poker by the book...

[greywolf26 0]

I'd like to start out by saying that I've only been playing hold'em for a few months...so forgive anything ignorant I may say. I watched the travel channels "Poker by the Book" show last night, and think that it was a bit of an education in itself. Far be it from me to assume that I would know better than the likes of Doyle Brunson, so it must be something I don't understand yet...help me out here.I didn't under stand the way he played heads up...ok, I get the first hand where he went all in on IMHO crap...he could afford it with such a massive chip lead...but after that...I thought that there were some bad calls. I guess what I'm looking for is this...am I right in thinking that there were some bad calls on his part...or did I just not "get it"?

[TheMathProf 0]

There were four hands that we saw, and that might not have been all the heads-up hands that there were (it looked to me like the chip counts were off for all the hands to be in sequence, but I may not have been paying close enough attention).Hand 1: You said you understood the first one, so let's not address it any further than to say that Doyle required Sklansky to have a decent hand in order to call, Sklansky had a great hand and took down the pot.Hand 2: One of the things that Doyle absolutely loves is to be the aggressor. When Sklansky raised all in with his A-5, I would imagine that Doyle was worried about starting to get pushed over. He's now got Sklansky with roughly 20% of the chips in play, and he's wondering if Sklansky's trying to make a move on him. In heads up play, oftentimes, the more aggressive player is going to win, cards not withstanding.So he looks down at his hole cards of K-J, clearly beating the random hand, and usually a pretty awesome hand heads up, and he plays it. Yeah, it's a slight dog to the A-5, and the percentages carried through.Hand 3: Gotta correct me if I'm wrong on this one, but I think this is the one where Sklansky hit top pair, Doyle hit middle pair, and Doyle called the all-in. This is the one place that might have been really questionable, because I thought the flop came 3 to the straight.Having played a little bit of heads up, it is amazing to me how frequently middle or bottom pair on the flop ends up being a winner. Kind of hard in my book to fault Doyle too much here.Hand 4: He's a 10:1 chip dog at this point, had a better than random hand, and had to make a move, for very much the same reason that Sklansky had to call Hand 1, and then Doyle lost the coin flip that was slightly in his favor.Anyway, all in all, I wasn't that confused by the play...What was more amazing to me was Phil Hellmuth's "huge stack" turned into 3rd place...

[Smasharoo 0]

It was a big FPS fest with each pro trying to show the others how he could give more free cards that would beat him or bluff into made hands if you just gave him a chance.Sklansky won because he wasn't trying to impress anyone. His readers allready know his books work.

[greywolf26 0]

thanks for the input, when you put that way I can understand it a lot better. I thought they showed more hands, but I could very much be wrong condidering the distractions between the dog and the phone(a friend calling to ask me if I was watching no less..."yes or i would be if i wasn't answer the damn phone"--he's a friend i can get away with it.)One other thing I made clear as mud in the first post...I not all the hands is what confused me, but why consistently go "all in". Of course I guess this could be explained by the fact that we didn't see all the hands and the travel channel (and others i guess) put a lot of stock into the value of showing the "exciting hands" I realize that they couldn't realisticly(sp) show all the hands...i know i counted at least 3 or 4 different dealers. so i'm guessing it was a pretty long game.

[Dr_Shakes 0]

I think one correction is that Doyle went all in on Slansky on hand #3. There is a big difference between making a move with middle pair and calling an all in with middle pair. Helmuth probably deserved to win, he played great and lost most of his chips to a 3 outer by doyle. If he wins that hand he probably wins the game. Sure he got lucky a few times but always when he could afford the gamble.

[....Ian.... 0]

TheMathProf, great post. hand 2, doyle loooked like he knew he was beat (by A high) he shoulda layed it down, which woulda been tough but i think he knew he was behind and calle danywayhand 3, doyle bet way too much on his mid pair. sure D should bet but the amount in the pot etc. was no reason to go all in.

