Saturday Home Game at Somone ELSE'S house...

Well, we made it to the home game Saturday night. My wife, my son (21) and myself. It is rare that I get to play somewhere else (usually I host), so I was excited. I don’t like to finish 1st at my house, so I typically play good enough to get to the final table and make fairly aggressive moves with the intention of going out just into the money. If I am distracted by anything and go out early, it is just fine with me. I just feel weird about inviting everyone over to my house and then taking all their money (not that I could on purpose anyway). There were 4 others playing this night, who I will detail shortly. We decided on a friendly buy-in of $30 and with 7 players, paid $150 to first and $60 to second. We randomly assigned the seating –at my request, and I ended up with the best player at our table, 2 to my left (ugh!).

Seat 1: Me: Donkey
Seat 2:Mr J-Host: Loose pre-flop. Loves to call BB, sometimes 2x BB. Easily folds to a c-bet, but will call down to chase draw on occasion. His favorite move is to bet a pot sized bet on the turn, after everyone checked on the flop. I took advantage of this and was able to re-raise with TPanykicker, or even draws and take down a good sized pot on the turns.
Seat 3:Mr B: Easily the best player at the table. Very aggressive, yet knows how to fold a hand. Give him chips and he is deadly! I’d say he has finished in the money in 70% of the tournaments I have played with him (probably 10 in the last year). I wanted him somewhere; anywhere to my right. No such luck.
Seat 4:Mr T: New blood. Very quiet, didn’t say much, but then asked how to deal the cards correctly when it came around to him. Should be our first player out.
Seat 5:Mrs.Jamyhawk: Solid, tight player. Plays very tight but will occasionally bluff with nothing. I mean nothing. When she gets caught, it is bad. It is not uncommon for her to go out very early, or end up in the final 3 players.
Seat 6:MrsC-Hostess: Calling station. Enough said. You better bet really big or she is calling all the way down. She has won plenty of tournaments when the cards are going her way. My plan was to overbet when she was in to make sure she can’t stay in and out draw me.
Seat 7:Brian-my son: Aggressive player. Plays way too many hands. Will chase draws and put up wild bluffs. Has to fold on the river to big bets when he misses his draws. He is going to be a great player as soon as he learns how to apply pot odds and calculate hand odds (which will be soon, since he is a math major in college. He just needs the book to get started).

Some notable plays/hands:

Mr B raises 2xBB from UTG and gets 3 callers. Flop comes JhKh6h. Mr B bets out a pot sized c-bet. Mr T takes his time and calls. I missed the flop completely so I fold as does another person. Heads up. The turn comes 7h. Mr B fires again ½ the pot sized bet. Mr T takes his time and calls. River is 2h. Now we have 5 hearts on the board. Mr B, who is notoriously aggressive checks to the “must have just learned how to play” Mr T. Mr T immediately checks and they flip over to show KcQs for Mr B and AhJd for Mr T (or what is also known as the NUT FLUSH!). So really, by just calling on each street he got maximum chips from Mr B. Of course, he didn’t know well enough to bet on the river. I am not even sure he knew he had the NUTS.

The very next hand, it got down to Mr B and Mr T again with 2 hearts on the flop. I don’t remember the exact progression, but Mr T hit the heart flush (again) on the turn. He did bet it this time but not aggressively. Mr B stayed in with a straight draw and hit on the river, but was nearly crippled after this hand. He was lucky to not be out thanks to Mr T being about as aggressive as a tight rock would be at bubble time.

Mrs C: hostess, was the first one out. I got her with pocket rockets. I bet just enough to keep her calling to the river and pricing her in with 2nd pair.

I started using the size of my stack to accumulate chips. When I was the cutoff , Mr T was in the BB. I raised 3xBB 2 out of every 3 orbits to take his chips. With Mr. B crippled (he would be SB in this situation), I could do this unchallenged (Mr J to my left would only call 3xBB with a monster hand). I would even pick up a few limpers once in a while. Pretty soon, I was more than double the size of the next player at the table.

Then I was dealt KK in the cutoff, but wanted action so only bet 2xBB. I got Mr J to call and Mr T who was already in the BB called, everyone else folded. Flop came Q high. Mr T bet a min bet, I min raised and Mr J folded. Mr. T called. Turn came a K. Mr T bet the minimum again, but this time I pushed him all in. He folded saying his Q was probably no good with the K hitting the turn. I wondered if I could have gotten more chips by calling here, but was afraid of what I saw earlier where he might hit runner runner straight or flush.

I put the pressure on MrT and even bought his blinds when he had less than 1 BB in front of him for the next orbit. He was out a couple of hands later.

