Swimming out of Venezuelan Hell

Originally posted by Tomaloc

Originally posted by Harrier88
There was a discussion in pleno1's thread on whether it might make sense to raise to 4BB in SB and 3BB in every other position. That's the way I'm currently doing it, and I think it works out all right.

where was that exactly? my first thought is that something is being taken somewhat out of context.
3bb and 4bb are pretty huge sizings to use as default in nowadays games late positions, specially in zoom micros where there is TONS of money to be made by opening super wide against the terribad nits. speaking from experience ♦

Right now I'm betting 3 BB from all positions. I just think less is useless (talking NL5 here, you raise to 0.10 and you aren't encouraging anyone to fold, maybe some of this terribad nits, ofc you have to know the guy is a terribad nit and it takes some hands). And more as I said made my post-flop game bets a little but significantly more costly.
Maybe moving up things change, heard a lot of people min-raising from later positions succesfully stealing, being hard to defend your blinds.
We'll see

Originally posted by Tomaloc
where was that exactly? my first thought is that something is being taken somewhat out of context.

It's on the first page, the 9th post if I counted correctly.

pleno is not actually arguing that one should raise to 4BB on the SB, he's just giving pro's and con's because someone asked about it. I'm personally using 4BB for a SB raise, however, and I think it works fine, as far as I can tell.

I also forgot to mention that pleno thinks that it can make sense to raise to 2-2.5BB on the button, but you can read about yourself.

yeah fair enough, though he did say he doesn't 3x the button. i'm fairly convinced that opening 3x on the button is suboptimal (this is a strong opinion and it's fair enough to disagree) i actually open 3.5x from utg with a rather tight range myself.
i guess that in the end it depends on how you evaluate your edge and how comfortable you are playing wide.

in my nl10 zoom sample, my raise first in from the button is at 85% ♦ that's literally 99% against unknowns who i perceive to be regs and i tighten up against decent regs/unknowns who i perceive to be fish.
my raise first in from sb is also at a ridiculous 75% opening between 2-2.5x and my "sb lossrate" is only -7BB/100

micro regs just have pretty inelastic ranges and fold WAY too much in bbvsb.
the average micro regular is tight, bad and plays face up oop. you can't afford to keep opening that wide as you move up though, specially players stop folding a lot in bbvsb

Originally posted by Harrier88

Originally posted by Tomaloc
where was that exactly? my first thought is that something is being taken somewhat out of context.

It's on the first page, the 9th post if I counted correctly.

pleno is not actually arguing that one should raise to 4BB on the SB, he's just giving pro's and con's because someone asked about it. I'm personally using 4BB for a SB raise, however, and I think it works fine, as far as I can tell.

I also forgot to mention that pleno thinks that it can make sense to raise to 2-2.5BB on the button, but you can read about yourself.

2 BB from the button would be auto-profit if the blinds together fold 57% of the time. If you bet 3 BB from the BTN, the blinds combined must fold 66 % of the time. The equation is Bet / ( Pot + Bet).
The equation assumes you always lose if either blind defends, but in reality you have some equity.

For the two blinds combined to fold 57% of the time, then EACH of them must fold at least 76% of the time.

How often do players defend vs a min-raise from the BTN?

I find they don't defend anywhere close to the amount required for auto-profit, but that is OK, since on the button you are in position, and can take the pot away post flop enough to make a wide range worth while.

In the SB betting larger is OK if it increases your fold equity.
Does it?

If it does, maybe it is OK to raise more.
If it doesn't, then you are taking a bigger pot to the flop out of position.

SO much depends on who is in the blinds.

Interesting discussion...
--VS

Hey mates. Hope you are doing alright, I've been busy going to class, getting home late and tired, not much time to play, but today I wanted to play more than I wanted to rest, so I played 2-table NL10 zoom to get used to what works and what doesn't. Keys: 2.5 raising from the button; call SB raise from BB position, call flop, raise turn worked 7/7 times (good boards).
I was about 2 BI up and lost about 1.5 with QQ v AA preflop.
BR: $305

One of those days... 400 hands -5 BI.. Down to $255.. Everytime I give it a shot my hands are so fucking fry.. 400 hands , pocket queens, they guy has pocket aces; pocket aces, the guy has 2 pairs; 2 pairs, the guy has a straight.. Days of grinding turns to nothing in half hour. Just great

