More Day 1

If you've ever listened to Bart Hanson's "Cash Plays" poker podcast, you'd be aware of one of his common themes while talking about playing no-limit hold 'em. Value. Every action you take, every bet, should be designed to earn you some value. I happen to agree with this concept and think that nowhere in the course of a hand is value more important than on the river.

The pots are bigger on the river. The decisions are therefore more important, especially when you are playing deep stacked. When I sat down at the 2/5 table at the Rio and bought in for $500, I committed mistake number one. While I certainly covered most players, there were two others with nearly $2000 in chips and $100 bills positioned in front of them. Both players were extremely aggressive, but the play of one of them stood out to me for the reason mentioned above. He was the best player I'd ever played with when extracting value on the river against his opponents.

He raised very frequently, opening for $20 if folded to him. Continuation bets were the norm and even when his opponents played back at him post flop or on the turn, he seemed to know exactly where he was in relation to their holdings. He must have made over $1000 on river bets alone in the time I sat there. Nearly each time he'd fire out a river bet, I was praying for his opponent to call because I was sure he was effectively bluffing. But each time he'd get called, flip up middle pair, 9-kicker, his opponent would simply muck. It was amazing, and I'll admit, a bit inspiring.

Meanwhile, I was sitting there making more mistakes.

I lost half my stack with AQ suited all-in preflop against a short stack who I felt was shoving out of frustration. Turns out he had Queens and I failed to suck out. The rest of my stack went away when I flopped top two pair against middle set. No 2-outer for me and I reloaded. I then just watched and learned since I was card dead and couldn't do much against the two aggressive players without putting my entire newly reloaded stack at risk.

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Thankfully, I got the text from Otis that they were going on dinner break and eating at a place called Rub. Rather than dwell further on my miscues, I took the opportunity to join them. Missing out on eating with friends is one mistake I didn't want to make.