[MarkD]

This post was written before reading any comments posted. It is my current thoughts on the hand unbiased.

Pre-flop:
I think completing the small blind here is trivial with J[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] 8[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]. 725-100 pot odds.
<font color="blue">At this point of the hand I put Fishman on a hand range something like: 22-77, 56s-JTs (possibly QJs – I’m not sure if he would raise with this), as well as some suited gap type of hands and possibly a big pair like AA-QQ (trapping). Maybe my range is too narrow here?</font>

Flop:
Perfect flop for me – almost. As mentioned in the initial post I really though Fishman was going to bet this flop if I checked to him. It also really felt like the BB had no interest in this hand and he was not trying to hide that. With this in mind, and with the thought that Fishman was an aggressive player I went for a check raise. I also thought that if the hand got checked around and a bad card came on the turn that I would be willing to get away from my hand without investing a lot of my chips.

When Fishman bet 325 I checked raised 1000 more, giving him pot odds of about 2.5-1 (2475-1000) which seemed like a good amount to bet to allow him make a mistake. The other bet that I thought was to check raise it 1400-1500 more (making my raise about the size of the pot).

My standard move on this flop would be to bet out about 400-500 and maybe that’s what I should have done here. I kind of wanted to play a bigger pot though so decided to get Fishman involved.

<font color="blue">The range I put him on is similar to the range posted above. I thought he probably had a flush draw or something like JTs.</font>

Turn:
Well, that card really sucks ass but I have to bet here. Checking is basically giving up on this hand and this pot is too big for me to do that. I really think I have to bet here and I choose 1500 because it is slightly less than half the pot, but is still a sizeable bet considering our stack sizes. It also leaves me 2400 behind which is 12BB’s. I thought this bet gave me maximum leverage on the hand while still allowing myself to fold if I had to.

When Fishman raised me all in I thought long and hard. My initial instinct was to move in. I talked myself out of it because I really thought Fishman’s only hand was a flush. I talked myself out of the possibility that he was bluffing (disregarded Harrington’s Law of Bluffing) because it looks like I have to call here and his raise really appears that he wants me to call it. If he wants me to call his raise then surely I have to fold right?

Well… that’s what I thought up until my flight home. I started to re-read Harrington before starting Volume 2 and got to Example 4: on page 138 where he introduces the concept of Inflection points. When I got to page 142 I felt as if he was talking about my hand exactly and I felt as if I had made a large mistake by folding. By folding I really did not give myself a reasonable chance to continue on in the tournament. 2400 was a really small stack at my table and with the blinds rising I was in trouble. Even though I still think that Fishman had a flush I believe that I should have assigned some probability to a range of hands that I did have beat (like AA with the Ace of hearts – however improbable), as well as a probability that he was bluffing, and taking that into account – even if I thought he was bluffing I should have sad “f*ck it” and gambled in this spot.

I think I was at an inflection point in my tournament and although this was probably a good fold in a cash game I think it was a bad fold in a tournament. I need to chip up sometime and here is a really decent spot.