A Few Omaha Simulations - Part II

In Part I of this column, I discussed the play of a pot-limit Omaha hand. I analyzed my play on all streets, and with the help of computer simulations, I tried to figure out my chances against the most probable hands for my opponents. In this column, I will discuss three more hands, taken from live play.

HAND NO. 1 (POT-LIMIT OMAHA):

A A K 9; ALL IN BEFORE THE FLOP IN A THREE-WAY POT AGAINST THE A A 9 6 AND THE 8F 8 7 7



This is a hand I played a couple of years ago in a small pot-limit game in Vienna, Austria (while visiting my girlfriend, who used to live there). I made it a habit to raise only three times the blind whenever I chose to raise preflop. That is, I never made a pot-sized raise before the flop; I always made this small raise, regardless of position, to build the pot a little with my good hands without giving away too much information. If someone reraised the pot, I almost certainly was up against a big pair (most likely aces), and depending on the texture of my hand, my position, the other opponents, and the depth of the money, I could then decide whether or not to continue in the hand. If someone reraised me when I had a very big hand myself (quality aces or some other hand that I thought was the best), I most of the time reraised the maximum to try to end the pot right there or to put maximum pressure on my opponents, depending on their exact stack sizes, of course. (While this is a pretty good way to play against the rather inexperienced pot-limit players in Vienna, against more sophisticated, aggressive opponents who might also reraise without aces, a different strategy is called for.)



In this hand, I was under the gun with the A A K9. Since I had raised before the flop with all sorts of hands (and therefore wasn't afraid that this action would give away my hand), I raised three times the blind here, also. The player on my immediate left reraised the pot, someone in the middle cold-called this reraise, and the action came back to me.



Reraising once again would get more than half of my stack in before the flop with a hand that figured to be the best, so I did. The player on my left reraised all in, the cold-caller (after thinking for a long time) called all in, and so did I. I had figured the opponent on my left for just big cards at first (he obviously was irritated that I made the same standard raises all the time, and I thought that at some point he would try to raise me off my hand with nothing), but when he reraised me once again, I knew he also had aces.



When we all opened our hands, the cold-caller (with the 8 8 7 7), a very nice and friendly person, said, "Hey, I might not be such a big dog after all." I thought at the time that our chances of winning would be something like this: me (with the A A K 9), 33 percent; Paul, the player with the middle pairs, 37 percent – because his cards were very live; and Hakan (with the A A 9 6), 30 percent. I figured his aces to be somewhat weaker than mine: His flush cards were rather dead and the sevens and eights he might need for a straight were in Paul's hand. Hakan thought (as did most players at the table) that Paul had made a mistake in calling all of these raises, and that our aces were a big favorite over his small cards.



Simulations showed that the opposite was true: Paul was an even bigger money favorite than I thought; his 8-8-7-7 won a whopping 47.1 percent of the time against 29.6 percent for my hand and 23.3 percent for Hakan's – which is food for thought for those who think aces are unbeatable.



Computer simulations like this show that aces can sometimes be very powerful, but also that highly aggressive players who like to play their small and medium cards against someone marked with aces aren't always completely wrong – and, in fact, may sometimes be very right. By the way, Hakan won the pot by making the nut flush in clubs.

HAND NO. 2 (POT-LIMIT OMAHA):

A A Q J; ALL IN ON A FLOP OF K 9 6 AGAINST THE A K J 9



This is another hand I played in Vienna, Austria. I was in the blind (they often play pot-limit Omaha there with one blind only), and everybody had called the initial bet; yes, that's why I love playing in this game. I found the A A Q J, and even though I had established a pattern of making only small raises before the flop, I decided in this case that I would raise the maximum. Since I had a big stack, I thought this might be the time to build a huge pot with this nice hand, even though I was out of position.



(Please note that this was a hand that I played a couple of years ago, and in retrospect, I don't like this maximum raise one bit, being out of position with a very large stack, because I basically announce to the entire table that I have aces.



