frenchkiss

Very high quality video, as always. There s a nugget every 5 secondes in what you say in all of your videos... Thanks.

Very interesting video, great insight. Thanks Phil !

Feedback : awesome video, great series. Note taking, assumptions, and adjustments are very helpful.and educational. Honestly, I almost never play HU PLO (I play mostly NLHE and PLO, both shorthanded and full ring sometimes), and I still loved the vid and learned a great deal with it. Keep up the good work (as usual) !

Great video, great series. Not much to add, except that I particularly enjoy the way you take notes, make assumptions etc, this part at the end is extremely valuable. Fantastic job as usual

Nice Video Sean

You' re spot on Brian; My first thought was to go for call turn/call any river, as I think I m probably ahead of his range with Q high, then I thought that it would really suck if he showed me Ace rag, as he would be likely to 4 bet with an A blocker... Taking that in consideration, I decided to shove, and thought it would be pretty hard for him to call, given his bluff frequencies. Even if results don't matter that much, I did jam on turn, and he tank called with 98o and won the flip. I felt bad after it, thinking that he did "put me on a draw" because I jammed turn, as I would have been very likely to flat any bluff catcher (TT, Jx, etc) or any monster (any K, boat, AA...), making my bluff "obvious".
But as said previously, call/call with Q high seemed a bit ambitious (even if more balanced); Maybe the right thing would be now to shove more value hands on turns in spots like those to balance my ranges, but then I make him fold a lot of his bluffs (and he DEF ships the third barrels VERY often...), so I really don't know :/

Well, I' ve seen him open down to 42s utg, and defend BB against an MP raise and a caller with J4s. He will def raise any suited 2 gappers from any position, and close to anything suited or offsuit 1 gapper from CO and Button. (I ve played over 4 months with him, 4 or 5 days a week).

As you mentioned Sean, I already started to develop a counter strategy based on his tendencies, but I don't know if they are correct : I started to flat more with A2s/A5s and ATs/AKs (I 3 bet the lattest like 50% of the time, call 50%) in order to let him get flush under flushed (or at least flush drawed over flushdrawed; He just can't fold when he flops a flush draw), I 3bet A6/A9s in order to reduce stack to pot ratio and be able to bet/get in comfortably if I flop nut flush draw+additionnal outs like gutter or Open ended, like A9s on 678 with both of my suit (I 3 bet those because of the fact that implied odds are worse than A5s for example, that have great deception for wheels etc).

I also 3 bet JTo sometimes, as he likes to call 3bets with medium suited connectors oop, so I can potentially flop a straight when he makes 2 pairs, or flop top pair+straight draw when he has bottom pair and straight draw, or second pair with straight draw. Lately I started 3 betting 99/TT/JJ (which I did not do always before), as I want to get all the stack in if I flop set over set, as we usually play 400bb deep (but I open myself to problems when he 4bets...).

I will sometimes (rarely...) 3 bet suited connectors just to give the illusion that I 3bet more frequently than what I really do, because my 3 bet/getting in range will usually be QQ+ vs him (I ve seen him go crazy with AQo or 99 with 400bb).

I don't know if those adjustments make any sense, and I' d be very happy to hear what you guys have to say about them, and hopefully also hear what other strategies/adjustments I could integrate against this specific opponent.

Even if spewy, this guy is def the strongest reg in the game, all other players are recreational players, and I feel that developing a solid overall strategy against him (who is my only "tough opposition") will definitely make an impact on my results.

Regarding hands like QTs, when I am in position, I just felt I gave up too much by not 3betting, but I could be way wrong. I mean, he still calls with inferior suited crap, and taking back the initiative against a super wide range had some value, but I' d be very interested to hear what you think are the pros and cons. But I m sure I could be convinced that flatting has better merits :)

Hi BagOfSuck, thanks for the reply. That's one adjustment I made against him, I usually go strictly for value against him, as he is leveling himself often; On the other hand (and I don't know if that's correct ???) he is continuation betting so often, and opening with so much trash (and calling 3b oop) that I was kind of feeling it's ok to 3bet, get back the lead, and build bigger pots in position with monsters AND playable hands when we are 400bb+ deep. Any thoughts on that ?

