How Many Suckouts Do You Make In Your Tourney Wins?

I have always said and firmly believe that even the most seasoned and successful pros, including the WSOP and WPT champs, have at least one suckout in the tourneys that they won. Would care sharing yours?

I am asking this because last night must have been the luckiest in my tourney career - I won a $33 tourney at Party, my second in 3 weeks! However, unlike the first one where my moves were more deliberate, last night was peppered with marginal, and what appeared to my opponents to be devil-may-care raises and all-ins that prevailed over much superior hands. For whatever reasons, i was in a gambling mood and followed my gut feelings contrary to what logical plays dictated and won key hands. Some examples of hands I can recall with vague details:

Hand 1 - First hour, I had only about 650 left and pushed with 88 against 2 limpers who both got me covered. I tripled up against AA and AK on a board of A 8 Q J 8.

Hand 2 - I called a push of a slightly shorter stack with QJo which I know is a no-no and won with 2 pairs against KK.

Hand 3 - I raised in the CO with Ad8d after a limper about same stack as mine who I perceived to be weak-tight. He pushed, I KNEW he had the goods but called anyway. My runner-runner flush against his flopped set of QQ

Hand 4 - Table chip leader, a good, thinking opponent in SB limped and I raised in BB with KJ. She pushed and I called. Board was 10 Q K K 9. She had AKs. Nothing but XXXX from her in the chatbox. I am now the chip leader with 21 players left.

There were a couple more that I cannot recall but these are the glaring ones. I was too excited for the unexpected show of love from the poker gods that I forgot to request for the HH.

Honestly, I cannot even count this as a B- game and not too proud of it. But a win is a win and 4K is good to clean up my plastics for the New Year. /images/graemlins/heart.gif /images/graemlins/laugh.gif /images/graemlins/heart.gif

[ononimo]

3.141592653589793238462643383279502884197169399375 10
58209749445923078164062862089986280348253421170679 ... give or take.

It takes luck to win a tournament, but luck doesn't always come in the form of a suckout. Basically, you win when you are consistently on the good end of variance. I'm sure you know that when you make a raise, call, or fold, you are making a decision against a weighted range of possible hands your opponent could have. Obviously the goal is to make decisions that are +EV versus that range. That may mean that Villains are consistently turning over hands at the low end of the range you put them on, or that your weaker hands are prevailing when Villains turn over hands at the top of their range. Of course, getting dealt good startings hands in the first place, getting moved to a good table, sitting in good position, catching blinds at the right times, having opponents win or lose key hands in which you are not involved, etc. are all elements of luck as well.

[winky51]

I think selecting the right time to risk all your chips is very important. 75% ahead only wins 1/3 of the time if you are all in 4 times.

I prefer building my stack with smaller raises and bets. I found I win a lot more small pots 90% of the time and lose small pots 10% of the time.

Once in a while I have a spontaneous brain fart and suckout with a turd hand on a bad call. Rare but there.

I do find in 30 min live rounds I usually have to SUCK once.

In 20 min live rounds with less chips I have to keep sucking, like 5 times in a row all in and win to make the final table

[ QUOTE ]
It takes luck to win a tournament, but luck doesn't always come in the form of a suckout. Basically, you win when you are consistently on the good end of variance. I'm sure you know that when you make a raise, call, or fold, you are making a decision against a weighted range of possible hands your opponent could have. Obviously the goal is to make decisions that are +EV versus that range. That may mean that Villains are consistently turning over hands at the low end of the range you put them on, or that your weaker hands are prevailing when Villains turn over hands at the top of their range. Of course, getting dealt good startings hands in the first place, getting moved to a good table, sitting in good position, catching blinds at the right times, having opponents win or lose key hands in which you are not involved, etc. are all elements of luck as well.

[/ QUOTE ]

umm, what he said. I had a few suckouts in the last 2 Monday night 10Ks on Stars. However, of those, rarely was I behind before the flop. My biggest might have been my AQo vs Jh8h, board comes JQ8, I pushed 350k and was instacalled, villan shows J8, turn came A, and I then feel free to launch a string of "table coach" aka Helmuth type berating. I also had got the lucky end of my PPs v AA on about 4 occasions. I do believe I made most of my decisions based on +EV. That, and you also have to make the tough calls, i.e., OESD facing an all-in bet and you have the guy covered. Does the gambler in you make that call? Or do you lay it down even though at worst you have 8 outs maybe as many as 11 outs? If you make the call, is it really a suckout when you see you are facing TP and you have an over card to that?

