HU with Huge Stack: How to Play?

[burgi]

Hi,
ok, this situation came up several times lately in my 30+3 SNG's at Party.
I was the big stack on the bubble and just destroyed my opponents on it, pushing any 2 because the other 3 were all kind of low on chips and nobody wanted to bust out in 4th.
Anyway, at one point on the bubble, the chips were distributed so that my 3 opponents all had about 400, and I had 6800 with 300 big blinds.
Ok, so then, the next person busts, and we're down to top 3. Then the next person busts and it's HU.
In HU, I have about 7400 chips and my opponent the additional 600.
How do you play in these situations with blinds at 150/300? Push any 2? become more passive and wait for a decent hand? Or how do you play?
I found myself having difficulty with that and even lost on several occasions eventhough I had such a huge chiplead.
Help appreciated!

[Phill S]

Gotta play any two, he has to.

If he gets himself back in, say 3K to your 5K, then you just play your normal heads up game.

Taking the conservative route with the SB is an option, but rarely the right one.

Phill

[Nottom]

[ QUOTE ]
Hi,
ok, this situation came up several times lately in my 30+3 SNG's at Party.
I was the big stack on the bubble and just destroyed my opponents on it, pushing any 2 because the other 3 were all kind of low on chips and nobody wanted to bust out in 4th.
Anyway, at one point on the bubble, the chips were distributed so that my 3 opponents all had about 400, and I had 6800 with 300 big blinds.
Ok, so then, the next person busts, and we're down to top 3. Then the next person busts and it's HU.
In HU, I have about 7400 chips and my opponent the additional 600.
How do you play in these situations with blinds at 150/300? Push any 2? become more passive and wait for a decent hand? Or how do you play?
I found myself having difficulty with that and even lost on several occasions eventhough I had such a huge chiplead.
Help appreciated!

[/ QUOTE ]

When its that lopsided, there is no reason to push literally any 2. You know hes gonna call, so why push a hand like 26o that might have very tiny EV only to double him up 70% of the time when you can fold and find something thats going to win a good 15-20% more often usually the next hand.

Basically wait for something in the top 70% or so and go with it.

[burgi]

[ QUOTE ]


When its that lopsided, there is no reason to push literally any 2. You know hes gonna call, so why push a hand like 26o that might have very tiny EV only to double him up 70% of the time when you can fold and find something thats going to win a good 15-20% more often usually the next hand.

Basically wait for something in the top 70% or so and go with it.

[/ QUOTE ]


The problem I have had with that though is because the blinds are so high 150/300 or higher, it might take me several hands to get such a good hand, but in the meantime, my opponent already added about 1000 chips to his stack or so. This still leaves me with a much higher stack, but when he beats me once then, he is right in it again.
See my point? I'm not saying that you are wrong and I did try to play it the way you just described, but exactly what I described above did happen.
I'm just trying to figure out the best way to play this situation, as I have tried both ways described above, and sometimes they worked, and sometimes they didn't. Just want to find out what other people think the best way to play this is, so I can just decide to play it that way, and if it doesn't work out, so be it.
But, thanks for your input and help in trying to figure this out for me!

[wiggs73]

In this situation, I'm not necessarily pushing any 2. Others have spelled out why. I am, however, calling his all-in with any 2.

[burgi]

[ QUOTE ]
In this situation, I'm not necessarily pushing any 2. Others have spelled out why. I am, however, calling his all-in with any 2.

[/ QUOTE ]

I like this strategy!! I think I will try it the next time this situation comes up!

[Madd]

In your example with stacks of 7400 and 600 and blinds of 150/300 you should push any hand that is at least 37.5% against any 2.
DYSW?

[burgi]

DYSW? What does that mean? If I understand why? Maybe?

If that what it means, I think I do! Because I have to post the blind as is and there is also his blind in the pot and I therefore have the correct odds. Is that correct?

[Madd]

Isn't this forum jargon ("do you see why?")?

HU you can simply fail your decision based on pot odds as +CEV means +$EV.
Another possibility to find out if you should shove or not is to calculate the likelihood of winning for the possible outcomes. This is quite easy as the relationship between the likelihood of winning is linear to your stack size. I.e. if you hold 80% of all chips then your likelihood of winning is 80%.

[Nicholasp27]

wait

you'll call his push with any 2, but you won't push with any 2?

explain why, please?

You should play exactly the same as you would if you had 600 chips, and your opponent 7400. Heads in a tournament, play is identical to money play.

[wiggs73]

[ QUOTE ]
wait

you'll call his push with any 2, but you won't push with any 2?

explain why, please?

[/ QUOTE ]

Heh, I was typing up my response and realized my logic was flawed and made no sense at all. So just push with any 2. If he doubles up a couple of times, go back to normal HU play.

[durron597]

If you lose HU with a huge chip lead, you are probably folding too much. Can you post a HH?

[sir..please]

push push push. It's highly unlikely he'll double up every hand, thus making you the winner or making him fold in which case the blinds will take care of him. I have come back fom nothing HU because the other guy was folding. However i don't think i've lost in the opposite situation.

[burgi]

Thanks for all the advice! This only happens to me occasionally, so I guess that it's part of variance, since I do continue to play pretty aggressively when this situation comes up. I rarely fold, except maybe 23o.
When being heads up, I usually end up winning (more wins than 2nd places), but these 2 games in which it happened, just kind of bothered me!

[lastchance]

[ QUOTE ]
wait

you'll call his push with any 2, but you won't push with any 2?

explain why, please?

[/ QUOTE ]
Because Villain has pot odds to call any 2, and you certainly don't have pot odds to push 23o.

Villain shouldn't be folding a single hand (sometimes they will), but assuming Villain plays perfectly, you can't push 23o because you're only paying 1/2 a BB open-pushing, but a full BB when calling.

[Nicholasp27]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
wait

you'll call his push with any 2, but you won't push with any 2?

explain why, please?

[/ QUOTE ]
Because Villain has pot odds to call any 2, and you certainly don't have pot odds to push 23o.

[/ QUOTE ]

so you're saying it's ok to call someone's push with any 2 but not push with those same cards? reverse gap?


you are saying that if he pushes and u have 23o, then you have pot odds to call that, but if you push first, you don't have pot odds? if he calls you it's the same situation, but pushing first gives you FE...and him pushing puts him on a better-than-random hand...so why would you call with something that you wouldn't push with?

[wizard]

Push Push Push but with a little discretion fold once in a while. Maybe 5 - 10% of your very worst hands. If he doubles up twice, I back off and start playing poker again.

[lastchance]

If you open-fold 23o, Villain's stack becomes t750 after folding.

If you fold 23o after Villain pushes, Villain's stack becomes t900.

Huge, huge difference.

[Nicholasp27]

if u call his push, u double him up

huge difference

[lastchance]

So what? A good player here is all-in with any 2 anyway. You don't have FE.

If you push with 32o, and he calls, (which he should 100% of the time), then you double him up 70% of the time.

But if you fold, Villain only has t750.

If he pushes and you call with 32o, you double him up 70% of the time.

If you fold now, Villain has t900.

[Nottom]

[ QUOTE ]
You should play exactly the same as you would if you had 600 chips, and your opponent 7400. Heads in a tournament, play is identical to money play.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is not true. As the small stack you can not afford to pass up even the tiniest piece of EV.

As the big stack you can wait for a more EV spot.