Live $50 NLHE SNG Hand

[DavidC]

This is the first time I've played a SNG in a LONG time. It's also my first live game for serious cash in quite a while, and it's my first time playing with these guys. I have a very aggressive image, but I don't think I'm seen as a sucker. /images/graemlins/smile.gif

Players are relatively new to poker, it appears, and particularly new to tourney play.

I was playing a live SNG with probably 6 players. Two had been eliminated, and I'd recently been removed from chip leader.

UTG folds, button calls, SB folds, and I have A6o.

My stack is t115 after posting a t10 blind (sb = t5).
UTG has t220 and is the chip leader.
There's t25 in the pot.

I raise from t10 to t50, and the button calls.

There's now t95 in the pot.

Flop: J42r

I'm first to act, and push my remaining t75.

What do you guys think?

I've heard in the MTT forum that you should exercise a 10x rule, meaning that if you have less than 10x the blind then you should be pushing your whole stack in if you play. Is this true?

--Dave.

[TruFloridaGator]

I would just check pre-flop, what kind of hands has this guy been limping in with?

[DavidC]

Not too sure, unfortunately.

I know that he's raised with good aces and with high pairs.

That being said, he hasn't done too much by this point in the tourney, as there's probably only been 40ish hands.

Would the purpose of calling be to minimize variance at this point?

--Dave.

[DavidC]

bump before bed... sorry. /images/graemlins/smile.gif

[shejk]

Well, if I play this, I push it preflop. The ten bb rule applies when there is no limpers. Here, you need more than 11.5 bb to be able to play this postflop.

As you felt when playing this, there was way too much in the pot for you to back down, you were almost committed to push. Better then to push preflop. In that case, he won't get the chance to see a flop, and only calling you when you're beat.

You could call as well, keeping the pot small, and making it possible to bluff at it on the flop without getting committed.

Good luck next time, I guess this is were you went out, eh?

[Slim Pickens]

So basically you played it as a stop-and-go? That seems like a fine strategy to me. Especially against weak, loose preflop players, the stop and go forces them to hit the flop pretty hard to even think about calling. If they're not calculating pot odds and such, they usually won't call with any less than TPGK, so I think you take this down on the flop ~75% of the time. I might raise less preflop just in case your opponent has some intuitive understanding of pot odds, maybe to 30, but if any of your chips go in, they're all going in at some point.

Slim

[DavidC]

[ QUOTE ]
Well, if I play this, I push it preflop. The ten bb rule applies when there is no limpers. Here, you need more than 11.5 bb to be able to play this postflop.

As you felt when playing this, there was way too much in the pot for you to back down, you were almost committed to push. Better then to push preflop. In that case, he won't get the chance to see a flop, and only calling you when you're beat.

You could call as well, keeping the pot small, and making it possible to bluff at it on the flop without getting committed.

Good luck next time, I guess this is were you went out, eh?

[/ QUOTE ]

No, I sucked out on him, and he got really pissed about it. /images/graemlins/smile.gif

He actually yelled, "Why the hell did you go all in?" after the hand.

------------

I have a question... unless I got some sort of crazy tell, if I check the flop and he pushes, I have to call, right?

I'm curious about that. If that is true, then I must push on this flop to preserve folding equity.

Regardless, I push preflop, but I'm curious about what is best once I do get to the flop.

[willie]

i probably just check this in the BB and check/fold the flop if i'm bet at.

no hand that you beat on the flop is going to call you, only hands that have you in bad shape will.

[DavidC]

[ QUOTE ]
So basically you played it as a stop-and-go? That seems like a fine strategy to me. Especially against weak, loose preflop players, the stop and go forces them to hit the flop pretty hard to even think about calling. If they're not calculating pot odds and such, they usually won't call with any less than TPGK, so I think you take this down on the flop ~75% of the time. I might raise less preflop just in case your opponent has some intuitive understanding of pot odds, maybe to 30, but if any of your chips go in, they're all going in at some point.

Slim

[/ QUOTE ]

He wasn't too enthusiastic about his call preflop (of course, this wasn't exactly true... given that he showed me either QJ or QJs, but that's what I read it as.

I'm new to this format of play, but I don't think that if I were putting him all in, he'd want to call with a four-flush or something like that... just because he's got 65% chance of leaving the tourney, and he doesn't get to keep the chips if he makes a correct decision for equity edge: he has to keep playing, right? /images/graemlins/smile.gif

That being said, if he needs the chips to continue to win the tourney, and he's pretty much out if he doesn't call, then he should call even as a slight equity dog, because it's his only chance of taking down a prize, right?

Just curious.

--Dave.