$55: Tell me how bad this push is

[Taraz]

The big stack wasn't particularly aggressive or anything. The blinds were going up next hand, but I still hate my play. This is bad, right?

***** Hand History for Game 2854705310 *****
200/400 Tourney Hold'em Game Table (NL) (Tournament 16476202) - Mon Oct 10 02:04:58 EDT 2005
Table Table 67289 (Real Money) -- Seat 5 is the button
Total number of players : 5
Seat 1: bizcut (930)
Seat 2: Hero(2550)
Seat 3: sanchez1421 (4095)
Seat 5: PERSlAN (1425)
Seat 6: ih8dancox (1000)
ih8dancox posts small blind (100)
bizcut posts big blind (200)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to Hero [ Ac, Qc ]
Hero raises (2550) to 2550
Herois all-In.

[runner4life7]

im ok with it actually. you could raise to like 500 i guess and call everyone other than the big stack but this puts more pressure on everyone and the big stack cant try to steal from you.

I give up, why do you hate this play?

[mike28]

I'm guessing the bigstack called you and you busted.

Raising to t5-600 is waving a flag for the bigstack to resteal.

The weaktightie in me screams fold but this is too good of a chance to pick up a free bb.

ram on!

[Annulus]

this is not an instant or standard push for me. of course UTG is not ideal position, but you have lots of poker left. also, if the big stack is not aggressive, why not just raise 500ish? of course you would have to call a push by any of the short stacks. but the fact that even if you see a flop and miss you are still in very good shape.

If u play to win its a good play, if u just want to make money,u can fold.if u dont push , and im big stack i will push with any 2 cards.so u have 2 plays fold or push.I would push, because there is only 4 hand you can worry about
aa,kk ak qq. all other hands are coin flips, or you will be at least 3-2 favorite.
I would push

[downtown]

The push isn't terrible by any means. It's definitely +EV. Whether rasing a smaller amount (say t500-600) is more +EV or opens you up to a big stack reraise and is therefore -EV is a matter of your read. I might raise it to t500 here myself if I think the big stack will only reraise with a good hand. If I think the big stack is good or I have a read, I may push it. Or I may limp it to mix it up in a rare occasion. Hmm, limp AQs, I know, sounds bad.

[Slim Pickens]

I think pushing is fine. I want to shut out any resteals. It's a huge mistake to raise to 500 and fold to a reraise from a lesser hand, so don't put yourself in a position to make that huge mistake. Both folding and limping make me want to barf $EV back at the screen.

[Taraz]

After reading some responses and reviewing the hand, I don't think pushing was as terrible as I previously thought. If I know that the big stack isn't particularly aggressive however, wouldn't it be better to raise to 500 and fold to a push by the big stack?

I know that 2+2ers would push any 2, but this guy wasn't that good. He wasn't really using his big stack to accumulate more chips. So my new question is, which is the better play? Push or raise/fold to a push?

I misread the blinds i thought they were 200-400
now that i see they were 100-200 I would make it 600 to go, and fold to a raise.
with blinds 100-200 the bigstack can loose 1/2 his stack if u have a good hand. With u raising utg u could have a strong hand.
IMO push is not that bad, but raise and fold to big stack would be a much better play

[Michael C.]

[ QUOTE ]


I know that 2+2ers would push any 2, but this guy wasn't that good.

[/ QUOTE ] I wish I was in a hand with a 2+2 player that I had notes on that would push any two. If that were the case, I'd raise 600 and call the push. Of course that could knock me out, but AQ is a pretty big favorite over any two, so why not play for the win? In actuallity I think good 2+2ers might push here with any two, but only if they had notes on you and were pretty sure you would fold, or if they had a good hand. So yeah, I would raise 600 here with the blinds that low, but what I'd want/expect the big stack to do here is very contextual, and you probably had some read on his style, no?

