Episode #111 recap: World Series of Poker Academy

MAIN TOPIC

We welcome Ante Upper John Lanier of Lutz to the show as we review the World Series of Poker Academy. The newspaper paid a nominal fee for Chris and me to attend while we were in Vegas, but John bucked up the entire $2,200, so listen to the show and get three opinions on whether you get your money's worth.

What it is: A 3-day instructional camp with professional players (Greg Raymer, Joe Hachem, Phil Hellmuth, Mark Seif, Scott Fischman, etc.) among the faculty. (They also offer shorter camps for less money).

What you get: Classroom instruction (pros contribute tips, plus a session with Joe Navarro on tells), "lab" instruction (sit at a table with a pro), two tournaments (top prize in each for our camp was a Main Event entry), some meals/parties and a goodie bag.

Is it worth it? Our general consensus was that there's too much in the camp that you can't put a price on, so it'll be a personal decision on the value. For example, if you're really excited about playing cards and learning from a particular pro, what exactly is that worth to you? For some, that alone might be worth $2K. For others, maybe not. Getting two shots at Main Event seat certainly has some value, too. All three of us thought the instruction could have be better structured. The labs were the highlight. If all the instruction was done in this manner, it would have been better.

Other options: While we didn't attend a World Poker Tour Boot Camp (though John will later this year), we did talk with some officials while in Vegas and an interview is included on the show to give you some perspective.

OTHER TOPICS

Who let the dogs out? We found out how fond Chris is of cute puppies when we talked about the dog poker chip set being sold by dogpokerchips.com.

New Florida games: We discussed what a wild and crazy game $2/$5 no-limit can be, since your max buy-in is $100. We also talked about how a good player can clean up in the $1-$5 spread limit hold'em game being dealt.

Tampa Bay Poker Replay: Scott reviews Derby Lane.

HAND OF THE WEEK

Listener Mike found himself with Kh-Ks in a $4/$8 limit hold'em game at B&M cardroom near his house.

UTG+1, he raised and got four callers. The flop came Qd-7d-2d, and our hero bets out, gets raised and one caller. He calls. We thought a 3-bet here would have been better. It's the "cheap" street, so use it to narrow your future decisions. If the raiser caps it, you can consider folding or proceeding cautiously in the rest of the hand. If he just calls, you've retaken the initiative, and if he folds, well, even better.

The turn is the 4c, and it's checked around to the raiser, the caller folds and now we're heads-up with a decision to make. Mike calls. At this point, we agree. We didn't get enough info on 3rd street to know how strong or weak we are. The river is the 9h, Mike checks, the bettor continues and Mike ultimately calls (good move - one bet to win a huge pot) and takes down the pot as his opponent had Ad-Qc.

- SCOTT

Comments

[ante_up_fan]

111 - in England we call any three digit number "NELSON". It's a cricket term. Probably about as interesting as Chris' bowling anecdote about 111 but thought i'd throw it in! - great show.

[Breeze Denotsko]

Limit strategy is covered in "Small Stakes Hold'em" by Ed Miller, Sklansky and Malmuth. I think I have heard y'all say you read it. But I think you may wanna re-visit the text.
No reraise on the flop with the KK due to the pot is a 'big pot' and therfore his oponents range would not shrink (10 small bets in pot thus any 4 out or more draws should call. With the added EV of nut flush draw he should re-raise/cap it if you re-raise). The third player already called a bet so cant call 2 bets cold (by definition 'cold means no previous invesment) If the pot were a small one then a reraise may give some new info. but not at this level of play. The KK player and the AQ player both played the hand by-the-book.
Dont get an ego bruse aout my suggestion to read this book. I just got done with it for a third time. I need to reread it every year or two it seems. NL kills my ability to play Limit. This book repairs the leaks.

[Chris Cosenza]

No ego bruise here, thanks for the suggestion. I read the book about 2 years ago and forget EVERYTHING in it. That's why I play NL. LOL! Thanks!

