Online Poker -- Play Some Hands with Ryan 'gutshtallin' WelchWelch Analyzes Two Hands From His Sunday Warmup Win |
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It took a score of almost $70,000 in January to get 25-years-old Ryan "gutshtallin" Welch to quit his day job in sales in favor of life as a poker player. He played baseball in college at Southern Illinois, so poker was a natural fit for his competitive edge. The score was for taking down the Full Tilt Sunday Brawl on Jan. 27, which is a pretty great way to start off a year as a poker pro. More recently, he made the final table of The Sunday Brawl yet again in October, and then he took down another marquee event, the PokerStars Sunday Warmup, last Sunday, netting him nearly $100,000.
Card Player spoke with Welch after his Sunday Warmup win to analyze two interesting hands from the event.
| Info | PokerStars Sunday Warmup, ninehanded table | Blinds: 1,250-2,500 with a 250 ante |
| Player | Ryan "gutshtallin" Welch | Shaun "shaundeeb" Deeb |
| Stack | 76,754 | 90,016 |
| Hand | 10 9 |
J 8 |
Shaundeeb raises to 6,000 in mid-position and gutshtallin calls from the big blind. The flop comes J 7 3
, and gutshtallin checks. Shaundeeb bets 7,500, and gutshtallin calls. The turn is the 8, and gutshtallin checks. Shaundeeb bets 17,500, and gutshtallin calls. The river is the 5, and gutshtallin leads out for 27,500 (leaving himself 18,004 behind). Shaundeeb pushes all in, having gutshtallin covered, and gutshtallin calls, showing a jack-high straight. Shaundeeb mucks two pair with J 8, and gutshtallin wins the pot of 156,508.
Shawn Patrick Green: What’s the situation in the tournament right now?
Ryan “gutshtallin” Welch: Basically, my stack is pretty average right now, I’d say a little above average. I’m sitting at about 30 big blinds, which, in a tournament like the Warmup, is actually pretty big-stacked, because most of the time players are sitting at around 10-20 big blinds. I’m the third-biggest stack at the table, there are three of us between 30 and 40 big blinds, and everyone else is sitting between 10 and 15.
So, it folds to Shaun Deeb, who is in middle position — the only other name at my table who I recognize is Deeb — and he opens to about 2.4 times the big blind. That is a pretty standard open for Deeb in middle position; I know he’s opening a pretty large range there. It folds around to me in the big blind, and I’m sitting with 10 9. It only costs me 3,500 more to make the call, and the 10 9 is a hand that flops pretty well and allows me to play post-flop. Even though I’m out of position in the hand, I can flop a monster and win a huge pot.
SPG: And if you don’t flop a huge hand, it’s pretty easy to get rid of.
RW: Exactly. It’s one of those hands where if you don’t flop anything, it’s easy to get rid of, but you also have the option of floating if you get a certain texture that’s good for that. It’s just one of those hands where you’re not going to get into a lot of trouble. If you’re calling with an A-7 and the flop comes out with an ace and rags, you’re forced into a tough decision when he bets into you. With 10 9, you’re going to crush the flop, float, or get rid of it. It wasn’t costing me much to call from the big blind, either.
SPG: That’s another point. With a raise of 2.5 times the big blind, it doesn’t seem like that does much to convince the big blind not to call in most cases, is that not true?
RW: I agree with what Shaun Deeb does, because I make most of my raises between 2.4-2.6 times the big blind. A lot of competent players aren’t going to be flatting a huge range of hands out of the blinds, especially out of position. A lot of times the marginal hands, the mid-pairs, and stuff like that are just going to get three-bet from a standard middle-position raise. So, I’m not flatting a huge range of hands. I might flat K-Q suited, or all of my pairs, because I have set-mining odds out of the big blind to hit a set versus an overpair.
But most of the time, I’m not flatting any of my ace-rag hands. I just don’t like getting involved out of position. Deeb will make the same 2.4-times-the-big-blind raise with aces that he will with 8 7. It’s one of those situations where I had a hand that flopped really well, and I decided to call from the big blind, and I really hadn’t defended my big blind at all in the tournament yet at this table. I figured he might slow down, too, if he completely whiffed the flop, and that might allow me to take it away on the turn.
SPG: So, the flop puts out J-7-3 rainbow, giving you a gutshot. You mentioned that, with your kind of hand, you can flop a monster or consider floating. Are you already considering floating, here?
