Simple Common Tournament Situation

[jedi]

I seriously can't believe that I'm reading that some people want to raise to 400 or 500 or so. I have to think that it's the WORST of the possibilities, with calling just slightly behind.

Originally I was thinking about folding this, but I think I can be convinced that all-in is a better play here. Blinds are next, you are up against a tight table. They'll likely fold and if not, you have live cards against most of them.

You've got less than 6xBB, you can't call or raise 3x. That shouldn't even be an option.

[Rick Nebiolo]

Without looking at the gazillion other responses I'd say this is a fold. Even if you don't defend your blinds you will still have T800 left with the button and several more free hands. Better to go all in by either calling a raise with a big hand or open raising all in with any ace, pair or decent king.

The answer might change if the limits are about to go up because open raising with T800 will rarely take down a big blind of T300 or T400.

Given this is a Sklansky question I doubt the correct answer is that simple [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

~ Rick

[deuces09]

It more or less boils down to these scenarios:

-folding
-calling with intents of a mutliway pot on flop
-calling with intents of a PF raise by a player in MP/LP, then move all in
-raising 3xBB (more than half of stack)
-raising all-in

I'm just not a big fan of folding here. I think the pyschology in Sklansky's question lies that the answer is not simple "push or fold". It probably means attempting to get a lot of people in the hand for a lot of chips as opposed to just 1 caller.

[cero_z]

Hi David,

Push. The blinds represent almost 30% of your stack, which will be valuable dead money if you get called by someone other than the blinds. If you try to wait for a better spot, you'll likely end up calling off your money to someone who's raised in front of you, with a lesser stack to boot. At least in this spot, there's some chance you can take it down without a fight. Your stack is critically low, and you'll need to double up a couple of times, regardless. Might as well start with 1100, rather than 800.

Finally, you might very well find yourself forced to call all-in next hand, with something worse than QJs. To avoid making this worse bet, make this semi-bad bet now.

[chesspain]

But where does God fit into all of this?

[cero_z]

Hi cola,

[ QUOTE ]
David's suggestion that you are the best player at the table is very telling as to the proper course of action.


[/ QUOTE ]
No. This is an irrelevant red herring--an oft-employed device by David. Your skill advantage will not count for much when any hand you choose to play will pot-commit your whole stack.

[David Sklansky]

Why? Because almost none of the answers attempted to do any math. I asked several world class players this question. All of them ventured an opinion and then said "am I right?" Because they all realized that this was in fact mainly a math problem. That should be obvious because we are talking about a possible all in move and talking about eight random hands yet to act. All in= math problem. Random opposing hands= math problem.

The fact that this is a tournament or that you are the best player has only a tiny bearing on the correct decision. Basically you move in if the EV of your resultant stack is more than the $1100 you have now and not otherwise. What is relevant is that your opponents are not live ones. This means an all in move will be called by medium pairs and up, big aces and perhaps KQ or KJ suited. Later positions will call with a few more hands than early positions. At this point it is all math. Yet almost none of you tried to do this math. HOW DARE YOU? What makes you think that this question should be attempted by the seat of your pants? Were you just lazy? Or is it because you do not know how to do this relatively simple problem? If you don't, you better learn now because otherwise you are almost certainly destined to go broke.

[Ulysses]

DAVID u RULE.

[AngryCola]

Of course I was wrong about this much. I admit that I didn't think that statement through enough. As I am not used to reading many of David's posts, I had no clue he would be using such "red herrings". I, unfortunately, just thought it was a clue. [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img] Oops.

I said in a couple other posts that I do not claim to be a world class player (or even a good one), and my opinion has not changed! [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] I try to think things out as best I can. I freely admit this may not be good enough.

I engaged in this discussion, because I was curious as to the the real answer. It seemed simple to me, but obviously I was wrong about that.

I'm just trying to learn, but I suppose that I shouldn't post my opinions in a way that seems to state that they are facts.

In the future I will try to add more of the math involved (which I now see is what David was really looking for) to my responses. I should have left this thread to the experts. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Happy hunting! [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]

[js13_tps]

so what was the answer? and whats the math formula for getting there? Does the math include a variable saying that bad players may call with a wider range of hands than good players will.