shooting for third

[stripsqueez]

$200 SNG - down to 4 and i have been blinded away with a bunch of crap hands and because there is a monster stack of around T6,500 - i have T750 on the button with the blinds at 300/150 - UTG who has T400 folds and i look at A9o

hmmm

stripsqueez - chickenhawk

[lorinda]

How many hands left in the level?

Lori

[young nut]

insta-push...most likely you are ahead, but this is a good enough hand that it don't matta! Plus the blinds are gonna eat you up in the next 3 hands, so push here.

[stripsqueez]

[ QUOTE ]
How many hands left in the level?

[/ QUOTE ]

lots

stripsqueez - chickenhawk

[lorinda]

Okay, that means that you lose a folding war if he wins one hand on the SB and you lose your 2nd BB, if someone raises on your first BB, so you are by no means certain to be able to fold in.

The offsetting consideration is that you will be the BB if he chooses to go to this folding war and you will be able to take two hands against one to knock him out (If someone else plays) or get a cheap BB
If he doubles through next hand, you're now the one under pressure.

From that side of things, you are likely to get your third place if you fold, but it's by no means certain.

Because of this, I raise with the A9o, if I want a folding war I want it to be a near certainty.
I hate this raise, but I think it has to be made.

Lori

[stripsqueez]

[ QUOTE ]
The offsetting consideration is that you will be the BB if he chooses to go to this folding war and you will be able to take two hands against one to knock him out (If someone else plays) or get a cheap BB

[/ QUOTE ]

if i fold and he doesnt defend his BB the other 2 guys will likely raise with random things next hand - if he wins that hand then he gets to pay the BB before me so i get 1 more chance for him to bust

i hate folding more than i hate raising but i did fold

stripsqueez - chickenhawk

[lorinda]

I'm in moron mode, you are correct.

This makes a fold far more acceptable IMO

Lori

[lorinda]

It's real late here so these are real rough estimates, however you can put your own numbers in.

EV if you fold.

$20 80% = $16
For simplicity no $30 or $50 (I always use 20-30-50 it keeps the math the same for all levels)

Raise

$0 30% = $0
$20 40% = $8
$30 15% = $4.5
$50 15% = $7.5

Total $20

From those numbers, the raise is better, but as I said, I pretty much made the numbers up.
When I'm more awake I'll use better numbers, but hopefully this shows the way to solve this problem.

Lori

[Gramps]

That's tough. If the big stack is playing aggressively, at least you don't have to fear the SB & BB doing the "let's both call and check it down to knock him out" play...but A9o is only like 60% or so against a random hand...it's not like you got a monster.

If BB is loose and will call with any two, I'd be more inclined to let this go. Make UTG make a stand first. If there's a chance of some fold equity...no shame in pushing. If the fold fest continues before someone else is eliminated, it'll be tough to get second let alone have a shot to win.

I don't think you can hate either way on this one. Some days I push this, some days I fold. Lot of "it depends whether..." going on.

[stripsqueez]

your numbers look okish to me lori - i could quibble with a few of them - i like the analysis

as it happens after i folded it quickly became 3 way and after several more hands i called a push from the second stack with T1,200 odd when he had T2,000 - my AQs got nailed by 77 - in short i was still a shot at second and of-course if i hit my coin toss first is in sight

stripsqueez - chickenhawk

[zephyr]

I think that an astute big stack will do everything in his/her power to get this one to be a folding war, as he is the one who will benefit most from it. That being said, I have to do more thought on the topic to determine what your best play is here.

Only my Opinion,

Zephyr