Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Omaha sucks- How would you play this?

I'll be the first one to admit that my knowledge of Omaha is limited. Nonetheless, I feel that it is adequate enough to compete in small buy-in tournaments with decent expectation. A hand in one of the Battle of the Bloggers 3 events had me questioning my understanding of basic principles. Here's a screenshot of of me going busto on, what I'm thinking, was a bad beat:


So here's the situation. It folds around to the SB, who pops me in the BB. With the double suited aces, I'm not folding. I considered calling, but I decided on a re-pop based on the value of my hand and my position if he can make the call. I've read a couple of different passages that say you must push the action with aces. Considering I was double suited, and with the above-mentioned thoughts, I re-pop the pot.

And he re-pops me to about 10,000. I don't like the raise, but I can't see laying the hand for the following reasons:

1. the value of my hand (which I may be off base with)

2. the size of the pot (getting my money in and winning gives me the chip lead)

3. I'm trying to calculate his range quickly and I can't see a lot of hands that are ahead of me (part of this thought was that the chance of him being double suited with the aces as well seemed to me like the chances of AA vs. AA in hold-em- does that make sense?) I ended up ranging him on AAxx, KKxx, double-suited broadway cards...that's about it. So, looking at my equity, I concluded:

AAxx- should be ahead of most of these because of my hand being double suited
KKxx- should be crushing these hands
double suited broadway cards- worried me a bit, but guessed that I should have decent equity against these hands (also thought that he could be sharing suits with me on some of these hands)

Okay, with seven seconds, I put this together as much as I can and come over the top. The board runs out as seen in the screenshot above and I'm out. So, my questions are:

1. Did I over play this hand?
2. What are arguments for alternative decisions?
3. If, as me, you smooth called the preflop raise, what would you do on the flop? Against a check? Against a bet? Against a check-raise?

Here's the hand history if it helps with the questions:

Full Tilt Poker Game #5599835419: Skill Series (40521358), Table 10 - 200/400 - Pot Limit Omaha Hi - 23:30:20 ET - 2008/03/11
Seat 1: Virge (18,375)
Seat 2: thebmorekid (14,757)
Seat 3: SirFWALGMan (6,031)
Seat 4: BamBamCan (3,070)
Seat 5: Jestocost (48,434)
Seat 6: jmlabrie18 (4,136)
Seat 7: KngofKngs (10,915)
Seat 8: bayne_s (4,393)
Seat 9: KillinKegz (24,665)
Virge posts the small blind of 200
thebmorekid posts the big blind of 400
The button is in seat #9
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to thebmorekid [As 5s Jd Ad]
SirFWALGMan folds
BamBamCan folds
Jestocost folds
jmlabrie18 folds
KngofKngs folds
bayne_s has 15 seconds left to act
bayne_s folds
KillinKegz folds
Virge raises to 1,200
thebmorekid raises to 3,600
Virge raises to 10,800
thebmorekid raises to 14,757, and is all in
Virge calls 3,957
thebmorekid shows [As 5s Jd Ad]
Virge shows [Ac Ah 4c 3s]
*** FLOP *** [9h 8d Jc]
*** TURN *** [9h 8d Jc] [8c]
*** RIVER *** [9h 8d Jc 8c] [9c]
thebmorekid shows two pair, Aces and Nines
Virge shows a flush, Ace high
Virge wins the pot (29,514) with a flush, Ace high
thebmorekid stands up
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 29,514 Rake 0
Board: [9h 8d Jc 8c 9c]
Seat 1: Virge (small blind) showed [Ac Ah 4c 3s] and won (29,514) with a flush, Ace high
Seat 2: thebmorekid (big blind) showed [As 5s Jd Ad] and lost with two pair, Aces and Nines


Any comments would be greatly appreciated...


Damn Donkeys,


Bmore

2 comments:

Rocco said...

No, you did not overplay this hand.

Omaha is a strange monster from my experience. I've played alot of these tourneys online and the one thing that is absolutely certain about the game is: the swings make Holdem look like Go-Fish. You have every right to get your money in with double suited Aces here. Although no hand in Omaha will ever be "dominating" before the flop (and even after it most of the time), this is a tournament and you have was is definitely the best hand preflop. Your edge won't usually be better than 60/40.. but even so.. that's all you can do. You do not fold here with this hand in my opinion.

Now, had you smooth called and seen the flop as is.. it becomes much tougher and I don't really have a right or wrong answer..
This flop is horrible for any AA hand.. but considering you have the Jack and running diamonds on a rainbow board... I think it's playable but marginal.. depending on how much it costs you. People in low limit omaha games tend to play JJ, QQ, KK, and AA very hard before and after most flops.. so I'd be tough for me to fold in a tournament situation against one of those players.

But that said, you did the right thing by eliminating that guessing game and putting your money in there preflop with the best of it.
As it stands, you were 27% to win and 50% to chop the pot before the flop... you just took a bad beat.

Heineken34 said...

Bmore,
I have been playing more Omaha than holdem lately and I agree with what Rocco said. Just a "bad beat". All-in pre flop is the right move, hard to call if you see the flop.