Riding the Donkeys

...at 25cO8B 9 max again (average pot size after a half-hour: $27, over 100x bb!!). I'd like to think I played well here, but this hand played itself from the flop. The short stack donkey Turddle bets the pot into the big stack maniac TripleNuts, into my medium stack holding nut FD, nut lo draw, and inside str8 draw, so do I: a) call, b) fold, or c) jam the pot with every last red cent? My only regret - I could only raise for $10, which was a little less than a third of my stack. Donkey shoves for $1 and change more, maniac calls. I turn the perfect card - 4d - which gives me the nut flush and wheel lo. The maniac check-calls my $10 bet - half my stack and a third of the pot, then check-folds a blank river for my last $11. What could he have called with on the turn that he would fold on the river??? Well, he is a maniac. Who cares. I take a $50+ pot (which for those new to math, is 200x bb).

That hand played itself. In this hand, donkey bets a small pot on the turn, and I call with a str8 flush draw - even with the board paired, he is a donkey after all. A surprise check-call from the small blind behind me tells me that I'm probably drawing dead. And the river - the miracle 8h to complete a jack-hi str8 flush. Obviously the donkey's money goes in, and I take Rover's stack also against his big boat queens full - I really thought he had quads what with the reraise game we had on that tragic river, which he should've considered me having. Oh well, I take a $110 pot.

The rule when deciding to enter a hand in hi-lo split games dictates that you hold cards that draw to both ends, not just one. I follow this rule more for limit games, but in pot- and no-limit I'll come in with only a hi hand as long as I'm in position and there has been at most one pre-flop pot raise. Here I limped with all paint on the button, and overcall an early pot bet with mucho outs to broadway versus his top- and bottom-pair. We both turn str8s - me with nuts (I even out-two-paired him there), and he with 2nd nuts, and guess what? All our money goes in. He misses a 2-outer to an underboat (submarine?), and my Broadway holds for a $115 pot.

SUMMARY: after just over an hour of play, I'm up 3.5 buyins. The juice just keeps flowing.

New Donkey Corral: 25c O8B

Don't usually play Omaha hi/lo, but I add it into the mix for occasional variety. You need some real donkeys at the table to make any money; if everyone there is at least half-decent then there's really no edge at all. You'll end up heads up a lot and splitting the pot. But this table was filled with live ones, committing some classic mistakes of the game:

• Calling pot-sized bets after the flop drawing to the lo only, with no reasonable hi or hi draw. This is one of the dumbest plays in poker.
  
• Raising preflop with aces and kings, and then overplaying them after the flop (see chat below, when I slowplayed flopped trips against an obvious preflop big pair).
• Overestimating fold equity. There are so many draws in O8B, when someone bets the pot on the flop, coming over the top bluffing air is -EV of almost infinite magnitude. I felted a guy in a $50 pot when he tried it.
  
• Calling 3- and 4-bets preflop with cards that are good only for hi or lo hands. You're putting a lot of money in before you have any idea of how the hand will develop.
  

This was a nothing hand at 25c O8B, not sure why he was pissed...

http://www.pokerhand.org/?4819536

KODIAKZERO wins ($7.13 chips).
DISCOKG: fuy
KODIAKZERO: sry?
KODIAKZERO: did you mistype "NH sir"?
<<>>
AKADINKY wins ($3.82 chips).
DISCOKG: no fu
KODIAKZERO: ok, well thanks for your dead money

Drawing to something you cannot bet

This is one of the dumbest moves in poker - drawing to something you cannot bet. In this hand of 50c PLO, Fatballs calls my bet on the turn with a baby FD and nut FD, even as the turn paired the board. So when he rivers his nut flush, he checks from early position and gets no action. Now one could argue that with double flush draws, he was in the money on the turn check-call anyways, but I see players making this play without any odds to call (real or implied), and checking their hands after they hit.