WPT Foxwoods Main Event Hand

[Prickly Pete]

My image: I've played at this table for about an hour or so and have only raised twice after others have entered the pot. The first was a button raise to 1100 after a few 200 limps and get a BB call and UTG+1 limp reraises allin for 2500 more and I fold.

The second was a CO raise after 1 limp. Button calls, limper folds and I end up doubling with AK vs A3 when an A flops and the money goes in on the turn.

I've been about the 3rd tightest player at the table and have 10K chips.

Villain read: About average tight at the table and has not shown down any garbage. But he's certainly raising enough that he doesn't have monsters every time.

Table read: I'm now sandwiched between Young Phan and Michael Gracz and there's only one weak spot at the table - a weak tight guy with a short stack. Outplaying this table isn't likely.

The hand: Blinds 100-200, Ante 25. Tourney avg stk - 16 K. (about 250 left out of 410 in this flight.) Villain (18.5 K) opens to 625 3 off the button and Young Phan (30-35 K) calls in CO. I have AKo on the button and reraise to 2700. Folds to villain, who goes allin. Young thinks and thinks before finally folding.

Action to me. I'm not the best at reading souls, but I can't see him making a move with nada here. If I fold I have 7300 left. What's my move?

[transmitt]

what's your stack?

[Prickly Pete]

[ QUOTE ]
what's your stack?

[/ QUOTE ]
10 K to start the hand, 7300 if I fold.

[psyduck]

Tough one because of your tight image and stack size.

(Hero has T10,000, villain covers)

So T12,700 in the pot and T7,300 to call? I'd call here...

[McMelchior]

A narrow view of villain's likely range:

AA, KK, AK, QQ. And Harington's 10% chance of a bluff.

Pot equity:

AA - 3 of 23 combos: 7%
KK - 3 of 23 combos: 30%
AK - 9 of 23 combos: 50%
QQ - 6 of 23 combos: 43%
Bluff - 2 of 23 combos: 60%

Gives you 40% equity in the pot (according to my calculations). If he's stupid enough to bluff with a worse Ace (or unlucky enough to hold a worse K) your equity goes up.

If you call t7,300 the pot will hold t21,175. Of which 40% is t8,640, earning you t1,340 or 15% stack increase.

Looks like a call to me.

Best,

McMelchior (Johan)

[Havok]

I had to think about the players you were up against, and what your raise looked liked before I made my decision. So villian shows strength, but has opened, and has an aggressive image. Co just calls, saying he doesn't have a great hand, but thinks villians is trying to steal the blinds and probably doesn't have a great hand. Then you reraise a large enough ammount, and you appear to be giving the original raiser a squeeze play. Except villian comes back over the top. Reverse squeeze play? CO folds and it is left to you with the big decesion. The pot odds are interesting though. Before you call something like 7,500 to win whats in the pot already of 12,000 estimated. So you have to invest 7,500 to win 4,000. To me it seems like villian doesn't want you to call. He could have a premium hand here. But, given your tight image, I think he thinks there is some FE in him going all in. So I think range of hands could be small pair, where it would be even money, or even Ace Queen where you would dominate him.

And last but not least. Given the tough table your at, and the aggressive oponents, I think you have to gamble here to move up the pay scale. I think more than likely your ahead, or have him crippled if he has ace/queen. Or your even money. IMO I would love to know the results though.

[Prickly Pete]

Thanks for the replies. I called for many of the reasons echoed here and was unforutnately, shown AA and I didn't improve.

[The Student]

Well, that hurts, but I still think it's a good call if you didn't have a read that he had a real hand. With a tough table, you will have to gamble at some point and you're getting pretty good odds on this hand to take a chance. He could have been making this move with much weaker PPs (99 - QQ) thinking that you're just making a squeeze play, and you're only really worried about KK and AA. Unfortunately he had one of those two hands this time, but I think that given your stack size, the table dynamics, and your cards, I still think this is a long-term EV+ call.

I qualify that however, by saying, that if you had a read on him as being very strong in this hand, then you should save your chips. One question I have that you didn't address in your OP - has the villian ever pushed AI before? If so, what did he show down?

ts-