Unloading QQ, Why Is It So Hard??

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What are the blinds here anyway, that the pot is only 600 after 20xBB goes in pre, then you check raise the flop and get called? 5/10 with 1500 chip stacks? Something seems wrong.

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You have the situation right. It was the 2nd or 3rd hand of the tourney. Obvious hindsight is that I should have let it go and played it differently to keep myself from getting too many chips committed so early. As I said, I had my cursor over the fold button when he pushed but changed my mind. Obviously a bad decision. On the other hand, building a nice chip lead early can be a good thing.

[Dave D]

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What are the blinds here anyway, that the pot is only 600 after 20xBB goes in pre, then you check raise the flop and get called? 5/10 with 1500 chip stacks? Something seems wrong.

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You have the situation right. It was the 2nd or 3rd hand of the tourney. Obvious hindsight is that I should have let it go and played it differently to keep myself from getting too many chips committed so early. As I said, I had my cursor over the fold button when he pushed but changed my mind. Obviously a bad decision. On the other hand, building a nice chip lead early can be a good thing.

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Oh. My. God.

NO.

This is results based thinking. This early in a tourney villian's range is huge. There's donks everywhere that might do what villian did in this hand with any range of hands. You simply cannot fold an overpair because you're afraid of TWO HANDS. You should be getting all in with this hand every time. Wow, this is making me angry.

[ligastar]

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This hand was just one case in point to illustrate the larger problem in skill growth, which is knowing how to get away from hands that look good but have a strong possibility of being dominated (e.g., drawing to 2 or 3 outs at most).

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Spee

This sentence grabbed my attention. I came across a spot last night in a Stars double-shootout where I knew I was beat...I took my time and came to that conclusion...and then 5 seconds later clicked call anyway. I called two of my poker playing friends afterward and had them talk me down...I was so irate at myself. I had won my first table and was 4-man at the final table and the winner got a seat in the Star's big Sunday tourney (where they are adding 100K as a "Christmas present" to the total purse).

I've gotten past the "ego" calls when you take things personally and in a fit of emotion you click call and go down in flames. I've gotten into a routine where I take a measured response...I take my time to ensure that I'm covering all my bases and taking in all available information (I practice this on-line because I think in live play it is important to play in a Chris Ferguson like fashion where you aren't giving a tell based on how long it takes for you to act on your hand...and playing somewhat like this on-line engrains this process and it transforms naturally when I sit at a live table). So in this instance it wasn't an ego call...and it wasn't because I didn't think through the situation...at the last minute I clicked call "hoping" everything would work out for me. This is a leak I am trying to fix and it takes a great deal of effort to get there.

Note that I'm not referring at all to the QQ hand you played and what actions you took in that hand. I'm talking about the generic I am behind hand...all evidence points to the fact that I'm behind...I can fold this hand now and still have a playable (often times above par stack) stack...but I go against my first instict and "hope" for the best. I can sympathize with you and want to encourage you to think hard and work hard at getting over this hump...that is what I'm doing now.

Greg H.

[BobK]

You know the likelihood of the other player holding a jack is very small.(they reraised preflop) The other player realizes that you may have a Jack since you only called their reraise.

The best way I see to play this hand is to checkraise all-in on the flop. Put the other player to the test. If they don't want to get knock out early sometimes they might fold a better hand.

You don't want to try milking this pot with a small checkraise when you might be behind. You also don't want to give them a correct call with a hand like AK.

If you lose, at least you didn't have to spend a lot of time in the tourney to do it.