Shortstacked 99 in big blind facing raise

[RichC.]

[ QUOTE ]
I think pushing is the worst option as we have no fold equity whatsoever. A stop n go is ok but with your read I think folding is probably best.

[/ QUOTE ]

You have got to be joking. I'm not folding here. I think 99 with a short stack is just too good to pass up here. Odds are you are in a coin flip situation. I'm taking my chances here. I like the idea of a stop n go except what do you do if its A high? Just shove and flip. Your FE is minimal at best.

[woodguy]

[ QUOTE ]
This is almost a textbook stop-n-go situation. I found this in my notes from a post Greg Raymer made a while back (sorry no link)-

"If you were holding 99 in the big blind, that would've probably been the time for a stop-and-go. As was already stated, the stop-and-go play is where you are in early position, call a bet/raise, and do so with the intention of betting all-in on the next betting round. You do this because you think you have the best hand, but you also think the opponent has a good chance of getting out on you. You know if you re-raise now they will be pot-stuck and call, but if you wait for the next card(s) to be dealt, they could have enough room to fold."

I also found this from Greg-

"I tend to use the stop-and-go in spots where these criteria are met. First, I'm pretty sure I have the best hand now. Second, if I reraise, there is very little chance the other guy will fold... Finally, even though I can't raise enough to get him out preflop, I can bet enough on the flop that he will likely fold if he misses, even if he misses holding two overcards."

Stated another way - if he has an overpair or his overcards connect on the flop you're likely getting stacked anyway, but if he has 2OCs and misses the flop you can keep him from seeing all 5 cards by pricing him out ATF. (And there's also that rare instance where you get him to fold a better hand when 2OCs to his pair hit the board.)

[/ QUOTE ]

Interesting.

I was always under the impression that you did the SnG when you were pretty sure that you were NOT ahead.

I guess Greg uses this move not to maximize return on the hand, but to lower variance with the hand (avoiding getting rivered by KJ with 99 all in PF)

It has usually been the mantra of most here that if your hand has value, then you should get it in asap.

I remeber way back when I posted about pushing, or c/r safe flops in this situations and I was told that I was playing scared poker, and wasn't maximizing value.

I think you lose some value when you SnG with a hand that is as good as 99, but you do lower your varinance.

Would like to see others thougths on this, as my regular way of thinking is that 99 has too much value to SnG here so its terrible to lose that value with a SnG.

Regards,
Woodguy

[rockin]

If stacks were deeper stop n go is fine for the reason of lowering variance. Here, I'm not putting another chip into the pot unless it's all my chips. Our stack is just too shallow and if blinds are going up soon, it is going to be even shallower.

[AceLuby]

From what I have been reading regarding the SNG, it should be used not to maximize EV, but to instead minimize variance. Is this a correct assumption?

If that is the case, why even keep this in your arsenal? If I push PF and they catch, well that's poker, we flipped and I lost. If I SNG and they hit, they stack me, if they miss I'm losing cEV because the rest of my chips didn't get into the pot when I was a 3:1 favorite.

Wouldn't you take the higher variance move to try to get that double up to do some real damage, instead of minimizing the chips you win when you're ahead?

[DonT77]

Actually, with more chips I'd be less inclined to SnG. With 11BBs here, our follow-up bet is almost the same size as the pot. You want your push ATF to be at least 1/2P to give your opponent worse than 3:1 odds (otherwise his call with 2OCs getting 3:1+ is correct). If we have more than 11BBs here, then I'd be more inclined to consider a fold or a call & evaluate line like AC suggests.

In conclusion a SnG works best when your follow-up bet is at least half the pot and not too much more than the pot (e.g. 7-11BBs against a 3x raise with no antes).

[Quanah Parker]

[ QUOTE ]

Either case we have an M of ~10 here and we're going to put 3 of those in this pot PF leaving us w/ 7 BB's and 6.5 in the pot. Do you see why you have to push or fold now? We can't afford to play this for set value.

[/ QUOTE ]

Rockin - You aren't goin to flame AceLuby for his M calc?

[seke2]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

Either case we have an M of ~10 here and we're going to put 3 of those in this pot PF leaving us w/ 7 BB's and 6.5 in the pot. Do you see why you have to push or fold now? We can't afford to play this for set value.

[/ QUOTE ]

Rockin - You aren't goin to flame Acebaby for his M calc?

[/ QUOTE ]

Oversensitive much?

[Quanah Parker]

Lol, Fair enough.

[AceLuby]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

Either case we have an M of ~10 here and we're going to put 3 of those in this pot PF leaving us w/ 7 BB's and 6.5 in the pot. Do you see why you have to push or fold now? We can't afford to play this for set value.

[/ QUOTE ]

Rockin - You aren't goin to flame AceLuby for his M calc?

[/ QUOTE ]

Flame away, but I was seriously stating BB's and not M, but put the wrong thing (I'm at work and was interrupted) Good catch tho'

[DonT77]

[ QUOTE ]
From what I have been reading regarding the SNG, it should be used not to maximize EV, but to instead minimize variance. Is this a correct assumption?

If that is the case, why even keep this in your arsenal? If I push PF and they catch, well that's poker, we flipped and I lost. If I SNG and they hit, they stack me, if they miss I'm losing cEV because the rest of my chips didn't get into the pot when I was a 3:1 favorite.

Wouldn't you take the higher variance move to try to get that double up to do some real damage, instead of minimizing the chips you win when you're ahead?

[/ QUOTE ]

You are correct that you lose out on the additional 8BBs that you would have won had you pushed and won in this situation and that is the price of running the SnG.

IMO, if you never used the SnG your long-term results wouldn't suffer much at all because -
1) The conditions for it to be applied properly come up so rarely
2) The results are usually only marginally better than pushing over the OR