On the Bubble again...

[Eric P]

No limit PP 10 buy in tourny. 4 players left.
stacks were 2200, 1750, 1900, 2800 (me)
blinds 250/500


I am in the small blind and it's folded to me, i have nines, big blind has about 2200. I raised all in, just hoping to steal, my thinking (which i'm sure is bad) was that if i rasie the minimum (to 1000) and he re-raises i have to fold, which i don't really want to do, becuase then i am in a bad spot, although that spot is better than the one i ended up in. He called and had QQ and that was that.

My question is what should I have done with these nines? raised to 1000 then fold to a re-raise? fold them and hope to let others bust out? I figure if i win this i am in good shape to win, however i'm thinking that nines isn't that great 4-handed anyway. What would you do in my spot?

[DoctorJ]

Understand your thinking about the size of the raise, but the problem is that you're risking 70-80% of your stack, with the likeliest scenario being that when you're called, it's by a hand far better than yours (QQ) or a hand that's 50-50 with you (AQ/AK). I would raise to 1000, and if you get re-raised, then you need all of your reading skills to estimate the likelihood you're beat. This is likely to be a tough call I can see wanting to avoid, but in this situation I think the all-in raise is even more risky.

It also depends on the texture of the table - are pot-sized raises being consistently called or are they capturing the blinds? What is your image? Have you been in confrontations with BB yet?

Of course, it was really unlucky he had QQ, and 99 is certainly better than an average hand in a SB-BB confrontation. So folding is out of the question, IMHO.

Just my two cents...

DoctorJ

[schroedinger]

On the 'net you have two choices:

1) the Easy way, push it all in and hope that this is not one of the 3% - 6% of the times that he has something to legitimately play back (AA, KK, QQ, (JJ), AK, (AQ) -- I think all in drops almost all TTs, but that's just me);

2) Figure out what size bet is enough to make BB fold all but those hands while at the same time not being able to read you for a good hand, but not so good that you want to risk your whole stack on it at this stage of the tournament, etc.

I am probably going all in because I will get a headache and take forever to think about all the things I would need to consider if I take any other action. "Almost Always" (even at 94%) winning is enough for me even on the bubble.

(I guess a third choice is to limp hoping to catch a set -- where, of course you could still POSSIBLY face a bigger set, etc -- or a read. And LIMPING screams to the BB to pretty much hit you with a hefty raise with any 2.)

In real life, you could do something ridiculous like turn the cards over (before you made any bet) to pick up a tell . . . LOL. And it would probably work, if you thought quickly enough to do it and catch BB off-guard.

[Guy McSucker]

With the stacks and blinds as they are, there's no play left in this tournament. Anything you do now is fraught with trouble, simply because the tournament has reduced to a luck contest.

Clearly you don't want to fold. You are chip leader but at these blinds, this is no great advantage, so sitting back is not an option.

If you flat call, lots of players will raise with all sorts of stuff, which might make your decision difficult.

If you raise, you can make it 1000, 1500, 2000 or 2500. The 1000 looks weak and will induce reraises from many aggressive players. Any other bet clearly ties you to the pot.

I would decide that I want to get all-in preflop, preferably as a favourite. If I'm beaten preflop I am going to shrug and play another tournament. So what's the best way to do this?

I think the minimum raise, followed by all-in if reraised, is the move. Many players will reraise you with any ace and any pair in this situation, giving you a good chance of getting all-in as a big or decent favourite. I think you're more likely to get all-in preflop with this mini raise than from a flat call, and to a bigger raise a lot of players will dump A3 which they might reraise to a mini-raise.

I have never thought of this move before so I'm interested to know what you guys make of it.

Guy.

[nicky g]

I think all-in is the only move here, or possibly complete to induce a bet. There is no play left in this game at all, as Guy said. I disagree that he will fold pocket 10s here - I doubt he'll fold anything down to 55 or any ace. I would not want to play in a tornament where the blinds got that high five-handed, to be honest.

[Kurn, son of Mogh]

Any pair is a raising hand 4 handed (99 *is* a great hand), especially with only one player left to act, so you can't fold. Since a normal raise (3x the BB) is more than 40% of your stack, the only play is all-in. He had a monster, sh*t happens. Shrug it off and move on. You did the right thing.

[ohkanada]

Only play is all-in like you did. It is crazy with blinds of 250-500 to not raise all-in with 99 in your situation. Are you going to wait until the blinds double before you start raising again?

Ken Poklitar

[ohkanada]

"I think all in drops almost all TTs"

I suspect the BB would call with any pair or any ace plus a bunch of other hands, so there are a lot of hands that 99 would get called where 99 is leading.

Ken Poklitar