Message Board

Lets put a filter on our results by clicking the filters button and selecting Cold Called under the Vol. Put $ in Pot

Now, sort your Known Starting Hands by CCPF to find your first hand to investigate.  My highest CCPF starting hand is 88. 

Here's where the voodoo begins.  Your going to have to investigate a lot of these hands to see if a patter emerges.  For my 88 hand, I really want to see the raise + a call before I enter the pot, or a limper before the raise.  With this type of hand, I don't want to cold call unless I'm getting close to set odds.  I'd rather raise it and hopefully play it heads up with position, or fold it unless I can get multiway action.

On hand #1.  I call from the button with 88 vs an UTG raiser + 1 Cold Caller.  The flop is J74 with two diamonds.  I hold the 8 of diamonds.  The pre-flop raiser bets, and the cold caller calls.  So far we know that UTG had a good starting hand, and our cold caller has, well 2 cards.  So what do I do?  Call.  ARRGGHHH! Exactly what I was looking for and on hand #1.  I should be raising this hand.  Per Ed's recent Golden Oldie, 1 hand played bad is not a leak so I'll continue to the next looking for a pattern, but it's not a good start.

After analysis of about 50 cold calls with 88 I found a big leak in my game.  It wasn't my pre-flop play.  I usually got in with enough players to justify the 2 small bets.  My leak was I don't RAISE on the flop to protect my hand enough.  A lot of the time there was limpers preflop and I hand position on the raiser.  One overcard would hit the board and the pre-flop raiser would bet.  The pots usually had a minimum of 8 small bets and I either folded, or called a LOT. 

For the record, I play mostly live now so a lot of these hands were from my learning process but it was bad enough I'll pay close attention to my middle pairs live now.

Repeat this process from highest CCPF to lowest and you'll probably find some leaks as well.

If enough people are interested I'll address using poker trakcer to identify the opposite or not cold calling enough preflop with speculative hands or exploiting opponents whose CCPF is too high.

thatjimguy,

glad to see someone is getting some benefit out my post(s).  I was beginning to wonder if I was wasting everyone's time with them. 

Middle pairs were once a problem for me and yes, I'll likely find the same problem with 77 and 66.  99 is a big winner, mainly because I play it stronger (not to mention that it's a stronger hand).  I haven't used PokerTracker to track my play in almost a year so some of the leaks i'll discover have been patched.

Oh geez, yeah get it. I didn't have it for awhile just playing online. Then I bought it. It helped me "get it" in certain situations my mind didn't grasp before.

For instance, new players like to smooth call with AA KK or AK way too much, thinking that trapping opponents would be better. They also dont like the raising hands like AK because they miss the flop a bit. Well, we all remember the hands that miss more than we remember the ones that hit. This would go on and on. But once one owns Poker Tracker, you can see clearly how much you have won with the AK over time. Upon seeing the proof, that bad play of smooth calling is eliminated.

A big caveat, PT has lack luster instructions. Such a big database and blah on how to use it. That guy must make bookoo bucks at $45 a pop, I would think that he could give us some bettre insight.

There is a e-guide for $20 called Poker Tracker Guide. Dude, whatever you do, don't buy it. You can read my vent here about that…

http://www.notedpokerauthority.com/board?forum=1&topic=72&page=1

Save the $20 and just come here and ask away. We'll help you along.

If I can't raise this board, I shouldn't have called the raise preflop.  No one has shown any strength.  Under the gun could very well have whiffed the flop.  The limper has indicated only that he has 2 cards he's called on both opportunities.  There's a good chance I have the best hand.  I can't eliminate players because of my relative position.  A case could be made for waiting until the turn to raise, but we can't guarantee that it will be bet again, UTG may well give up on the turn after two calls.

Let's assume that UTG's range is 99+, ATs+, AJ+, KJs+, KQ+

If we are behind, we may be able to push UTG off a better hand.  He won't be too happy to see a raise if he has 99-QQ.  We'll likely get 3-bet with AA, KK, KQ, KJ.  If he smooth calls the flop raise and our turn bet, we can check behind on the river if need be for a free showdown.