Good players easily would have taken advantage of someone playing as predictably as this. So, nowadays, I never make a similar big raise in this situation, especially if I would opt for a much smaller raise in all other situations, such as without aces.)



Anyway, we took the flop sevenhanded, and it came K 9 6. I had an overpair, the nut-flush draw, and an inside-straight draw. I thought that with so many draws or made hands possible on this flop, I might need to make the straight or flush (or three aces) to win. Coming out firing, I could expect to get called in a few places, since people over there don't fold easily. With so many dangerous cards possible on the turn, the last thing I wanted was to invest 15 percent or 20 percent of my stack now and then have to release my hand if the turn card might have helped one of my opponents. I decided to check. Everybody checked to the button, who bet the pot, as I expected. He is a very aggressive player who almost always bets the pot after everybody has checked to him, and especially when I am in. I figured that he didn't necessarily have a premium hand, and thought this was a great opportunity to protect my aces by blasting all the others out of the pot, so I made a pot-sized check-raise to try to play the hand heads up against the button. When everybody folded, he called all in, showing the A K J 9 for top two pair. I hadn't expected his hand to be this good, but I figured my hand would still be at least even money against his. (He obviously didn't think so, by the way he reacted after a running pair gave me the pot.)



Replaying the hand on Wilson Software showed the following results (a simulation of 100,000 hands): The win rate for my hand was 55.3 percent versus 44.7 percent for my opponent. My wins were: flush (62 percent), straight (17 percent), two pair (13 percent), trips (5 percent), and full house (2 percent); his wins were: two pair (57 percent), full house (40 percent), and straight (3 percent).



I definitely had made the right decision in playing my hand the way I did after the flop. Even though I want to defend my hand, I don't want to put a substantial percentage of my stack in on the flop when it is probable that I will get called and the turn might easily give somebody else the nuts (or give me the nuts when I might not get any more action). This means that quite often with a hand like this (overpair/nut-flush draw/gutshot draw), you want to put all of your money in on the flop to see the turn and the river, or you don't want to put any money in the pot at all. The only time you're in real bad shape by making this check-raise all-in move is when you're heads up against a set, and even then you are usually not that far behind – especially if the money is not too deep and/or there is quite a bit of dead money in the pot.

HAND NO. 3 (POT-LIMIT OMAHA):

A 8 7 6 VERSUS Q J 10 9 ON A FLOP OF K 9 8.


This is a hand I played in Holland against a dangerous opponent (who had been affected by losing a big pot, however) who came out betting the pot from her big blind on a flop of K 9 8. I had bottom pair, the nut-flush draw and an open-end straight draw on the bottom end. I was on the button, and raising the pot would put me close to all in with a hand that would be a favorite against almost any hand heads up; even against a set, this hand wouldn't be in terrible shape.



Simulations show that my hand is a clear favorite over hers on the flop (61.5 percent versus 38.5 percent), and a pot raise therefore would have been the best course of action – especially since I expected her to have some kind of draw, also.



I decided to just call, however, and raised her all in on the turn (3), even though I hadn't improved. On the turn, she had become the favorite to win (52.5 percent to 47.5 percent); because of the money that was in the pot already, it was still correct for me to go all the way to the river. Still, simulating this hand on the computer showed that I had made a mistake in playing my hand the way I did. Even though playing it the right way – by raising pot on the flop – probably would have yielded the same result (she wouldn't have folded, and I would have gone all in and lost the pot, since I received no help on the river), that's not relevant here. Remember, professional players aren't supposed to think in terms of results. It's making the right decision that's important, not getting the right results, and in this case, there was no denying that I had played the hand very badly.

SOME FINAL WORDS
In this two-part series, I have tried to show you the right way to look at your game and to analyze the decisions that you make at the table. Computer simulation programs and the odds calculator that is available at www.CardPlayer.com have become important tools in this analysis process, and I hope that this series has given you a little insight into how to properly use them.