Learn ... or Lose

by Daniel Negreanu

At the beginning of 2003, I made a conscious decision to play fewer tournaments and get back to playing more live-action poker. Playing the tournament circuit is fun and all, but the travel does get tiresome, and frankly, it simply doesn't pay as well. Card Player's tournament Player of the Year award is fun to compete for, but realistically, you need to maintain a steady diet of tournaments in order to win it.

So, of late, I've gone back to work at Bellagio about five times a week. The game of choice is usually a combination of seven or eight different games: hold'em, stud, Omaha eight-or-better, stud eight-or-better, ace-to-five triple draw, deuce-to-seven triple draw, razz, and Omaha high. Of these games, Omaha high has to be my least favorite. If you read "This Game Sucks" (Vol. 16/No. 8, April 11, 2003), you'd know what that means. It simply means that I'm just not very good at the game, and/or I haven't completely grasped the game as of yet.

Rather than pout and complain, "This game is stupid," or, "Why are we playing this game? There is no skill in this silly crapshoot game," I decided to keep my mouth shut and learn it. I enjoy playing in mixed games a great deal. It kills the monotony of playing just one game. If it were up to me (it never is), we'd play as many different games as possible. Of course, there is always someone who says, "No, we aren't adding hold'em unless we add ace-to-five," or, "We can put stud and razz in if we take out hold'em and the deuce-to-seven." And this is always followed by, "Why do you have to have it your way all the time?" Blah, blah, blah. This process sometimes takes more than 20 minutes, and has probably become my biggest pet peeve in poker.

Of course, I understand that everyone wants to play what's in his best interest, but there is a remedy for that: learn all of the games well! If you do that, you won't feel you are at a disadvantage, regardless of the mix they finally decide on.

Well, clearly, I felt I was at a disadvantage during the Omaha high section, but not so much so that it would affect my decision to play in the game. I felt like a favorite in all the other games, and also realized that the only way I was going to improve my Omaha high game was to actually get some experience.

So, anyway, it was a Tuesday night at Bellagio and I was playing in a sixhanded $600-$1,200 mixed game. We got around to Omaha high, and I picked up the 101042 in first position and limped. From what I'd noticed, there was little preflop raising going on, so I felt comfortable trying to see a cheap flop with this marginal hand, despite my poor position. Two other players limped in behind me, as did the small blind, so five of us saw the flop.

The flop came down 1043. I had flopped top set, but when there is a flush out there in a multiway Omaha high pot, chances are that someone has you beat, especially if there is a bet. Well, somebody did bet - right in front of me out of the big blind. For some reason, I felt that "Player Y" had flopped a medium-sized flush or was running a bluff with the naked A(naked meaning he didn't have another heart in his hand). If he had flopped the nut flush, I would have expected him to check from such an early position, hoping to check-raise. My only option here, I believed, was to smooth-call, thus letting others in behind me and improving my pot odds against a made hand. No one else called.

The turn brought the 8, no help for me. Once again, Player Y bet out. At this point, I decided I was going to call him down whether or not I improved my hand. So, I decided to raise (read "The Turn," Vol. 15/No. 23, Nov. 8, 2002). Why would I do that? Well, if Player Y did in fact have a medium-sized flush, he may decide to give me credit for having the nut flush. After all, if I did have the nut flush, there is a good chance I would have played it the same way: slow-playing on the flop to let others into the pot, then raising on the turn when the bet doubled.

The only thing I really had to fear was Player Y holding the A, regardless of whether or not he actually had the flush. If he had the nut flush, he'd obviously reraise me. The real question I had to ask myself, though, was, would he reraise me with just the naked A and then follow through on the river? If this were pot-limit Omaha, I never would have played the hand this way and put myself in such a position, but since it was limit, the play would cost me only one bet, I thought. After analyzing the hand some more, though, I realized it would actually cost me two more bets if I was going to call the river anyway.

My real goal with the raise was to try to win the hand without having to improve my hand. It was risky, but I was pretty sure that Player Y didn't have the nut flush, until ... he reraised me! Oops. Based on his body language, I was now pretty sure I was up against the nuts, and I wasn't going to pay off the river unless I improved. Initially, I planned on paying him off, but after watching the way in which he reraised me, I decided that I was going to lay my hand down on the river if I missed.

Of course, with so much money now in the pot, I had an automatic call for just one more bet. Then, the river brought the fourth 10. I managed to get multiple bets in with far the worst of it, and came out smelling like roses. Is there anything sweeter? To my surprise, Player Y bet out again, and then called my raise, as well.

Looking back at the hand now, I can see that I played it poorly. I would have been better off taking the conservative route by just calling on the turn. It seemed like an advanced play at the time I made it, but I missed out on one key piece of information. If my opponent had the hand I thought he had (a medium-sized flush), he probably would have checked the turn. His bet should have told me that (A) he didn't have the nuts or (B) he had the key card, the A. In either case, a raise was bad. In (A), I was simply going to have to pay an extra bet, and in (B), I actually risked the chance of being bluffed off the best hand. Mistakes like this one are OK, as long as you gain something of value from them.

I'm nowhere near being an Omaha expert, by any means, but by continually analyzing hands and putting forth my best effort, I hope to eventually have a full understanding of the game. This, of course, applies to every game, not just Omaha high. As I said in my previous column "This Game Sucks," there are two ways to go about things: (1) Be ignorant and blame it on the "stupid game," or (2) step up to the challenge and learn everything you can about the game. My advice? Try No. 2.