he saw it in your face that you didn't have a big hand, he is ahead of your non-big hand range, OBV

I've been following this thread since the start, the thing I don't really follow (well, there's a lot I don't follow, but let's say the main thing I don't follow) is, why are Live Players and Online Players being categorised as separate groups?

e.g. what is your guess on the following:
a - how many of the so-called "top 50 live" players have not also played online?
b - how many of the so-called "top 50 online" players have not also played live?

(EDDTown, aren't you a hybrid player, by your own definition?)

The argument just seems to be something like "when playing live, the players with the most live experience will always be better than the players without any live experience"

I'd really like to hear some stories / examples about tells in live play, especially as EDDTown is saying that they can make up 30% of his edge (using the 80% favourite comment combined with having no real edge if a good opponent had no tells). That would be a lot more interesting than bad beat stories.

I'm not talking about collusion, That's obviously a big risk too, but the bigger risk is software coding player accounts.

Me & Claudia do play in the same game sometime because where we live there's usually only one big game. We have no choice. When we play other places we don't even like to be on the same table. There's always 4 or 5 other players in the game that we play with everyday so if we were cheating someone would have noticed by now. The funny thing is, A couple is actually the least likely to cheat because everyone would be watching. The people you have to watch for are the ones no one suspects, Especially in another location. Me & claudia don't hide the fact we're together. We play the hand normal if others are in the pot. If its head up & no one else is in the pot, we pretty much always check it down.

Besides the fact I don't have to cheat to win, If I was the type to cheat, I probably would have took the 20k & 45K the online poker sites offered me , Don't you think?

WOW, Just read that, I can imagine you are still upset over that. I'm glad you came into the forum because that hand is a perfect example of this entire thread, I opened UTG & got reraised & cold called, You were sitting on my right & I was watching you when you decided to move in. It was really a bizarre hand & a lot people were asking about it afterward, Why I had moved in with A5 on top of so much action. One of the reasons was because I just sensed that you were making a play. I could feel it when you talked yourself into moving in so I though my A5 was ahead even though it shouldn't have been with all the action. I think you made a great play & made a great read, I made a great reread, but Unfortunately you were still ahead with A7, I think one of the other guys folded JJ. I got super lucky with the 5, I'll never forget that hand & I'm sure you definately won't, Tough break

I ended up making the final table 2nd in chips playing for a million, but super bad luck on the final table, 8th place, gross

A lot of people that cheat are winners. There is no connection between your ability to win without cheating and actually cheating. Winning players get greedy or might just be scum in general. Turning down poker sponsorship also has nothing to do with cheating. I'm not saying you cheat anywhere in this post, FYI.

You are saying things as if they are directly related (winning at poker w/out cheating (x), not cheating(y)) when in fact they are not identical situations.

If you have x, that does not prevent you from doing y.

If you look hard enough, you might even find a post by ME ( as clocwork) saying I think the internet is rigged too, before I realized what I was experiencing was standard variance, plus I wasn't a great limit player. Mind you, there have 100% been full-on cheat sites in the past that didn't last long, but that's not the point here. You appear to be grasping at whatever straws may bolster your tenuous argument, and reposting from the early days of 2+2 is a pretty large grasp. Just as you shouldn't reference a study from 1966 on computers in the home, you shouldn't reference posts from 2+2 in 2000 as evidence of internet poker being rigged.

Of course, even though you have NEVER cashed out a winner in over 200 deposits and have played MILLIONS of hands online, you still think it's rigged, a cognitive dissonance you still have never addressed.

Wanted to explain this hand a little more, It was a $2000 buy in tourney with 2300 players. We were down to like 4 or 5 tables I think. Most players were pretty scared to play without big hands & several on our table were playing like that so I opened A5 off UTG with a big stack, I got reraised in middle position & flatted on Hijack or CO. Black winter day made a super bold play & squeezed from the BB all in pretty deep, I happened to be watching him when he was contemplating the action & I got a sense that he was making a move so I shoved all in over the top to isolate, I got JJ to fold & got it HU, He was weak as I suspected but still had me beat so it was a strange hand. I hit the 5 & won the pot, Always felt kind of bad for it, but anyway both hands were very weak compared to the chips that went into the pot.

