First I wanted to remind everyone that I don't think I am some kind of superstar poker player, this is not a brag post and I am looking for some serious advice...

Lately I've been feeling like I have no idea how to play certain situations because while the math says I should be making one move, my read tells me I should be taking another. In the most recent situations, I've gone with the math only to find that my read was 100% correct and had I followed it I would have kept myself in the tournament. Maybe my understanding of the math and putting players on a range of hands is completely horrible and I have no idea (which is why I'm asking you whether or not I am a donkey.) Here are two situations where I made the correct read but had to factor in other informatioin to choose my play and ended up busting because I didn't follow my read...

1) With a fairly average stack I raise 4x the BB with QQ from EP and get a call from the player on my left, who I've tangled with on several previous hands and had pegged as a fish. It's folded around to the button who raises to 3.5x of my opening bet. It's folded around to me, I read him for AA but go all-in figuring that there are too many other possible hands he could have that I have beat. I could have just called, but I wanted to end the hand there and not have to play this hand out of position against this particular player, plus I of course wanted to eliminate the player on my left. The player on my left folds and the button calls and turns over AA, I don't catch a Q and am knocked out of the tournament. From the way he had been playing and my read of the situation, the only hand I thought he could make that move with is AA, but then I also thought it would be prudent and correct to think he could also have KK which also beats me, or a few pairs lower than QQ and some high-card hands (AK, AQ, maybe AJ), obviously discounted QQ since I already had two of them. Either way, when I called I was still certain he had the Aces, but felt like I had to play it that way or the guys at 2+2 would think I was a fish.

2) I'm watching a friend of mine play a tournament, and we discuss poker on a daily basis and play together a lot, the point being that we know each other's games fairly well and (usually) respect the opinions of one another. A big reason for this post is our disagreement about how he (we) played this hand...

Holding K7 on a flop of 778 /w 2 spades, with three players in the hand the first player to act bets a little less than the size of the pot, my friend just calls with his trip 7's (we agree this was a mistake) and the last player to act just calls as well. The turn is the Jd, the first player to act bets the same amount he bet on the flop, we elect to raise his bet 4x, and the last player to act raises that bet a little more than 2.5x. The original raiser folds, and after verbally discussing with one another that we think we are beat by the player acting last because we think he is holding T9 for the turned straight, we raise all-in, and get called by the player who did make his straight on the turn holding T9, and do not fill up and bust out of the tournament. I thought this hand was particularly sick because the only specific hand we put that player on was T9, and sure enough he had it, but we decided to call anyway because we were only a slight underdog to the range we put him on. I PokerStove'd it and we were 48.7% to win vs villain's perceived range. We disagree on this play, my friend thinks he made the correct play and I think he should have layed his hand down after the three-bet by the villan and figure that not only does the read we had support that, but also the slight edge this player had against us with the range we put him on.

Now, in both of these situations I feel like I knew that I was beat with really no shot at winning short of some miracle cards falling in my favor, but I called anyway because I thought it was stupid to go with my read of one particular hand vs a range of hands that I should give my opponent credit for. Usually I put my opponent on a range of hands and play accordingly, but in these situations where I feel a player has a specific hand and the pot is offering me favorable odds, and considering that I risk going bust if I am wrong and can also afford to fold, should I go with my read and fold even though the math dictates that I should get involved?

Note that I consider myself to be a very observant player, I have a freakish obsession with details and feel that it naturally carries over to my poker game. Should it? I've heard that you should never call a bet if you are sure you're beat (a bit of a generalization, I've been know to draw and float), but I've heard otherwise as well. I don't put players on one specific hand very often, but the times when I do and go against my read because I think doing so would be foolish is making me feel like an idiot when my read turns out to be perfect. Help!

seriously this is a really long post
but by going by the title alone i'd say you need both... when it comes down to it if you are on a flush draw and you have the odds and he turns over AA and all you have is 23s you should still call ...

Holy crap, yeah, wow. About the long post thing. I don't know what I was thinking.

If you have strong reads than they should be included when you assign hand ranges. You cannot assign every hand in the range an equivalent frequency if you have a read that says otherwise. It will help if I use numbers.

You - 6000
Fish - 6000
Villian - 6000

blinds 50/100

you raise to 400
fish calls 400
villian makes it 1400
(pot: 2350)

You say that you are almost sure he has a bigger pair. Let's be very generous and say that this is an incredibly strong read and you feel that will be the case 70% of the time. You also feel that 20% of the time he will have AK, 5% of the time he will have AQ/AJ or a lower A/x and 5% of the time he will have a lower pair. Now you have used your reads to set up a math equation. You multiply the frequency of each hand by your equity vs that hand that way you can obtain an equity that weighted to reflect your reads.

(.7 *.2) + (.2 * .5) + (.05 * .7) + (.05 *.8) = .315 or 31.5% would be your equity in the hand

Had you just assigned each hand an even frequency, you would get something different.

(.25 * .2) + (.25 * .5) + (.25 * .7) + (.25 * .8) = .55 or 55% would be your equity

edit: this is assuming you have zero fold equity when you shove

The original raiser folds, and after verbally discussing with one another that we think we are beat by the player acting last because we think he is holding T9 for the turned straight, we raise all-in

hmmm.

I PokerStove'd it and we were 48.7% to win vs villain's perceived range.

Isn't his range 88, 87, T9, JJ, and maybe any X7 hand? You're about 24% against that range.

with experience the math comes naturally after a while, your feel helps you understand whether or not you should be making the call. The good players use math in the factor of solving the situation at hand, but its only a part of making the decision, all good players understand that table dynamics in tournaments change everything.

This post wreaks of "fear of losing."

Annette,

Could you paste the "reason". I am not sure I know which one you are referring to.

Thanks.

ive always felt the same way, that ill go with my instinct over math, but im a donk, glad to hear someone whose good feels the same way

Yes, but you have to understand that Annette uses this approach at the other end of the spectrum. She is not afraid to play weaker cards if her read tells her too.

obv.

My whole game reeks of fear of losing. Or at least, I'm a very competitive person and one of the struggles I've had to deal with is playing a game where the best player doesn't always come out the winner. Of all the games I have played, poker is by far the one filled with the biggest element of chance, so getting used to losing while being the best player has been tough. What I'm trying to say is, I'm not overly nitty or anything like that, but I hate to lose and had a rough time coming to terms with playing a game with this much variance.