NL HE hand

Hi forum,


Here's a hand I played last night in a NL HE home tourney. We are down to the last 6. Top 4 get paid. There is T23000 in play and I have about T1250, so, a below average stack. We are at the 50-100 blinds but the bell just rang and we are going to 100-200 on the very next hand. I am in the BB.


UTG calls, middle player calls. SB moves in. He has me covered by about T100.


Here's the deal. I look down and see AQo. From my read, I can tell that he hesitated slightly before moving in, also, after I asked him a question, trying to get a read, I though he had a vulnerable hand. I figure his most likely hand was a medium pocket pair, like 77, 88, 99, 10. I thought there was a possibility of AK or AQ. JJ, QQ, KK, or AA were also possible but AA or QQ less likely evidently. I really put him on 88, 99 or TT.


Also, I could count on the other 2 players folding any hand except one they would be trapping with, but this was really not likely.


What is your play?


Thanks,


Nicolas Fradet (The Prince)

Nic,


With that read, fold. There's no hand he has you are better than 50-50 against. And there is also the possibility that one of the limpers is trapping with something big.


Andy.

AND you have enogh chips to last thru about 4 more rounds


you may not get better cards, but you may get a situation which lets YOU do the betting and makes them worry about calling

The fact there is 2 limpers and then the SB raises I most likely muck. It seems more likely the SB has a real hand.


Ken Poklitar

ohKanada@hotmail.com

"AND you have enogh chips to last thru about 4 more rounds"


That really isn't true.


With 1250 and blinds of 100-200 he needs to find a hand in the upcoming round or following round at the latest. He can't wait until he has 250 to raise. He should be raising all-in with something before he hits 600.


Ken Poklitar

ohKanada@hotmail.com

Fold. I have seen a lot of players get busted out of tournaments with hands like AQ by making a stand with them in wrong situations. I think this is one of those situations. You're up against a hand that almost for surely has you beat, plus there is still the 'x factor' of the limpers to act after you. You're getting down to the short strokes, but you still have a little time left. Wait it out, a lot can happen in a round or two.

Fold, but only if you figure on getting at least one decent steal opportunity in the next round (i.e., before the blinds reach you again).


You can fold here, fold the SB if necessary, and still have T1050, or 5xBB. That is enough to make people fold, so fold now and steal back T300 in the next hand or 4.


Also, calling isn't terrible. In fact, it's probably only a small mistake, and that's assuming your read is good. You're getting T1550 for a call of T1150, or about 4:3. You're certainly not a dog by that much given the range of hands you're putting him on.


Later, Greg Raymer (FossilMan)

Thank you all for the replies.


I was going to be in a tough spot with the blinds going up next hand and I hate being too short stacked, like this was going to be.


One thing I did not mention, the chip leader (with about T9K) was seated 2 to my left and, although I had managed to steal his blinds once in the last 15 min, I knew he wasn't going to let my do it as often as I would have liked, since he was a bit looser that average and, well, the chip leader. The table was not that tight and I really could not expect to have an opportunity to be first in with a reasonable hand (except UTG)in the near future.


So, after debating, I thought my read had a reasonable chance to be good, that is that he had a lower pocket pair. The problem was AK. But if I put him on 88, 99, TT or JJ or AK, AQ. I am a 45-55 dog a good portion of the time here, which is what I wanted. And like I said in my first post, I knew the limpers would fold almost everything. The pot was offering me about 1.25:1 and it was right in there if indeed he had 99. If he had JJ I was a 1.33:1 dog and if he had 55, I was actually making profit on my call. Although I did not think he really had 55, I thought, like Greg said, that a call would only be marginally wrong and with the other constraints, it was worth it.


So I called.


He had JJ. He flopped a set, and rivered quads for a grand finale...


I know this was a close call, closer than what some of you might think. Although I must admit, I did not include some of the details of this post in my original post.


At the time, I really thought the play was fine, the I considered folding would have been the better play. Clearly, if I had been wrong about my read and he had QQ, KK or AA, I would have been screwed.


Thanks again,


Nicolas Fradet (The Prince)

"Clearly, if I had been wrong about my read and he had QQ, KK or AA, I would have been screwed."


Don't forget AK. With you holding AQ, there are 3 x AA, 6 x KK and 3 x QQ = 12 AA, KK, QQ out there and 4x3 = 12 AK - as many as the other three put together.


I still don't think it is as close as you are implying.


Andy.

Andy,


I agree about the AK, but my call was a lot based on my read of him, and me being confident enough that he had a somewhat vulnerable hand.


To me, this meant 88, 99, TT, JJ or AK (maybe AQ). There are 6 x 88, 6 x 99, 6 x TT, 6 x JJ and 12x AK which means I am only in big trouble 1/3 of the time. Add 3 x QQ to this and I'm still ok. But I can't afford to add KK or AA to his range of hands.


I would have liked the play a lot more had I had AK, since I would be a favorite against AQ and ok against QQ.


Given the fact that I could not imagine stealing the blinds that often in the next 3-4 hands, do you still think it was not close?


Nicolas Fradet (The Prince)