SS2 Phil Hellmuth Story

[GFunk911]

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You are confusing your terminology, but I think I see your point.

Your theory misses a very important point. He is not wagering even money. By calling, he gets more than what he risks. If you bet 10,000 and get 14000 in return, you should be willing to bet on an even money situation.

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you get 14000 for your 10000 if you win the hand, what if losing eliminates you? say its 50-50 and your probably behind at the moment, i dont think the 4000 balances out the risk of being knocked out. no? (im still new at this tourney stuff)

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It does. If you are an average player, getting "knocked out" is not some magical thing. Having 0 chips is worse than having 1 chip, just like having 1 chip is worse than having 2 chips.

If you were to graph stack size against Tourney EV, the bottom doesn't suddenly drop out at 0. It's a steady curve, with a relative gigantic but absolutely tiny blip from 1 to 0.

Very early in a tourney (assuming an average player) 2000 chips give you roughly twice the Tourney EV of 1000 chips, and 2400 chips gives you about 2.4x.

Sorry, this post (my post) is pathetic and probably incoherent. Hopefully somebody else will fight off the barbarians for the umpteenth time. Do you see why?

p.s. I love that PP quote, about "the call being your edge." I'd never heard it before

[MissOt]

phil cant win at cash games so it was a good fold lol. for another poker player, maybe a better cash/tourney play, prob not

[JohnG]

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Wh should Phil gamble this early on when he knows he's better than most the players in the tournmaent? He wants to play poker, not flip coins for money.

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Then he should be playing cash games rather than tournaments.

If it's the hand I think it was, it was a bad fold.

[MicroBob]

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The point is that I think people take the idea of passing up small edges WAY too far.

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Yes...many players do.
but pushing relatively small EV edges in early tournament play is NOT the same as doing pushing your EV in ring-games.


It would be one thing if Phil got aggressive with his mega-draw....it's another thing entirely to call someone else's aggressiveness here (see: gap concept).


Obviously we don't know all the details here....but laying down this draw if it puts him all-in early in a tournament isn't completely terrible and is FAR FAR FAR from being the tightest lay-down Phil has ever made.


Unless I was bored and looking for something else to do I would make this lay-down every time in the early rounds of a big tourney unless, of course, I didn't.

I consider myself to be a fairly aggressive tourney player...to the extent that I'm probably too aggressive much of the time.
But calling all-in bets early on with a strong (or even not-so-strong) draw is going to be a common method of exit for many of your opponents.

[Kerplunk]

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laying down this draw if it puts him all-in early in a tournament isn't completely terrible and is FAR FAR FAR from being the tightest lay-down Phil has ever made.


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And that's something to think about when considering how and why phil played the hand like he did. Hellmuth usually makes a lot of noise when he makes a "big" laydown. I find it interesting that Paul Phillips was at the next table yet still remembers the hand clearly years later. I wonder if Phil made a big deal during the hand, or if he even flipped his cards. I can think of multiple televised occasions when he's been rather dramatic about tough folds, even somewhat proudly showing his holdings. He wants his opponents to know that he's capable of tough laydowns, and he'll use this planted info in later hands to induce bad decisions from his opponents. Against certain players, he will get them to overplay their hand, thinking they can push him off a marginal situation when in fact he has them dominated. Against other players, he will use his tight "wait for a better day" image to steal when they have the best of it.

Not everyone can take Phil's style and make it work for them. Same goes for Harrington, Hansen, and pretty much any player, especially if they have a "trademark" style.

[JohnG]

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I wonder if Phil made a big deal during the hand, or if he even flipped his cards.

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If it's the hand I am thinking about, Phil wrote about it in his hand of the week column. At least, it's a very similar hand where he folded an open ended straight flush draw getting 3-2 pot odds on the flop. It was discussed on here also, with Fossilman making a lot of good points.

[Kerplunk]

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I wonder if Phil made a big deal during the hand, or if he even flipped his cards.

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If it's the hand I am thinking about, Phil wrote about it in his hand of the week column. At least, it's a very similar hand where he folded an open ended straight flush draw getting 3-2 pot odds on the flop. It was discussed on here also, with Fossilman making a lot of good points.

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Well, what I was really asking was if Phil made a big deal about it during the hand itself. I was guessing that he did, since Paul Phillips recalls being at the table next to Phil's when the action went down. Why would Paul have known, much less remembered, that he was present for this hand if Phil didn't bring attention to it while it was happening? It wasn't even at his table.

Whatever the case, it's still pretty clear from other instances that Phil's M.O. is to be dramatic and vocal when he makes a big laydown. Like when he (correctly) folded his top pair while heads up against Annie Duke during the T.O.C. (he showed his King for good measure). Or, during the World Series when he called over a camera crew to show that he was folding pocket kings when some (I think) unknown put him all-in off a ragged looking flop.

Again, I think Phil is trying to reinforce the image that he's willing to fold strong hands so that a) players will be more likely to overplay a hand b) when he does move in, players feel an extra pang of fear.

[knifeandfork]

my thoughts on the hand are if you are going to open you should open big with a draw like this. pushing even is not out of the question depending on the unknown variables of players stack sizes pot size etcetc (the idea being let your opponent be the one calling while a dog and add in some fold equity i think). if i open then its pushed to me in this spot im going to call 7 or more out of ten depending on above variables of course.

the more interesting point of Phil's play to me is the theoretical. Phil is of the school of thought that he is better than his opponenets so why should he take risks early on? I think this school may have fallen behind the (insert your choice here ill use Daniel N.) school that sees a need to get to the "easy" (dead) money earlier in order to be able to survive the ups and downs one will face in the increasingly huge fields full of players willing to mix it up with questionable hands/plays.

this leads me to believe that the former pupil is now doing the teaching and overall results for the last few years would seem to confirm this. that and a buk gets you a cup of coffee.
VI,
jason
PS curious to hear thoughts on the proposed "schools" here sorry if this has already been thoroughly covered i skimmed some of the replys

[zaxx19]

This is a good gamble. The pot odds say you should call, so call.

This is a fairly simplistic and imho specious way to look at MTT play even in the early stages....

There are however many in the MTT forum who would agree whole heartedly.

Factors other than pot odds to consider imho:

1) field size

2) relative skill edge + or -

3) Playing style(how well one plays a larger stack versus smaller one

4) Relative skill of table..passivity..looseness

5) length and structure of tourney

[college kid]

Because it's a coinflip (slightly better than) and Phil doesn't want to take the cahnce to bust. Gap Concept. If Phil had shoved with it that's another story, but calling with it is clearly wrong early on in a tourney. Cash games, I'll gamble with that all day, but not early on in a big tourney.