Reviewing Your Session

One of the more difficult things about poker is figuring out how to improve. Reading books, watching videos, talking to friends, hiring a coach, and similar activities can certainly help, but one of your most useful tools is open-mindedly reviewing your sessions. Asking yourself, “What did I do wrong?” or “How could I have figured that out?” can greatly accelerate your self-improvement.

Thinking and planning away from the table is vital to improving your game. While playing, you rarely have the luxury of extended periods of time to work out the best play. If you consider your options later, you will be much better prepared the next time a similar situation happens.

Here is a hand I played recently in a Bellagio $40-$80 limit hold’em game. Let’s look at how I played it and then what I worked out later.

Background: I had been playing with this cast of characters for a couple of hours now, and had reached some conclusions. In particular, the guy two to my right (“Mr. Action”) had been raising with some surprising hands, to say the least. He had won with a J-6 suited and a 10-5 suited, and had open-raised with both from middle position. I had not held much when he raised, but I was anxious to three-bet him when I had any excuse.

Finally, I had a red A-7 offsuit on the button, and he open-raised. I three-bet, and we were heads up on the flop of Q 8 4; not my favorite, but he checked, I tried a bet, and he folded. I love it when a plan comes together.

The hand: An orbit later, I was in the cutoff, and again Mr. Action open-raised. This time, I held the legitimate three-betting hand of pocket eights, and I three-bet. However, this time, the button, a fairly tight stranger, cold-called, as did the big blind. Mr. Action also called.

I was not that worried about the big blind. A couple of days earlier, he had called three bets cold from the big blind twice — once with the 8 2 and once with the 8 4. On the former, he made a flush, and on the latter, he withstood a barrage of raises on a 6-4-2 flop to river an 8 and take down a large pot.

Back to this hand, four of us saw a flop of A 9 2. Both the big blind and the original raiser checked to me. I was unhappy to see an ace in four-way action, and elected to check. The button checked, as well, so we saw a free turn card, the 7. The big blind checked again, but this time, Mr. Action bet.

I was very suspicious of this bet, and just didn’t like the way that he looked when he put the chips into the pot. This is hard to describe, but he did not act confidently. Instead, he looked somewhat frightened and unsure. With this evidence, I decided to call, and the others folded.

The river brought the K. Mr. Action checked. I saw no reason to bet, so I checked behind him. He flipped over the K 5, and much to my disappointment, he took the pot with his pair of kings.

Analysis: It is easy to write this hand off as a bad beat. My opponent hit a miracle three-outer to win the pot. And it certainly happens that you play a hand properly and your opponent gets lucky. That’s poker.

Nevertheless, it is important to look at every hand played, to decide if you could have made better decisions. Let’s look at mine.

My preflop play was fine. I would be happy to three-bet Mr. Action with much worse holdings than two eights.

My flop check was questionable. With the ace staring me in the face and three opponents, two of whom had called three bets cold preflop, I wanted to see the action on the flop and turn before I committed chips. However, the preflop calls by the other two players may have been induced by the proximity of this three-bet to the previous one. Players get suspicious when the same sequence recurs.

It is likely on this hand that a flop bet would have won the pot for me. If not, the bet could have better defined the situation that I was facing for a small price. After all, there were already more than 12 small bets to be won, and if my eights were ahead, they were certainly vulnerable.

My more important error was on the turn. After Mr. Action bet, I was determined that if he bet again, I would also call the river. With that being understood, I should have raised the turn. That play might mimic my holding a hand like A-K or even A-A. A turn raise might even get a hand like 10-10 held by one of the players behind me to fold. My play of calling when I should have recognized the raise-or-fold situation was passive and weak. I was too fixated on the plays of Mr. Action, and was not thinking correct poker strategy.

Conclusion: I did get unlucky in the hand, but I also made strategic errors — one minor (in my view) and one major. If you simply focus on your luck, you will not realize the errors that you may make, and take steps to correct them.

I know better than to play like this, but my attention was diverted by a single player. If I get another chance to play a similar hand, I will be better prepared to think and act correctly by virtue of this self-analysis.

This activity is not fun. It is far easier to blame the poker gods than to blame yourself. But the poker gods will not help you play better in the future. Only you can do this, and realistic self-analysis is an essential step toward self-improvement. ♠

Barry Tanenbaum is the author of Advanced Limit Hold’em Strategy, and collaborator on Limit Hold’em: Winning Short-Handed Strategies. Barry offers private lessons tailored to the individual student. Please see his website, www.barrytanenbaum.com, or write to him at [email protected].