Quote:
Originally Posted by pokahpaul
also, not to pick on you Pokey, but can you give me an analysis on my game too??? just like you did for aceofspades????? I'D REALLY APPRECIATE IT!! =P
Say the devil's name and he appears....
I don't use HEM, but it seems pretty easy to interpret.
First off, some numbers of yours that I would like to see, because they tend to help people spot leaks:
1. W$SF. The "Won Money When Saw Flop" number indicates how effective you are with your overall aggression, especially when combined with WtSD and W$SD. Based on your other stats, I'd guess your W$SF is somewhere in the high 30s or very low 40s. If it's not, it could indicate a problem: a particularly low W$SF says that you're either not aggressive enough postflop (doesn't look like a problem), not selective enough with your aggression, or too straightforward with your aggression.
2. c-bet %. One of the hardest numbers to balance is your continuation bet frequency: too high and you become exploitable by people who press back light. Too low and you become exploitable by people who call preflop with speculative hands. Since you play so tightly preflop, a good number for you would probably be in the 75%-90% range: you can get away with c-betting more often simply because you raise so infrequently. Of course, selectivity is the key here, as with everything else in poker.
On to the analysis. Here's what I see:
1. You don't seem to be playing a very successful game from the big blind. Specifically, you seem to be overly tight. Now, while I agree that Tight is Right from the blinds in general, 9.4/4.7 really crosses the boundary from "responsibly tight" to "paranoid." To my mind, you should be 3-betting more frequently from the blinds than from almost any other position. Why? Because so often you will be facing a steal attempt by a player who has crap. At $50NL and $100NL, lighter resteals from the blinds are absolute rock-solid gold. Here's how you do it: the hand is folded around to CO or BTN who makes a standard raise. You check, and he steals more than 30% of the time. That tells you he has absolute doggy crap quite often. You look down at "22+, AK, AQ" (NOTE: that's 8.3% of your range, or almost double the amount you've been 3-betting from the blinds so far) and you say "time to go to war." At this point, you three-bet solidly: bump it up to about four times his raise. This will win you the pot immediately a remarkably large fraction of the time. When you are called, that's totally cool, too: now, you c-bet ANY flop, but you c-bet WEAKLY. My usual choice is to c-bet only slightly larger than my original preflop raise. I'm talking 50-60% of the pot size, here. Remember: the pot is already very big and many of your opponents are going to be playing fit-or-fold on the flop. Your c-bet wins the pot about 2/3rds of the time even though you're only putting in a small bet. If you are called, only continue with the hand if you really have something, but just making this preflop/flop play will be enormously +EV for you.
2. You are cold-calling WAAAAAY too much. If I'm reading your stats correctly, when you are faced with a raise you cold call an average of 8.7% of the time preflop. Zounds! I just checked my database ($200NL, but close enough) and of the players that I have at least 3,500 hands on there are exactly three winning players with CC% over 8.00. Three. Out of 741. You do not stand in good company. I'd try to get that number cut to 1/3rd of its current level as a start. Anything over 4% should be worrying you, and anything over 6% should be a leak. (Just to give you a reference, my VPIP and PFR look similar to yours but my CC% is 1.59%, so it really can go QUITE a bit lower.) How do you get it down that low? Easy: don't cold-call. If someone raises in front of you, make a decision: do I like my hand enough to three-bet this? If the answer is "yes," then three-bet. If the answer is "no" then you should fold unless you have a VERY good reason not to. Now, overcalling is a different matter; there are times when a speculative hand (usually a pocket pair, but sometimes a suited connector) does quite well overcalling a preflop raise, but for the most part when there's a raise in front you should be looking to either 3-bet or dump it (almost always dumping it, of course). The beauty of this plan is that when you actually find yourself mixed up in a hand postflop you almost always have the betting lead, and that's a recipe for success. Cold-calling is typically far less successful than reraising, barring an opponent-specific read.
3. Scale back that flop aggro. You seem to be going nutso on the flop. A flop aggression over 6 indicates that you're either trying to pick up entirely too many hands on the flop or you're giving up entirely too easily on the flop (or some combination of both, more likely). Some ideas to improve on this: first, not every flop is stealable. When you complete from the SB and four people see the AQQ flop, you do not have folding equity. As a general rule, people do not believe the blinds have an ace in a limped pot, and in a multiway limped pot someone probably DOES have an ace. Kings are about the same. If there are two broadway cards on the table you won't successfully steal often enough to make it worth trying. If the board is reasonably coordinated (two-tone or all three cards bunched reasonably close like T97 or 975) you probably have little folding equity. The best board to bluff from the blinds is three lowish uncoordinated cards: J73r or some such. Next best is an INCREDIBLY coordinated board heads-up: 654, or JT8 all clubs. Pick your battles. Second, recognize good slowplay opportunities. If you raised preflop with AA and the flop comes A44 you do NOT want to c-bet. Checking behind is more likely to get you two streets of action. You've crippled the deck, your opponent can't catch up, and you'd really like him to find a reason to call. a c-bet just pushes him off most of his hands, whereas a check gives you the chance to milk him on the turn and river. Similarly, if you've got AA and the board is A44 and villain donkbets you, consider a smooth-call. When OOP villains donkbet into my pot I only rarely raise; I'd rather force them to make another extremely difficult decision on the turn. Make it excruciating for them and they're less likely to donk you in the future, which makes your plays easier. Also, if you flop well when someone else was the preflop raiser, you're under no obligation to IMMEDIATELY checkraise. Sometimes you make more money by waiting until the turn to snap off two bluffs instead of just the one. This works best if the board is dry so that you don't run the risk of villain drawing out on you. In position I do this even more often, sometimes slowplaying all the way to the river against an aggressive opponent: if he keeps betting, I keep letting him have the lead. Finally, if your opponent is a calling station or if you think your opponent is otherwise extremely unlikely to fold, consider giving up on the flop if you miss badly. You don't have to always c-bet your 33 just because the board is T97; sometimes it's best to just walk away.