimes in with the money line: "You know it's impossible to have more than 16 outs in Hold'em". Half the table nods and a couple say "oh yea, I heard that. It's good to know odds".
So I proceed to start tryin to get takers on a prop bet that I can point out a situation where you can have 21 outs on a flop and 25 on the turn and nobody would bite. I shrug and tell him 22 vs JTss on a 985ssx board gives you 21 outs to beat the ducks.
A 4th man now chimes in. "No, you're double counting the straight and over cards. It's more like 14 outs now". This tilted me a lot. I tried to explain by counting each card one by one but they kept giving me a blank stare like I was speaking Mandarin.

During this whole exchange I was getting more and more tilted, and within about a 10 hand span I donk off 4 buy ins, not really paying attn. to the play just tryin to prove my point. In retrospect it could have been a tablewide conspiracy to tilt and then busto me 4 times over in which case bravo sirs, you've won this round.

Like I said, the most absurd thinking comes from those who feel the need to criticize others at the table.

I've seen this situation before... if you are in a free-roll tournament where a fixed number of players win a fixed, but even, amount (say, top 3 each get $100)... if you are short-stacked with A/A but there are 5 people left and 3 of them are all-in, it may be in your favor to fold.

At a homegame I once got it in on a flop, we turned up the hands and I had 21 outs. Everyone wanted to figure out if I was ahead or behind, so they retrieved the "poker odds" chart from the shelf and it only went up to 15 or 18 or something. Must be how these things get started.

Sorry for my non-contribution, but this thread is A+.

Remember an Aces Cracked promo at Lucky Chances in NorCal.

You got a rack of whatever game you were playing (so at 1,1,2 you got 100 bucks)

These two old guys get into a huge hand, pot is over 800 bucks by the riv, Board has a 4 card straight on it with middle cards. Guy with Aces calls and starts to celebrate. 800 plus pot is shipped to the other guy (with the nut straight) and we all ask why are you celebrating you just lost the pot.

He looks at us like we are red headed step children, and deserve a smack and says "I have to call that, Its Aces cracked time" We then point out he lost 400 to make 100, and once again he thinks were all ******ed and says I won 100 bucks, what are you talking about.

Completely agree, I felt like that was one of my biggest leaks back in the day just letting myself get tilted so bad from other people talking strat and playing badly etc. But now I absolutely love it and tend to just join in the fun: "Oh you got Q3o 4 times today? I'd definately play that the next few times you get it, it's gonna hit!"

I accept blame. Good story, but I definitely feel for the kid.

If the regular was really thinking long term good, he might have given some of the kid's bets back.

Winner. Absolutely hysterical.

He "has" to have 15 outs here? Is the button unallowed to be dealt KK/66/55/AsKs?

AsKs is the only thing he's in trouble against.
KK/66/55 can only remove a max of 1 out (and 1 more out on the turn if the drawer doesn't get there right away).
It's a must-call unless the other dude has better spades.

There's the problem with the nomenclature. You can have 20+ outs to beat a specific hand that's known. If I have, as above, JsTs on a 9s8s9h board, and villain has 2c2d, I am 70% to win the hand: any spade except the 9, any Q, any J, any T, any 8(counterfeiting his ducks) will probably win me the hand. If, on the other hand, my opponent has 8c8d, I am 10% to win.(Pokerstove FTW)

I guess it depends on when you are counting the outs, whether you have a known holding by Villain.

The 9s is already on the board and you forgot any 7.

Mea culpa.

Playing $3-$6 LHE at the Mirage a few years ago.

Young East Indian kid sits down next to me UTG. Dealer pitches the cards around and looks at him for action. The kid hasn't even unracked yet, looks confused and stares back at the dealer.

"$3 to call"

The kid throws in three white chips.

Action moves around, being raised (and maybe re-raised). When it gets back to the kid, he looks at me and says "Can I look at my cards yet?"

I can't help myself "Have you already put some money in?"

"Yes, sir. Three of the white ones."

"Sorry. You can't look now. Throw in six more."

He played the whole hand blind...

LOL, Exactly. I do the same. At the local casino I play at, I'm spewing off the same garbage to these old timers. On a kill in 3/6 limit, I pick up Aces, and end up heads up on the turn with this very nice old lady. There is a king high board, not too threatening to Aces. I had already raised her on the flop, taking control of the hand. I bet on the turn and river, and she calls. I show my Aces, and she flips over K-5 offsuit for just kings. She seemed surprised to see the Aces, and I shrugged my shoulders saying "tough one." "It' s hard to get away from that," she says. And I just nod and say "exactly, what are you going to do?"

I have to admit, I feel sleezy at times, being so fake around the old timers.

I nvr said "has" to be. I said probably, he can be dealt any one of those hands. But at these tables you can almost never give set credit to overshoves as they are the "nuts" to them and will be slow played to the river and AKss may be the only real consideration imho. Either way I would think in this game it's a snap call. (Sorry Stevie G).

Well, he would be slightly less likely to have pocket queens...