The Live Grind

Last week I played at a local poker house in a $1-$2 NL game. It's always a somewhat strange experience, given how frequently I play online 6-max, to sit in a full ring live game. My strategy and style of play is calibrated to online shorthanded games, so I find myself making some big mistakes in these games. Here are the biggest ones:

1) Not noticing stack sizes

This is easy to do for several reasons: One, there is no little number floating over each player's head showing the exact size of their stack (waiting for the software upgrade on that one). Two, the game is slow, such that when you wake up and find yourself in a hand, you often haven't taken a good look at each player's stack in some time. And three, it isn't all that easy to look at someone's stack and determine exactly how much they have.

As a result of this mistake, I've found myself trying to steal pots from committed opponents. I've also made bad calls due to miscalculated implied odds.

2) Firing multiple barrels against calling stations

The 1-2 games I play are dominated by people who want to spend a couple of hours playing poker. This means playing a good number of hands and seeing a lot of flops. It also means sticking around in a lot of hands, whether it be wise or not. I donked off a decent portion of my stack double-barrelling in 2 different spots. One on a K-high board against a loose fish with K-8o, another on an A-high board against a guy with A-5o. The lesson against most of these players is simple: value bet them to death, and if you want to take a stab at an orphaned pot, one stab will do.

3) C-betting too much

This is a corollary to problem 2), accentuated by the fact that, even in a raised pot, there are usually 4 or more players calling and seeing the flop. As a result, when you miss the flop, unless it is a super-dry flop, it is likely that someone got a piece. In general, the C-bet doesn't have the effect that it used to, and in live games, that statement is even more true. So unless it's a 2- or 3-handed flop, I will forego a C-bet on a lot of flops that I would automatically bet online.

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So yeah, I make some common mistakes. Overall, I love these live games. It's always more fun to add in all of the little details of a live game - the chips, the reads, the banter. And, these games are far easier to beat. But, it takes an amazing amount of patience. Grinding these games is really grinding, because these games can be so loose that you are best off waiting for made hands to get paid off.

Some time back, I asked a group of poker-playing friends how I could open up my game to play more loosely, thinking that this would be a good way to adjust my style to try and take advantage of some of the bad players at these games. It's probably fine to try to make a change like that, if I commit to it, and deal with a painful adjustment period and some higher variance. But I have realized that I really just need to stick to a TAG approach to crush these games. Which means long periods with no action, and some night where I play for 4 hours and only have 1 or 2 noteworthy hands to show for it.

To wit: last night, I played 1 big hand early on, then lost a few later in the night by exercising live game mistake 2). Here's the big hand, most notable for my mistake on the flop:

It's a kill pot, so an LP player has posted a $5 blind. My stack is $119. Other significant players in the pot all have me covered. LP is an old man who has been playing loose. SB is weakish too.

Hand: 8h-9h in the BB
PF action: 2 MPs call the $5, the SB raises to $15, I call, the MPs call, and the LP kill pot blind poster calls.
Pot = $75

Flop: Qc-Js-Th
Action: SB leads for $25, I call $25, 2 MPs fold, LP raises to $50. SB calls, I shove for $54 more. LP calls, SB calls.
Pot = $387

Here's where I make a mistake. On one hand, it is risky to overplay bottom straight, given the fact that SB will sometimes have AK here, and K9 is also a possible holding from an LP player. So I call thinking I can sweat the board pairing and get it in on a later street.

But, with this thinking, I am ignoring my stack size. My stack is small enough that I should basically be willing to get it all-in when I flop the 3rd nuts. Also, as noted earlier, these games are full of poor players who will make bad calls with lots of 1 and 2-pair hands, and also with draws that I am way ahead of. So I should be making a raise here, maybe to $65-$80, and planning on getting the rest in on the turn no matter what comes. By just calling, I give a lot of hands the right odds to draw, and with any A, K, or 9 on the turn, on top of any board-pairing card, I risk falling behind and being in a tough spot.

Luckily, the loose LP made a raise and allowed me to get my stack in on the flop. The rest was just sweating it out.

Turn: 5d
Action: LP shoves, SB tanks and folds, saying he had KQ.

River: 7c
I turn up my bottom straight and LP turns up QTo.