RW: Once the flop comes out with this texture … I don’t know if you can get much dryer of a flop texture than that; J-7-3 rainbow is about as dry as they come. There aren’t any flush draws out there, and no aces or kings, so that eliminates a lot of his raising hands, I’d think, because all of his aces missed, and his K-Q also missed.
So, basically, I decide to float depending on what size flop-bet he makes. Normally, any flop-bet I’m making, and I know Deeb thinks the same way, is usually about half the size of the pot. I’m almost 100 percent positive that he’s C-betting that flop every time. No matter what he has in his hand, with that kind of flop, he’s usually C-betting. I don’t know how much he knows about me, but he should know that I know that he knows [laughs] that he’s going to be C-betting, so therefore I’m going to flat to try to float. Also, I have a gutshot-straight draw and a backdoor club draw, not that you can bank on [the backdoor draw], but it’s something to look at. If I do pick up a club draw on the turn, he may slow down on the turn and check behind, giving me a free shot at the flush and the chance to get paid off by a small pair or other marginal hand.
SPG: What happens if, on the turn, you hit a 9 or 10. Can you play that very aggressively?
RW: It depends. It depends on the size of the bet that he makes on the turn. I don’t think that he’s going to fire two streets without at least top pair, or a hand like pocket tens or pocket nines. If the turn puts out a 9 and he fires a second barrel, I’m probably just going to give up the hand. So, I might lead with my 9 or 10 on the turn, but if he flats, it’s going to be a tough decision on the river. It’s just one of those spots where it’s really going to just depend on what the river brings. I hadn’t played back at him much, and we didn’t have a whole lot of history, so I didn’t think he’d fire a second barrel unless he had a huge hand, because I would play a set like that, as well. A pair of sevens or threes, where I’m just calling from the big blind, flatting his original raise, check-calling his flop bet, and then leading on the turn, hoping for a raise.
SPG: So, you flat-call here, and you end up hitting the nuts on the turn, a straight, with an open-ended straight-flush draw. Is there ever a time when you’re going to be leading out in this situation?
RW: I hit the mother of all cards on the turn. First of all, on the flop, he bet exactly half of the pot; it was about as standard of a C-bet as it could get. On the turn, I hit the exact money-card that I wanted, and my hand is completely disguised. I don’t think he’s ever putting me on calling with a dry gutshot-straight draw. I’m almost 100 percent going to check the turn when I hit, just in case he does have a hand like an overpair, or God forbid a set, he’s going to bet out on the turn. He’d also fire out a second barrel with air; just because I floated on the flop doesn’t mean that he’s not going to fire a second barrel with air, as well. So, I gave him the opportunity such that if he has a hand that I can’t get value from, I might get value from him bluffing.
SPG: You check and he leads out again for about 60 percent of the pot. Your decision here is to check-call or check-raise.
RW: When he bet the turn as strong as he did, at that point I was pretty certain that his range was pretty narrow. At this point, he’s not firing a huge second barrel with air. I mean, I guess he could do it with air, but more often than not, he has at least top pair, if not possibly an overpair still, because he fired pretty strong on the turn.
So, at that point, I decided to just flat-call the turn bet, because I think a player of his caliber, who plays a lot of hands, could possibly get away from top pair or maybe even queens. But I don’t know if he really folds queens if I jam the turn on him; when someone flats the flop and then check-shoves the turn, that’s usually a pretty strong hand, and you’re really not beating a whole lot at that point, especially not with something like A-J or a pair of queens. I didn’t want to give him the option of thinking that he was beat at this point. I wanted to build a pot to where there is so much in the middle on the river that I can value-bet the river and he’d basically have to call, even if he has A-J, K-J, or Q-J.
SPG: And then the river puts out a complete blank, not pairing the board or anything, so you still have the absolute nuts, and you lead out with a value-bet, like you said.
RW: There was 65,500 in the pot when the river came, and I had about 40,000 behind, and he had me covered by a bit more. I decided that I could just jam the river, but I didn’t want to jam the river and have him fold something that had marginal value. I wanted to make sure that I got value on the river from an overpair, or even a pair like pocket tens. If I jam the river, he’s probably going to fold those kinds of hands, but if I value-bet like I did, by betting something like 27,500 into a pot of 65,500, he’s getting huge odds to make that call with top pair, and he almost feels like he has to call because of the way that I’ve played the hand. I played the hand really strangely. I didn’t show any strength at all, except check-calling.
SPG: But isn’t that a different point, though? Against a player like Shaun Deeb, who is definitely competent, does it not send off red flags for you to lead out on the river with a suspiciously value-bet looking hand after having check-called up to this point?