Hi Brian, and first of all thanks for your contributions to the forum, I dig your posts a lot.
I think I was not clear in my original post, he bets 420 and has 1100 left behind approximately.
And just to make things clear, having played this opponent almost everyday for the last 4 months, I guess he has air like 80%+ of the time here and I'm not concerned about running into a monster AT ALL. My goal is to find a way to maximize EV in this current spot against a hand that is very airy, and possibly balance my ranges fairly well not to be exploitable, which I seem to have failed to do, as you will see in the actual results :)

I' m on the button

Oh, just to give results, turn went check/check, river was an offsuit T and i did bet 1100 to get value from 2 pair. He folded

I agree that Sean's line makes perfect sense.
Also, thanks for your thoughts Flatbread, it seems that I got too scared by
Unlikely scare cards, as there are not that many of them, and actually bloating the pot now only makes me vulnerable to those scare cards on only one street : the turn (coz of the pot size bet left if i repop flop as Sean mentioned). Repoping on flop is clearly the right play. Thanks for making it more clear for me, it helped me to think better !

I already said that he would not fold anything to a 4 bet, my question is to find a way to maximize EV and keep playability at the same time OOP.

Regarding the straddle, I guess it depends how you rate yourself compared to the opposition, but if 4 or 5 guys are playing pretty poorly and have like 500BB+, I definitely think that putting in a live straddle will help me to get a greater portion of their stacks in when I want to. Then everybody starts straddling and fishes like when you give them action and bring a "gambling" atmosphere.

Well, we are 1200 big blinds deep, so I don't think that jamming will get a lot of calls except for 43o and 43hh... I'm not sure that shoving 6k into 600 will get many rewards... But I still can't find an option that I like :/

Feedback : Great vid as always, I really enjoyed it. Hopefully, runitonce members will be able to see the final table and end of the tournament !... Thanks for doing it despite being sick...

Hi Phil,

I am currently making the transition to PLO because of some pretty good live games running nearby, but those games are quite different than those depicted in most coaching videos (short handed, HU...) as they are 8 handed, and most of the time played with a variant called 5 card Omaha (I don't know if you ever played Omaha with 5 cards before, Phil ?)

Basically, it' s not uncommon to see 8 way limped pots, or 5 way single raised pots etc... It's very tough (if not impossible) to see a flop HU, 3 way, or even 4 way...

Also, I have the impression that the fact that we are playing with 5 cards instead of 4 brings much more backdoors into play, discourage preflop jamming (it's hard to hold with AAxxx dble suited), and I kinda feel it might be also tougher to bluff postflop (But, once again, I have pretty poor judgement as I m just starting to get a feel for the game).

Anyway, to make a long story short, my suggestion might be you shooting a video about adjustments on deep stacks 8 handed games (or close to full ring), with people that are very sticky preflop :) and maybe a small chapter about how to adjust to variants like this 5 card thing... (I' m aware of the fact that my suggestion might be too specific, so don't bother if you think if such a video would interest too few viewers)

Finally : Great site, amazing content. Thanks a lot, and I hope you ll get rid of that cold quickly !

Feedback : I liked the video. As you pointed out in the vid, I think that doing it only from time to time (once a month ?) would be fine, and mixing it up with PLO and NL cgames would be the best balance. Anyway, I always learn tons from your analysis, whatever the content is. Can't wait to see the end of that one.

Hi Phil, hi guys,

I had a question for you Phil regarding the KAJ9ccc hand on the T4Q5ddcc board (26 min down the video).

On which rivers do you plan on giving up your bluff ? I am sure that you had a pretty precise idea of what his turn range consists of, but you did not break it down during the video...

Would you give him a range of some kinds of 2 pair hands like Q5 or T5 with diamonds along (or with dominated clubs), or maybe also X678 with diamonds or clubs... (But you still went with the bluff with the 5 river ?)

I am currently making the transition from NLHE to PLO, and it's a difficult process to give people PLO ranges at the beginning, so I was just curious to hear what you thought was his most likely range to raise/call turn.

As for general feedback Phil, you should not be concerned about you "rambling" (!) as you said in some of your vids : Analysis is great and never boring, all the points developed are interesting and crucial, and the material is outstanding as usual. Keep the good stuff coming !

Happy holidays to everybody.