With 5 of us left and my chip stack very healthy, I began raising 3x BB 3 out of 4 hands. If I was caught stealing, I could afford the fold and if I had something, then my opponent was risking their tournament life on that hand.

I doubled up Mr B a couple of times knowing he would shove with ATC whenever he was getting maximum value in the pot. Once I had K9off and hit a 9 on the flop, but his 8J held up when a J hit the turn. Eventually though, my wife caught his ATC’s when she had QQ. This put her comfortably into second place. Next to go was Brian. Blinds were getting big and he tried calling down with a couple of hands he should not have been in. So he was short stacked when I called his all in and won with some random ATC that I would have called him with there.

With 3 players left, my wife and I beat up on MrJ, raising on every hand. It wasn’t on purpose, but if she didn’t raise, I did with ATC. He folded most orbits and when he called, a c-bet would suffice to take the pot. If he re-raised, a fold was easy. My wife ended up taking him out and we were close in chips now.

Someone suggested a chop (not her or me) and we laughed knowing that it would be a fight to the death before we would miss taking the other down. 2nd hand HU, she raised pre-flop and I called with 7c8h. Flop came AsKc4h. She bet half the pot and I knew it was a bluff so I went all in. She said “I know you have an Ace so I have to fold” and I flipped over my bluff to hopefully put her on tilt (this is my wife we are talking about here). The next hand she went all in and I folded. I had her right were I wanted her. I called her BB on the next hand and she went all in with KJo/s. I called with A6sooooted, and it held up. My donkey ass took first and my lovely wife took 2nd. I could play in lot more tournaments that end up that way.

A few important lessons to get from this game about Home Games:
1) Home games see a lot more conservative betting patterns. Yes, more people will see a flop by calling the BB, but they will also fold to any bet. I like to overbet from the button, SB or BB, when 60% or more of the table has limped in. A bet of 5x the BB will easily push everyone out most of the time. I would rather buy the pot 3 out of 5 hands rather than limp 5 hands with everyone else and miss the flop each time or get outdrawn. And, you have to push people out when you are on a draw (which is easy) after you have seen the flop. Also, you have to keep opponents in when you have a big hand. Smooth calling or min raising works great. This puts you susceptible to being sucked out on, but if you can manage not to get in over your head, you can put the odds in your favor by slow playing monsters. You will only get sucked out on 2 out of 5 hands (IMO), just make sure you aren’t all in on the river when you know they were drawing to you and you don’t have the nuts.

2) Take advantage of new players. New players do not know how to protect their blinds. They limp in whenever they can and easily fold when they miss the flop. Take the blinds from them. Take them early and often. Especially if they are still in later in the tournament when blinds have increased. This is a critical stage to put pressure on someone new even if you are UTG. Most good players will fold to your raise from early position (when they have nothing and they are not in the SB or BB) and a new person doesn’t want to risk “so many chips” later in the tournament. A newer player tends to really tighten up with the bigger blinds. Mix it up, obviously. This is a great way to gradually build chip stacks around the middle to middle-late stages.

3) In the early stages, stay out of the way of someone you know is a great player. There is no reason for you to try to steal a pot from someone that knows how to re-steal. Stay very tight when in a pot with this opponent, and stick to your pure fundamentals. That is, until you are in the money. After that, everything goes, but early on, try to gang up on the other players. If you are the two most aggressive and knowledgeable players at the table, you should be able to outlast everyone else and fight for 1st and 2nd. Of course, if you see a great player crippled –CRUSH them, and fast.

4) Watch closely for betting patterns and exploit them. Most players in the home game have a preferred betting style and rarely stray from it.. Really! They rarely trap, they don’t mix up their raises, and they don’t bluff (at least not in different increments). I’m not talking about your typical blogger or the 3 times a week at the casino players. I mean the once or twice a month home game player. They have a certain style and they stick to it. It may take a couple of times playing with them to really identify it, but watch closely for it, and you will find it. Like the example above where the person would limp into a pot, let it check around after the flop, and then bet the pot on the turn; I learned to exploit that by re-raising him every time. He folded 3 out of 4 times. And on the 4th time, I could get out of the way knowing I am +EV for that move.

Overall, my point is that the Home Game is different than online poker and different than playing live at the casino (or underground rooms). Take advantage when you can, but remember to keep it friendly –or you might not get invited back.

Hope to see you at the next one.

Don't forget:
MATH tonight on Fulltilt
Tournament: Mondays at the Hoy
When: Monday. 10pm ET
Game: NLHE Deepstack
Password: hammer

Stay patient…