Pot Limit Omaha

Part 2

In order to better understand tournament situations and non-standard PLO situations, I will show you some hand histories from a recent $10 with one rebuy & add-on PLO tournament I won on PokerStars. The hands all take place at the final table.

Going into the final table, I was about the middle of the pack. I had a massive chip lead early at my table, and rode to the final nine among the chip leaders the whole way. Early on, I tried and relax and let everyone else do the pushing. Finally, I ran into a situation where I had to trust my read and not make the obvious play, which to me was to fold.

Having been aggressive most of the time up to this point, I knew my image was a little lacking. So, when I raised the 6,000 big blind the maximum from the button (21,000 to go), and the big blind came back at me for most of his chips, I knew he didn't have to have anything huge. I had shown I had the ability to lay a hand down, and I was also very fast to attack the blinds.

The problem was I had K K T 3 with three diamonds! I had to hope he A) didn't have aces and B) didn't have a good hand to snap mine off. However, I knew he wasn't waiting for aces and decided to put him all-in, which he called with Q997.

As it turned out my hand was almost a 2-1 favorite pre-flop! It's rare for such a hand to come up in Omaha. In fact, if your hand is more than a 60-percent favorite you're in great shape. I was in spectacular shape, just hoping no nines, hearts or straightening cards fell. Fortunately they missed the board and my kings held up, putting me in good shape early on.

The lesson you should take from this hand is that your opponents will re-steal from you, if they sense weakness, especially if you have shown a history of folding in big pots like this. You have to analyze each and every situation in a tournament from the ground up and figure out what your best course of action is.

In another pot, a very passive but loose player limped in four-handed, as did the button. I completed from the small blind, putting in 6,000 more, and the big blind checked. On the flop of Ah 3s Js, I checked my J 3 x x hand. I had no redraw, but felt jacks up was probably the best hand at a short table.

It checked to the loose player who bet the minimum. On such a dangerous flop, I felt they either had a monster draw, or had a very weak hand. I was leaning heavily towards the latter, because this player wasn't very tricky.

However, if I attack them now and bet the pot, they would likely call with even top pair. The reason being is that a hand like A K 7 5 on this flop is still a cointoss against my hand. With two pair and no redraw, assuming he had no common cards, I am just 51.8-percent to win! I decided my best course of action was to wait until the turn came.

I called, and the 8c fell. Unless he had A 8 in his hand, or even J 8, I thought I had the best of it. Even if he did have one of those hands, he still might fold, fearing I had a set on the flop. So, I bet the pot, 72,000 chips. If they played, they'd only have 6,000 more to put in the middle, so I was essentially saying "play for your tournament life or fold."

They thought for a long time and told me they thought they had the best hand, but finally mucked. There's a very good possibility I either saved myself from losing on the river, or made them fold the best hand with my unusual play.

Another hand to just show how tournament play changes your action came up when I had 8 9 9 T in first position. It was four-handed, and instead of opening the pot like I might usually, I just mucked my hand. This hand is normally good enough to either limp with or raise in late position, but a few things were working against me here. First, my hand is good in multi-way pots, since I have three cards to a straight and a pair that could make a set. It's not one of the best PLO hands, but it's definitely playable under the right conditions.

However, late in a tournament, when most raises are either re-raised or folded to, I felt my hand had little value. If I just pick up the blinds, that's only 18k for me when I already had 121k in chips. That's a nice amount, but the downside to stealing is those times I have to play for my whole stack. 8 9 9 T isn't that good heads-up against an overpair or a hand with common cards like A K Q T, A J 8 9, etc. In a heads-up pot, I would likely be up against a bigger pair, and I would be praying for one of two nines--not a good spot to be in.

Another similar hand was the Q J T 9 I held later. At this point I was second in chips with 300k+ and raised in first position with this hand. A short stack re-raised and I put him in, and he showed me K K 5 5. Knowing my hand was likely to be a cointoss against a big pair I called and he ended up making quad kings to my dismay. After the hand, my opponent commented "keep raising my blinds," and kept letting me steal them. Seems kind of odd that he would challenge me to keep raising his blinds, inferring he will start defending or re-raising, yet he let me continue to steal them en route to victory.

Finally I wound up heads-up with a two-to-one chip lead and held off my opponent. I doubled them up once, but I felt I still had an edge heads-up and kept pounding. Finally I got my chips in on a Q J x flop with a pair of nines and the nut flush draw. I was expecting to have to race it out, but my opponent showed A T x x with a baby flush draw. All I had to do was dodge an ace or king, and I was gold! Thankfully I did just that and took the tournament down, my first PLO win.

I will try and get a real PLO expert like gank or Jeff Henry to write more about the game. Until then, I hope my advice over the past few columns helps you take your PLO game to the next level!

Jon Eaton

note by gank: Pot Limit Omaha is one of my favorite games. Not only is it the preferred game played by Europeans, it is usually the biggest cash game played during big tournaments like the World Series of Poker.