Hello again Pocketfives community, it's your Cash Game Correspondent, Richie Menlo. Since my last article, I have been watching a lot of the major sites in search of a hand worth bringing to you. Most of the money is getting thrown around in the high limit Pot Limit Omaha games on Full Tilt Poker. My knowledge of Omaha is rather new, and my game of choice has always been NLHE, so I felt a no limit hand would make for a better article. The only issue then was finding the right hand.
Most of the higher limit holdem games on Fulltilt don’t run as regularly as the PLO, so instead of waiting all day railing the empty $200/$400 game, I decided to pull up Pokerstars and check out their $25/$50 no limit game, which had a couple players with a lot of gamble sitting in. The hand I decided to look a little deeper into was played in the later night on November 2nd or early morning of November 3rd, depending on where you draw the line for where days end and begin. For me, even though it was 2 a.m., I had not gone to sleep yet, so it was still Thursday.
Right away, I knew it was going to be a table worth watching. Oren Halling, who you would better know as H@££inggol, was there. He's a man who in the past has absolutely owned the $25/$50 game on Stars. Another player I recognized right away was Pocketfives member Sumeet Batra, who plays under Batera. He's a solid player who I met in Aruba right after he took down a monster pot in the $25/$50 live game there (a game that generally had a $100 straddle) during the ub.com event. Seat 3 had Snake8484, who also has good results across many sites. The last of the names that seemed to catch my eye was Brian Townsend, who you know as aba20 on stars or sbrugby on Fulltilt (who is signed on for the season 3 of GSN’s High Stakes Poker).
The action started under the gun, when aba20 made it $200. H@££inggol called, and the rest of the table folded. The flop came out Q J 2, and aba20 checked. H@££inggol bet out $350, and aba20 raised $700 to $1050, which H@££inggol called. The turn showed the 9, and aba20 bet $2,250, leaving himself $1,794 behind. H@££inggol shoved all in with the $4,422 he had left, and aba20 called his remaining $1,794. The river brought the A for a board showing Q J 2 9 A, and H@££inggol showed A 10 for a pair of Aces. aba20 flipped over the winning hand of A Q for top two pair and raked the pot of $10,663.
Let's take a look at the overall play of the hand. The raise by aba20 under the gun with Ace Queen off is a standard play in any cash game. Given the fact that aba20 opened under the gun in a nine-handed game, many players at this limit would fold ace ten of hearts because it is an easily dominated hand. However, H@££inggol is anything but a conventional player at any limit, which also makes him very dangerous. With that said, he decided to take a flop with the hand.
The flop gave aba20 top pair and top kicker, and he checked to his ultra-aggressive opponent with the intention to check-raise. H@££inggol bit, and he led for $350, which aba20 promptly raised to $1,050, a good sized raise. At that point, H@££inggol could have just gotten away from the hand, but knowing that aba20 is capable of playing back at him, H@££inggol opted to take another card with the hope of either hitting his hand or taking the pot away from him on the turn.
The turn card brought a 9, which also put three spades on the board, and aba20 led out for $2,250 an almost pot-sized bet that was also more than half of his remaining chips, showing H@££inggol that he was committed to the pot. H@££inggol then shoved all in for a total of $4,422, which covered the $1,794 aba20 had left, presumeably trying to represent a made spade flush. aba20 called, getting about 4.95 to 1 on his money, as he was holding top pair and the nut flush draw. This was a very interesting shove by H@££inggol, because he was aware of the price he was laying to aba20, and he held only an open-ended straight draw. At this point in the hand, with the amount of money invested and the price that was being given to aba20, there are few hands besides a stone cold bluff that he could lay down. Even most semi-bluffing hands aba20 could be holding would be a favorite over H@££inggol's ace ten.
The river then brought an insignificant ace, and aba20 scooped the pot. When the money got in on the turn, aba20 was about an 86% favorite to take the pot down. In this pot, aba20 outplayed H@££inggol by being aware of his opponent's hyper-aggressive style and tricking H@££inggol intto making a $5,000 mistake on the turn. All one can say to aba20 is nh and gg sir.
The reason I picked this hand is that it was a well-played hand by a great player who forced another good player to make a costly mistake. I hope you guys find this hand as interesting as I did and hope it showed you the different levels of play involved in a high stakes cash game between two very advanced players.
For your Pocketfives.com cash game correspondent, this is Richard Guzzo saying "Thanks for stopping by and seeing Richie on the Rail."