My July 2014 Trip To Las Vegas

My June trip to the 2014 World Series Of Poker did not go well. I busted out in the three tournaments I played in and lost in the pot-limit Omaha cash games as well. However, when a friend of mine offered to give me the opportunity to take a trip back out to Las Vegas in July and play in no-limit hold’em cash games, I decided to have another shot at making some decent money. I am glad that I did!

In my June trip, I spent nearly all my time playing at the Rio, which is the main site for both the tournament and the cash games. In my July trip, I spent about half my time playing at the Wynn and the other half playing at the Venetian. I was really pleased with the ambiance of my surroundings at both hotels. The poker rooms were well run and the dealers nearly all of high quality.

My game of choice for the whole trip was $2-$5 no-limit hold’em. This may sound like a fairly small game — and it is when the vast majority of the players buy in for only a few hundred dollars. But in Vegas during the WSOP, nearly everyone buys in for $500 to $1,500 in the $2-$5 blinds game. It plays much more like a $5-$10 game, sometimes even bigger, with wins and losses of several thousand dollars quite normal. I like playing with small blinds and lots of money on the table. This lets me enter fewer pots and still have a chance at booking a solid win.

I played a lot of no-limit hold’em in the 1980s, but most of the time thereafter, my game of choice for cash games has been pot-limit Omaha. Hold’em games nowadays are a lot different than in the 80s, with more aggressive play. There is more money pressure on you, and more bluffing. How would I do in the new environment, I wondered?

I constructed a game plan for coping with aggressive players. If I played very tight in early position, most of the big pots I played would be with good position. So I avoided playing hands in early position where a raise would drive me out of the pot. Hands such as little pairs and ace-small suited I routinely mucked when in early position. Since nearly all the pots were being raised, this policy made good sense from a money management view, as well as fitting my goal of playing the vast majority of the time with good position.

With my good hands, I often just limped in with a hand that was worth a raise, particularly when holding high-ranking unpaired cards such as A-K and A-Q, especially if I was not suited. Those hands present a problem anyway when you raise and miss the flop, especially when out of position, and they improve only about a third of the time. So maybe I turned down some opportunities that I might have made some money on, but I sure avoided some headaches.

It is seldom that one relishes constantly having money shoved in their face by an aggressive bettor, but what if you have position nearly all the time? And what if you had a good hand most of the time? I was quite happy the way my game plan worked. Even though every once in a while I had a tough decision to make (what poker player does not?), most of the time, the opponents either steered clear of me or I held a good hand. Furthermore, due to my table image, I was able to pick up a lot of pots where I did not have the best hand.

Here is what I think of the younger players, who are more numerous and more aggressive than my 20th-century opponents. Their style of playing a lot of hands, raising a lot of pots, and generally making small continuation bets (c-bets) is very effective in tournament play. It also works well in short-handed and heads-up combat. But it takes a fine poker player to play in that style and do well in a cash game at a full table, especially when there are relatively low blinds for the amount of money in play. Without the pressure of getting ground down in blinds and antes, the hunted becomes the hunter. When you try to win nearly every pot, you seldom have a good hand and are at a disadvantage to the player who can pick his spots against you.

I was in Las Vegas for ten days on this trip, and won every day until the last one, where I dropped $600. One hand in that session was the toughest poker decision that I had to make on my trip, and my error was responsible for a $600 swing. Let me tell you about it.

I picked up two red kings on the button. The under-the-gun (UTG) player limped for $5, a middle position player made it $20, and the next player called. I did exactly what you would have done; raised to a total of $80. The three players who were already in the pot called my raise. Naturally, an ace came on the flop, which was actually A 8 3, putting a spade two-flush on the board. There was $327 in the pot, which was almost exactly what I had left in chips. They all checked. Should I: (A) Go all-in (B) Make a probe bet of around $125 © Check. I thought there was one too many players in the pot and checked my kings. If someone had an ace, I was down to either 2 or 1 outs, depending if someone had a flushdraw. The 9 turn card looked like a blank to me (except for the remote possibility of pocket nines). The first player, who had about the same stack size as I did, now went all-in. The others folded and it was up to me. What should I do?

Before you venture your opinion, you naturally need to ask about the player who went all-in. He was about thirty years old, fairly aggressive, but no loose cannon. He was certainly capable of betting all his chips on a bluff when getting even money pot odds. Would he have checked an ace? I doubted it. He probably had a king or queen kicker for jumping the fence to cold-call a bet of $80. There was a flush draw on the flop. The more I thought about it, the more I felt he would be highly likely to have bet a hand like A-Q on the flop. I called him, and I was right about him not having an ace. But he showed me a big surprise, a hand that he “could not hold” on the betting. He had a 9-8 offsuit for his UTG cold call of $80. The dealer put out a blank on the last card and my opponent raked in a pot of close to a grand.

Change any element of this scenario and it is a different problem. But if this type of situation arose again, I would still be uncertain what to do. It’s a tough hand! ♠

Bob Ciaffone’s new poker book, No-limit Holdem Poker, is now available. This is Bob’s fifth book on poker strategy. It can be ordered from Bob for $25 by emailing him at [email protected]. Free shipping in the lower 48 states to Card Player readers. All books autographed. Bob Ciaffone is available for poker lessons.