Mind Over Poker

I’d like to share a hand I recently played, because it represents one of those hands that many have told me there was nothing I could have done about it. Personally, I disagree with that assessment, and the fact that the hand came at a critical time made the pain that much worse.

Here was the situation: I was playing in an event at the recent Harrah’s Open in Atlantic City. Eighteen places were paid, and we were down to 16 players. The next step up in pay would be 15th place. However, I wasn’t worried about that. I wanted to win, or at least finish in the top three. I was playing at an extremely tight table. The blinds were 2,000-4,000, with a 500 ante. I had about 36,000 in chips. Because of the tightness of the table, I knew that I could steal a few blinds with a raise of three times the big blind. Even if I ran into resistance when trying this, I needn’t go broke. Of course, I wouldn’t be afraid to push if I needed to do so.

None of the players had terribly big stacks except for the overwhelming chip leader, who was seated to my immediate right. He had about 125,000. The good news for me was that I had position on him, and he was playing extremely tight. He had just gone on a tear with the deck and had won some big pots. However, he was not being aggressive at all. He would bet or raise only with very big hands. Instead of bullying this tight table with his big stack, he was content to play tight.

We had just come back from an hour dinner break, and my plan was to steer clear of our chip leader but be aggressive when he wasn’t in the pot. The very first hand after the break found me on the button. The small blind was not yet back from break, and his hand was dead. Sure enough, the action was folded around to our chip leader in the cutoff. I was hoping he’d fold, so that I could raise. He did not cooperate, however. He made a minimum-raise to 8,000 total. If he was being true to his previous pattern of play, he had a fairly strong hand. I was fairly certain that I was going to fold. I checked my cards, and I had A-10. Against most opponents in this situation, I’d be happy to take them on. However, against this nonaggressive chip leader, I knew that I should let the hand go, lest I get in trouble. I knew that I’d have better opportunities. Even after looking at my hand, I was prepared to fold.

Then, I started thinking about it. Because my opponent was fairly obvious in his actions and I had position on him, I decided to call. I thought he made a mistake in not raising more, and I wanted to take advantage of that. I also glanced at the big blind, and he looked ready to fold. So, I called, and the big blind instantly folded. The flop came 10-8-2 rainbow. It was a perfect flop, or so I thought. My opponent again made a rather smallish bet, putting 8,000 into a 26,000 pot.

I’m obviously not going to fold, and I couldn’t see any value in calling. If he had pocket jacks or better, so be it, I’d be in trouble. However, if he had a hand like A-K, A-Q, K-Q, or K-J, I saw no reason to let him see more cards. And if he was sitting on a hand like K-10 or J-10, I’d be happy for us to get the chips in. So, I pushed all in. He instantly called and turned over J-J. I still had outs, but the board bricked out and I was done.

In hindsight, I think my mistake was getting involved in the first place. There was just no reason to get involved with this guy. You have to know your opponents and look at more than just the cards. Against most players, I would not second-guess my actions here at all. However, this guy was a rock, and I knew that. It wasn’t about trusting my instincts. What it should have been about was using all of the available information and making the best possible decision. Once I called preflop, I was a prisoner to my cards. There was no way that I could have gotten away from that flop, which came about as bad as it possibly could have for me.

David Apostolico is the author of several poker-strategy books, including Tournament Poker and The Art of War. You can contact him at [email protected].