NL tournament hand

Small home game with 10 players, all of whom have some familiarity (or more) with poker theory and no nut cases. Winner take all. One rebuy allowed if totally busted (buyin gets you 1000, rebuy also gets you 1000).


We are still at 10 players during the rebuy period and I have about 1400. Blinds at 15-30. I get AKo in mid-late position (3 from button). Very tight player (VTP) raises to 70 and I call. Next player, a bit unpredictable, reraises to 200. All fold to me, including VTP.


Raiser has about 400 left and I reraise and set him all in. He calls.


Thoughts on the play of this hand? Results in next post.


David

As I say, raiser called for all his chips.


Raiser had 10-10.


Flop: A-10-4

Turn: J

River: Q


And my runner runner broadway sent him for his rebuy.


I didn't think too much about this hand but another player, who it could be fair to say is the best player in the game, suggested that I should only call the raise and see what the flop brings. I wasn't sure (and I'm still not sure).

I would have re-raised the original raiser instead of flat-calling. Once you have just called and then you are both re-raised I would assume he has a decent pair or AK. I think just calling or re-raising are both viable options. If he is one that could have AJ or AQ then re-raising is best. By re-raising you minimize any post-flop decisions and you hope you are at worst 50-50.


I probably just call and wait for the flop.


Ken Poklitar

When you hold AK in a situation like this, its all about the other person's hand. Imagine you could see his cards. What would you do if he held:


A) 22-QQ? Are you comfortable playing the coin flip here? There is the blind $ and the VTP money in there. Will he ever fold when you come over the top if he has the lower end of these?


B) Ax-AQ, any non-pair without an A? Get the money in now. You're way ahead with the Ace hands, and a smaller favorite with the others.


C) AA-KK? Easy fold.


Where did you put him? If you had your doubts (as many of us do in these cases) calling is fine here. Unless I knew this guy to be a stealer or someone who tries to bully me, I'd just call. I wouldn't be able to rule out C, and A is very possible so I might play it safe. Sounds like you thought B was most probable with A 2nd, and C not so likely. That's the only combo that tilts the balance towards going all-in, IMO.


I agree with the others that reraising pre-flop is in order here. Then when someone jacks it up again you have a better idea where they are coming from.


KJS

I figured the balance of probabilities meant either a worse ace or a lower pocket pair. Given that I was not all in and he was (and therefore I was playing with less valuable chips than him), AND that he had position on me which would make post flop play difficult were I to miss, I decided to just deal with it right now; a bit of a cop out. I figured he would most likely call and on average it would be 35% coin flip, 35% me dominating, 20% same hand, 10% him dominating. Obviously I didn't do this exact math at the table, but in retrospect it approximates my feelings about the strength of his hand.


I didn't take into account at the time the fact that since VTP had folded, he likely had a medium strong hand which could easily have contained an ace (AQ, AJs that kind of thing) which probably hurts my hand, but also makes it less likely he has AA or KK.


My great worry was a miss on the flop, checking and then facing an all in bet. As it turned out, it would have all gone in on the flop anyways, so not a big deal either way.

David,


My decision would be greatly influenced by what the "unpredictable raiser" thinks of VTP's raise. Since you say there are no nut cases, I would have to assume that his classification of VTP is close to your assessment.


I think you're in big trouble here, I would let the hand go. Most likely your cards are busy anyway.


Haven't peeked yet, but interested in your results.


Mike

David,


Wow... I didn't expect to see TT as his reraising hand. However, you know his tendencies much better than I do. If I were playing in this game for the first time, I would have laid the hand down.


IMO, you both got some good fortune, some more than others.


Congrats on an interesting post.


Mike

"Given that I was not all in and he was (and therefore I was playing with less valuable chips than him)"


No ! Not in a winner take all tournament. Small stacks are only more valuable per-chip in proportional payout tournaments. Ask if you can't see why.


Andy.

That's pretty much how I see it, and I would also flat call the first raise a lot of the time. Playing AK is very dependent on your opponent and his pre-flop standards for whatever action he has taken. Another key question is will you get paid off by QQ or JJ if you flop an A or K ? If yes, you should tend to call pre-flop, if no, it's more raise or fold.


Andy.

There are 2 things I don't like about the way you played the hand. First, I think that usually, with AK, your objective is to win it preflop. Against a very tight player, this is the perfect situation. I would have reraised him to make him fold the hand. Maybe he'll fold a hand like 99, TT or JJ which would be very nice.


Second, even if the reraiser is unpredictable, and considering that you said there were no yahoos at the table, he has to respect the first raise given the player as well as your call of an UTG raise. I would expect that you are in big trouble here most of the time (AA or KK). I would release the hand. If you are not, then you are either tied (AK) or slightly behind (QQ-JJ-TT). You are getting about 3:1 on your flop call, but I really think you can expect to be an worse dog than that most of the time, unless you know the player well enough to play.


Nicolas Fradet (ThePrince)

Andy,


you don't think that given the fact that the raiser is very tight, this should make you reraise more often that just calling, since he is the perfect opponent to release the hand?


Of course this also means that he is goind to have a good hand also but if he is capable of folding a 99, TT or a JJ, you have gained a lot by making him fold to a reraise.


Nicolas

This was the first time VTP had played in our game and I knew he was a VTP, but unpredictable did not know him that well (other than the constant mockery of VTP for being a VTP). He likely had some inkling that VTP was tight, but probably not to the extent that I did (which explains my call rather than reraise preflop). Had VTP reraised after Unpredictable raised, I would have mucked. Once VTP was out, I figured I'd take my chances.


Both players occasionally post here so maybe they will respond.

Even in a winner take all tournament, your last hundred chips have to be more valuable than the first hundred off a stack of 1000, no??


I'd like to hear further explanation.

