Two bubble hands

[Sam T.]

Sorry, no hand histories, but I'll do my best. Final table of a 3-table Party tournament, six or seven players left. Stacks are generally even, and the blinds are getting big. Few hands are going to show-down:

Hand One:

Hero is on the button with KK. UTG (solid player) raises 3xBB.

Hero...


Hand Two:

Hero is in the BB with T9o. One player (a rather loose caller) limps, SB folds, Hero checks.

Flop: 962r

Hero...

[AJo Go All In]

you need to be a lot more specific wrt to stack sizes/blinds.

most likely the answers are: 1) all-in. 2) all-in.

[holeplug]

Hand 1: Push

Hand 2: A bet will probably win this for you but if he's loose he may call with overcards hoping to catch.

[2planka]

Hand one: push. If you get a caller, fine. I like your chances. You want them to have to think about it.

Hand two: Tougher one. I'm betting this flop, just depends on how much. Comes down to stack size. If a 3xBB bet represents ~30% of my stack I'm inclined to push here and get ready to play in the next one if overcards hit.

If I have him covered, it really depends on my read of the other guy. For example, if I think he'll chase with any A, and my stack can support a fold if an A hits, then I'd bet smaller, say 2xBB, and try to extract some chips. This is a riskier play than pushing, IMO. Since he could have any number of hands.

I guess I'd tend to be more aggressive. Shove the stack and make him decide whether to risk his chips on such an ugly board.

[Sam T.]

Hand One (KK):

Perhaps I was wrong to do this, but I just called. My assumption was that he would bet out no matter what happened on the flop, and I would re-raise all-in. The flop was rags, he bet out the minimum and I pushed.

I'm not sure I like this play. My assumption was that I would live or die on this hand, and I wanted to get as much out of him as possible in the event I lived. In short, I wanted to collect my folding equity after he put in a bet on the flop. (Would I have felt pretty silly if an ace came on the flop and he had A2o? Yep.) As it turns out he called my all-in, showed QQ and MHIG.

Hand Two T9o:
I pushed. I didn't think a min-bet would knock him off overcards, and any meaningful bet would commit me to the pot (sorry about the lack of stack sizes!). He showed A9o, but I rivered a ten to win it. /images/graemlins/grin.gif