Well, to your credit you did say immediately, even before i turned over my hand, that you put me on a squeeze, so it wasn't that horrible of a play, although you are not even ahead that far vs my squeezing range with A5o and you put in about 80%of your stack, so i was still upset when you got rewarded by hitting the 5ball.

And you weren't 3bet by someone else, you raised and got 2 calls, then i shipped about 27bbs in.

It's weird to dissect a hand from 3 years ago, but opening this thread and seeing your name gave me a bad flashback. This pot was about twice the average with 20 left (3 shorthanded tables, not 4-5) in the WSOP event, you don't get many chances to be this close to a bracelet and a ****load of money...

I was thinking it got 3 bet, but that's been three years ago so not sure. I knew I wasn't going to be far ahead if you had a random hand but with the dead money in the pot I figured it was worth it if I could get HU 3/2 fav with all the dead equity in the pot. You got unlucky it was me in the hand, I'm probably the only player that would have done that & it was strictly something that I picked up in the hand.

Ya, It's super tough to go through that many players & get a bracelet shot, Last year I got 3rd in the $1000 that had 4400 players, It was a minefield & finally got 3 handed with a 9 million to the other guys 3 mill & 2.8 mill & finished 3rd, sighh

Wait, you just did respond to me! I'd offer to play, but I know that you'd just refuse to escrow.

If you and Claudia share a bankroll isn't that effectively the same as soft playing eachother if you sit in the same game?

Softplaying isn't cheating unless you do it in a tournament. In tournament play its obvious cheating because it allows each of you to move up higher without risk of going bust. In a cash game as long as it's heads up & no one else in the pot, It doesn't really matter what you do since you can pull money out of pocket or pick up & leave at anypoint.


A couple of years ago I busted her in festa al laego tournament on money bubble, she raised A9s & I called with 44, flop x49 & we got it in. She busted the 3k on bubble, If we were cheating , that wouldn't have happened.

Lol, the coincidences are getting weird.

I have read a bit further in this thread and now i see that your wife is Claudia Crawford and you claim her to be the best female player in the world?

As it happens, i played with Claudia this year and i don't want to insult her personally, she is a nice and pretty woman, but she was playing pretty bad and donating chips. This was very deep in the ME, so it's not like she didn't care.

Her bustout hand was calling a raise for like 15-20% of her stack with QJo and then shipping almost 4 times the pot after the original pfr checked the flop (the flop was 9Tx, so it wasn't that awful, but her betsizing gave it away and she was called by 77). She made some other spewey moves as well and blew away a very good stack.

So, once again - not trying to disrespect her as a person, but there is no way in hell she is even in the top 100 of the best female players in the world.

softplaying in cash games isn't right if there is a max buyin. Say $5/$10 (no 300 raise) w a max buyin $2,000

Player A has $2500, Player B has $3000. Checking down pots in this situation is bull****

EDIT: It isn't EVER right IMO. Could you imagine the outcry if poker strategy friends checked down their hands in an online game? As a side note, one of the most enjoyable sessions I played at my local casino was when a husband/wife (both very recreational players) were playing. If they got into a pot together the husband went balls to the wall trying to bluff his wife since he knew she was weak tight. Made for some interesting hands having that "leveling" factor. Maybe you should try playing poker against your GF, it is quite enjoyable thinking on many levels and trying to mind-**** somebody you know.

maybe if you weren't so ignorant and done your research, posts from the year 2000 regarding the legitimacy of online poker have been discredited from numerous statistical tests.

but no, you're still stuck in that mindset and from how you seem to believe things in the world are only your way or no way, there is no reasoning with you

