99 on Button vs UTG Min-Raise

[DonT77]

Full Tilt 24+2 MTT -

With the blinds at 250/500 and 50 ante (on a full 9-handed table with about 45 players remaining top 18 pay), UTG (with 7000 chips) min-raised to 1000, folded to me on the button (having 9000 chips) with 99.

What's my play?


* Thoughts and results to follow *

Edit - no real read on UTG other than he hasn't been involved in a lot of pots.

[ziggydonks]

read on utg is very important here. what is it?

[Lloyd]

You have enough chips to play for set value so you should at least call. With position, I think that's probably the best move.

[woodguy]

[ QUOTE ]
You have enough chips to play for set value so you should at least call. With position, I think that's probably the best move.

[/ QUOTE ]

That's what I was thinking too.

Are you raising a continuation bet on a ragged or 1 Broadway non-Ace flop?

I'm thinking that it will cost 1/2 your stack to raise a continuation bet, and I'm not sure I want to commit those chips just yet.

Regards,
Woodguy

[Lloyd]

I think my default would be to check-fold if I don't hit a set. Like you said, if he checks and you lead out for even half the pot you are pretty close to committing yourself and I don't think I'd want to do that. So if he checks, I'd take a free card. Now, if he checks the turn I think I'd make some type of probe bet as now you're not committed with one card to come.

[woodguy]

[ QUOTE ]
I think my default would be to check-fold if I don't hit a set. Like you said, if he checks and you lead out for even half the pot you are pretty close to committing yourself and I don't think I'd want to do that. So if he checks, I'd take a free card. Now, if he checks the turn I think I'd make some type of probe bet as now you're not committed with one card to come.

[/ QUOTE ]

If he checks, I think I'm against a higher pair and take the free card.

My question is:

Flop come 3 [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]7 [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]T [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

He leads for 1/2 - 3/4 pot, are you raising , folding or calling?

Regards,
Woodguy

[Lloyd]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I think my default would be to check-fold if I don't hit a set. Like you said, if he checks and you lead out for even half the pot you are pretty close to committing yourself and I don't think I'd want to do that. So if he checks, I'd take a free card. Now, if he checks the turn I think I'd make some type of probe bet as now you're not committed with one card to come.

[/ QUOTE ]

If he checks, I think I'm against a higher pair and take the free card.

My question is:

Flop come 3 [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]7 [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]T [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

He leads for 1/2 - 3/4 pot, are you raising , folding or calling?

Regards,
Woodguy

[/ QUOTE ]
Obviously this is a tricky and common spot. It's very read dependent and based on the calibre of players in the tournament. You certainly have to play it differently versus someone who has no idea what a continuation bet is versus someone who does.

Let's put the villain on a range of hands. That's where the first problem pops up. What does his mini-raise mean? Big hand wanting action? Decent hand not wanting to invest a lot pre-flop? The answer absolutely determines how we're going to play the hand.

If we know that he only mini-raises with a big pair then we call pre-flop for set value. No set, no bet, check and fold. If we knew he had AA then that would be the correct way of playing.

But if we open up his range to include AA-TT, AK-AQ it's a whole other story. We're still a slight dog on this flop but it's close with decent odds.

Let's do an EV calc.

FOLD: EV equals 8000

PUSH: There are 59 hands he could have with a range of (AA-TT, AK-AQ). Let's assume that he will call our push with AA-TT and fold AK-AQ. I think that's reasonable. So he'll fold 54% of the time and call 46% of the time. When he calls (with AA-TT) he's a 90% favorite. When he folds we're up to 11,250 (assuming neither of the blinds are in the hand and that's probably not a good assumption given the odds they're getting). When he calls we're down to 2,000 90% of the time and up to 16,750 10% of the time. The EV when he calls is 3475. Our total EV when we push is 9550 versus 8000 if we fold. So pushing is better than folding if we put him on that wide of a range.

So it all comes down to the range of hands. For example, just take away AQ and we go from a slight dog to a 2 to 1 dog which would clearly make a push -EV. With online players, my default is to assume an UTG mini-raise equals a strong hand. Therefore, I'd fold if I don't hit my set until they prove they'll mini-raise with a broader range.

[DonT77]

Well, this is a good example of how not to play a hand -

I was thinking that 99 is so vulnerable that I didn't want the blinds seeing a cheap flop (SB getting 4.3 to 1 and BB getting 6.4 to 1) with a hand like QJ or KT and I wanted UTG to pay if he had AQ/AK. I wanted to raise to drive out the blinds and to put UTG to the test so I actually raised to 4000. It was folded to UTG who pushed. It was 3600 to call to win 13100 so I called off most of my remaining stack. UTG showed KK and I was in bad shape. I got lucky and caught my 2 outter and doubled-up as a 4:1 dog!

I suppose with position I could have called, and that would have probably been the best play - because after I raised I realized I was PC'd by HIS stack - something I forgot to consider for whatever reason. [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/blush.gif[/img] Advanced players don't make this mistake and it is one I hope to not make again.

[DonT77]

Good stuff guys - thanks for the replies.

[woodguy]

[ QUOTE ]
Obviously this is a tricky and common spot. It's very read dependent and based on the calibre of players in the tournament. You certainly have to play it differently versus someone who has no idea what a continuation bet is versus someone who does.

Let's put the villain on a range of hands. That's where the first problem pops up. What does his mini-raise mean? Big hand wanting action? Decent hand not wanting to invest a lot pre-flop? The answer absolutely determines how we're going to play the hand.

If we know that he only mini-raises with a big pair then we call pre-flop for set value. No set, no bet, check and fold. If we knew he had AA then that would be the correct way of playing.

But if we open up his range to include AA-TT, AK-AQ it's a whole other story. We're still a slight dog on this flop but it's close with decent odds.

Let's do an EV calc.

FOLD: EV equals 8000

PUSH: There are 59 hands he could have with a range of (AA-TT, AK-AQ). Let's assume that he will call our push with AA-TT and fold AK-AQ. I think that's reasonable. So he'll fold 54% of the time and call 46% of the time. When he calls (with AA-TT) he's a 90% favorite. When he folds we're up to 11,250 (assuming neither of the blinds are in the hand and that's probably not a good assumption given the odds they're getting). When he calls we're down to 2,000 90% of the time and up to 16,750 10% of the time. The EV when he calls is 3475. Our total EV when we push is 9550 versus 8000 if we fold. So pushing is better than folding if we put him on that wide of a range.

So it all comes down to the range of hands. For example, just take away AQ and we go from a slight dog to a 2 to 1 dog which would clearly make a push -EV. With online players, my default is to assume an UTG mini-raise equals a strong hand. Therefore, I'd fold if I don't hit my set until they prove they'll mini-raise with a broader range.


[/ QUOTE ]

Thanks for all the heavy lifiting Lloyd.

I agree that min-raises late in a tourney are usually a big pair unless proven otherwise, which is another good reason to have focus when playing.

Thanks again,
Woodguy