hand from Empire 200k last night

[Apathy]

Ok I just saw this thread and I must say I really did consider the stop n go at the time. Clearly folding is not even an option Gavin was raising very frequently, and knew I had been playing tight, he had stolen my blinds once on the bubble and at least one other time when it was down to two tables when I happened to have trash.

The chip situation was such that if I didn't double soon I had no real shot at a good finish, there were about 18 people left, typical empire payout structure.

If I push I get the money in well ahead of his range of raising hands here and get a chance to double up with the best of it. The only thing a stop n go does for me is reduce variance (not something I really want since I need to double) and let Gavin get away the times I flop an ace.

I understand the arguments presented by MLG but I think if he saw the chip counts at both tables at the time he would think less of the stop n go here.

[billyjex]

I agree with your push. We want all the chips we can get at this point and Gavin calling with an inferior hand is what I would want, even if it might knock me out of the tourney when I wouldn't have been if I stop & go'd.

[Apathy]

[ QUOTE ]
ok, let me give some examples:

flop comes K35, I obviously am calling when he pushes, he would have lost this just the same if he pushed preflop.

flop is 234, I fold, but perhaps a K or 9 would have come on the turn or river in which case he wins when he wouldn't have by pushing preflop.

flop is AKx, I call his all in and he gets the last 5k in in better shape then he would have if it went in preflop.

There are tons of examples, but these are some that reduce his variance.

Gavin

[/ QUOTE ]

Ok so in the three examples you stated on #1 there is no difference in the outcome and chips cahnging hands.

#2 Is horrible for me because AJ is quite far ahead of K9 on a 234 flop and you would be making a correct fold

#3 Would give the same result as a push preflop as well.

Really unless you can give me examples of flops where you are ahead of me and then fold on the flop, I can't respect your stance on this hand. Give me a low pair on this hand and *maybe* I would use the stop and go but certaintly not with AJ at this point in the tournament.

[MLG]

Everybody who is condemning the use of the stop n go here is doing so predicated on what Gavin had. You don't know what Gavin had when you look at AJ preflop. If you knew he had K9 then a push isn't clearly worse than a stop n go, but you don't know. You have no idea what Gavin had, and that is what makes the stop n go right.

[kuro]

Don't you think AJ is a little less than 60:40 vs the range Gavin could raise with in this situation? Am I being too loose on the hands that he'd steal with?

If you had a small pair in the blinds, then I could see how a stop and go would maybe be better because you're looking at maybe a 50:50 vs. the range.

[Double Eagle]

[ QUOTE ]
Everybody who is condemning the use of the stop n go here is doing so predicated on what Gavin had. You don't know what Gavin had when you look at AJ preflop. If you knew he had K9 then a push isn't clearly worse than a stop n go, but you don't know. You have no idea what Gavin had, and that is what makes the stop n go right.

[/ QUOTE ]

That's exactly what I was not doing in my initial response.

I think at least some of the equity from an effective use of the stop and go needs to come from hands that fold while ahead in order to make up for the equity lost when he forces a fold from hands that are behind. Let's give Gavin 33 here instead of K9 - what flops will he fold to a push? Aces and 2 paints I would think. In fact its only the two paint flops that miss us that we want Gavin to fold. I don't know how to calculate the odds of this happening but it seems to me that this is going to occur far less often than when the flop is scary and hits us. Even then we aren't in terrible shape with 10 outs.

Gavin's original post opined that the original line with AJ was a big mistake. I still have not seen any scenario that would have been EV+ for him to have taken Gavin's line here over the pre-flop push. Yes he might be able to reduce variance very slightly, but only at the cost of quite a few chips in the process - and at this point in the tourney those extra chips were very important and certainly worth trading for that addtional variance.

[Apathy]

[ QUOTE ]
Everybody who is condemning the use of the stop n go here is doing so predicated on what Gavin had. You don't know what Gavin had when you look at AJ preflop. If you knew he had K9 then a push isn't clearly worse than a stop n go, but you don't know. You have no idea what Gavin had, and that is what makes the stop n go right.

[/ QUOTE ]

Your post makes no real point... of course I don't know what he had, only the range of hands he could have, but how does that fact make the stop and go better, which of my points and the points of others in favour of pushing don't work given the fact that we only know his range of hands.

[iRoD]

Apathy, your push makes sense and I don't think its close... stop n go does not make sense because it is likely you have a better hand then Gavin...
I just the huge variance between the flops he hits and the flops he doesn't hit.


I can tell you all that Apathy considered this hand for more than an instant and I agree with his decision.

Cheers Pat [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]