Playing Poker with James Woods

WHO HAS TWO THUMBS AND KNOCKED JAMES WOODS OUT OF THE TOURNAMENT?

One of the highlights of the tournament I played at Foxwoods over the weekend was knocking James Woods out of it. Playing against him was very interesting. He has an unusual and distinctive style, but it’s one I've seen before and so it didn't take me too much effort to adjust to it.

James plays a lot of hands, which means by definition that he plays a lot of garbage hands. And he sticks around in pots for multiple streets, especially if he's hit a piece of the board such as middle pair. Believe it or not, it's because of this fact that his middle pair ends up being best; his opponents become so frustrated that they will start playing back at him. But James has a decent post-flop game, so he ends up winning more than his fair share of hands that make it to later streets.

In addition to his general loose style, he also overbets on every street. For example, during the 25/50 level he brought it in for 400 in middle position (I’m more likely to bet 125-150). This bloats the pot early and takes opponents out of their comfort zone. He also has a rather deliberative pace, shall we say. This doesn't go over well with the typical fast-acting, East Coast player. Sometimes you can put a player on tilt just by playing very slowly against him. (It doesn't work against me though. I don’t care how slow you are.)

Too many opponents will try to play back at someone like this by also playing garbage and seeing if they can win as well. But since James has more experience at that, it's not going to be a winning strategy for them. My approach is to play tighter than usual; i.e. play only really good hands. This is obviously something I'll have more experience with than James does, so now we’re playing poker on my ground. If I don't flop good, I let it go. If I DO flop good, I'll be more likely to let him bet for me until showdown, when I scoop.

It definitely helped that I was three to his left; not counting the blinds I had position on him in every hand except once each orbit. Any hold'em player will tell you what a huge advantage this is: I was able to see what he was going to do before I decided to commit my action.

We played a total of four hands heads-up. The first hand was early, before I’d gotten the hang of his particular style, and he won that hand. The other three hands I won, including the one that knocked him out of the tournament. (In case it matters, my AK beat his A9).

Including James, there was a total of 251 players in this tournament, and I ended up cashing in 21^st place, so not a bad result I must admit.

From -$1000 to +$1000 : A $2k swing in just two hands

This is what a $2000 chipstack looks like.

I worked a 12-hour session at $2/$5 no-limit yesterday at Foxwoods. This is a tough room for a lot of reasons; one of which is that most of the folks who play here are professionals, semi-pros, or at the least regulars who show up frequently and play long hours. There are very few tourists such as me who just show up on a lark to play cards for a while. This isn't Vegas.

The maximum buy-in at this table is $500. I always like to buy in for the max, because if I strike gold I want to be able to win the most I can with it. If my stack drops below $400, I’ll add another bill to the table to bring it back up again.

Well, yesterday started out as one of the driest sessions I can remember. At one point, I went four hours without playing a single hand. I kept adding bills to the table, one after another, and after ten hours I was down $1000. I guess you could say that since I had around $500 on the table, I was actually net down only $500, but personally I don’t count the win until I leave the table. So in my mind, I was down one grand.

It wasn't any single hand that put me down. A loss rate of $50/hour on a 2/5 game isn't very much at all. I just wasn't getting anything worth playing.

As I always do, but especially when I am in the midst of a tough session, I examine my game very closely to see if I can figure out where I’m making mistakes. If I’m playing poorly, I’ll just get up and leave and admit I've been beaten. If I’m playing well, I’ll blame the cards and stay at the table. In this case, I knew I was playing very well. I folded Ace/King preflop in one hand when I could tell it was beaten (it was). In another hand, I folded pocket Jacks preflop for the same reason. The flop came A-K-J and the winner had pocket Aces, so I would have lost a fortune if I’d stayed in. I was clearly plugged into the table and making great reads. Nevertheless, a loss is a loss, and the competition was extraordinarily good, so even though I usually can beat the 2/5 game at Foxwoods I decided that on the next day I would drop down to 1/2 – an easier game for me, but one that doesn't bring in nearly enough money.

One of the things that so intrigues me about no-limit poker is how a player can spend hours building up a monster stack, winning hand after hand, and then lose it all in a single bad call. It's something I see nearly every session (although it hasn't happened to me yet). But I didn't think I would be on the receiving end of this experience.

It was ten hours into the session when this hand came up. I was dealt 66 in middle position. I limped in, deciding ahead of time to call the raise that would surely be coming. Sure enough, the player on my left who was a very good loose aggressive player (but then they all are at this room) popped the bet up to $25. There were four callers, including me, so five of us went to the flop.

The board came out K-6-4, so I hit complete Yahtzee. An early player checked; I checked; the opener popped in a good continuation bet and got two callers. When it came back around to me, I check-raised half my stack. The opener folded and the other two callers came along.

The turn was an Ace. It checked to me; I bombed the pot with an all-in. One player folded; the other hemmed and hawed and then called. The river was a brick and I nearly tripled up with my flopped set. From $500 to $1500 in one easy hand!

The very next hand, I was dealt pocket Kings. This time I played it fast. I raised a decent amount and got two callers. The flop was T-8-6 with two diamonds (one of my Kings was the diamond). I c-bet big and the two callers came along. The turn was another diamond. I bombed the pot again, and both players folded. So now I was up even more.

I stayed with the game for another two hours, and kept building my stack, but fatigue finally took its toll and I decided to leave before I started making mistakes that shrank the stack back down. But there’s more poker to be played today!