Hey mates, as I've said earlier, I've been going to class lately which leaves me no time to play poker, either I don't have time or I do but I'm too tired to play anyways; so today I've decided I'm going to "gamble" my bankroll (leaving $30 to rebuild in NL2 in case I fail, eventually if I come back to poker) in MTTs in the following 4-5 days.
I made this schedule:

14:00 3.30 NL Progressive Super-Knockout
14:00 Big 11
14:00 3.30
14:15 1.10 + R
14:30 5.50 [1R1A]
14:45 4.40 [Turbo]
15:00 2.70 Knockout [Turbo]
15:15 5.40 Knockout [Turbo]
15:30 3.30 + R

*On Sunday I'll be also playing Sunday Storm.

It's approximately $50 daily, I have $280; I'm willing to blow $250 between this and next weekends. I'll update every night and probably you won't be hearing from me after next week, until july.
I'll be updating every night.

Whoa, dude, are you absolutely sure about that?

That's a huge gamble, and I think it would be a shame to lose all that hard earned money. Why do you want to risk it all?
MTTs have a ton of variance, you'd need 200+ buy-ins if you were to play them seriously.

Do you already have experience with MTTs, anyway?

Originally posted by Harrier88
Whoa, dude, are you absolutely sure about that?

That's a huge gamble, and I think it would be a shame to lose all that hard earned money. Why do you want to risk it all?
MTTs have a ton of variance, you'd need 200+ buy-ins if you were to play them seriously.

Do you already have experience with MTTs, anyway?

I'm thinking it through, maybe a test day to see how I feel, how it goes, I watched 3 very good videos of early stages play, I know the basics on stealing and took a 100 hands ICM test and had 87% which isn't that bad.
I'll remove big 11 and play the schedule today and tomorrow, if I lose all 16 tourneys I stop (BR $200). I know it's still a gamble, but I'm consciously willing to take the shot. I'll update after today's results.

I see. Looks like you enjoy taking chances.

I'd still advise you not to do this. Even the best MTT players finish ITM only 10-20% of the time, you'd need loads of luck to avoid losing most of your buy-ins.

Unlike SNGs, MTTs aren't played for the low ITM finishes anyway. The way to make money in MTTs is to keep playing the tourneys you're rolled for (like I said, 200+ BIs normally), and shoot for the big final table finishes, which happen only rarely even to the best players due to the huge amount of variance. With such a small sample of tournaments, getting a decent amount of deep finishes seems to be next to impossible.

For what reason do you even want to play MTTs? Are you just willing to try them for a change of pace, or are you looking for a more profitable format? How about playing some MTSNGs instead?

what

if you have no time or motivation or whatever to play... just withdraw and buy something nice for yourself? going into mtts just like that is a bad idea.

Originally posted by Harrier88
I see. Looks like you enjoy taking chances.

I'd still advise you not to do this. Even the best MTT players finish ITM only 10-20% of the time, you'd need loads of luck to avoid losing most of your buy-ins.

Unlike SNGs, MTTs aren't played for the low ITM finishes anyway. The way to make money in MTTs is to keep playing the tourneys you're rolled for (like I said, 200+ BIs normally), and shoot for the big final table finishes, which happen only rarely even to the best players due to the huge amount of variance. With such a small sample of tournaments, getting a decent amount of deep finishes seems to be next to impossible.

For what reason do you even want to play MTTs? Are you just willing to try them for a change of pace, or are you looking for a more profitable format? How about playing some MTSNGs instead?

Originally posted by Tomaloc
what

if you have no time or motivation or whatever to play... just withdraw and buy something nice for yourself? fish biggrin going into mtts just like that is a bad idea.

Well, I didn't do it. I had to drive a friend to get his car of the mechanic and I'm just getting home now. And it gave me time to think about it and I'm not gonna do it.
I came with this crazy idea because the 3 shots I took at NL10 were a failure and I won't be having time to either play or study to improve my game in the next 3 months, and I didn't want to quit with $250, so I wanted to take one last gamble. I was aware I had to run unbelievably lucky to cash big (not just because of variance, but because MTTs aren't my game), but I wanted to do it anyways. I probably would have done it and lost my money if you guys didn't open and I appreciate it.
Now I'm thinking of cashing out 100 and playing NL5 whenever I have the time and energy to play.
Again, thank you very much helping me make the smart call here.
I'll update here when there are some news.
Take care.

