Maybe I'm a little bit less of a beginner than this sub is intended for, but I'm still trying to master ABC poker. I'm really looking to get good enough to play 1/2 live (and eventually 2/5) and earn money at those stakes. However, I do not feel I am good enough yet to do this and do not feel very confident in some areas of my play. I am thinking of picking up a book such as the grinders manual if it would help me improve my play (shot in the dark, but does anyone have an old copy they'd be willing to give away?

I feel as if I'm better than the significant majority of people here at 5nl but sometimes make bad decisions by calling too much or choosing bad spots to bluff off my stack that causes me to be a breakeven or barely winning player at these stakes

I've played 1k hands of 10nl, 10k of 5nl, and 6k of 2nl (currently at 5nl exclusively)

Areas of my game I am not confident in:

1. What to do against 3 bets when I am out of position against people with 8%+ 3 bet percentage

2. I am confortable cbetting, but less comfortable on when to call cbets, and when to check raise them against regs.

3. Uncomfortable defending my blinds

4. Playing against LAGs in general


Does anyone have any advice or resources regarding these?

Also, here are my stats:

https://imgur.com/a/eq9cKzx

1. It might help if you filter your HUD for the biggest pots you've lost in these spots and then go over some of the hands you feel you played badly or were confused in (not KK v AA or AK v KK i.e standard spots)

2.As far as check raises go, at 5NL I wouldn't worry about working MP v BTN or CO xrs unless you have very specific reads on players. As far as when you want to xr, generally they are useful v someone who overcbets (over 60% over a decent sample and definitely over 70%) when you have a range advantage (lower boards or paired lower boards bb v mp). I.e a board like 976r bb v mp, you're going to have at least 60 value combos, so you're going to want to have a good chunk of 8x that you bluff xr and go for 3 with, as if you have an 8x hand, you basically ensure that they only have 3 combos of the straight whereas you could have 15 straights and you can even fold out overpairs on the river even if rest of the cards are bricks.

3.Generally tighter is better, you just need to have the right 3b range v different positions

The little bit of cash I've played was fairly soft, but take what I say with a grain of salt, because I grind tournaments. Anyway, there is a ton of material out there that I'm sure is going to be better than reading a book. Start there. If you want to be able to make money doing this (even as a side thing, which most people will recommend to you, at least starting out), then invest actual $ into getting better. You can get an essential membership for like $20 at Runitonce.com or you can get something similar at upswingpoker.com . I'm sure both will help you leaps and bounds to become more comfortable in spots you're not sure of.

Also, 17.5k hands is not very many hands. glgl

1) Usually just fold anything speculative. A lot of players at 5nl/10nl get caught up in preflop wars - if you're 4bet bluffing into someone without a fold button all you're doing is building a huge pot - out of position - with a weak hand.

Remember that most of the time you have a very small sample on your opponents. A guy could look like a 3bet warrior but really he's had AA/KK a few more times than expected.

2) Facing cbets is a huge topic. You'd probably be best posting individual hands.

You mentioned check-raising - make sure you have a plan for the rest of the hand once you start adding that into your game. It's easy to barrel off stacks after you c/r simply because a laggy player is annoying you!

3) You can defend very tight vs UTG/HJ and not lose out on much ev. Be more inclined to defend suited connectors or 1-gappers if you want to widen your defending range - hands like Axo can be real trouble hands vs the early positions.

Defending vs a steal is more complicated - generally defend quite a bit wider vs a minraise than vs a 3bb open. The Grinders Manual is quite good at breaking down different steal situations, especially how to construct 3betting ranges.

4) As mentioned above it's easy to label someone as a LAG when really they've just been getting good hands (or they had 15 minutes of tilt etc). Either way, the worst thing you can do is over-adjust. If someone's really getting out of line a typical solid game will get their money eventually, don't try to fight spewy aggression with more aggression.

Overall stats look pretty good (much better than I usually see in BQ threads like this). I think variance in the small sample is probably having a bigger effect on results than any obvious leaks. 5NL can be a bit annoying because it's often full of ABC regnits that are hard to crush (they don't pay off your big hands), and doesn't contain anywhere near as many complete newbies/fish.

You should mostly fold to 3-bets when you're OOP (e.g. fold AQo), but can 4-bet JJ+/AK and mix in a few Axs combos. How you run in the 3b/4b pots can have a significant effect on small samples, so it's not uncommon even for 5bb/100 winners to have breakeven/losing spells of 20,000 hands or more.

After a quick glance I think 25/18 is a slightly larger gap than is ideal, and your 3bet% was only 6.something. I think if you 3bet slightly more (8-11ish%) in places you normally flat your vpip/pfr will be more ideal. Just don't spew in those extra 3bet pots.

I have been neglecting cbetting in position (for example out of button) and instead flatting with the idea of outplaying my opponent. And yes, I've been trying to tighten up somewhat and get my VPIP down to like 22 or 21 to be a true TAG.

Should I still flat suited connectors and stuff out the button? What are some good 3 bet hand candidates out of the button? A2-A5s. A10o, QJ suited?

I'd mostly 3bet the sc if you choose to play them (ideally vs CO) ATo is a fold. Axs is good along with the QJs KJs type hands. If you flat 22-66 vs an open then I'd start almost always folding those. TT-AA should obviously usually be 3bet w/ TT or maybe JJ sometimes flatting vs a tight EP open. Basically I rarely flat.