I've been on a ridiculous hot streak in the past week (which is why I'm currently #1 on the tlb). Before the week even started I won 2 consecutive 180 man sngs. Since then, I've won 3 more 180 man sngs, a 22+r, a 189 man $20 PLH, and 2nd in a $10 PLO. I'm pretty sure I sucked out at least once in each of these, and in some of them I sucked out at least 4 times. That said, there is a difference between sucking out because you made a bad play or sucking out because you made a +EV play given their range and they happened to have a hand that made your play -EV. I'm happy with MOST of my play, although there are certainly several that I'd like to take back. My favorite "suckout" of the week, even though it doesn't really count, was AK v 88 3 handed in one of the 180 mans. Allin preflop, flop JJJ, turn brick, river J, that was pretty neat.

[ QUOTE ]
I think selecting the right time to risk all your chips is very important. 75% ahead only wins 1/3 of the time if you are all in 4 times.


[/ QUOTE ]


??????
3/4 or 3:1

[ QUOTE ]
I've been on a ridiculous hot streak in the past week (which is why I'm currently #1 on the tlb). Before the week even started I won 2 consecutive 180 man sngs. Since then, I've won 3 more 180 man sngs, a 22+r, a 189 man $20 PLH, and 2nd in a $10 PLO. I'm pretty sure I sucked out at least once in each of these, and in some of them I sucked out at least 4 times. That said, there is a difference between sucking out because you made a bad play or sucking out because you made a +EV play given their range and they happened to have a hand that made your play -EV. I'm happy with MOST of my play, although there are certainly several that I'd like to take back. My favorite "suckout" of the week, even though it doesn't really count, was AK v 88 3 handed in one of the 180 mans. Allin preflop, flop JJJ, turn brick, river J, that was pretty neat.

[/ QUOTE ]

Now why cant I hit a run like this!!! No I get my KK vs an all in AQ and instapushed by AK, board is AQxxx, i go from 9th in chips with 50 left to out. No cash. GRRRRRR!!

[FrogMouth]

I have noticed 3 types of luck in most of my tourny wins.

1)Getting paid off on big hands.
2)Not getting crippled by other's big hands
3)suckouts

For me at least, 1 and 2 have been much more instumental in my big cahses than suckouts. I remember tripling up w/ AA near the bubble as the key to my first win. I also remember only denting my stack when my set of 8's ran into flush and I got scared off. I will admit that I did have one win where I couldn't loose a hand, and went into every one with the worst of it. But that is a rarity.

Oh ya, #4)stealing the blinds, and not running into AA!!

[MikeSmith]

last week when i won the 180 man 20+2 i delivered 2 suckouts with about 15 left.

My QQ vs AA and then when i reraised all in the table bully when i had 98 in the BB and he called w/ Q10 the board
A 4 10 J Q for a straight, It was beautiful

[illegit]

In my big wins I always had a few suckouts along the way, but I think another key factor is that when i did suckout I was rarely in for MY tournament life when it happened. Like if some nit finally pushes w/ AA from the button on a stack of 3 BBs, and I call from the BB on a monster stack w/ 54s and crack AA I don't really think it should even be considered a suckout.

[Sam T.]

I agree with that the different kinds of luck are key. We don't usually think of doubling or tripling up with AA or KK as getting lucky, but it is extremely lucky that some donk decided to go to felt with 99 or AJ pre-flop, or that you hit your set when someone else hit TPTK. Once you get the big stack, you can survive the inevitable come-from-ahead losses when your AK gets cracked by shorty's A7, so your "bad luck" doesn't end your tournament the way it would if you had a medium stack.

That said, with a couple of exceptions, in every largeish tournament that I've FTed, I've had to hit my 2- or 3-outer at least once, but usually twice.

[woodguy]

[ QUOTE ]
: How Many Suckouts Do You Make In Your Tourney Wins?