A smart move indeed, especially if you're still lacking experience with MTTs.
There's nothing wrong with letting some money rest on your account for a while.

Of course, you can still give those MTTs a try if you want to, you just need to stick to the games you're rolled for. It can be a pretty fun format.
Or, like I said, how about MTSNGs? They are played in a similar way, but take far less time. As a drawback, the prize pool is obviously quite limited compared to MTTs.

Originally posted by Harrier88
As a drawback, the prize pool is obviously quite limited compared to MTTs.

I think what tempted me in the first place were the big prizepools. I was thinking "I just have to cash big once", but ignoring how hard would that be.
I'll just take a rest for a while, maybe surf the forum half hour a day, have a session a week so I don't lose the skills.

Hello mates, been a while now, haven't played poker in about a week cause I've been focusing in my studies and it leaves me no time to play.
This lead me to a "project" I was working on in 2011, which is baseball handicapping. Back then a college friend and I worked on some systems for baseball betting, we only tried them for a month and they worked pretty well, it only took about half hour of our day to choose the teams and the bookies with the best odds. We mostly did it for fun since we didn't have a lot of money to invest (between the 2 of us we had only about $100) which is the reason why we stopped, since it wasn't worth it, we ended the month with $112 (12% ROI) and with 3 months of season to go we weren't even going to get to $200, so we pulled out dissapointed.
So these days I've been following the leagues and preparing to get started again, I only have $300 so I won't be making much, but still better than making nothing.
Next week I'll start posting some picks + odds in this thread to those whom may be interested.

I'll keep you guys posted.

That could be interesting. I used to be a pretty big baseball fan a few years ago, but haven't really watched any games in a long time. Do you bet locally, or online?

Oh, and the $300 you mentioned are not your poker bankroll, right?

You must be like 1/10000 people in europe who likes baseball haha.
I'm more a football (soccer) kind of guy, I never liked watching baseball and I used to enjoy playing it a lot, but I got hit once in the ankle and it actually tackled me, couldn't walk well for about a month and I never had the balls to stand in the field again.

Back then I used to bet locally, but know I'm thinking of betting online, I already checked about 4-5 sport betting sites with a 10-cent line, although I think all the sport betting sites now use this line, but whatever.

And yes those 300 are my poker bankroll. Since I'm not going to be using it in a while I'm going to try to grow it with baseball. I think I'll start next friday since almost all teams, but one or two, start series on friday.

I'll be updating then.

It's true, baseball really is a very neglected sport over here, but I have a feeling that it is slowly growing. What's your favorite team, btw?

I really love all kinds of sports. As a visitor of my blog, you probably already know that I play rugby at club level (another obscure sport in my country). At university, I used to practice softball, fencing, boxing and, for a very short time, also lacrosse and even horseback riding. I also participated in university level tournaments for beach volleyball, rowing, and team handball (in which I finished 1st, as a goalie).

A few years ago, I also used to be a goalkeeper at a local soccer club. This is definitely the #1 sport over here by far, though I think that this was actually a drawback for me, because almost every guy around here has played this sport at some point, and everyone thinks they're an expert.

I always approach the FIFA World Cup with mixed feelings. On the one hand, I'm extremely excited about the actual event, on the other hand, I'm dreading the time when everyone, no matter how little they know or care about this sport, will go crazy whenever Germany is playing, everyone will think they have what it takes to be the national team's coach, and 80% of commercials on TV will be soccer themed. I also dread all the inevitable nationalism at that time, especially since I have next to no national pride at all. I remember betting on whatever team Germany was playing against during the last European championship, just so I'd have an excuse why I'm not cheering along with everyone else.

Originally posted by lkdr9494
And yes those 300 are my poker bankroll. Since I'm not going to be using it in a while I'm going to try to grow it with baseball. I think I'll start next friday since almost all teams, but one or two, start series on friday.