RW: It might, but like I said, I don’t know how much he knows about my play. It might set off alarms, but he did bet the turn pretty strong, so I’m pretty sure that he has some kind of strong holding. If I jam the river, maybe it does look a bit more like a bluff, and I can’t say that that wasn’t the right play, and I might do that play every once in a while. But at the time, sitting with the stone-cold nuts, I wanted to make sure that I didn’t jam and get no value from a hand that couldn’t call a shove but might call 27,500 on the river.
But when he shoved all in, I actually thought that there was a possibility that we were chopping the hand, both holding 10-9. He can’t come over the top of me without basically the nuts, either. So, he flipped over J-8, and it was basically a cooler for him.
SPG: So, the turn was very much your money-card.
RW: He was raising, like I said, a pretty wide range; he raised a J-8 offsuit in middle-position. He hits top pair, I check-call, and then he hits his two pair on the turn. He’s got to think his hand is good. If I had his hand, I’d be jamming me all in, too. You’re only losing, basically, to the nuts in a raised pot. If I have a hand like A-J or slow-played kings or aces, he’s got that beat. There’s no value in just calling; there’s probably more value in the long run to putting me all in, which wasn’t much; it was only like 18K.
Obviously that was a big pot for me to win, because we were basically the two chip leaders at the table, and that exploded my stack to being in about the top 10 in the tournament.
| Info | PokerStars Sunday Warmup, ninehanded table | Blinds: 7,500-15,000 with a 1,500 ante | ||
| Player | TheOldSlyFox | Jorge "twin-caracas" Arias | GravityPilot | Ryan "gutshtallin" Welch |
| Stack | 194,916 | 381,445 | 685,539 | 412,731 |
| Hand | ?-? | ?-? | ?-? | 5 5 |
Twin-caracas raises to 40,000, GravityPilot calls, gutshtallin calls on the button, and and TheOldSlyFox calls in the big blind. The flop comes J 8 7, and all four players check. The turn is the 2, and everyone checks to gutshtallin, who bets 71,000. TheOldSlyFox folds, twin-caracas calls, and GravityPilot folds. The river is the 2, twin-caracas checks, and gutshtallin bets 167,500. Twin-caracas folds, and gutshtallin collects the pot of 323,000.
RW: I think, at this point, we’re down to like the final three or four tables, and I’m sitting with about 30 big blinds, which is still a pretty good stack. I’m third in chips at this table, and the two bigger stacks are on my right.
SPG: A player in mid-position raises to 40,000, about 2.7 times the big blind, and you get one other caller. You’re on the button with pocket fives. Is this pretty obviously a set-mining situation for you?
RW: I don’t really have odds to set-mine, because the original raiser only has 340,000 behind. When the second guy flats the raiser, he has 600,000 behind, but because I have 400,000, he effectively has that. I’m not really getting the best odds to set-mine at all, but in this situation with a raise and a call, and I have the button with a pair, there’s a chance that flop a set, but in the very least I get to play in position. I just decided to flick it in and play a hand in position, regardless of what I held, even though my hand did have some value.
There’s an argument for possibly making a squeeze-play there, making a three-bet to try to pick up the 116,000 in the middle, but what was strange about the hand that kept me from doing that was the flat-call by GravityPilot. When twin-caracas — who is a good player, and one who I recognize; him and bigegypt [Joe Elpayaa] were the only ones I recognized at the table — raises and then gets flatted by another player … I don’t know. If GravityPilot is a thinking player, he can flat with a lot of hands that might call my shove at that point, a hand like pocket tens or jacks. I just didn’t want to make a squeeze and then bust there, because I don’t like three-bet folding at that point with my stack.
So, I decided to flat on the button and play a pot in position.
SPG: And then TheSlyOldFox calls in the big blind, so you take the flop four-handed …
RW: … Which was another strange part about that hand, Shawn. The big blind flatting was also strange because of how short he was. The big blind only had 13 times the big blind. So, he didn’t have a whole lot of chips behind him, and even though it only cost him 25,000, it was strange for him to flick that in, leaving himself with 10 big blinds. So, now we’re in a four-way pot and I have a measly pair of fives, but at least I have the button. This is a really strange position to have to play.
SPG: The flop comes out J-8-7 rainbow, which looks pretty similar to the last flop, so that seems to be pretty dry. Do you rate to be ahead at this point, even versus three opponents and three overcards?
