NLD

NLD is an acronym that stands for "nice laydown," and it is most often used while playing Internet poker. In poker, making big laydowns is a huge part of being successful. Recently, in the $500 buy-in (with rebuys) no-limit hold'em event at the Horseshoe in Tunica, Mississippi, I was faced with three excruciating decisions; two of the hands were great laydowns and the other was a borderline call. I'd like to take you through these particular scenarios and provide some insight into my thought process.

The first hand is one that I played against my dear friend Robert Williamson III. First of all, let me set the stage a bit. I was playing overly aggressively with my big stack at this point in the tournament, even having to show a 3-2 offsuit when a short stack pushed all in after I had raised and I was forced to call him. Robert, who also had a reasonably large stack, was playing the exact opposite style; he was playing solid poker and not getting out of line at all.

While still stacking a fairly large pot that I had just won, I fired in a raise with pocket jacks on Robert's big blind. Everybody folded around to him and he pushed all in on me. The blinds at this point were $500-$1,000 with a $100 ante. I brought it in for $2,500 and Robert reraised me all in for another 18K. This was obviously a huge decision that I was forced to make, and one that I agonized over for at least five full minutes. Here is how I arrived at a decision; perhaps it will help you if you're stuck in a similar situation. The first thing I evaluated was Robert's perception of my table image. It was clear to me that he had made note of the 3-2 offsuit I had played, and that he also was aware of the fact that I had raised his big blind three of the previous four rounds. It also was very clear to me that he knew I had picked up on the table image he was portraying. In my (perhaps) warped mind, I figured that Robert was waiting in the weeds for me, and I figured that at some point, he would use his tight, solid image to make a big play on me. This seemed like a good spot for him to make his play, so I reluctantly called. I was very surprised when he showed his A-K, and when the flop came down J-J-3, I shook Robert's hand and tried to apologize for making the borderline call. In the past year of playing poker, I have made many new friends, and it always hurts to bust them out, but unfortunately it's part of the game. Sorry, again, Robert – your play was brilliant, as usual.

The next hand I played was against one of my biggest rivals, Billy Duarte. Billy is definitely one of the toughest players on the tournament circuit, and I truly admire him and have learned quite a bit from watching him play. The blinds were $1,000-$2,000 with a $300 ante, I was still playing very aggressively, and Billy was to my immediate left. He had not played a single hand against me up to this point, and was playing the same tight, solid style as Robert. I also suspected that he might have been waiting for an opportunity to make a big play on me at this point.

Everyone folded to me in the cutoff seat, and I raised it to $5,000 with pocket queens. Billy glanced at his hand, grabbed some chips, shook his head very discreetly, looked back at his hand, and then announced that he was moving all in for 45K. Both blinds folded and it was another 40K for me to call. I had 75K in chips at the beginning of the hand. At first, this seemed like an automatic call. If I called and lost, I would still have 30K, which was about average at the time, and if I called and won, I would have a 2-1 chip lead on the second-biggest stack in the tournament with about 55 players left. I took my time and started to wonder what type of hand Billy could have in this spot. The more I thought about it, the louder the alarm bells in my head rang. I knew that Billy didn't want to tangle with me. I knew he would smooth-call my raise if he had A-K and position on me. I also concluded that he thought I would never be able to put him on aces or kings in this situation from the way he played it.

After about five minutes, I was approximately 92 percent sure he had me beat. Before making my final decision, I did consider a couple of other factors. One thing I took into consideration was my dominant stack at the table and the flow of the game at that point. I had been building my stack consistently without much confrontation, and was winning lots of blinds and antes. I was pretty sure I was beat anyway, and decided not to gamble. I folded the queens faceup and begged Billy to show his hand. He showed me the A and I muttered something like, "If you don't show me the other card, I'll jump into the river!" He then flipped over the A. Making a great laydown like that had a huge effect on me. It boosted my confidence and proved to myself that I was in the zone.

The next hand I want to share came up shortly after my hand with Billy. The blinds were now $1,500-$3,000 with a $400 ante. I still had about 75K and raised to 8K with pocket jacks. Billy smooth-called my raise from my immediate left and Jeremy Tinsley called the 5K more from the big blind. The flop came 7-2-2. Jeremy checked and I bet 14K into the 29K pot. Billy quickly folded and Jeremy raised it to 28K. "Now, how in the world can I fold two jacks in this spot?" I spouted out. I thought through the possible hands Jeremy could have in this spot, and narrowed things down to A-2 suited or A-7 suited. At this point, I had Jeremy covered only by about 10K. Once again, I was faced with an extremely tough decision. Jeremy is an incredible player, and I had no intentions of getting involved in a big pot with him. At this point of the hand, I assumed that Jeremy had read me for having a big pair, and he was check-raising to induce a reraise. I figured that if he held the A-2 and put me on a big pair, he didn't think I would be able to fold it. Also, this would be a smart play for him, because if I did indeed have a hand like J-J or Q-Q and he just called me on the flop, an overcard to my pair on the turn would scare me off and he wouldn't be able to double through me. After I evaluated the situation for what seemed to be an eternity, I decided to put my jacks to sleep. Jeremy, being the gentleman that he is, showed me his pocket sevens for a full house on the flop. Some may think that Jeremy made a mistake by fast-playing his hand in that spot, but I think he played it perfectly. I believe he would have gotten paid off about 95 percent of the time in that situation against other players.

Making these laydowns gave me a great shot with the chips I held to go on to win the tournament. They gave me some confidence and kept me playing great poker that night. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to hang on long enough and didn't really find any hands after the laydowns, but I did give myself a great chance. Congratulations to Anthony Hellmann, who did hang on and won the tournament.