Ho-Hum day on the poker tables

Today was a rather "ho hum" day on the tables. Net I was slightly down, close to break even. I had the favorable tables (a 70% saw flop, 63% saw, and two 40-50% saw flop... overall table preflop aggression of less than 10% as a prime example of one table I was on today). That table, while sounding real appealing, was not entirely favorable. I think it was "too fishy" --- yes peeps, that is possible. I was constantly being outdrawn by one or the other, or the other or the other...

I decided that I'd love one or two of these peeps on my table, combined with perhaps another monster such as myself, or at least a few tight passives as well, but not as a collective. I even got accused of "fishing" today myself on a seperate table!!! I was dying... I raise UTG pre with AQs, an overly aggressive button player calls me as does the small and big blind. So four handed, we see a flop of K-10-x. SB checks, BB bets, I raise, button reraises, fold, fold, cap, call. Turn comes 9. I bet out, continuing my show of strength. River another blank.

Now, other than the call after the cap (though could be a trap), I've got no reason to believe I have the best hand. However, in diving into the aggressive button's stats, I see him being 5 for 5 in went to showdown, so I know that if he misses his hand he goes to showdown. Additionally, his postflop aggression is above a 3, preflop raise about 40%. With all of that in mind, I figure that his call meant he was chasing, though he could have a small pocket pair. I figure if I check, he's going to bet and it could get expensive, especially if I am wrong about him (regarding not being on the board and having a pocket pair). Additionally, I've shown strength all along, he contested it both preflop and flop, but not as aggressive as I've seen him before. I suspect my best chance of either limiting my losses at this point, or winning the pot is by betting, so I fire off a bet, he calls cleanly. We show down, he had ace two off, and I take down the pot.

And then he calls me a fish! Are you f'ing kidding me? I replay the hand to review who exactly was betting and who was calling. I wasn't the caller. But, I just laughed and told him how lucky I felt. He singlehandedly recouped most of my losses from the more fishy table earlier in the day within a few hands. When I offered to play heads up at a price of his choosing above $50, best of seven series, he left without response. Oh well.

Well, tommorrow is Friday, and that means its mailbag time! So until then...

Mike



Poker