The Bat Cave

Or least that’s what I’ve been told recently. But I’ll get to that later.

First, I’ve decided to continue with my idea to write about my sessions. I enjoy writing about poker, probably more than anything, plus I think taking notes during my sessions helps keep me accountable.

Secondly, I think I finally figured out how to rate music on my blog. I will be unveiling my new method this weekend.

Thirdly, I have a lot of T.V. shows I’ve watched recently that I haven’t talked about yet. I will try to do that this week.

Lastly, I didn’t write any notes while I was in Reno for the Run It Up series, but hopefully I’ll post a trip report sooner rather than later.

Okay, so on to my $8/$16 session at the Palace today. I mean, it started off innocently enough. Actually it started off in $6/$12 Omaha 8/B, but I didn’t stay there too long and quickly took my $29 profit to the $8/$16 game. I actually really enjoy playing Omaha and it’s a nice change of pace, but it’s hard to justify playing in a split pot game at lower stakes when the all the quads on the PSJ board are $499, the Spade Royal is over $33,000 and two other Royals are $6000. It’s not like I play for jackpots, but at those numbers, I just have to play in the Hold Em game.

Like I said, my session didn’t start off well and after an hour I was down about $200 overall and it was mostly because of this hand:

Button straddles, I three bet TT from the small blind, everybody folds and I’m heads up with the button. The flop comes down 752 rainbow and I check because the button likes to bluff and will probably put me on overcards. He does bet and I check-call, planning to raise the turn. The turn is a Jack and I execute my plan and the button just calls my check-raise. The river is a blank and I go for some thin value because I expect him to be a little confused and pay off light and he raises me? Now I’m confused – and I don’t fold when I’m confused, so I call and he shows me a set of Jacks!

I continued to trend down when I opened the AJ off from early position and got called by a somewhat tight and passive player on the KK5 flop. The turn was a 3 and we both checked and I paired my Ace on the river. I don’t think betting is wrong here – he has a small pair or medium pair often enough to justify a value bet, but bet-calling the river was a mistake and he showed me KQ after I paid his raise off. This is definitely a player I can reliably bet-fold the river to.

Next, I opened with AA and got three callers and was check-raised by the big blind on the JJ2 flop. I know this player is capable of trying to run me off an ace high hand and he’s also capable of having a Jack here, so I decided to turn my hand into a bluff catcher and just call down, like I would with AK. The turn was a blank and I called another bet. I would bet the river if he checked to me, but it paired the 2 and he fired again. I called and he showed AQ high.

At this point, I was trending back up and I was talking to the dealer in the box about how my buddy said I’m “blessed” while we were down in Reno, indicating that I really have nothing to complain about when it comes to poker. I hate losing, especially in tournaments, and it’s natural to feel bummed out when you bust events, but looking at what I’ve done over the past couple years it was hard to argue with him. Variance has really been on my side lately. I’ve been cruising at an ROI of 331% since November 2015 in live tournaments. That’s insane!

So as we were talking about being “blessed”, the dealer (a friend of mine) was saying how it’s true and that I never seem to miss a flop in limit Hold Em either. On cue, I’m dealt the TT in the big blind, raise five limpers, and get the T32 with two spades flop. As if that’s not sexy enough, I’m heads up on the turn with a player that has an Overs button (Overs buttons increase the betting to $12/$24 when those players are heads up) and he raises when the 8 of diamonds hits. I three bet and he calls. This is a pretty tight player, so when he raises the turn and a brick hits the river, I think there’s some merit to trying to check-raise again. We know where 75% of the tens are and I would expect him to have at least two pair when he raises me on the turn, so he seems heavily weighted towards sets of 2s, 3s, or 8s. So if the river bricks out, it’s really hard to imagine him checking those hands behind. But the river was a 6 of spades and I thought he would check that card back a lot, even when he had sets, so I bet and got paid off.

I was up $60 overall after a couple hours, but the run good was activated now. I raised the small blind with QJ of diamonds, bet the AJ5 one diamond flop, check-called the 5d turn and check-raised the Kd river. Then I limped along on the button with 98hh and stabbed at the A63 one heart flop, got one straggler, fired the 3h turn, and then raised the river when he led on the Jh. That one got him talking to himself!

Then I started flopping sets all over the place. I flopped sets of 8s and 6s for massive pots. I flopped a set of fours that won a good pot. I had 44 on an A52x3 run out. All in pots that were raised before the flop. I triple barreled with AdQc on the J42dd8dQ board and my rivered pair was good. Then I got the AAxA board with AQ and this was actually a weird one. I had raised before the flop and then I bet the flop and turn and my opponent raised me on the turn and then folded when I three bet? I mean, that is just comedy. What hand is he trying to represent? What is he trying to get me to fold? I guess he’s bluffing there, but what a crazy board to try and bluff a preflop raiser on.

All in all, it was a great session that started off slowly before I started running so hot half the table was mumbling to themselves. Normally, I’d never leave when I’m running this good and playing well on top of it, but I haven’t seen my wife in ten days and wanted to make sure I was home before she got off work, so we could at least spend a little time together before she went to bed. So I booked a hefty $1120 win for the day and called it an early night.

Welcome back to Gotham, TDK!