[Shillx]

Raising to T600 and calling a push is flat out terrible. It is like a 1.2% mistake to make this play if you know that he will push over the top with any 2 cards. The goal here is to get the big stack to FOLD as much as possible. If he calls the all-in with all of his hands, pushing is terrible eventhough we are a huge favorite. We are looking to gamble with the smaller stacks or get everyone to fold by pushing here. We have to be sure that the big stack isn't a total donkey before making this push.

Brad

Edited to say that pushing here is far and away the correct play.

[mike28]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]


I know that 2+2ers would push any 2, but this guy wasn't that good.

[/ QUOTE ] I wish I was in a hand with a 2+2 player that I had notes on that would push any two. If that were the case, I'd raise 600 and call the push. Of course that could knock me out, but AQ is a pretty big favorite over any two, so why not play for the win? In actuallity I think good 2+2ers might push here with any two, but only if they had notes on you and were pretty sure you would fold, or if they had a good hand. So yeah, I would raise 600 here with the blinds that low, but what I'd want/expect the big stack to do here is very contextual, and you probably had some read on his style, no?

[/ QUOTE ]

1. AQo is more like 64% against any 2, not a huge favorite.

2. Raising 1/3 of your stack and then folding sucks

3. If the big stack has any idea he's crashing over the top of your t600 raise.

4. Don't raise 1/3 you're stack then fold.

5. push

4. Don't raise 1/3 you're stack then fold. 4. Don't raise 1/3 you're stack then fold. [ QUOTE ]


[/ QUOTE ]

he is raising 1/4 of his chips utg
i dont think i would call big stack push because he could very well have pp which is 50/50, or i would risk my tourney on 60/40 when someone has 900 chips and is posting the blind

[Michael C.]

I think you guys misinterpreted my post. I was just commenting on "a good 2 + 2 player would push any two here vs. a 600 raise." If I knew that were the case, I'd try to get him in every time. Because I'd take a 65% of getting the dominating chip stack and then punishing everybody the rest of the way. As it is now, you aren't sure of anything. So yeah, you are correct that pushing is probably better now that I think about it, I disagree that you wouldn't want to face the big stack if you knew you were a 2-1 favorite. Again, though, what you would do here depends a lot on how the big stack plays. If he's really passive and isn't even going to call 600 without AK or a wired pair, than a smaller raise might make sense?

[tigerite]

[ QUOTE ]
I think you guys misinterpreted my post. I was just commenting on "a good 2 + 2 player would push any two here vs. a 600 raise." If I knew that were the case, I'd try to get him in every time. Because I'd take a 65% of getting the dominating chip stack and then punishing everybody the rest of the way. As it is now, you aren't sure of anything. So yeah, you are correct that pushing is probably better now that I think about it, I disagree that you wouldn't want to face the big stack if you knew you were a 2-1 favorite. Again, though, what you would do here depends a lot on how the big stack plays. If he's really passive and isn't even going to call 600 without AK or a wired pair, than a smaller raise might make sense?

[/ QUOTE ]

You are showing a total lack of understanding of the mathematics and ICM with this post. It's a leak.

[mike28]

[ QUOTE ]
4. Don't raise 1/3 you're stack then fold. 4. Don't raise 1/3 you're stack then fold. [ QUOTE ]


[/ QUOTE ]

he is raising 1/4 of his chips utg
i dont think i would call big stack push because he could very well have pp which is 50/50, or i would risk my tourney on 60/40 when someone has 900 chips and is posting the blind

[/ QUOTE ]

I've been up way too long. All of a sudden I thought 6x3=24.

derf derf

raising 1/4 of your stack then folding sucks

[EricW]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I think you guys misinterpreted my post. I was just commenting on "a good 2 + 2 player would push any two here vs. a 600 raise." If I knew that were the case, I'd try to get him in every time. Because I'd take a 65% of getting the dominating chip stack and then punishing everybody the rest of the way. As it is now, you aren't sure of anything. So yeah, you are correct that pushing is probably better now that I think about it, I disagree that you wouldn't want to face the big stack if you knew you were a 2-1 favorite. Again, though, what you would do here depends a lot on how the big stack plays. If he's really passive and isn't even going to call 600 without AK or a wired pair, than a smaller raise might make sense?

