[Mark Heide]

Easy E,

My decision for moving all-in on the button is based on several factors, including my opponents understanding of tournament strategy, their quality of play, and what they think I am thinking. First, both opponents appear to understand which hands hold up in a heads up confrontation. The player in the big blind had moved-in in middle position with AQ and doubled up, the small blind had called an all-in with AT and doubled up. So, I estimate that they value ace-anything and pairs as hands that are needed to play in these situations. Since, there are 13 pairs with 6 combinations of each for a total of 78 pair combinations and 12 ace-anything with 16 combinations of each for a total of 192 ace-anything combinations. The 78 pair and 192 ace-anything combinations give a total of 270 playable all-in hands. I believe both of my opponents would put me on one of these hands.

Some other factors to consider is the size of there stacks and how close to the prize money we are. Both the big and small blind had approximately $6000 in chips. For these reasons I believe that they would not risk any chips unless they thought that they had a better hand than me. Let's assume that they both believe I would only make that all-in move with a hand that would play well heads up and assume that 270 possible combinations are one of those hands. I believe that either one of these players would not risk a significant amount of their stack unless they had at least a pair of 8s or higher and AK, AQ, AJ, or AT. If I assume this to be correct, there is only 106 possible combinations they will play. Since, there are a total of 1326 possible card combinations that they can be dealt, each of my opponents has an 8% chance to get a hand that they will play against my possible 20%. The combined chances of both opponents getting a hand they will call me with would be 16%. So, I am an 84% favorite to pick up the pot uncontested. But, in this situation, one of them did pick up that chance and called.

Good Luck

Mark