What makes tom dwan good

He's obviously capable of doing that with overpairs especially considering the fact that the most aggressive player in the game is still behind him, but he certainly won't do that every time. The fact that he decided to call Dwan's squeeze instead of back raising further reinforces the notion that his range might not be very premium pocket pair heavy especially in the deep stack situation where back raising premiums makes a lot of sense. The flop is extremely interesting.

It hits both player's ranges fairly well especially Ivey's so it wouldn't make much sense for Dwan to go for the multi-street bluff In this particular situation's players were so deep that hand's that could bluff catch in bb spots can't really stand the heat Durrrr was about to dish out. Again like in the previous example hand Dwan's hand selection might not be perfect no backdoor equity to fall back on , but when you're playing hands an hour timing and table dynamics become much more important than hand selection.

The river showcases how great both players are. Dwan had the discipline to go through with his initial gameplan and Ivey was probably one of a handful of players who at a time wouldn't release the hand immediately after seeing a bet. Unfortunately, for him, he couldn't beat some better hands that Dwan might elect to turn into a bluff in this spot and he ultimately couldn't make "the sickest call of all time".

In this particular spot, Dwan leverages the fact that this massive multiway pot combined with the extremely dry texture will keep everyone extremely honest. Even if we account for the context of live deep stack televised poker show and we assume players might play some 2x combos here that they wouldn't play otherwise, it's still relatively small part of any competent player's range simply because of how preflop equity works. This is especially true for Barry who can't really have any monsters on this texture except for two combos of TT, 22 Dwan is blocking TT and the board is blocking 22 and even though his flop continuation bet into seven people will be extremely honest Greenstein can't possibly feel amazing about his holding even in the best case scenario AA.

Dwan recognizes the lockdown board no hand has good equity against the nuts and he's blocking the virtual nuts by holding Tx and decides to be the only person in the room capable of dishonest play in the 8-way pot. He realizes that he can fold out very strong hands with impunity which he later confirms by correctly stating who folded the best hand in this spot. Speaking of Eastgate, as the second to last caller preflop he was the most likely player to have 2x in his range simply because the great odds he was offered preflop , but he was still very unlikely to have the nuts for all the reasons described above.

With so few possible 'top of the range combos,' his range after flatting the flop was unnaturally skewed towards the medium strength hands and putting the pressure on the medium part of someone's range is one of the best things Dwan could do from the game theory point of view. This is one of the lesser known hands Tom Dwan played probably because he ended up losing it but it showcases how you can make a great decision based on the board texture and blockers combined with villains betting patterns.

Dwan is blocking the Qx, KK is very unlikely given the preflop action and additionally, Dwan is blocking a lot of semi-bluff combinations. Lastly, it doesn't really make sense to check raise top pair for value and again Dwan is blocking KQ and KJ. All of that combined makes an aggressive player's range circa very likely unbalanced towards air combos which gave Durrrr a great opportunity to bluff catch with the medium part of his range.

That being said Feldman ended up having the rare top of the range combo which doesn't make Dwan's overall decision bad. All the bluffs in the world can't help you if your value bet game is lacking and Dwan is perfectly aware of that. In this particular hand against Phil Helmuth , he purposefully chose betsizing that's consistent with his image.

Since opponents already assume that Durrrr is polarized in this spot why not go for maximum value with the top of his range? The flop check and moderately sized bet on the turn ensured that Hellmuth's range would be fairly wide.

This, coupled with his keen understanding of poker fundamentals, made him an unpredictable, difficult opponent to play against. Fans of poker could be forgiven for wanting to emulate the Dwan approach. And when it comes to home games, forget about it.

Tom Dwan has a reputation as something of a maverick, an unconventional wizard at the poker table. This takes the edge off the loose-aggressive strategy somewhat. When players in a home game come up against an aggressive player, they will usually back off.

But at the same time, you may be up against already unpredictable players, without the sophistication you would expect from opponents in a cash game or in tournament play. Odds Shark Staff Tue, Mar 9, pm. The first is the value of knowing your image. Tom Dwan certainly has an aggressive image, and it may have been the factor that allowed him to get maximum value with his aces up. The second is how to approach spots where you may be getting bluffed.

The trick here is to have a sound strategy, understand what part of your range that you need to be calling with, and trust your range work. Which player would you like to see us analyze here on the Upswing Blog? More Tom Dwan, or someone else? Let us know below. Want to make profitable poker decisions in 30 seconds or less? Learn more now! This is Dynamik Widget Area. To quote one YouTube commenter : I like how nowadays Tom Dwan is like a mythical creature like bigfoot or the lochness monster.

Preflop This hand takes place at a Triton Series high roller cash game. Preflop Analysis. It denies the big blind from seeing a cheap flop and possibly out flopping you. It forces the initial raiser to put more money in the pot when you are likely ahead. If Tom Dwan has a hand like 99, 98s, or A4s, he will probably call the 3-bet and be at a significant equity disadvantage. Flop Analysis. Both players in the blinds make standard checks over to the preflop raiser. The big blind whiffed and has an easy fold.

Turn Analysis. River Analysis. Tailoring Your Bluff-to-Value Ratio Based on Bet Size The theoretically optimal bluff-to-value ratio in a spot depends on your opponent's pot odds to call, which depends on your bet size.

Related Posts. By Patrick Harvey March 9, March 3, May 31,