A Winning Night and a Question

I had my most successful night at the Party Poker $5 cash tables since beginning to keep track of my daily returns. This has helped give me a giant boost towards the next milestone target in record time, which is probably just as well considering the Christmas-based interruptions that I’m expecting in the back half of the month. It seemed that no matter what I did last night I couldn’t help but take down the pot – certainly makes a pleasant change to sitting on the other end of a notorious Party Poker suck out.

Compared to the vast majority of microtable denizens I am a particularly tight player, sticking to premium starting hands for the vast majority of the time. A significant number of players I play against have a VP$IP of over 50 which is really quite ridiculous, but it also provides plenty of opportunities. Sometimes I get myself into a fold-rut where I will automatically fold whenever some crazy makes what I consider an indecently large raise before the flop, even when I’ve got a decent starting hand.

So that’s why it was really out of character the way I played my A Qs.

I was UTG and whacked in a 6xBB raise trying to limit the commonplace multi-way pots that scuttle many a strong starting hand. My raise was immediately called by the guy next to me, only to be raised All-In by the next bloke. Everyone else folded around to me. My usual reaction in this situation is to fold, fearing I’ve come up against AA. But last night I allowed myself to break free from my usual passivity and chucked it all in. As an added bonus, the guy who called my original raise also called the All-In move.

A Queen in the door saw my hand prevail and tripled me up. Unfortunately the Party Poker software doesn’t show each player’s hole cards when All-In in cash ring games so I have no idea what the other guys made their move with. And here’s my point… other than to crow about a handy win…surely, if I have risked all of my money by calling someone’s All-In move I have bought the right to see the hole cards of my opponents. Party Poker displays the hole cards when players are All-In during tournament play, why not at the cash ring tables?

I shall be asking the Party Poker powers the same question.

Current Bankroll Position : +272.66%