Well, Looking at a few hands isn't going to tell you much, If they saw the pot I played with you , most people would think I was a donkey if they didn't know why I made the play. Claudia played great in the event & I think she only did a couple of things wrong that I recall. She does get emotional & tilty & she atually went off on day 5 & made a horrible play & got lucky, I chewed her out over it, but day 6 the only thing she did wrong was not manage the brackett inside 100 players with a lower variance game. She was still trying to chip up & win the thing. She looks at it from chip EV standpoint & is just a matter of experience. Its a big stage at that point in the tourney & it takes a lot of heart to make the right plays. She played the last hand correct except that I wished she would have folded it since she was close to the next bracket, It was marginal. But she flatted qj on the button, with the antes, position & her reading ability it was fine. The raiser actually bet the hand & she moved over the top, I was watching, And he made a really strange call I thought with 77 as the best shape hes in is 2 over & a gut normally.

She's played cash games & NL & plo with a lot of the best players & always wins, but they do come after her.

She made an unbelievable play on day 6 with a k5 off against pius heintz on a read after he raised utg, she was in BB. She 5 bet him head up & he finally 6 bet her in & she had to fold, but he showed a 9, So just great poker , but she can play with anyone .

LOL, super bad luck, indeed. Do you ever actually put anyone on a GOOD hand, then fold, or do you just do the standard tourney donk line of "put your opponent on a hand you can beat, then call"? I keep seeing these examples of you and your GF making these ridiculous plays because you never seem to think anyone ever has anything, yet even when they don't have much, they still crush your hand. I pretty much look weak every hand I play, just so guys like you will over-think it and call off bad. Any corroborated instances of you actually making a big fold ever?

He checked, i am 100% sure of it. I was at the table. If he bet, shoving over the top would be standard there. Although, preflop is still bad with her stack.

There is a lot of value in being the last woman standing, btw, and by that point only 2 other women were left in the field.

In the last hand claudia played the flop was 4 9 10 & she had QJ, he called with 77 after betting & getting raised in, so she was actually ahead in the hand. With a short stack there & antes in the pot, QJ flat on the button is not a bad play , there's obviously not much left in implied odds against her playing a marginal hand since shes short.

Yet again, you show just how clueless you are by saying that softplaying is only cheating in a tournament, then contradicting yourself with an incorrect analysis of an example of it in cash games.

Color me surprised you don't understand the intricacies of implicit collusion.

Gabe, i am 100% sure the guy checked and Claudia shipped around 700k into 200k pot. I was playing at that table + i had wagered a last longer bet before the ME, 7 guys (hellmuth, cunnigham etc) vs all the women, so i was watching really closely.

Preflop can't be good with 20-40k blinds + 5k ante. She has 20bbs and only 6.5m, how is it correct to flat, even IP, against an early position raiser, especially with a aggro swedish guy in the blinds?

Not to mention, that the raiser is french older dude and those guys don't like to fold, so she pretty much has to hit the flop to win a pot.

You are right, that you can't always judge a player from few hands. But there are fundamental mistakes, which can be spotted right away and she made a least 2 or 3 during the time we played together.

She has potential though, she is agressive and fearless + being a pretty female, she can get a great deal from one of the sites, if she ships something.
That being said, she has A LOT of improving to do.

We cover everyone at the table & always rebuy if we lose a pot , Everyone want's us to check it down anyway to get the hand over quicker, No one wants to sit & watch us drag a hand out , It is actually a big disadvantage since there's always a showdown & everyone sees what we are playing.

Well, neither of us play an orthodox strategy because we are watching tells, so a math determination of whether or not a certain hand was played correctly would never work. We flat certain hands in position that others wouldnt. Shes been killing these online kids in the cash games, we can all improve, but shes as good as anyone I play with for sure. A couple of years ago she was playing 50 100 200 PLO with ben roberts, david williams, devilfish & several other top PLO players & winning everyday. Shes much more experienced than you think

Does anyone else think it's ironic that All Talk complains bitterly about some alleged cheating online (which has no evidence for) but goes on to openly admit to routinely softplaying with his partner during live play?

We actually reverse cheat Daliman, its a huge disadvantage to us to check it down because everyone sees our showdown hands, but after being together for 6 years & playing everyday, I don't care anything about playing her in a head up pot. we just want to get to the next hand