[mark]

I really enjoyed this weeks episode as always. John seemed to be a natural fit for your show. Maybe you should consider having him sit in when one of you is out of town. He seems to encompass a lot of what Ante Up is about.

[Blazman]

JLBsox....
I tried to post my comment but it thinks that I am spamming the comments so click here for my response..
http://www.cardclubs.net/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=2723

-Blaz

[Boil]

I thought this was an excellent episode - was great to hear a review of the boot camp/academy which really considered if the paying punter would get value from it. Good idea to have john on to hear the views of a paying participant.

apart from the Navarro tells book it does not seem to me that anything endorsed by Hellmuth offers good value- once they've paid his fee.

Funny to hear Chris's interview with Phil Hellmuth - anyone remember Chris's "Buttkicker to Butt Picker" coment on PH from an earl episode of Anteup?

How about an Ante Up mini boot camp? Would there be any call for that?

If you could get say Kenna James or Lee Childs say to do some Labs - it seems that that is the most interesting feature of the Academy - or "students" could come prepared with Hand of the Week type hands to be gone through

[ChicagoMike]

A great effort as always this week guys. You helped to fill 5 hours in the car out to lovely Iowa tonight and you don't know how much that is appreciated.

A HORSE Academy would be cool, but I would fear paying $2500 to hear Annie Duke tell me that A,2,3,4,5 is called a wheel and is the best hand you can have in Razz.

You guys should see if some of the online training sites like PokerXfactor, cardrunners, etc would give you a week trial for free to review the sites and do a show on that. I would think that the $24.95/month that these sites charge is more along the lines of the Ante Up Nation pocketbook than an academy or boot camp.

Heck, if you could get Kenna and Lee I'd come to Tampa and pay at least $24.95 for an Ante Up Academy.

[New Scott]

As Lee Corco would say, "Not so fast my friend." I looked at the Derby Lane schedule they have ZERO non-Hold'Em tournaments in August.

[Scott Long]

Hey NewScott. Yeah, one of the players at Derby told me last week that only 10 players or so showed up for the Double Flop tournament. It's a shame. The world needs more than NL Hold'em.

[Scott Long]

Breeze, you got me thinking about this hand a lot since you posted. This Sklansky friend of yours sounds like he knows his stuff. :) But I think I still stand with my play. It might not be mathematically correct (a fatal flaw in limit), but I do think it would garner some info.

Preflop, here's what we likely figured out about our opponent. He likely doesn't have AA, KK, QQ, JJ, AK or maybe even 10-10, or he would have 3-bet preflop. So what kind of hands would just call an UTG+1 raise? Probably not much more than a middle pair or a high suited Ace. Unfortunately, 7-7 or A-X diamonds are the two hands we're most afraid of on this flop. We have to bet, and any player worth his chips will raise us, even if he missed the flop completely. (Since we raised preflop UTG+1, we likely have a big pair, and therefore, should be scare of this flop). So when the player raises as he should, I'm willing to "build a pot" for him in order to see how he reacts to the 3-bet. If he was bluffing, he's done and I've won without guessing on later, expensive streets. If he 4 bets, then I can consider a range of options on the turn, including check-call, which would defend against a single Ace of diamonds. And if he just calls the 3 bet, then I know he doesn't have one of the hands that concerns me, so I have to assume he's drawing (of course, a case could be made for him having 7-7 and being afraid of us having Q-Q, but I'm willing to take that chance). And if he's drawing, I have him beat unless he hits, so I can put another bet in on a diamondless turn and again on a diamondless river.

One final thought - I'm not so sure there are a lot of $4/$8 players out there playing Sklanksy MegaMath style. Of course, that doesn't mean that we shouldn't play correctly ourselves, but I personally don't put much stock in the possibility that I'm facing crafty players when I sit down at a$4/$8 table. I'm willing to make "incorrect" plays on cheap streets to avoid making "correct" plays on expensive streets.

Thanks for making this hand even more interesting than I thought it was initially.