So that means you're going to move a part of your bankroll?
To give you a little tip, there are a couple of poker sites that also double as a bookie, so you can use the same roll for poker and sports betting.

Whatever you do, just be warned that managing the same bankroll for both sports betting and poker can be quite challenging. Unfortunately, I can't give you any good advice, because I kinda suck at sports betting. I have heard somewhere, though, that you should use around 1% of your roll for a single bet, which seems a little conservative, unless you're betting on hundreds of games each day.

My favorite team is Texas Rangers mostly because of venezuelan Elvis Andrus and when I started with baseball handicapping texas made it to the world series, tho they didn't win.

About rugby I'm completely ignorant. Rugby here is like baseball there
It's rarely broadcasted and when it is I don't know exactly how it's played so I don't watch it. I really don't care about other sports besides football (my team is Arsenal since I was 9 years old because I had fifa 2003 for playstation2 and I knew nothing about football so when I played the first team alphabetically was Arsenal and my idol became legend Thierry Henry when he scored Manchester United to win the last league they won about 9 years ago).
I enjoy watching baseball and basketball world series cause it's the finals, it's like the bubble

My team for the FIFA World Cup is and has always been England. Venezuela has a football team but it sucks so hard. To qualify to the World Cup in South America there are 9 teams competing and 5 go to the World Cup.
5 teams excluding Brasil who is hosting and still can't qualify!!
Of course everyone loves it and believe it's the best team ever and they hate you for liking other team.
I actually belive Germany has the best chances of winning, but my heart is with England no matter what. I guess that's what I should feel about Venezuela, but I seem unable to. I think even if they got to the world cup and they played England my heart would be with England.

I'll move my entire bankroll and divide into 3 bookies online.
Since I'm not planning on playing poker until august I won't be needing a site where I can also play poker. In august I'll just move my bankroll again to pokerstars.

About bankroll management I'll be using $5 units which is a little <2% of my bankroll. Back then I used exactly 2% with a 20-cent line and it was profitable. I used to bet on 3-8 games daily if I remember correctly.
That's one of many advantages baseball has. There are over 10 games almost everyday. Also there can be no ties and games are played in series, you know 3 games against the same team.
It's easier than poker but far less profitable. I'm expecting something like 10% monthly, but we'll see.

My favorite MLB team is the Red Sox, so I'm relieved to hear you're not a Yankees fan.

If you're familiar with American football, you should have a vague idea about rugby. I guess comparing these sports is like comparing tennis to table-tennis.

Originally posted by lkdr9494
my team is Arsenal since I was 9 years old because I had fifa 2003 for playstation2 and I knew nothing about football so when I played the first team alphabetically was Arsenal and my idol became legend Thierry Henry when he scored Manchester United to win the last league they won about 9 years ago

I can definitely relate to that. When I was playing FIFA 2004, I arbitrarily picked a team from the 4th highest English league for a career, because that's the lowest league in the game and I liked the idea of playing my way up to the top. That team happened to be the Kidderminster Harriers, who later served as the inspiration for my username, and I even started to support the actual team when I looked them up and still do (unfortunately, they got relegated to the 5th league in 2005).
Now that I play poker, that name seems even more fitting for me, because I'm now trying to grind my way up in the same way as I did in my FIFA 2004 career back then.

I also support the English team, it's a shame that a nation that's so crazy about soccer, and pretty much invented this sport, only has one World Cup title under its belt.
Yeah, Germany has a great team right now, they do have a good chance to win the cup. Though I'm secretly hoping for them to be eliminated as soon as possible, because that's when I can forget about the local hype and just watch the actual event in peace.
I think even the United States could be a promising underdog this year. They're coached by Jürgen Klinsmann, who was coaching the German team at the 2006 World Cup. He's an amazing and innovative coach; his team even managed to beat Germany 4-3 in a friendly game last year. The USA will most likely not win the World Cup, but I think they're going to turn some heads this time.

Originally posted by lkdr9494
About bankroll management I'll be using $5 units which is a little <2% of my bankroll.

That seems reasonable enough. You need to be careful not to seriously damage your poker bankroll if you move it all, but if you stick to that BRM, I think you should be pretty safe.
I'm looking forward to hear about your baseball picks. As you may know, I have a little soft spot for sports betting myself, even if I'm not good at it.