[jayistheman 0]

doyle was missing some gigantic cash games to play in that tournament... he was missing out. quite frankly, it didnt seem like he cared at all

[....Ian.... 0]

Helmuth probably deserved to win, he played great and lost most of his chips to a 3 outer by doyle. If he wins that hand he probably wins the game. Sure he got lucky a few times but always when he could afford the gamble.

yea phil got very unlucky, but you can bet that travel channel produces were LOVING it when he was losing.phil losing is much better for ratings than phil winning

[Dr_Shakes 0]

Yeah can you imagine if it wasn't someone of Doyle's stature who put that beat on him. He would have gone nuts. LOL

[Absolution 0]

Ya, Phil's respect for Doyle was probably the only thing holding him back there. I like how ESPN always shows Phil sucking up to Doyle, who sits there with this annoyed look on his face. I wonder what the relationship is really like.

[BilliardsBoy 0]

I heard the relationship is on the rocks. Phil walked in on Doyle and Chip Reese playing heads up one night. Needless to say, the police were called and a scene was made. I heard Chip still can't put his full weight on his left leg and that his basketball career is probably over. Not to mention the fact that they don't see eye to eye on family planning or what religion to raise kids on. :cry: I really wanted those two to make it.

[jayistheman 0]

ha

[KDawgCometh 2]

Yeah can you imagine if it wasn't someone of Doyle's stature who put that beat on him. He would have gone nuts. LOL

yeah, he even whined when Howard sucked out on him. Phil and Doyle is kinda like a uncle/nephew relationship from what I've noticed. Doyle and TJ are the onlyy ones who can ever hard needle Phil without him going nuts. It should be noted though that Doyle was the preflop favorite

[firstyearclay 0]

I didn't see one fancy play at all!!LOL

[gregdon8 0]

I know it is very difficult to criticize Doyle, but I think he played very poorly heads up. You do want to be the agressor, but you can do that without going all in. Also, Sklansky is known for being super tight. Doyle did not need to play big pots he could have easily just worn him down by betting flops, regardless of the cards he held. I noticed especially the all in call with middle pair. He didnt have to put it all in if he just makes an average bet and Sklansky calls that should be enought to let him know to back off, considering how tight Skalnsky plays. Phil realized that Doyle will frequently overbet by going all in and trapped him perfectly but got unlucky. I know you are all going to see that Phil got lucky too. Well against Sexton the right play was to call with the pot odds. Even if he felt that Mike had KK the odds would have been right for a call. Against Caro, I think they deservedly chopped. How bout the play Phil made earlier on Mike when he reraised him all in with QJ off. Phil was by far the best player last night in my opinion, and I know this will cause some controversy as a lot of people here dont like him.

[faketree 0]

Yeah can you imagine if it wasn't someone of Doyle's stature who put that beat on him. He would have gone nuts. LOL

yeah, he even whined when Howard sucked out on him. Phil and Doyle is kinda like a uncle/nephew relationship from what I've noticed. Doyle and TJ are the onlyy ones who can ever hard needle Phil without him going nuts. It should be noted though that Doyle was the preflop favorite

On th contrary about TJ. I can't remember offhand what tournament it was, but there was a hand where Phil and TJ were in where TJ misread his hand and Phil accused TJ of slowrolling. He didn't go off on TJ but he sure had about 10-15 mins worth of Phil-like comments about it.That being said, Phil rules. His reads are incredible. I just wish he didn't blowup like he seems to do lately. I know he got outdrawn on the A5 vs. K10 hand, but after that he uriniated his chips away very quickly with a questionable Q10 call soon after.Also, as the poker went, I wasn't very impressed by anyone except Phil. Caro was a character and fun to watch. TJ looked like he couldn't wait to get to the craps table. Doyle played well until they got heads-up and tried to run over Sklansky. Sexton was quite awful. I mean Phil made him his bitch and single-handedly took him out.

[Suited_Up 2]

Ok, seriously... stop being nice to Doyle cause he's Doyle... He played like crap! Flat out. I don't know why, or how he wins at cash games... but it looked like he doesn't know what he's doing. And did you say Phil's reads are amazing?The other day I saw him on the Taj championship... Get completely owned because his reads were terrible. He laid down AK against AQ, and QQ against QJ because a K came on the turn. The only reason people think his reads are so great, is that every time he makes on of his patented Big Laydowns... He shows them to everyone!

[TheMathProf 0]

I keep hearing about how Sklansky's a tight player, but don't you have to throw some of that out the window when it gets to be heads up?