[/ QUOTE ]

You are showing a total lack of understanding of the mathematics and ICM with this post. It's a leak.

[/ QUOTE ]

tigerite is right. You DON'T want to face the big stack when you have a sizable stack yourself when there are shorter stacks because of your stack in relation to the total amount of chips and the prize pool. Winning 65% of the time and not being guaranteed first place while busting out 35% of the time and not getting squat works out to be -EV in the long run.

[Michael C.]

I don't think everything can be determined by ICM. If you are good with a big stack and can run over the field, you can pretty much be assured of second if you win a showdown with the big stack, and you'd be a heavy favorite for first, with the blinds getting higher. So if you KNEW that the big stacks range was that he'd push with any two, I don't think that's completely ICM-driven. If you think you are better with a big stack than your opponents, what would your percentage be to get 1-2-3 if you win that push? You can't use ICM to figure it, because it doesn't take your abilities with a big stack into the equation... Forgetting the big stack here pushing with anything, I thought the whole point of the 10X rule is that that's the mathamatical point where you can never make a 3X raise and fold. Well here you have 12X the big blind. If you put the big stacks push range very high, and thought the only way he'd go over the top of your AQ is if he was much better, how would ICM calculate it then? ICM is a great tool for certain push/fold/call decisions, as the SnG Power Tools shows. It isn't applicable in every situation, and you're basically just ignoring my part about the reads and what we can do with the big stack, and assigning the big stack a probability regardless of how much I bet.

[tigerite]

You certainly can work out the ICM values for this. Just not via SNGPT.

[EricW]

[ QUOTE ]
I don't think everything can be determined by ICM. If you are good with a big stack and can run over the field, you can pretty much be assured of second if you win a showdown with the big stack, and you'd be a heavy favorite for first, with the blinds getting higher. So if you KNEW that the big stacks range was that he'd push with any two, I don't think that's completely ICM-driven. If you think you are better with a big stack than your opponents, what would your percentage be to get 1-2-3 if you win that push? You can't use ICM to figure it, because it doesn't take your abilities with a big stack into the equation... Forgetting the big stack here pushing with anything, I thought the whole point of the 10X rule is that that's the mathamatical point where you can never make a 3X raise and fold. Well here you have 12X the big blind. If you put the big stacks push range very high, and thought the only way he'd go over the top of your AQ is if he was much better, how would ICM calculate it then? ICM is a great tool for certain push/fold/call decisions, as the SnG Power Tools shows. It isn't applicable in every situation, and you're basically just ignoring my part about the reads and what we can do with the big stack, and assigning the big stack a probability regardless of how much I bet.

[/ QUOTE ]

Well if the blinds are high, then the situation differs. However, the main point here is pushing is 1000x better then calling.

Another thing is again it all depends on chip sizes. If you have 2500 chips, the big stack has 4000, another stack has 1400 and an mini stack has 100, would you call a push from the big stack when you have AQ?

[Michael C.]

[ QUOTE ]
If you have 2500 chips, the big stack has 4000, another stack has 1400 and an mini stack has 100, would you call a push from the big stack when you have AQ?

[/ QUOTE ] No, I wouldn't. But in the current situation, I don't think you're near as much a cinch of walking into the money as in your example. That's a situation you can put an ICM value on a lot easier too, since it's a simple push/fold, with ITM around the corner.

[Michael C.]

[ QUOTE ]
You certainly can work out the ICM values for this. Just not via SNGPT.

[/ QUOTE ]ICM) can give you the value of your stack now, and what it would be if you were to double up 65% of the time, and what it would be if you were to bust 35% of the time (zero). What ICM can't figure out is how much extra that big stack is worth to a good player, who can then walk over the rest of the field and practically guarantee himself second place (barring extreme bad luck), with a huge shot at first. That's a weakness of people who rely simply on ICM in every instance, IMO.