The time has arrived! With Daniel going into this matchup to be played almost exclusively online, the pair and PokerGo kicked things off with a bang by playing the first 200 hands of their 25,000 hand heads up feud live in the studio!
We break down some of the biggest pots between the two rivals. Incase you don’t know much about the build up between these two, they don’t like each other is an understatement. It was refreshing to see that the pair talked it up a little between hands, cracking jokes and telling stories.
4-Betting with K3s
Daniel bloated this pot massively pre-flop with a 4-Bet on the Button after facing Dougs 3-Bet with his suited Ace. After that though KidPoker as he was known before his hair implants and many wives, seemed to pump the breaks and couldn’t fire a single shell to try and take Polk off a hand.
The pot was checked down and Doug won with his Ace high.
Tough Spot for Doug
Those of you that know heads up poker, know that folding top pair is hard to do at any point, so with Daniel 3-Betting AJo and outflopping Dougs AQs it proved impossible to get away from. Doug paid off all of Daniels 3 value bets and Daniel grabbed a pretty chunky lead.
3 Barrell From DNegs
Daniel put in the 4-Bet preflop, with K9o, which is a great hand to 4-Bet because you block hands like KK and AK and the hand doesn’t play too well without the betting lead. So, therefore, it’s a great 4-Bet bluff, Doug could fold himself, or just muck further on in the hand due to being out aggressed and out of position.
Daniel fired small on the Flop and Turn and then ended his triple barrel with a pot sized bet on the River. Doug could only beat a King high bluff like Daniel held, or maybe a hands like A5s, or 78s.
Doug Mucked pretty instantly and Daniel claimed “Old man Speeding” which is already a bit of a catchphrase, with Daniel pulling off a few good bluffs in the match.
Polk Shuts Down
After firing a huge bet on the Turn as a semi-bluff, Polk avoids pulling the trigger on this non-board changing River and wisely so as Daniel was most definitely calling with three of a kind.
Check Raise River Bluff
Probably one of the dirtiest things in Poker is value betting when you get checked to on the River and then getting raised. Well, Doug took his Rivered pair of fours and turned them into a bluff here, with blockers to the straight and two pair hands like K4 or even 44.
This is a pretty good play and if Daniel was lower in his range might well have worked, however, Daniel was sitting on two pair here and wasn’t in a folding mode with a huge lead in this match up.
Biggest Hand of the Night
It all went down within the last 10 hands of the match, with Polk stuck just under one buy-in, he tried pulling off a huge move in this pot.
Doug floated the flop with near-zero equity, bet huge when checked to on the Turn and then went for a near 1.5x sized pot jam on the River.
The strange thing is Daniel had exactly the hand he can never fold here, Dougs bet puts even good Kings in bad shape with this sizing.
When all was said and done, Daniel had bagged up a nice little win, with Polk seeming like he pressed a little too hard for the cameras. Maybe this will change the odds a little on this heads up match, with bookmakers stating pre-game that Polk was around a 5/1 favourite.
Daniel must have had some really good heads up coaching, his Turn play in particular seems to be amazing, playing small ball by checking his weak holding and stong ones too. Allowing Polk to over bluff at him on Rivers.
The question is, how will Daniel do playing two tables of heads up online, which is Dougs speciality, time will tell, but after seeing this initial face off, I like Daniel to upset the odds in this matchup.