Run it Twice -- Mike Watson'SirWatts' Talks Us Through a Pot-Limit Omaha Hand |
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Mike "SirWatts" Watson is a 24-year-old professional poker player who makes his living traveling the tournament circuit and playing cash games online. He has accumulated just under $2.3 million in tournament winnings, which include a World Poker Tour win at the 2008 Bellagio Cup IV, but when he's not 
competing in a live event, he's can usually be found playing pot-limit Omaha or no-limit hold'em online at stakes anywhere from $25-$50 to $500-$1,000. Watson is also an instructor for Card Player Pro, a poker video training site.
The Game
Date: March 6, 2009
Type: Cash game (Half pot-limit hol'd'em/half pot-limit Omaha)
Game: Pot-limit Omaha
Blinds: $500-$1,000
The Lineup
Seat 1: trex313 ($24,483.50) --- sitting out
Seat 2: luckexpress10 ($74,892)
Seat 4: SirWatts ($66,998) --- $500 small blind
Seat 5: Gus Hansen ($59,997.50) --- $1,000 big blind
Seat 6: Patrik Antonius ($64,500)
Run it Twice -- Review of the Hand
Preflop Action: It folds around to SirWatts in the small blind, and he raises to $3,000 with K
K
5 4
. Gus Hansen calls. The pot is now $6,000.
Kristy Arnett: Gus is known for his aggressive style. What kind of player is he in a blind-versus-blind situation, and what considerations were you taking when deciding your preflop action?
Mike Watson: Definitely Gus is the kind of guy who is going to defend a lot of hands in position, as he probably should. He’ll reraise me a little bit, as well. Not a crazy amount, but he’ll be looking to three-bet his better hands. In this situation, I have pretty decent cards to go along with my Kings. I’ve got hearts and also connectors as my side cards, so it’s a pretty strong hand, one that I’m pretty much always going to be raising from any position in a five or four-handed game like this. It’s definitely a really standard preflop raise for me here.
Flop Action: The flop comes 8 7 6
. SirWatts checks, and Hansen bets $4,000. SirWatts check-raises to $18,000. Hansen calls. The pot is now $42,000.
KA: You flop a straight, and a flush redraw. How does that redraw affect your decision-making on the flop?
MW: If I didn’t also flop the second-nut-flush draw, I’d have to play the hand kind of cautiously, but because I had it to fall back on, I decided to play it a little bit more aggressively.
KA: So when you checked the flop, you were planning on a check-raise?
MW: Yeah, that was the idea. It was a pretty coordinated flop. Against a guy like Gus, if I miss, I’m giving up on this type of flop pretty often when I’m out of position. It would just be too hard to fight the pot away from him.
KA: By missing the flop, do you mean that after the flop, the only hand you have remains the pair of kings?
MW: Right. I might fire one bet with just the kings, but a lot of the time, I would even be checking, hoping he’d check behind. It’s just such an ugly board to try and play out of position, because there are just so many ways he can already have me beat, and if he doesn’t have me beat and I bet and he calls, I’m going to hate most of the deck that comes on the turn. It is definitely a board I’m just going to be giving up on a fair amount of the time with a big pair. I do balance that by sometimes checking a monster here. Sometimes I’ll check just a draw and go for a check-raise on a semi-bluff. In this case, though, it’s weird because this is another spot where I have a made hand, and I have a draw, like the hand we talked about before [in a previous Run it Twice article]. That time I went for pot control, but here I wanted to play it more aggressively.
When I check to him, he’s probably aware that I’m giving up a lot when I check a board like this, as I said I would with a pair of unimproved kings. Gus is certainly aggressive enough to stab at it with quite a lot of hands. I just want to give him a chance to throw in a bluff. The bottom end of the straight is going to be the best hand most all of the time, and if it’s not, then I have the flush draw to fall back on. There are a lot of worse hands that he’s going to be willing to put money in with, too. He’s not going to be folding the nut-flush draw necessarily, or if he flopped a set, he’s probably going to go with it, too.
I was sort of hoping that a check-raise on the flop after being the preflop raiser would be a bit of a weird line in a lot of peoples’ eyes. Usually, when people flop a good hand after being the preflop raiser, they just continue betting as they would with any other hand. I was hoping it would confuse him a little bit. It’s the classic line players take in no-limit hold’em when they are the preflop aggressor and flop a draw. They want their opponent to put a little more money in the pot before they make their semi-bluff.
Against someone like Gus, I pretty much just want to go with this hand on the flop as much as I can because I don’t want to get into a situation where I’m check-calling and I don’t know what cards are good, what cards are bad, and so on. I’m going to play it in a way soas to maximize the amount of money I can get in when he has a worse hand, and if he has me beat, I’m probably going to go broke anyway. I can definitely get it in against a set, possibly two pair, a straight draw, or a lower flush draw, something that I have crushed. I think there’s definitely enough value in trying to get it all in. That was basically my thought process on the flop.
KA: Did it surprise you when he just called your raise?
MW: Yeah, it’s kind of strange. On a board like that, I would normally expect him to just put it all in on the flop if he had a really big hand, but a the same time, it’s possible he’s letting me bluff again if he has the nuts. He might be hoping that I’ll just bluff off my stack if I happen to have blockers like a pair of nines or tens in my hand.
KA: What exactly do you mean by making plays with blockers?
MW: So, it’d be a play where since I have two nines or two tens in my hand, it’s likely he doesn’t have them or the nuts, so it gives me leeway to try and represent the nuts.
Turn Action: The turn is the Q. The board reads 8 7 6 Q. SirWatts bets $42,000, and Hansen calls $38,977.50 all in.
KA: You continue with the aggression on the turn. Why all in?
MW: At that point, I’m pretty much committed to the pot, anyway. When he just called on the flop, it kind of looked like he had a weak draw that he didn’t really want to go with, but he wanted to see another card. He could have just the naked nut-flush draw and want to peel once. Sets are still in his range, as well as the two-pair and straight draw type hands. If I check, I’m not check-folding my hand. It’s a spot where if I’m beat, I’m going to lose all my money anyway, so I have to bet for the times I have the best hand or when he’s drawing.
River Action: The river is the Q. The board reads 8 7 6 Q Q. SirWatts shows K K 5 4 for an eight-high straight. Hansen shows K 9 5 4 for a nine-high straight. Hansen wins the pot of $199,993 (including $2 for rake).
KA: Looking back at the hand, do you feel like there was anything you would have done differently or is it just one of those hands that you have to lose?
MW: No, I’m happy with out how I played it. I think it’s just an unlucky spot.
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