A rag or 98o?
 

In turbo online tournys and you're in a situation where you are forced to go all-in would you rather push w/ two rags or A rag? The idea behind the two rags of course being that the person that is going to call you could have A better and you are drawing to one out. Also with two rags, you are an underdog, but not by that much. The A rag idea is that the A high will give you the win in the long run over ATC.
What do you like to push on? I have reasons to side with both ideas, but in my experience I think that pushing w/ A rag is better just because if they dont have a pocket pair or A then I'm doing fine. I feel like its worth the amount of times that I'm dominated

Ideas? Comments?

Re: A rag or 98o?
 

what you are really talking about is the equity against peoples calling range.

you can just pokerstove it with different ranges and see how the hands match up

Re: A rag or 98o?
 

yea, but I'm curious about discussion through human insight about the situation. I'm interested in the "theory" and not the explicitly the "odds"

Re: A rag or 98o?
 

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you can just pokerstove it with different ranges and see how the hands match up

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No, you can't. Suppose your opponent's calling range is just AA. When called, you are in significantly worse shape with Axo than with 98o. However, you are better off pushing with Axo against that opponent because you block half of the AA combinations, and so you will be called less frequently, 3 times out of 1225 instead of 6 times out of 1225. Losing 84% of your stack 3 times is better than losing 64% of your stack 6 times. This blocking effect is not reported by PokerStove.

As I recall, Axs does better than 76s against many plausible calling ranges when called. The blocking effect adds to this, making it even more clear to play Ax and hope you aren't dominated.

Re: A rag or 98o?
 

My read on this is that you are more likely dominated late in a tournament jamming ace rag vs. 2 live cards, as the most likely hand range includes big pairs and any ace better than yours. Have not done the math to see how ace rag holds up against a calling range of better ace x, vs. 89o vs. ace rag, but I sure know I've been busted out of many a tournament jamming ace rag into a better ace.

I've had better luck with the 89. (89 vs. ace 3 heads up, you are a 44% fav, ace 7 vs. ace 10 you are 24%) I take the 89

Re: A rag or 98o?
 

depends on what position you're pushing from and what their calling ranges are (if you have any reads).

Re: A rag or 98o?
 

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I've had better luck with the 89.

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You'll need it.

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(89 vs. ace 3 heads up, you are a 44% fav, ace 7 vs. ace 10 you are 24%) I take the 89

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If A3 is in your opponent's calling range, would you rather push with 89 or A7? That you might get lucky with 98o and you might get unlucky with A7 is not a rational argument against the ugly but stronger A7 hand.

Re: A rag or 98o?
 

[ QUOTE ]
My read on this is that you are more likely dominated late in a tournament jamming ace rag vs. 2 live cards, as the most likely hand range includes big pairs and any ace better than yours. Have not done the math to see how ace rag holds up against a calling range of better ace x, vs. 89o vs. ace rag, but I sure know I've been busted out of many a tournament jamming ace rag into a better ace.

I've had better luck with the 89. (89 vs. ace 3 heads up, you are a 44% fav, ace 7 vs. ace 10 you are 24%) I take the 89

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Holdem Hi: 1712304 enumerated boards
cards win %win lose %lose tie %tie EV
9d 8h 252629 14.75 1453302 84.87 6373 0.37 0.149
Ts Tc 1453302 84.87 252629 14.75 6373 0.37 0.851


Holdem Hi: 1712304 enumerated boards
cards win %win lose %lose tie %tie EV
Ad 7h 487639 28.48 1220220 71.26 4445 0.26 0.286
Ts Tc 1220220 71.26 487639 28.48 4445 0.26 0.714

Re: A rag or 98o?
 

Basing your judgement on the jam-or-fold tables in Chen and Ankenman's "Mathematics of Poker" is perhaps not a bad thing to do. (These tables contain the optimal play of the heads-up jam-or-fold game.)

According to Chen and Ankenman's tables, for A2o it is better to push stacks up to 29.2 BB, whilst for 98o one should prefer jamming over folding for stacks only up to 20.5 BB. Higher A-rag hands (A3o, A4o etc.) all have even higher jamming power.

According to the same tables, a hand like T9o has equivalent jamming-strength as A3o (EV-positive up to stacks of 31.9 BB).

Re: A rag or 98o?
 

Remember with A2, while you're in worse shape than 98 if your opponents calls with 55, you're in better shape when your opponent calls with KK, KQ and similar hands.

People fear domination probably a bit too much: while you apparently have half as many outs, in reality your equity is about 3/4 what would be with "live cards", plus there's a smaller probability your opponent holds a dominating hand given you hold one of the cards.