Black's 2 donkey plays

[ClaytonN]

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And if he had 77-TT like Black thought he did, it's not even 'that' bad of a play. Force him to make a tough call, and still be a coin flip if he does.

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If any of you have ever heard the term squeeze play, this would be it. Loose opener (Matusow) gets two looish calls from Lazar and Black.

If you're Black, and you see Barch make the reraise, you're going to put him on a much wider range due to the previous set of circumstances. It's just in this case he had JJ instead of something like 77.

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And if he had 77-TT like Black thought he did, it's not even 'that' bad of a play. Force him to make a tough call, and still be a coin flip if he does.

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If any of you have ever heard the term squeeze play, this would be it. Loose opener (Matusow) gets two looish calls from Lazar and Black.

If you're Black, and you see Barch make the reraise, you're going to put him on a much wider range due to the previous set of circumstances. It's just in this case he had JJ instead of something like 77.

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Barch wouldn't be foolish enough to make a squeeze play against four players or whatever it was. We know for a fact that Black doesn't have AK because he would have reraised. And he doesn't have QQ + because he also would have reraised. Barch knows this, and he knows JJ is a solid favorite here.

People seem to forget the chip counts, Barch's stack was hardly chump change compared to Black's stack. I believe he had half as much as Black did, so this isn't your typical bubble play. Does anybody really think Barch is going to fold after he gets raised when Black has shown little strength in the hand? Why would he want to look like a pushover at the feature table? I think Black tried on several occasions to give his chips away to anybody who had a hand.

[TheJackal]

It was a good play given the fact Black didn't think Barch could call there with anything less than a premium hand. The only problem I see with the play is Barch has got to know his jacks are the best hand, and the only question is whether or not to play them for all his chips. I don't think you can pass here with JJ, but I do think Black made a good play, because if Barch had something a bit weaker, I think he would have folded.

[Wayfare]

I do not like the KJ play, but I understand why he made it:

1: Bubble play with $400k of real money makes Barch's calling ability severely impaired.

2: Present action made it possible for Barch to have a much wider range than people think. (77 and up, AQ etc.) Look at who the UTG raiser had. T9o. Proved.

Big problem is that AA/KK/QQ NEVER plays like Black played this hand. I can see Barch imagining Black with 99 and folding 88 or AQ, but he can't fold JJ to that action.

[gergery]

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if barch folds JJ everyone would be saying it was a great play but because barch calls its a donkey play.

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Um, there was a UTG raise, 1 call, and then Black called. He does not make that play w/ QQ-AA. Easy call by Tex. (says someone who has never played for that much money

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That's only because you knew his hand. Barch knew that Matusow was raising light, and knew neither of the first 2 callers had great hands or they would have raised. So a good player in that spot will sometimes raise with any two cards, because he knows that anyone who wants to play with him has to put their whole stack at risk (or half their stack in Blacks case).

Black knew this and therefore put Barch on wider range of hands, and was re-stealing. Fairly standard play. Whether it was a good play or not depends on how Barch was playing, their images of each other, etc. But it is well within the possibility of being a good play.

-g

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if barch folds JJ everyone would be saying it was a great play but because barch calls its a donkey play.

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Um, there was a UTG raise, 1 call, and then Black called. He does not make that play w/ QQ-AA. Easy call by Tex. (says someone who has never played for that much money

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That's only because you knew his hand. Barch knew that Matusow was raising light, and knew neither of the first 2 callers had great hands or they would have raised. So a good player in that spot will sometimes raise with any two cards, because he knows that anyone who wants to play with him has to put their whole stack at risk (or half their stack in Blacks case).

Black knew this and therefore put Barch on wider range of hands, and was re-stealing. Fairly standard play. Whether it was a good play or not depends on how Barch was playing, their images of each other, etc. But it is well within the possibility of being a good play.

-g

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Why would Barch make a squeeze play with 4 other players in the hand? If he had a medium pair Barch would have just called for set value. But thinking he is on a steal here is very wishful thinking.

[Daliman]

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sykes, good work typing that all out for me. Spot on.

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uh.... no

You have to consider raising standards. THe whole bubble thing is overrated here.

[Daliman]

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So a good player in that spot will sometimes raise with any two cards, because he knows that anyone who wants to play with him has to put their whole stack at risk (or half their stack in Blacks case).

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RIIIIIIIIIIGGGHHHHTTTTTTT. Name ONCE you have ever seen this play b4. just ONCE.

[gergery]

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So a good player in that spot will sometimes raise with any two cards, because he knows that anyone who wants to play with him has to put their whole stack at risk (or half their stack in Blacks case).

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RIIIIIIIIIIGGGHHHHTTTTTTT. Name ONCE you have ever seen this play b4. just ONCE.

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Harrington in last year's WSOP did it to Arieh and Raymer, as seen on TV. And it happens all the freakin time online (ever seen Dr. Gammon play?)

I'm not saying he's doing it with pure trash, but hands like AJs-AT/KQ/99-77 are very possible raise-fold-to-reraise hands here and potentially much wider depending on table dynamics.



-g

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All of you that are saying that the KJo hand is a donkey play are IDIOTS.

Seriously, none of you should ever play in the main-event (let alone a tournament entry of more than $1K), you weak-tight donkeys.

The difference between 10th and 9th is 400,000$, plus you can add a final table to your name.

If I was Black, I would do this with any type of hands (suited connectors/broadway/small pair) to push Barch off a hand that's not QQ+. Barch made a great read that he wasn't a coin flip and called with his jacks.

The reason that this play is so great is because if one of you weak-tight donkeys makes this play with jacks, and Black puts you all in you're folding A LOT of hands including sometimes AK. Seriously, unless you only call with QQ/KK/AA/AK (2.6% of hands) and you make the 1 million raise with hands from, 99+/AQo+ (5.1% of hands), Black moves you off your hand close to 50% of the time. and even if you call, Black wins 1 out of 4 times against that hand range.

So congratulations, you lose $400,000 and 4.5 million in chips to the chip leader who now has close to 19 million in chips (more than 1/3 of the chips in play) 1/4th of the time.

Even if Barch folds 99-JJ/AQ (which he will close to 50% of the time), Black now has close to 16 million chips. And you're not even guaranteed making the final table and $1,000,000 if you're Barch.


The more I think about it, the more I think it's a donkey move by Barch if he doesn't call Black a large percentage of the time. He forced Black to make that move.

Seriously people. Stop talking like you know what's going on.

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I agree with your math and taking the payouts* into consideration, but I think you are missing the point here. Look how this hand played out...

"Hand 41 - Andrew Black has the button in seat 2, Matusow raises to $260,000, Lazar calls, Black calls, Barch reraises to $1,000,000, and everyone folds to Black, who thinks long and hard. After a few minutes, Black reraises all in. Now the million-dollar pressure cooker is in full force on Tex Barch, who counts out his chips as he considers the call. Andrew Black looks relaxed as he takes a drink from his water bottle, and then watches Barch count his chips. Barch takes a good look at Black, who was looking down and shuffling his chips. When Black looks up, their eyes meet for a moment, and Black smiles at the surprise. About ten seconds later, Barch makes the call."

Black just called after Matusow's raise and Lazar's call. Now if I'm Tex and after I reraise everyone folds to Black who puts me all in, I'm almost positive he's trying to make a move here. If you saw the hand on TV, it's even more obvious. I'm not even faulting Black for trying to make a move heads up in a big pot before the flop even came. He just picked a bad spot here and wasn't too convincing IMHO.