[/ QUOTE ]

All of them.

Regards,
Woodguy

[winky51]

If you go all in 4x in a row with a 75% chance to win.. then you only win all 4 31% of the time.

.75 x .75 x .75 x .75 = 0.3164%~

that's all I'm saying. I'd rather level out the luck with winning smaller pots 90% of the time and losing 10%. Rather than getting it in with the best hand thats 75% ahead 4 times in a row. The 2 high standard deviations of fish that call you here will eventually beat you in that race. This is in low level $200 tournaments where most of the field are fish. There will be more fish with larger stacks than good player swith large stacks.. So I always have 2-3 larger stacks at my table with 2 of them loose and in the "gambling mood".

[winky51]

[ QUOTE ]
Oh ya, #4)stealing the blinds, and not running into AA!!

[/ QUOTE ]

Very very important. I love stealing blinds. I think I make more money that way.

[adanthar]

Very few. I don't think I've ever had over 2 real suckouts while winning a tourney and in the 100K win my worst all in was 46/54.

Every time I have > 3 suckouts along the way in a single tournament, I'm either in some unavoidable spots (KK vs. AA, combo draw vs. set with shallow stacks, etc.) or not playing my A game/probably not playing my B game.

[ QUOTE ]
If you go all in 4x in a row with a 75% chance to win.. then you only win all 4 31% of the time.



[/ QUOTE ]

this makes no sense.

but sadly, I understand what you mean.

does that make sense?

you are using a control group of 4 rather than an absolute of 4. i get it. 100 sets of 4 allins equals 31 of those sets you will win all 4 allins. originally it sounded as if you were talking about ONLY 4 allins. this was worded poorly, i hope you see why i was confuzzled.

[winky51]

np man. I was confused too when I kept pushing with the best hand and losing tournaments.

"How can I lose I went in with the best hand!?!?!?!"

Now I know and I do much better now /images/graemlins/smile.gif

[Annulus]

Sucking out while making +EV decisions is normal and all tourney players do this, some very often. Sucking out making -EV decisions is a major leak.

Just 1. The last hand of a 350 person tourney on Pokerroom. I had A3c, other guy had 33 (had a 2.5 - 1 chip lead by this time). Flopped an A to win. Other marginal hands: AJc against 55 on a board of Tc 9s 9c. rivered a club.
A3s against 33 on a board of 6s 4s 2h. riverd an Ace. Other than that, always got my money in with the best of it.

[nath]

Quite a few, sometimes. It depends... I'm usually making more suckouts if I've gotten lucky enough to get a big stack early because I'm doing much more gambling and pushing around the short stacks.
I don't like to be all in very often and I've found the less frequently I'm playing for all my chips on one hand the better my results are.
Luck is always a factor... my luck usually comes from getting big hands paid off or winning races at the right time. Occasionally I'll get it in as a dog, sometimes even knowingly, but I try to avoid that.
Also, no dumb mistakes. That helps a lot.

[tshak]

[ QUOTE ]
Other marginal hands: AJc against 55 on a board of Tc 9s 9c.

[/ QUOTE ]
Actually, you are a 3:2 favorite here.

[Dan Mezick]

I believe 2 to 4 suckouts per 200 hands or so is what I experience on the way to just about every final table I experience.

Usually it's a pair against pair battle where I have cut it a little too fine in my estimation of relative strength.

[el_dusto]

Every hand I win is a suckout.

At least according to my opponents.

[bobbycharles]

[ QUOTE ]
If you go all in 4x in a row with a 75% chance to win.. then you only win all 4 31% of the time.

.75 x .75 x .75 x .75 = 0.3164%~


[/ QUOTE ]

This may be the Holy Grail I've been looking for...ok, that's a stretch, but I've never done the math from an entire tourney standpoint before.

This could be the single most important concept I never understood. Ok, that's a stretch too...but.. No wonder I'm always so pissed when I get knocked out of a tourney with the best hand going in and lose to the runner runner.

Thanks Winky. Excellent.

I agree with Adanthar, my good finishes come from not suffering bad beats. Getting my money in when I'm ahead and have an edge and it holds up. That needs to happen several times to win a tourney.