Can anyone actually get away from this hand???

[Fat Nicky]

The only tourneys I play are live homegames w/at most 30 people, this is one of my first online multi table tourneys as I usually play limit. I'm looking to expand my game and change things up a bit

Stars $20, 800 or so started.

10/20 blind level, stacks aren't changed much from the 1500 starting chip amounts, i'm at 1400 or so.

Pre-flop: Hero is BB w/Q[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] 5[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]
EP min raises to 40, 2 or 3 callers in between, Hero calls.

Flop: (~200 in pot): A[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] x[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] x[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] (the x's indicate rags).
Hero checks, EP raiser bets 180, 1 LP caller, Hero calls.

Turn: (~740 in pot): x[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]
Hero checks, EP raiser bets 200, LP calls, Hero raises to 500, EP folds, LP goes all in, Hero calls all in.....

Thoughts on the whole hand???

[BlackAces]

Preflop call was very marginal, as you're holding a pretty bad hand out of position. Inexperienced players will only be helping themselves by folding this hand.

Flop call was bad, as you're not getting the odds to draw to your flush.

On the turn, you see why playing any two suited can be a bad strategy. LP almost certainly has you beat here. He called EP on the turn hoping to extract some more from him on the river, but when you came over the top, he decided to just go all-in right there with his nut or second-nut flush, figuring you would call with your lower flush. You still have half your stack, so folding is still an option.

[Woody09]

I'm not really a fan of the check raise on the turn; plus so early in tourney, why even play that hand very hard in BB. COming in for the min raise is ok i guess, but its a crappy hand to push with early... then again, in a $20 tourney, I guess if you want to double up or bust and move to another tourney thats a good strategy.

[Sam T.]

If you weren't in the BB, fold pre-flop, and if you do play be very, very careful. You are calling a raise for the privilege of drawing to the non-nut flush. This MIGHT be okay if you are HU, but not so good when you are multi-handed. Early on lots of players (including yours truly) will hang around with Axs just for his kind of hand.

I hate the raise on the river, and I hate the call all-in even more. With the non-nut flush, your goal (IMHO) should be to get a cheap show-down. Unless the villain has trouble recognizing suits, he knows the flush is out there. On he river, you make it clear that you have one...yet he seems not to care. I wonder why?

[Fat Nicky]

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Preflop call was very marginal, as you're holding a pretty bad hand out of position. Inexperienced players will only be helping themselves by folding this hand.


[/ QUOTE ]

I was getting about 9:1 on calling from the BB with a suited Q, is calling really that bad. My thinking is that my implied odds are pretty decent.

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Flop call was bad, as you're not getting the odds to draw to your flush.

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Was getting 3:1 on my call, with greater implied odds should I hit, thats why I called.

[ QUOTE ]
On the turn, you see why playing any two suited can be a bad strategy. LP almost certainly has you beat here. He called EP on the turn hoping to extract some more from him on the river, but when you came over the top, he decided to just go all-in right there with his nut or second-nut flush, figuring you would call with your lower flush. You still have half your stack, so folding is still an option.

[/ QUOTE ]

How many times does LP actually have a higher flush here? My thinking was that my Q high flush is good a high enough percentage of the time.

[DVC Calif]

You have the third nut flush, so you are either way ahead or way behind A/K x [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]. I probably would call as it is very early in the tourney and you haven't invested a lot of time. If you bust out, move on to another tourney.

What range of hands could you place Villain on? Certainly a strong ace, with maybe the A[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] hoping to hit the river. More likely some suited connector looking for cheap flop and chasing his draw.

There's the possibility that you could double up plus a little more. Those chips are worth the gambool in my opinion. Too bad the A[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] or K[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] didn't come out on the board to help you assess the stregth of your hand.

As to how this should have been played, Fold pre-flop...even to a minraise. Seriously, you don't want to have to make these types of decisions with such a marginal hand out of position. ...but they were so sooted...

[Fat Nicky]

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COming in for the min raise is ok i guess, but its a crappy hand to push with early

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I didn't min-raise. An EP player min-raised, I called from the BB.

[BlackAces]

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Preflop call was very marginal, as you're holding a pretty bad hand out of position. Inexperienced players will only be helping themselves by folding this hand.


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I was getting about 9:1 on calling from the BB with a suited Q, is calling really that bad. My thinking is that my implied odds are pretty decent.

[/ QUOTE ]
Your implied odds are destroyed by the fact that you're out of position. You're not going to pick up any significant money if you hit your flush, because people will check behind if you check, and fold if you bet.

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Flop call was bad, as you're not getting the odds to draw to your flush.

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Was getting 3:1 on my call, with greater implied odds should I hit, thats why I called.

[/ QUOTE ]
I take it back. Flop call was OK, but you need to wonder why LP could call such a large bet. Again, you have little in the way of implied odds, as you're not likely to pick up much more if your flush hits, being first to act.

[ QUOTE ]
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On the turn, you see why playing any two suited can be a bad strategy. LP almost certainly has you beat here. He called EP on the turn hoping to extract some more from him on the river, but when you came over the top, he decided to just go all-in right there with his nut or second-nut flush, figuring you would call with your lower flush. You still have half your stack, so folding is still an option.

[/ QUOTE ]

How many times does LP actually have a higher flush here? My thinking was that my Q high flush is good a high enough percentage of the time.

[/ QUOTE ]
Given this betting sequence, I think he has a better flush here most of the time. Why would LP flat call, and THEN go all-in? He's obviously not worried about anything you may have if he just flat-called the person leading the betting the entire way, before you had a chance to respond. The more I think about it, A[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]x[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] is the only hand that makes sense here.

I still say this needs to be folded preflop. That way, you avoid putting yourself in situations where you have to make hard decisions such as this one.

[SossMan]

I am really surprised by the weak-tightness of the responses. I'm guessing your post title is lending itself to this type of "scared analysis".

You are getting much too good a price preflop to consider folding. You have Q5s, so obviously you can't raise. That only leaves one option.
If you weren't closing the action (i.e. the raise came from LP and there were some limpers inbetween) then I can see a fold, but I'd probably still call unless I thought that there was a chance that it would be limp-reraised.

On the flop, you are getting 3.11 to 1. You are getting more than enough implied odds to make up for the small lack of pot odds to see the turn.
If the board was paired, then I can see folding.

On the turn, so long as the board wasn't paired, I can't imagine any betting action that would allow you to get away from this hand.
For the poster that said that your all in call was horrible. All I can say is....huh??? You really think that he's drawing dead to the bigger flush more than 76% of the time???

I think you played this well. The only thing I would have changed is a little larger check raise on the turn after you get the LP caller in between. The naked A [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] is a very likely card to be out in this spot, and it's likely that whoever has it will not be able to fold, so you have to charge them for it. I would have checkraised all in on the turn.

-SossMan

[Scooterdoo]

The original poster should completely disregard this post. It makes no sense and I think is completely wrong. You're getting great odds to call, plus it's such a small % of your stack why not go fishing here (assuming you're careful after the flop).

You were getting great odds to call the flop, and you have to call the all-in on the turn, you cannot get away from the Q high flush assuming someone has a better flush. If the board was paired it could be a different story. My only change would be to check raise all-in, in case he holds just the K or A of spades I want to get all of his chips in the middle now, you won't get them in at the end if he misses which is the likely scenario of course. Hey, if you lose to a better flush, so be it. That's part of the game, but you need to be aggressive here.