MATH Monday

I played the MATH last night for the first time in ages. Not sure why. I finished watching Sunday's episode of Wire in the Blood via DVR (good show -- BBC America Sunday nights) a few minutes before 10PM and next thing I knew I was signed up and being dealt cards.

And what crappy cards they were. At one point I seriously considered just sitting out because it wouldn't have made any difference in my play. Fold, fold, fold, fold. Maybe I've been spending too much time in the cheap seats, but this struck me as a hyper-aggro table, even for a blogger event. Very, very few were the hands that saw a flop without a raise. This made it very tough to take a speculative stab with the odd suited ace or suited connector hand, which were about the best I could hope for last night.

I'm sure my play looked incredibly weak. In a way I suppose it was. But when somebody opens their jacket and shows me the butt of a gun sticking out of their waistband, I like to know I at least have some bullets in my gun before I pull it out. And I don't necessarily mean "bullets", if you know what I mean. Coming over the top of a pre-flop raise with the hammer may be a cutesy move in bloggerdom, but it's never struck me as an especially smart move in the larger scheme of things. If I'm going to put a big chunk of my stack in the pot, I at least want some kind of chance should I be forced to push the rest in. Not that I'm above a stone cold bluff, but I prefer to be holding something that stands some kind of chance.

The player to my right raised every single time from the button when it folded to him. Once, maybe twice, I had something that I was able to push back with, but he stole the blinds more times than I could count because I kept getting junk. My undoing came at his hands when he once again raised from the button and I felt my ATs was enough to push back with. He had something like AQ and there were no tens to be found on the board.

One thing that was blatantly obvious was the difference in play between this game and the shallow waters in which I've been wading lately. As I said before, there were no family pots in this game. Seldom were the hands where even half the table saw a cheap flop. And there certainly weren't any players who continued to play their small pocket pair against constant resistance and a flop with all overcards. Not that I was expecting any.

Since my exit came fairly early, I licked my wounds for a little while and then rejoined The Quest. Happily, I found a table filled with the aforementioned fools who couldn't get away from a hand if they had even the tiniest pair. I was continually shocked and amazed at the junk people were playing in large pots and taking all the way to the end. These guys clearly had no concept of pot odds or having any idea of where they really stood in a hand. It was great fun and just what I needed to get out of my MATH funk.

It's funny how these things run. For the longest time I'd been getting tables with mostly players who seemed to know what they were doing. Recently it's been nothing but tables filled with the clueless. I actually have trouble believing it when I'm at such a table. I keep expecting fate or lady luck to jump in and say, "Hold on a minute. I'm not going to let you take the candy from those babies that easily."

Last night I got a higher than normal number of good hands, but the size of the win was mostly due to having opponents who let me punish them severely for their far less than optimal play. My biggest issue was trying to decide exactly how much would be too much for that final value bet. Thinking it over after the fact, I'm not sure there was a too big.

It was getting late and I kind of wanted to quit so I could go to bed, but I also didn't want to walk away from such a money making opportunity. Then a lotto player sat down and that was my cue to go. I finished up $3.61 for the session.

Is it odd that I drop $26 on the MATH and don't really give it a second thought and yet get excited about winning $3.61 at $0.01/$0.02 NL?