huge laydown on the bubble?
 

Single table, 4 remain, top 3 are in the money. Small stack is UTG+2, and cannot cover his BB.

Blinds are now 200/400, and, after checking the BB, you have a stack of $520. You have Td5c, heads-up vs. the SB, who limped (he is a solid player, big stack with approx. T2K after limping).

Flop: AdJs4d. Check-check.
Turn: [8d] AdJs4d. Check-check.
River: [Jd] 8dAdJs4d. SB now bets. Pot is now $1600.

All-in or fold?

What\'s your goal?
 

Do you want to make the money or win the tournament. If making the money is important to you then fold. If not I go all-in. I can’t imagine him limping with a K or Q high hand in this situation unless he was trying to trap you. I think you have the best hand, so I would call/bet the river.

Re: huge laydown on the bubble?
 

With any King or Queen the solid player should have been raising you pre-flop. And he probably should be betting on the turn at a minimum with K or Q high flush draw.

Call.

Ken Poklitar

Re: huge laydown on the bubble?
 

how many chips did the other player have? I think this might change how i would have played it here. If he also is very low on chips ( ie the utg player) i might fold it here. Certainly the small blind could be trapping. The odds of him having a kd or qd is 12%. Not easy to answer because you haven't really told me enough about the sb player other then he is solid. I tend to agree with the other players that a solid player would have raised preflop or bet the turn at least unless he flopped a made hand.

results and comment
 

I called, and the SB showed Qd9d to knock me out. To his defense, there is no way I was folding preflop with half my stack already on the table, so why would he want to risk his chip lead by raising me?

Davidross made an interesting point that was the basis of my decision. If I folded, there was a very high probability that I would finish ITM, but I'd have a crippled stack once I got there. What fun is that? With a call and win, I would suddenly be big stack and have a very real shot at winning.

By the way, I left out a key point: This was just a little $5+$1 tourney (I know, high rake, shouldn't have even been there). Third pays $10, First pays $25. If the stakes were high enough to make me sweat, I may very well have laid down here.

Not Huge laydown
 

"Huge" laydown - my foot - your headline made this sound like a good sized tourney. At the stakes you were playing for, you must take the action to win - so all in it is.

Laying down 3rd high flush heads up = big laydown.
 

"Big" doesn't refer to the stakes, but the size of the hand being layed down. And yes, for all my money, it would take a big laydown to toss a decent sized flush heads up after all the checking going on, especially if there is any chance my opponent would be counting on the board to be scary enough to get me to fold my tiny stack.

M.

Re: Not Huge laydown
 

""Huge" laydown - my foot - your headline made this sound like a good sized tourney. At the stakes you were playing for, you must take the action to win - so all in it is."

--Sorry if the title misled you. I've just always believed that the size of a laydown is dictated by the size of one's hand... And this holding seemed like a pretty big one, given the situation.

Out of curiosity, does the hand play out differently for you if the single-table buy-in is not $5+$1, but rather $200+$10? Consider the payout structure to be $1,000/$600/$400.

Re: huge laydown on the bubble?
 

I'm not as positive about the call as the others. Would you really be a big stack here. You would not win the entire $1600 in the pot as you only have 520. I would guess this is a paradise tourney, so the average stack size is $2500 four handed. Since the low player has less than $400, the average is $3200 for the other three players. If you win the pot, you will have $1840, which may tie you for second, but probably you are still in third. I like the chances of you taking third when the low-chip guy loses better than I like your chances of finishing second or first.

Also, the amount of the buy-in should not matter. If anyone thinks it does, they are playing too high. The only time I would be unusually concerned with making the money is if it is winner take all, or through unfortunate circumstances I am very short stacked and would really need to get lucky to advance beyond the last paid spot. When I am very low on chips near the money, my goal becomes to cash. When I am low-medium or higher on chips, my goal is to win, so I will take more chances. You were very low in this situation.

Re: Not Huge laydown
 

Third flush is not that huge a hand - even heads up (maybe it's my O/8 background). And yes, I have different goals when the payouts are larger. If I am playing for two hours in a tournament, I would like to have some $ back for my time. If I can make $200+ is a big difference than can I make $5-25. A win rate of $100+/hour is excellent in most poker players perspectives.

Theoretically, it would be nice to make the 100% perfect play no matter what the stakes, but different payouts mean different definitions for perfect [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]