Darkened Poker

Poker after Dark is having their ” Top guns Cash game” and it is finally some pretty good poker TV.

In this episode Howard “The Professor” Lederer shows us how not to play AA as he gets stacked by Eli Elezra’s set of 8’s.  So many mistakes in this hand it was like a gift that Eli Elezra did not even have to work for.

1. Howard does not pick a way to play his AA, just calling Phil Iveys raise of 3k he could play them small ball and exercise pot control.  Re-raising big he could play long ball poker and either take down the pot or really maximize the amount of money he put in while ahead.  But instead he only re-raises to 10K and puts 10% of his stack in pre-flop ( started with 100k ) which told everyone he had AA or KK, pot committed him and still gave small pairs the odds to draw at him.  Just calling the 3k to trap Phil Ivey or re-raising to 20k would have been a much better option, if your going to announce your hand strength with 2 people still to play make sure the information is useless to them.  Also given that he is out of position I would raise even more to compensate for that fact, I sure do not want to be playing out of position for the rest of the hand against Eli and Phil.
2. On the flop there is both a str8 and flush draw which is never what you want to see with over pairs.  At this point he he bets 2/3 the pot which means 1/3 his chips are in the pot and he can be all in by the turn.  This bet is even worse than the pre-flop bet as 2/3 the pot is not enough to chase 2 people out with that many draws.  If he wants to drive people out a pot size bet would be proper, but in this case I do not think that is the right way to go.  Problem with betting the pot is he would only get called or re-raised with a Set or the combo Str8 and flush draw.  Since he is out of position I would check this hand, see what they do and use it as a bluff catcher if the situation is appropriate.  Most likely call Phil all the way down if he bet and Eli folded on the flop.  Maybe call one street if Eli bet and Phil folded but dump it past the turn if he is still betting as Eli could only have odds to call pre-flop with pair type hands.
3. The turn play is even worse, Howard hums and haws and then goes all in for a pot size bet of 70k.  Is anyone at that table really believing your acting job?  One good thing about getting all in on the turn is you are not put to a hard derision on the river if the draws get there.  It would be the right move if he was playing against fish that would call a bet that size on a draw.  But no one at that table is going to call him unless he is crush so he is just asking to get stacked.  Sadly he has committed so much pre-flop and on the flop that even if he just switches to check calling down now he would most likely get stacked anyway.   At this point he could just check and call down Eli if the flush or str8 does not get there.  It is not a great move and kind of weak but at least then his hand has some bluff catching power.

Hand in question happens at 9 min point.

Have not been a big fan of the Poker after Dark but these are getting almost as good as the High Stakes Poker shows.

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Darkened Poker

Tags: Eli Elezra, Howard Lederer, Phil Ivey, Poker, Poker After Dark, Texas Holdem

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