Hand 2 Hand Combat -- Corwin Cole

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Event: World Poker Tour Festa al Lago main event
Players: 368
Buy-in: $15,000
First Prize: $1,411,015
Stacks: Corwin Cole – 65,000 Villain1 – 62,000 Villain2 – 48,000 Jon “pokertrip” Friedberg – 69,500
Blinds: 200-400

Craig Tapscott: It’s early in a major event and the starting-table dynamics are very important. Set that up for us.

Corwin Cole: We’re 10-handed, and the relevant players are:

Villain1: He’s a complete fish, very loose and very spewy, hemorrhaging off a lot of chips but winning them back by also running very good.

Villain2: He’s playing almost identically to Villain1.

Myself: I’m playing fairly aggressively, but not too loose, due to four good players having position on me. I’ve been winning solidly so far, having shown down a full house to win a big pot from Villain1 recently.

Jon “pokertrip” Friedberg: I don’t know who he is at the time. I only know that he is a competent online tournament player. He has been playing very tight and honest so far.

Villain1 and Villain2 limp in from under the gun [UTG] and UTG plus one, respectively. Cole limps in with the A 2 from middle position. Friedberg raises to 2,400. Villain1 and Villain2 call.

CT: From your CardRunners videos, I know that you always have a plan. So …

CC: I figured that Friedberg was likely to have a strong hand, such as a medium to big pair, a big ace, or a couple of suited Broadways. He’d been tight and honest, and it would be a waste of his time to bloat the pot with a weak or speculative hand, because he had no possibility of winning without seeing a flop. Both of the loose players in front would be showing up with wide ranges of weak hands.

CT: What additional read do you have on the situation to go ahead with your suited ace?

CC: I had to examine the types of boards that I could hit, and what I would want to do with my hand when I did. If nothing but an ace came, I figured there would be a good chance that I had outdrawn Friedberg, with him likely to be holding something like J-J. Yet, he could have some bigger aces, too. I estimated that I would have only a minimal loss against Friedberg when I hit an ace. Similarly, both of the loose players in front of me were playing with their cards effectively faceup, consistently making it obvious what they had.

If I flopped big, two pair or better, I figured that with three other people in the pot, one of them was likely to have a big hand already, and with two of them being loose and spewy, it seemed like a good spot for a big payoff. I was optimistic about my ability to win a big pot if I flopped a monster. Part of this came from my relative position in the expected flop action.

No matter what came on the flop, it would be very likely that the two loose players would check, I would check, Friedberg would bet with his strong hand, and either or both of the loose guys would stick around with a bad hand. At that point, I could raise it and make it easy to play for a big showdown and win a lot of chips, if I had the right flop to merit that plan.

Finally, if I missed the flop completely, I could still win a nice pot. If the board looked very dangerous for a hand like Q-Q, Friedberg would be unlikely to handle much pressure.

Cole calls.

Flop: A 8 7 (pot: 10,200)

CC: If Friedberg had a good pair lower than aces, he would likely bet once and check twice. If he had an ace with a good kicker, he would likely bet twice and check once.

Villain1 and Villain2 both check. Cole checks. Friedberg bets 4,600. Villain1 and Villain2 fold.

Cole calls 4,600.

CC: If I was faced with a bet on the turn, I would fold unless I had picked up a flush draw. If the turn improved my hand, bringing an ace or deuce, I would lead out as a value-bet, since I wouldn’t expect Friedberg to be bluffing if I checked. Finally, if we both checked the turn and the river was unlikely to have made Friedberg two pair or better, I would check-raise against a small bet, because I figured that he would fold A-10 to A-K if I represented that much strength.

Turn: 5 (pot: 19,400)

CC: The 5 completed a possible open-end straight draw for 9-6, which I could have, in Friedberg’s eyes. That encouraged me to proceed as planned and check-raise bluff a lot of rivers if we both checked the turn.

Both players check.

River: 9 (pot: 19,400)

Cole checks. Friedberg bets 7,100. Cole raises to 19,800.

CC: Putting him on a hand like A-Q and figuring that I could easily represent a variety of better hands, I raised. This bet made it fairly cheap for him to call, but I was trying to make him fold hands that should look like garbage versus the action throughout the hand. I didn’t think that I needed to make it expensive, given the exact type of hand that I wanted him to fold. After several minutes of deliberation …

Friedberg calls.

CC: I immediately flipped over my A 2 as if it were the nuts, because that’s what I always do, even if I obviously get caught bluffing. Friedberg flipped over the 9 8 for two pair.

Friedberg wins the pot of 59,000.

CT: Where did the plan take a wrong turn? Can you re-evaluate your thinking for us?

CC: Before the flop, I thought Friedberg couldn’t possibly have a hand like 9-8 offsuit. If he can have hands such as this, he can also have some hands with a 6 in them, which would mean that I was trying to bluff against a straight on the river some of the time, and I was also trying to bluff against two pair substantially more often. All of that makes my plan awful, before the flop and all the way through. Today, I am still baffled by his preflop raise and don’t agree with it at all, but it did cause me to make one simple mistake that snowballed into an enormous spew of chips. I think my play would be correct if and only if my read had been correct.

During the dinner break, I discussed the hand with Jimmy “Gobboboy” Fricke. He commented that he thought it was one of the worst hands he’s ever heard in his life, and was surprised when I told him that I had played it. I explained my reasoning to him. He pointed out that I had underestimated the propensity of Internet tournament players to make “hero calls.” If I had actually thought my raise on the river to 19,800 would make Friedberg fold A-K, I was inexperienced in trying to run substantial bluffs on players like Friedberg, and needed instead to either make a much bigger bluff or not bluff at all.

Corwin Cole works as a poker coach and video producer for CardRunners. He teaches no-limit hold’em theory and strategy for both tournaments and cash games, with a variety of approaches. His fundamentals emphasize adaptability, creativity, and maintaining confidence.