Gazes Call with AK after 2 all ins 4 handed

[Vee Quiva]

Has there been any discussion about this hand from the WSOP tonight? I ran a search and could not find any.

Does everyone agree that it was a stupid call?

Granted if he gets lucky and wins the pot, he's got a legitimate chance to win the whole enchilada.

i think this is a definite call barring some extreme circumstances.

[A_Junglen]

I don't see a problem with the call, specifically if your Bill Gazes and your clearly there to win.

I was surprised to see how PO'd Minh seemed about it though.

[Photoc]

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I was surprised to see how PO'd Minh seemed about it though.

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Looks like Mihn has been watching old Helmuth footage on ESPN for some pointers.

[BTirish]

Given how close his stack was to one of the all-in players, I'm not sure I see the reasoning for the call.

You have to figure that at least one of these players has a pocket pair. The most likely holding for a player without a pocket pair is a weaker ace--but if there's a weaker ace out there, then your 3-way equity with AKo goes down.

I guess if he were very sure that the player with the larger stack had pushed in with a weaker ace, then the call would be justified. This depends on how big the disparity between the stacks was, though.

As it was, he ended up with a 3-way coin flip where going out behind both of the other players was a possibility. Justifying the call because it could put him in a position to win the whole thing has to be balanced against this possibility.

edit: I should add that I do not think it is a stupid or really bad call. Nor do I think I am qualified to pass any such judgment. I just see a difference between a 50-50 coinflip and a 3-way race when it's for your tournament life. Kudos to him for being willing to gamble to win--I just don't think it's the obvious best move.

[Dynasty]

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You have to figure that at least one of these players has a pocket pair. The most likely holding for a player without a pocket pair is a weaker ace--but if there's a weaker ace out there, then your 3-way equity with AKo goes down.


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No, it doesn't- at least not significantly.

I don't remember the suits of the cards in the actual hand. But, this should suffice.

Holdem Hi: 1370754 enumerated boards
cards win %win lose %lose tie %tie EV
As Kh 496900 36.25 869636 63.44 4218 0.31 0.364
Jc Jd 636192 46.41 730344 53.28 4218 0.31 0.465
Td Th 233444 17.03 1133092 82.66 4218 0.31 0.171


Holdem Hi: 1370754 enumerated boards
cards win %win lose %lose tie %tie EV
As Kh 448950 32.75 902682 65.85 19122 1.39 0.334
Jc Jd 628006 45.81 738247 53.86 4501 0.33 0.459
Qd Ah 274676 20.04 1076956 78.57 19122 1.39 0.207

I'm not dismissing an extra 3% equity. But, even when the AQ is substituted for the TT, The AKo hand has 33.4% equity. The proper poker play is to call although it's essentially EV neutral with high variance. So, the decision comes down to what the proper tournament play is. Given the stack sizes, I think it's an easy call.

[illegit]

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Given how close his stack was to one of the all-in players, I'm not sure I see the reasoning for the call.

You have to figure that at least one of these players has a pocket pair. The most likely holding for a player without a pocket pair is a weaker ace--but if there's a weaker ace out there, then your 3-way equity with AKo goes down.


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Goes down, but not far enough down to fold. i.e. if he's against JJ and AQ his equity is STILL 34%. Since he's getting 2-1 on a call his call is correct in this situation.

If he folds: He's pretty much guaranteed 3rd, and has an OK shot at 2nd (though he's still a dog to the 2 bigger stacks), and 1st will still be very tough as the short stack.

If he calls and loses: he's still guaranteed 3rd, but now 2nd and 1st are basically impossible

If he calls and wins: he's guaranteed 2nd and has a real good shot at first.

The risk/reward for a call looks pretty good to me.

[Dynasty]

The more I've thought about this hand, the more folding AK seems to be a terrible decision. I just don't see a good arguement for laying down the hand.

[2+2 wannabe]

who actually won the hand?

[MicroBob]

and this is the case regardless of whether he ONLY cares about finishing first...or if he is just trying to maximize his equity (since it is a fairly standard money prize-structure).


Actually...even if 4th place gets $0 it's a reasonable call (assuming the other two guys really DO have equal stacks that are slightly smaller than his) because he still should have 3rd mostly locked up.


I can only envision folding here if the top 3 places all paid equally AND 4th place got zero.
In that case he's running the risk of the shorter-stacks splitting the pot while leaving him with a miniscule-stack...while folding the hand still gives him a fighting chance to make the top 3.

But in the situation as is it just HAS to be a call:
It's 4-handed and they could have a LOT of hands here....it's a normal prize-structure...he has both stacks covered...1 of the players is likely to get eliminated right now regardless of whether the AK wins the hand.

Folding here is really bad.