If Donkey Play Is So Bad, How Come It Wins So Much?

[villaridge]

Hiya folks. I got something on my mind, and that's Donkey play. lol, you see it everywhere. We all roll our eyes at that 65 suited that took down AA, or somesuch hand.

But the fact of the matter is that donkeys win a hell of a lot of hands that "we" don't think they should have. Come on peeps, you have all sat there in a game where a donkey, plays donkey hands, and wins hand after hand, after hand. Sometimes they win so much, that your eye-rolling becomes tilt.

Now we have all been trained to the mantra, of know pot odds, know position, know the player, know card ranges, know implied odds, know how many are in the hand, know bluffing, know bet-sizes, know C betting, know blind stealing, know 3 betting, know 4 betting, know value betting, know BB, know yada, yada.

But NONE of us has seriously studied or trained on how to play agaisnt a donkey, or how to play like a donkey. Oh sure, there is the standard "when I see a donkey, I wait till I have a really good hand and go after them" school. LOL, a school of thought that only has one thought.

Like, I can google, or buy books that explain how to 3 bet in massive detail. Or do the same for how to play position. or whatever aspect of poker. But is there a book out there on how to play donkeys? Hell No. Is there a book or article out there on How to play like a donkey and win?

Yet donkeys keep winning. Judging from the Bad Beats stories people post, donkeys win an amazing number of times, all the times.

My question is, if donkeys win so much, how come no one has researched why and tried to give some serious thought to this aspect of poker?

All comments are invited. Merry Christmas to all

[nb1961]

OK disclaimer first, I'm crap at poker odds.

My theory is this, you have a roughly 32% chance of pairing at least 1 of your hole cards. So if you play tight "proper" poker say a VPIP of 19% that's 19 hands in every 100 of which in an ideal situation you will hit 6 hands with something. Now if Mr Donkey is playing 60% of hands that's 60 in every 100 he will hit 19 hands with something. Link this with aggressive play that scares the tighter players out of more hands Donkey boy has somewhat of an advantage. Add to the the fact that he doesn't seem to care if he loses or not he is just in it for the adrenalin rush you are having a hard time.

Yes long term your tight style will pay off with a profit, short term the donkey bast**d just made you smash another computer screen.

Now the more pot odds skilled can pull my theory to bits

[scrawnybob]

damn it NB are you trying to blow the reality of my real "small ball" strategy out of the water ????

dont tell everyone why the "donk" win out and how seeing 50% of the flops might work out profitable (at least over the very short term)

;-)

on a serious note NB has pretty much nailed it

cheers SB

[nb1961]

Now the real discussion here need to move on to how do we combat the short term advantage the donk has. As mentioned we all pretty much know the tighten up, wait for a big hand and relieve him of his stack method. This is fine but how many times have we all sat there with steam coming out our ears because we have AK and the flop is all low cards and the donk shoves a 3x pot size bet into us because he has hit 2 pair.

[Ramster]

Now the real discussion here need to move on to how do we combat the short term advantage the donk has. As mentioned we all pretty much know the tighten up, wait for a big hand and relieve him of his stack method. This is fine but how many times have we all sat there with steam coming out our ears because we have AK and the flop is all low cards and the donk shoves a 3x pot size bet into us because he has hit 2 pair.

That is why taking notes on players is so important
In open tourneys its a bit harder to get a proper read on players thats why imo you are generally getting a better game in a private tourney because you are playing together regularly you get more of an idea on how others play
In ring games notes are even more important as you have more chance of running into players regularly then in MTTs

[Poker Orifice]

"it depends"
It depends on what 'type' of donkey they are.
There's an easy enough way to adjust to each donk, depending upon how they're donking it up.

[nb1961]

"it depends"
It depends on what 'type' of donkey they are.
There's an easy enough way to adjust to each donk, depending upon how they're donking it up.

Come on then PO give us more

[nb1961]

Prime example of the hand I mentioned above.

The Villain was Vpip 85 / PFR 7 / AF 0.5 over 30 hands at this point. He hadn't folded 1 hand pre flop the 15% missing was big blinds.

PokerStars - $0.02 NL (9 max) - Holdem - 9 players

UTG: $2.84
UTG+1: $1.90
MP: $4.97
MP+1: $1.87
LP: $1.62
CO: $1.85
Hero (BTN): $1.87
SB: $2.00
BB: $2.00

SB posts SB $0.01, BB posts BB $0.02

Pre Flop: ($0.03) Hero has A K

UTG calls $0.02, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, Hero raises to $0.10, fold, fold, UTG calls $0.08

Flop: ($0.23, 2 players) 3 J 6
UTG checks, Hero checks

Turn: ($0.23, 2 players) 9
UTG checks, Hero bets $0.13, UTG calls $0.13

River: ($0.49, 2 players) 9
UTG checks, Hero checks

UTG shows 6 8 (Two Pair, Nines and Sixes) (Pre 41%, Flop 76%, Turn 86%)
Hero mucks A K (One Pair, Nines) (Pre 59%, Flop 24%, Turn 14%)
UTG wins $0.47

I think I played this about right, I tried a delayed cbet to see if he would go, I was pretty sure he wouldn't. I later found this to be correct when he went all the way to the river with A high and handed over $1.50 and I later stacked him with trip Q's. But it took an hour of patience and 1 rebuy when he stacked me, total profit off him in the end was around $4.00.

[ennotserp]

The problem for me is that I get knocked out of a tourney or SnG more often by donks than I knock them out. Without using a poker tracker (not that it would do any good), I don't have access to all the stats so have to rely on observations. So, maybe playing like a donk would be best when playing against those who you do not play against often, especially in ring games. Have often thought of playing suited or connected donk cards (keeping position and opponents in mind), simply because I can remember a number of times where I would have won huge pots (but I guess I've been brainwashed into not playing like this).

Back to poker trackers, Phil Gordon's "Little Gold Book" has a section on HUDs which is interesting, but are they beneficial if you do not play often against the same players. He suggests that if you don't use a HUD, you could keep track only of VPIP, PFR, and 3BET, as you should when playing in a live game. One question I have - if a player is card dead and folds a lot pre-flop, wouldn't this indicate that the player is playing too tight when really he is just not getting any hands, even marginal, therefore producing invalid stats. He either has to play "donk hands" or suffer the consequences by having everyone fold when he finally gets a hand. Believe me it happens.

[Poker Orifice]

Not in response to 'playin' donks' but more so in response to when to play suited connectors.
Vs. tight (TAG) players who are rarely raising but when they are, they're often continuing on flop a high% of the time... it can be very profitable to play SC's (in pos.) vs. players like this because we have great implied odds.... when we do hit our hand we're likely to get paid off for it because the tight-TAG is very likely to have a big hand (overpr. AA, KK, QQ, or AK, AQs w TPTK type hands) & most won't be able to get away from it (at least not in the lower/micro buyins).

I much prefer to play SC's vs. these ^ kinds of players vs. the loose donkey player. (but of course 'it depends' on what kind of donkey they are).