I was reviewing my hands in poker tracker and decided to look at my results for the top ten hands without regard to position.

my VP$IP is high 33% for 4,500 hands.

(AA-99, AKs, AKo, AQs)

Well, boring life for sure - 4,500 hands I have had the top 10 hands 198 times. I would have cobwebs if that is all I played. I would have won $230 overall.

I lost $300 with AKs and KK (32 of the hands) so that killed my profits big time.

So I added suited paint to the mix - hands went up to 289 and profits went down to $159. More fun less money.

So then I looked where my profits did come from.

Top 5 winners

T9o - +381
AKo - +284
ATo- - +261
QJs - +184
86s - +158

Top 5 losers

AKs - (219)
55 - (215)
T9s - (197)
KJo - (188)
44 - (167)

I am barely winning at this game and need to re-evaulate my strategy.

Playing too tight does not seem to work but it does show a profit. Playing too loose sometimes shows a nice profit but higher swings.

I need to learn to play better and work on my starting hands.

I lost $500 on AKs, KK and KQs - that tells me that I can not play these hands well after the flop.

For now I am going to stick the the top 10 hands plus the top SC for no raise (AKJQs) and see what happens.

Call a raise or re-raise AA and KK. This should bring my VP$IP to around 20%.

Anyone have a better strategy that works. It seems to me that everyone on the forum is a wiinner. I guess the losing players do not read the forum.

Barely winning means that I am losing about $5 an hour now. Not very good at all.

Uhm. I am revising my position play. I never payed attention to that.

I play:
All pockets, regarless of position. If the pot is raised I am almost always in with any of them. I am showing a profit in a huge sample. I used to go crazy some times with unimproved JJ-TT-99 when the flop didnt bring any overcards.

I am playing almost all suited connectors in position, sometimes I call raises with one gappers if the raiser is not solid and is going to be stacked if I hi8t anything just like two pair.

I play KQ, KJ, QJ. Lately I am not limping in EP, specially if there are aggressive players behing me. I use to limp with them all the time and I was leaving the BB on the table too often, so now I am only playing them in position or in a very passive table.


Of course Ak-AQ-AJ and AT if not in a ultra agressive preflop table. I dont like coldcalling with AT or even AJ. I have problems doing it with AQ, but sometimes I do it. The problems is it s hard to win a big pot with it. You either take it at the flop by reraising or might lose a big one if a mirace doesnt give you the str8 or something.

I also limp AXs specially in LP.

My VP$IP is around 17%.

Well, the offsuit connectors are something I'm thinking about in LP, but I really think 33% seeing flop is way too high. Tight play means somewhere in the range 15%-20%, and pretty much all sources view that as the best strategy in cash games.

I definitely think you should be re-raising AA (big) at every opportunity. The re-raise quantity is imo an amount that denies setting odds to a hand like QQ. For example, at the $100 level, QQ raises to $4 with stacks of $100. Make it $16 or $20. QQ won't lay down as a rule. Re-raising KK also certainly isn't a mistake.

Other questions: Do you lay make a solid continuation bet after raising--even with overcards or missed AK? Do you lay down missed AK or QQ to overcards?

Smaller pocket pairs are just "set it or forget it" hands. Particularly if you're having difficulties, I think you should go several thousand hands at least without ever taking a stab with anything that's not an overpair or doesn't make a set.

Keep very few hands in EP. For me, if I play a hand in EP, it's either AK or PP.

Those are at least the first things that come to my mind as possible leaks. I think you're playing too loose and either over- or underplaying some of these hands. There may also be a "bad luck" factor involved, but I think some of this has to do with some leaks in your game.

One other thing I noticed: In your recent set hand, I noted that you were regretting not check-raising the turn. It's a MUCH better move betting into the raiser on the flop.

You just don't know what scare-cards are going to hit on the turn (I believe it was pairing the 3 in the hand you mentioned), and if your opponent has an overpair, there's also a possibility of getting stung there. If you bet into the raiser, you force overpairs to raise at you. It's just a good habit to get into.

That hand also makes me think that you have too much of a tendency to slowplay in one way or another. You should never be afraid to bet out good hands and raise (or re-raise) strongly with them. I suspect that it would help rather than hurt your game if you just eliminated the check-raise altogether for a while. It's very rarely the best move in NL.

Good advice guys - I just posted a 77 hand that I bet too much on.