I would have thought that the worst his hand would have been was JJ. If the early raiser is tight and then someone cold calls the tight raiser I would be wary in re-raising with TT. It would be a muck or flat-call situation for me.


Glad you won the hand.


Ken Poklitar

Well, no. In a winner-take-all tournament, your chips are worth whatever fraction of the total chips they represent, and that's it ! If there are 100K chips in play and a $100 prize, a 1K stack is worth $1, a 10K stack is worth $10 and an 11K stack is worth $11 - $1 more.


It's easy to see how smaller stacks are worth more in a proportional payout situation, eg one player has 99K chips, the other has 1K chips, 1st prize is $70 and 2nd prize is $30, the small 1K stack is worth $30 (+ a little bit) ! But if it's winner take all then the small stack has a 1% chance of winning (all other things being equal) and it is still only worth $1.


"Survival" poker does not pay in a winner-take-all tournament. Every decision should (theoretically) be made purely on the basis of chip EV. Players' relative ability comes into it yes, but even so this is a small factor.


Hope this helps,


Andy.

Hi Ken, I enjoy your posts on this forum.


I had the 10-10 in this hand and had 500 chips. The key factor for me was that there was only 10 minutes left in the rebuy period. This is just a fun event and I would rather bust out and pay the $10 rebuy for 1000 chips than try to play with a small stack once the blinds start getting significant.


Our name for this is strategic bankruptcy. I want to either double up or bust out entirely with the 10-10.


I could have just put it all in when I originally re-raised, but I didn't respect Dave Ottoson's call of the original $70 raise. I raised an amount that I thought would get me heads-up with Dave, but not enough that he wouldn't call and hopefully pay me off. If the early raiser has a monster hand, then I will probably bust but maybe suck out...either is fine.


After Dave re-raised me for my last 300 I don't even have a decision to make as the rest of my money was going in anyway.


The possibility of strategic bankruptcies near the end of the rebuy period often creates a tough decision for players with a medium stack (like Dave in this case) facing a raise from a player who could be holding any 2 cards.

Yeah the rebuy aspects of this situation were missed by me. Both in the fact that if you have no rebuys left you probably do need better then TT to re-raise plus if David knows you have a rebuy left and there is only 10 minutes to do it, then you may be weaker then normally expected.


One question on this comment:


"I didn't respect Dave Ottoson's call of the original $70 raise"


Assuming you know the original raiser is tight, why wouldn't you respect a coldcall of a tight raiser? Was it because the raise was smallish? I think the blinds were 15-30 but I may be wrong.


Second question. If David re-raises the original raiser to 200. Do you raise all-in, call or fold?


Just wondering,


Ken Poklitar

Did you know your name is an anagram for 'Talkin Poker'?

"I didn't respect Dave Ottoson's call of the original $70 raise"


This is worded a bit poorly by me. What I should have said is that I think Dave will make this call with many holdings other than an overpair to my TT. I believed I could get my 500 in on basically a coin-flip proposition which in the circumstances is ok.


"If David re-raises the original raiser to 200. Do you raise all-in, call or fold?"


My instinct is to re-raise, I think with my TT holding I want to get it heads-up if at all possible. No reason to get greedy since doubling up is fine if I can pull it off. If both players fold I get 415 chips, almost as good.

Can't say that I did /images/smile.gif


Ken "Talkin Poker" Poklitar

Should you jam with AKo? As usual, the answer is "it depends". It depends on whether you expect to be ahead or behind, plus some other practical considerations.


If you re-raise immediately, the chance of being called is roughly 100%. Given the re-buy (strategic bankruptcy) situation, that chance increases to roughly 100%. No-brainer: your opponent will call. If you wait and bet after the flop, he might actually have to think about things, and he might make a mistake.


As an aside, let's look at a similar situation that occurred near the end of this same tournament, when down to the final two. DS is on the button, and raises about half his stack. JS has ATo, and a much larger stack. JS re-raised all-in, and DS called instantly. I agree with playing the ATo, because it is better than many of the hands DS could have, and has draw odds against others (I thought a medium pair or an Ace was most likely). Now consider the idea of re-raising him all-in, but doing it in *two* installments. Call before the flop, and bet out regardless of what the flop brings. The odds for JS haven't changed, but now DS (who doesn't know JS's plan) may actually fold a better hand. Suppose DS has 55, or AJ, and the flop is Q-9-6. It might be tempting to fold (especially for our DS).


This is a little trick we like to call "bluffing". It is the privilege of a drawing hand to bet whenever it makes its draw, and to sometimes bluff when it misses, thereby increasing its overall expectation, by a lot. Bluffing 100% of the time might be a good idea against DS, but the drawing hand can *always* gain something, even against a perfect player.


For example, if you have a 20% chance of making your winning draw, you can bluff another 10% of the time (ie. one bluff for every two legitimate bets, assuming a pot-sized bet), and it will guarantee a return of 30% of the original pot, rather than 20% -- regardless of the opponent's calling strategy. That's _half again_ as much as you earn by just shooting.


If you re-raise all-in with a drawing hand, and get called automatically, then you have put your money in with the worst of it, and you have also deprived yourself of the extra equity derived from bluffing.


In the case of your AKo, your hand is stronger, but so is your opponent's, in all likelihood. If you are ahead, then you should jam all-in with the best of it, and cut off his opportunity to make a play (bluff or give up). If you are drawing to beat a pair, then you should probably draw, unless you are afraid of being out-played after the flop.


In addition, given the stack sizes and the re-buy situation, it was much easier for you to release an apparently losing hand than it was for him, but first you have to give yourself that option.


Having said all that, I still don't think jamming with your AKo is all that bad of a play. And if all the money is going in regardless (due to the pot odds), then it doesn't really matter when it goes in.


- Darse.