Puzzled. (Not exactly a bad-beat post.)

AtticusFinch · #1 03-07-2005, 12:21 AM

I'm in second place with KcKd, 1500 chips. Blinds at 50, I raise to 200, get 2 callers. Flop is Qc 4c 2h. Biggest stack pushes all-in from the small blind. Is there any possible way I can fold this hand? I doubt it, but I'd like to hear opinions.

At the table, the big stack turns over 44. All I could do is shrug and say nh, then think about whether I liked his play or not. It seems foolish at first blush, but I don't know. He has to bet the flop because of the flush draw. So why not push all-in? The pot is pretty big already, after all, and with two players in, there's a good chance one of them will call with by far the worst of it. As it turned out, the other guy also called (with AcTc), so the big stack made a huge score here.

I'm not even 100% sure it was wrong to call my initial raise. He was sitting on 3k chips, and the implied odds of the exact scenario that occurred probably make it worth having a look at the flop.

Thoughts?

raptor517 · #2 03-07-2005, 12:26 AM

if A10 called in FRONT of me before i acted i would consider folding. other than that, i dont see much of a way u can get away from this hand. you have backdoor Kc too, which doesnt really matter against the A10, but will help you against the set if no A10 is in there

AtticusFinch · #3 03-07-2005, 12:38 AM

Any comments on the big stack's play here?

raptor517 · #4 03-07-2005, 12:41 AM

i dont mind the big stack's play at all. he will get calls from VERY weak hands thinking that he is bullying. tough spot for kings

citanul · #5 03-07-2005, 01:02 AM

Also, he'll get calls from very strong hands that he has crushed... Many players who raise preflop (as you did) won't even be able to lay down AKo, or any other pair. What buyin level tournament is this?

I agree that the "standard" plays are usually to send out a probing bet here with the set, or to checkraise, the PFR, but I think that if you don't occasionally push at a preflop raiser when you flop a monster, you're missing out. All those times when they have AA or KK, well, sometimes you get all of their chips anyway, but sometimes not. Eh, on this board, I guess that it's very unlikely you're not getting all of the KK's chips with 44, but it may be possible if there was a push and a call to lay down KK...

Anyways, the short answer is I don't mind the big stack's push, and the preflop call isn't so bad either I guess.

Sucks,

citanul

sphinx · #6 03-07-2005, 01:39 AM

I am new to message boards, so please bear with me (and feel free to make suggestions) if I fail to follow some of the customary practices.

Does anyone think that our hero failed to raise enough to put heat on big stack pre-flop? It seems to me that one must take into account the possibility that our hero's raise was inadequate to dissuade the big stack from calling with many playable hands. Was his goal to induce play or get rid of draws?

Scuba Chuck · #7 03-07-2005, 01:42 AM

[ QUOTE ]
I'm not even 100% sure it was wrong to call my initial raise. He was sitting on 3k chips, and the implied odds of the exact scenario that occurred probably make it worth having a look at the flop.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is what I think is worth learning from this statement.

BTW, I was just thinking today I hadn't seen you post in a while?

adanthar · #8 03-07-2005, 01:47 AM

No. If you're raising to 300 every time you have a raisable hand three things will happen: you'll start losing a lot more with AK than is healthy, you will never get any action from hands you actually want a call from, and you will lose your stack with QQ-JJ to AA every single time.

The big stack's play is bad, BTW, because Hero has a better chance of holding AK than anything else and now he folds it without a single extra chip in the pot (the same goes for JJ). The one good time to make this push is when the flop comes something like AK4 and there are 3-4 people in behind you; *now* somebody has to have hit this and will probably call. Aces and kings stack off a set on this board anyway, so the only thing he gains from this is about negative a billion chips.

AtticusFinch · #9 03-07-2005, 01:52 AM

[ QUOTE ]

BTW, I was just thinking today I hadn't seen you post in a while?

[/ QUOTE ]

I was out of town for spring break in lovely Mississippi, land of incredibly beautiful women, and incredibly lousy net access, which together kept me away from poker for a while.

citanul · #10 03-07-2005, 01:57 AM

True, I generally usually advocate pushing things like bottom set on either a better board, more opponents, or both, but this is very opponent/buyin level dependent. If your opponents are going to call with AK (which they do) or going to call with some random pocket pair (which they do) then it's really not bad at all. If you give me $1 for every time I see someone go broke tomorrow calling a push with a pocket pair lower than the top card on board, I can skip "work" and just do that instead. So without some knowledge of the opponents, yeah, it's a pretty bad-ish push.

Also, why is AK the most likely thing to have the raiser have? We're short a TON of information on the hand, such as the OP's table position, and # of players left at the table. Both of which would help us put OP in a hand for the big stack's read.

citanul