RW: I don’t know if I can say that I think I’m ahead; it’s a pretty dry flop, and there are a lot of hands that twin-caracas would be raising that would miss that flop, but I’m still somewhat worried about GravityPilot. I’m perfectly content giving up with this hand on the flop if either one of them make a continuation-bet, especially if twin-caracas makes a continuation bet with three other people in the hand, I know he wouldn’t bet that with air. But that didn’t happen. It went check, check, check to me on the button.
SPG: So, at that point, do you not see that as your opportunity to use your position?
RW: Well, I may bet there sometimes, but in this position, for some reason, I just didn’t want to C-bet the flop. I thought that my hand had some showdown value, and I know that there are a lot of turn cards that aren’t very good for my hand, but what I didn’t want to happen was to C-bet the flop and get check-raised all in by TheSlyOldFox. If I C-bet that flop and bet 60,000 and he goes all in, I basically have to call him with pot odds. That’s why I didn’t really want to C-bet that flop. If he has a J-10 type of hand that would flat preflop, he’s obviously going to check that flop, looking to check-raise all in with his short stack. I decided to check behind and re-evaluate what happened on the turn.
SPG: The turn puts out a complete blank, the deuce couldn’t really hit anyone, and they all check to you again. When you sent me this hand, you prompted it with, “This was the one of the only really big bluffs I made in this tournament.” At this point, when they’ve all checked to you for a second time on a dry board with a turn that didn’t rate to help anyone, are you really bluffing when you bet out here?
RW: It’s not quite a bluff; I think it’s a value-bet/bluff hand. My river bet is really when I kind of turn my hand into a bluff. When I get on the turn, I thought I had the best hand. But when twin-caracas called my turn bet, he could have possibly been check-calling with a hand like pocket nines and didn’t want to fire a C-bet on the flop in a four-way pot with an overcard out there. Or maybe he has a hand like pocket sixes or 9-8, or even a hand like A-K that I’m ahead of. When it checked to me on the button and he called, it was kind of strange, but there was a flush draw that hit on the turn, so that opened up his range a little bit more to include hands like A 10.
The only reason that I thought that my hand might be a bluff on the river is because now the pot is huge; the pot has officially gotten big on the turn. I bet 71,000 into 181,000, which was basically a probe-bet to see where I was at in the hand. I could get value from draws or even A-K or A-Q that thinks that I’m betting here with garbage because I’m in position. So now there’s 283,000 in the pot after his call.
SPG: The river puts out the 2. You bet on the turn, when he couldn’t have put you on hitting the 2, and now another deuce comes out, and you continue again after he checks to you. Are you telling a consistent story?
RW: There are hands in my range that would very possibly check that flop. I could be flatting with a hand like Q J and hitting a the flop, but I might not always bet that flop. In a four-way pot, there’s a good chance that I’ll check behind for pot control, basically, in case one of them is slow-playing some kind of monster. Sometimes I’ll even check a set there; if I have a pair like sevens or eights, which are certainly in my range for flat-calling on the button, that flop is so dry that it almost certainly hitting my opponents if they’re all checking, so I can check behind for deception, as well.
My reason for betting half of the pot on the river was that even though there was a very good chance that my hand was good and that I could check behind and scoop the pot, I didn’t want to take a chance and have him call with some mediocre hand like sixes or 9-8, something small that has showdown value and has me beat, but can’t really call a large river bet. I needed to scoop that pot, basically. That was one of the key pots in the tournament, as far as my stack; I had already put in 120,000 or so when I only started the hand with about 400,000. So, I put in 25 percent of my chips, and I didn’t want to lose that pot with him flipping over a pair of sixes.
My bet may have been for value, and I’ve seen weirder calls with an A-K hand in that spot, because my line looks weird. My line doesn’t look congruent to a big hand; I could have air there, also. When the turn comes deuce and the river comes deuce, that’s the kind of flop, turn, and river you’re looking for if your unimproved A-K is going to be beating anything. It could have been a value bet, but it’s more likely that he had a missed draw and just decided to fold on the river, so I could have just checked behind. But with the small chance that he had a small pair that had me beat, I decided to go ahead and make a pretty good-sized bet, leaving myself with about 100,000 behind, basically putting him all in. I didn’t think that he could call that river bet without at least a jack, and I didn’t put a jack anywhere in his range at all. I guess he could have made a sick call with a pair of tens and completely owned me, but …
SPG: Thanks for going over those hands with us, Ryan!
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