I wonder if I should point for the 1000th time how Brian uses the table chat to give away information, and how bad of an idea I think that is. Here, he's not only telling everyone how he plays AK preflop, but he's saying how he plays it after the flop when someone makes a bet like that into him. Dude... it's a bad habit. Why won't you break it? You can't possibly think that giving out information like that all the time can HELP your game, right? Surely you realize it hurts you. Do you ever muck your winning hands, or do you show them every time? Just wondering...
Wit that said, if you said it here to entice him to show his hand to you, then I'm more ok with it. I'm actually really surprised he showed you AQ though. If I was him, I would have shown you ONLY a hand worse than AK, and mucked everything else (and told you it was worse than AK if you asked).
The point is, I think you chat way too much.
As for reads.... every poker hand tells a story. And every piece of information you know about every player involved in the hand up until this point in time helps tell the story. Betting patterns tell the story. Timing tells the story. Certainly there are tons of in person thing (gestures, hand motions, eye movements) that help tell the story. The board cards and YOUR hole cards help tell the story. Sometimes other players comments help tell the story. Anyway, it's the job of a good poker player to take all this information, to process all of this data, to figure out what his opponent is holding. The more information you have (say, by the river), the easier it is to complete the story.
Typically, I find that I put my opponent on a range of hands and as the hand progresses (as the story develops), I narrow down that range. Usually, when it's decision time, I have a range of hands and rough probabilities for each of them in my head. I then use that information to make my decision. With that said, there certainly are times when I put an opponent on a specific hand, and I actually surprise myself at how good I can read people now and then.
When I post my $1000 tourney recap, there will be a few times where I illustrate this for you. For example, when I was holding 77 one time, and my opponent pushed in behind me. I was getting around 3:1 on the call, which isn't enough if he's got an overpair, but is PLENTY if he only had overcards. I put him on 88, 99, TT, JJ, or a range of overcard combination. Estimating there was a 50/50 shot that he had the overpair vs. the overcards (and also a slight possibility he had 55 or 66), and also KNOWING that at least 1 and possibly two Aces had been folded at the other end of the table (probably outs for him if he had the overcards), I was able to make the call for 3:1 He ended up having TT and I lost (this was the first time all tourney that I put my money in as an underdog)... but I stand by the logic I used to make the decision, and I'd make it again.
Damn, this got long.
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