[jayistheman 0]

Ok, seriously... stop being nice to Doyle cause he's Doyle... He played like crap! Flat out. I don't know why, or how he wins at cash games... but it looked like he doesn't know what he's doing.

it was a freeroll.... he didnt care. it was like playing for pennies with some friends man. he already has a good image with the public... hes already in the poker hall of fame.

[KDawgCometh 2]

On th contrary about TJ. I can't remember offhand what tournament it was, but there was a hand where Phil and TJ were in where TJ misread his hand and Phil accused TJ of slowrolling. He didn't go off on TJ but he sure had about 10-15 mins worth of Phil-like comments about it.That being said, Phil rules. His reads are incredible. I just wish he didn't blowup like he seems to do lately. I know he got outdrawn on the A5 vs. K10 hand, but after that he uriniated his chips away very quickly with a questionable Q10 call soon after.Also, as the poker went, I wasn't very impressed by anyone except Phil. Caro was a character and fun to watch. TJ looked like he couldn't wait to get to the craps table. Doyle played well until they got heads-up and tried to run over Sklansky. Sexton was quite awful. I mean Phil made him his censored and single-handedly took him out.

it was showdown at the sands that this happened at. Phil later recanted on TJ slow-rolling him as he knew that TJ wouldn't honestly do that, Phil even wrote a hand of the week article basically absolving TJ of slow rolling

[Suited_Up 2]

Ok, seriously... stop being nice to Doyle cause he's Doyle... He played like crap! Flat out. I don't know why, or how he wins at cash games... but it looked like he doesn't know what he's doing.

it was a freeroll.... he didnt care. it was like playing for pennies with some friends man. he already has a good image with the public... hes already in the poker hall of fame.

Well he doesn't with me anymore. I also started to read his NL section in SS2... and I think it's terrible. It's some of the worst advice I've ever seen. It seems to me that he's trying to make everyone play bad, so he can win.Some high points: I like to get all my money in when I think I probably don't have the best hand.It's ok though, because I pick up small pots along to way to make up for not getting good odds on the big pots.It scares people because they know i'll put them all-in at any time.(Doesn't scare me, because now I can be pretty sure I'll win those hands most of the time)

[JFarrell20 1]

I saw some very bad plays in that show. Sexton didn't protect one of his hands. I saw a hand get checked in a 3-way pot all the way to the river. Even the players were laughing. Nobody protected their hands, they were all waiting to trap it seemed. Even Sexton said "I should have bet the turn" on that hand.Then Hellmuth, as usual, gets a chiplead then starts raising people with garbage. Typical PH.I was extremely unimpressed with Caro's play. He talks a lot of sh.it too. I wouldn't talk to him at all at the table. Caro looked like he hadn't seen action in a loong time. Why'd he fold 10-10 against TJ!?!? The crowd even groaned..From what I saw Sklansky played the best and thus won. Hellmuth played 2nd best but busted out 3rd.Kudos to Sexton for making a great laydown against Phil after Phil came over the top of him for about the third time early. I didn't see how he could get away from that one. Oh another hand that I thought was played poorly was Caro (I THINK) Vs. Brunson. Caro had 33, Brunson had paint cards I think... K10? Anyway flop comes 245X?3.... making caro trips but giving brunson a straight if he's holding an ace (or 6 for that matter). I thought Caro had to lay that down there because he had to put Brunson on an Ax... If brunson had a pocket pair he would have bet the turn. He didn't, so Caro should have put him on Ax... meaning brunson makes a straight on the river. I really didn't like Caro's call. He was right as Doyle just had King high. But I would have thrown that one away 9 out of 10 times.

[UNCCwill 0]

Ok, seriously... stop being nice to Doyle cause he's Doyle... He played like crap! Flat out. I don't know why, or how he wins at cash games... but it looked like he doesn't know what he's doing.

obviously he has had more success than you, and you definitely can't criticize his playing style because of a tv show

[Ramocita 0]

Actually,,,It was Sklansky that hit the set. Doyle didn't expect him to call at the river.

[CrazyEyez 0]

There's no way Doyle should have lost with that chip lead. It looked like he just wanted to get it over with. I noticed the same thing in the Poker Superstars. He just looks disinterested. That being said, to say that his no-limit section in SS2 is crap is just rediculous. The style that he recommends is for big cash games. A lot of it just won't work at the micro-limit tables.