June 14, 2008 - August 17, 2008
$1/$2 No Limit Cash Games:
Because of these results I now rarely play online. The $1/$2 no limit cash games in these casinos are very soft. Here are a number of reasons why:
- Players are either passive or bluff way too much - Most players can never seem to find middle ground in their play. They are either at one side of the spectrum or the other. Players that bluff tend to do it a lot (and in very poor spots) and passive players don't seem to bluff or raise at all.
- Very few players adjust their game to the table - I tend to see a lot of the same players in the games I play and they all play the same style no matter what table they are at. None of them adjust their game to the changing dynamics of the table.
- Players just play their cards - I am always amazed by this. Some of these players have been playing poker for 20 years and still play without consideration of other players actions or the number of other players in a hand. It is not uncommon to see a player in first position to act bet a flop into 6 other players with top pair and a weak kicker. They will genuinely think they have the best hand. The play of some players can be very tranparent because of this once you sit at a table with them long enough.
- Players over-value their hands - See the above point. AK gets overplayed. Top pairs get over played. Bottom two pair gets over played. Pocket pairs are a disaster for everybody. Etc.
- Players have a lot of physical tells - I recommend reading Reap Em and Reap and Caro's Book of Tells. While these books should not be followed exclusively, they do give a good background of things to watch for. One thing to watch out for though is that physical tells can be misleading if the player over values their hand and actually thinks they are ahead, when in fact they are not. For example, some players will reraise with top pair in multi-way pots and have very confident body language because they think their hand is stronger than it actually is that particular situation.
- Players do not like to fold, especially before a flop. - If players limp for $2, they are almost always willing to call a $15 raise pre-flop out of position to see a flop. So a $1/$2 game can easily have a $75 pre-flop pot after a few limpers and callers. Some players will even call $25 pre-flop raises with a $100-$125 stack and then say something like "I have pot odds so I have to call." um, yeah sure... just nod and smile, nod and smile.
- Players lack basic understanding of poker odds and theory - Players love to chase their draws to the river. Because of this you can really charge players to chase their draws, especially on the turn. Another fundemental that some player even get wrong is that they will continue to chase even when their hand cannot improve (chasing a straight on a flush board).
- Players do not follow the size of the pot - I will give a common example I see to illustrate this point. Preflop their are 6 limpers and the button raises to $25. 5 People call, making the pot approximately $150. Bets on the flop now tend to be $35-$50, which is 1/3 or less of the pot, but these raises get the same result as a $75-100 bet because nobody follows the total pot size. The best way to explain this is that players view bets as absolute and not relative to the pot.
I have experimented with different buy ins and have had the most success with a $200 buy in. Most other players usually tend to have and average of $150-$200 stacks, with 1 or 2 bigger stacks at the table. I like to sit with $200 initially and play short stack poker fairly aggressively, while observing the deeper stacked player's tendancies. Once I build up to $300-$400 I am deep enough to be playing the deep stacks a lot more with hands of high implied odds value.
In a future post I will talk about some of the adjustments I made to maximize profit in these games and other strategies that seem to be the most effective.
