The worst satellite play in the history of mankind (some content)

[adanthar]

9 left, 5 make it to the tournament, 8 paid. wellsw is the chipleader with 16K. The other guy in the hand has 13K and is in second place. With no one else over 9K and three short stacks/four mediums, both can fold in at will.

Dealer: Hand #71191721
Dealer: MangoTheClown antes 50
Dealer: RiverRat27 antes 50
Dealer: wellsw antes 50
Dealer: ALPAR04 antes 50
Dealer: waggs31 antes 50
Dealer: Kernal13 antes 50
Dealer: saintswin antes 50
Dealer: Adar antes 50
Dealer: lucky0309 antes 50
Dealer: Adar posts the small blind of 200
Dealer: lucky0309 posts the big blind of 400
Dealer: You have been dealt [2s Ts]
Dealer: MangoTheClown raises to 1,200
Dealer: RiverRat27 folds
Dealer: wellsw calls 1,200
Dealer: ALPAR04 folds
Dealer: waggs31 folds
Dealer: Kernal13 folds
Dealer: saintswin folds
Dealer: Adar folds
Dealer: lucky0309 folds
Dealer: The flop is [7d 6d 7s]
Dealer: MangoTheClown bets 3,450
Dealer: wellsw raises to 6,900
Dealer: MangoTheClown raises to 11,333, and is all in
Dealer: wellsw calls 4,433
Dealer: MangoTheClown shows [Kd Kc]
Dealer: wellsw shows [As 5s]
Dealer: The turn is [7c]
Dealer: The river is [4h]
Dealer: MangoTheClown shows a full house, Sevens full of Kings
Dealer: wellsw shows three of a kind, Sevens
Dealer: MangoTheClown wins the pot (26,116) with a full house, Sevens full of Kings

Here's the $64K question: Which of these two guys played the hand worse?

[gumpzilla]

Lots of things to love here. In the situation you've described, I can't really think of any reason to play A5s for any kind of raise against the second largest chip-stack. Against any stack, really. The gain from busting him is obviously much, much less than the loss from doubling him up. So yuck there.

Under different circumstances I might like the flop bet from KK, like if I thought it was likely that JJ or QQ would hang around and if I wasn't risking so much in real EV rather than chip EV. But, a pot sized bet with this board in this situation seems to be an invitation to disaster. Too much risk for too little reward, and too much room for big stack to come back over the top. I like the spirit of coming back over the top here, but I have two problems with how it was done: a) I think I would have pushed rather than minraised if I was going to call a push reraise anyway, b) what hand can I possibly be representing that I would have come in with? A seven? AA? Just any overpair? Obviously A5s doesn't know the opponent has KK. But, again, this just seems like an implausible play from A5. And for very little reward, given that he's still the big stack. Makes no sense.

That said, if A5 is thinking, and thinks he's up against a rational opponent, he should expect a fold most of the time from KK. KK even after the big flop bet still has a stack that will let him compete. However, given the play so far, I don't see much reason for the big stack to think this way about his opponent, given the willingness already shown to mess around in here. The push by KK is kind of bracing, but as I mentioned above, what hand are you going to put big stack on here? AA is the only thing to fear that can possibly be realistic; whether pushing is a bad move depends on KKs read about how likely that is. KK certainly has enough left to fold here; the decision to push looks worse and worse the more likely it is that KK could coast into one of the seats even after folding here.

So, after all of that rambling, I tend to dislike A5's play more; I just don't see how he could have expected, given the evidence KK was already showing about how willing he was to continue to play anti-satellite poker, to have serious folding equity there. Add that in to a pretty silly preflop call, and I'll go with him.

[Baloosh]

Looks to me like wellsw made the worse play in that hand, and it's not even close. Mango's standard 3x raise UTG is completely fine, until everyone folds except the 2nd big stack. wellsw was the only guy that could hurt him, so now Mango should play this carefully.

He had to know he was going to get called when he pushed, so that was his first boneheaded play. Mango's play was boneheaded througout the entire hand.

[adanthar]

Bump because hey, I can and it's funny

[gumpzilla]

I'm curious to hear your answer to your question; are you waiting for more posters first? Put something about backing in here, maybe.

[microbet]

I'll go with the A5 being the dumber. There are 9 players left and only 5 get the prize that you are there for. I would assume the 8th place doesn't really pay very well.

The BB is at 400, not trivial even to 13k, and if a small stack or two doubles up no one will be able to coast to a top 5 spot.

KK should avoid the big stack, but he does have KK and there is no ace on the board. I guess when A5 raised the flop, KK could have folded, but he's certainly not coasting into a top 5 spot after giving this hand up.

A5 on the other hand, had the lead and made a stupid bluff into a player that could cripple him. He had huge FE in this situation and may have figured KK or even AA would fold, but it was a dumb risk. He called preflop with A5? Against the number 2 stack?

The trick answer is the KK played it worse, but I'm going to have to answer that A5 is the dunce.

[The Yugoslavian]

Mango played it worse because he is a clown.

Also because he easily could have had 0 chance of placing. The chips he gain do nothing to his tournament equity. While the same applies to wells, at least he still has tournament equity if losing the hand.

I would welcome both players to my table any day of the week.

Yugoslav

[ColdestCall]

Wow.

I've got to go with Wellsw playing this hand worse, but I don't really have time to get into the reasons because I have to go dedicate my life to trying to get into satellites with these guys.

[jeffraider]

Mango played it worst, because he could go broke on that hand.

[adanthar]

I think I have to give the edge to wells but it's close. I think it's influenced by some of the other plays he made (limping in with K2s and then calling my (BB's) 2/3 pot bet on a 553 board with no flush draw. Niiiice.)

FWIW, here are the critical plays in the hand in order:
1)Mango raises KK PF (he should probably fold, although I can't *really* blame him and I've done worse)
2)wellsw calls (lol)
3)Mango overbets the pot on the flop (I have no clue why he wants to go all in with the chip leader)
4)wellsw predictably reraises (lol)
5)Mango 3 bets all in (probably the worst play of the entire hand, because he can STILL fold in after all that)
6)wellsw calls (lol)
7)wellsw fails to river an ace

Sadly, wellsw finished sixth, but that's OK because at least I'll still be up against Mango in the actual tourney. Mostly, I posted the hand to get some thought going on sat structure and how it (should) alter your play.