I will make a continuation bet on the flop if I miss it and I have raised PF. I usually pick up the pot not always - are CB's worth it?

I will lay down QQ to overcards and a strong bet. I will go for the no-set-no-bet on my PPs to see what happens.

What happens to me is that I lose a few big hands with big cards that add up to about $600 or so. I have to be vary careful of position. Being first to act after the flop with KK sometimes bites me.

Some good advice here. I will re-read it and keep posting my troubled hands.

At this moment in time I am at $355 on a $200 buy-in table. Broadbent at FTP.

I am crawling out of the hole for now.

Thanks

Your sample size is way too small to be of any use when trying to break down individual hands.

In my database KQs is a big loser. Should I stop playing it? I was all in for $2000 with the nut straight and got outdrawn. Its going to take me an aweful long time before I enough KQs hands to get back to the actual EV of this hand.

I figured that shy guy had AA or KK but he could have had AK or JJ.

Preflop when he re-raised me I had two choices - put him all-in or muck my QQ.

There was $75 in the pot and I needed to call $21. 3.5 to 1 pot odds. Not very good?

I decided to call the $21 and see if I got lucky - nope.

FullTiltPoker Game #202802573: Table Broadbent - $1/$2 - No Limit Hold'em 2005/08/31
Seat 1: TJ Orlowski ($166.05)
Seat 2: nickdanger21 ($331.55)
Seat 3: Beggan ($185.60)
Seat 4: tpad ($209.25)
Seat 5: AlamedaMike ($182)
Seat 6: lakers45 ($153)
Seat 7: JRD312 ($74.55)
Seat 8: Tails2124 ($65.65)
Seat 9: shy_guy_inc ($126.70)
lakers45 posts the small blind of $1
JRD312 posts the big blind of $2
The button is in seat #5

*** HOLE CARDS ***

Dealt to AlamedaMike

Tails2124 folds

shy_guy_inc raises to $6

TJ Orlowski folds
nickdanger21 calls $6
Beggan folds
tpad folds
nickdanger21: ill call you shyguy

AlamedaMike raises to $27

nickdanger21: i'm nice
lakers45 folds
JRD312 folds

shy_guy_inc raises to $48

nickdanger21: thats alot
nickdanger21 folds

AlamedaMike calls $21

*** FLOP ***

shy_guy_inc bets $78.70, and is all in

AlamedaMike: you got AA?
AlamedaMike has 15 seconds left to act
AlamedaMike folds

TJ Orlowski: well you only have TT...so
nickdanger21: alameda mike got nothin
TJ Orlowski: you have to fold

I really think in general that you need to tighten up and focus on accurately representing your hands.

Re-raising QQ is not a good move, barring some particular read on the raiser, and I think you should just scrap it for now altogether. I honestly don't understand the action here.

Did you initially raise or did you limp on this hand? You should in any case be raising it.

Then if you get re-raised, here's my view, which I think works very well: Do you have odds to set or not? i.e., does it cost you more than 10% of what you stand to win by staying in the hand. If not, just fold it to the re-raise, which is representing AA/KK. Without good reason, it's not a bad policy to just believe what they are representing. I'd honestly be very surprized here if shyguy didn't have AA or KK, the way he's playing this.

On that hand, you get in overly deep, then fold. You just can't do that.

I posted a query on how to play QQ from late position when there is a raise. I was under the impression that with QQ in this spot I should reraise or fold and sometimes call. The action is based upon any read. In live games I usually muck my QQ if I know the player.

Online I do not give the respect to the players that I should.

So are you saying that raising with QQ is too loose and that I should fold and sometimes call? If the stack is deep enough then a call is warrented.

Thanks

In this case I should have just called. Shy Guy had $120 and the call was $6. I had $182 so I call and no set then fold to a bet. Sounds like a good plan.

Mastering NO-limit Hold'em by Fox page 76 makes the same recommendation. If you think the raiser has AA or KK then you should fold QQ.

I think you should normally raise QQ. I almost never limp with that hand. I also think that out of position, you should call a raise to you, not re-raise.

At a 1/2 game, getting in for $6 is not a problem at all. But it looks to me here like you limped, them shyguy made it $6, then you made it $27. If that was the action, then I don't like your limp, and I don't like your re-raise.

I would probably have made it $6 or $8 myself here. With shyguy's stack of $126, I'd still be able to call a re-raise up to $18 ($12 more). But I'm check-folding after that unless I set.