WSOP Main Event

[shermanash]

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Lapper: "Making the money at the WSOP main event would mean everything to me, and I don't believe it is an unrealistic goal."

After reading what I would consider some rather half axx condescending replies you final received some very good at realistic advice which made this thread actually interesting.

First YOU have defined your goal - To make the Money. On the specific hand you lost out on last year with AK from the bb that you now regret you deviated from the path that would probably best allow you to attain that goal. Based upon YOUR criteria then folding AK was the proper play. The risk return just wasn't there.

Do NOT miss interpret this comment to mean the decision was "wrong" only WRONG to accomplish your own goal.

You gambled on what you had to believed was a better than a 50/50 proposition and lost. That Lapper is as you know poker pure and simple. Truthfully I would prefer YOU pushed all in than CALLED all in with an AK but that is only my style and would not have changed the results in the least. Given the exact same situation as it was played with 60K chips at that stage I will let everyone scream and call me a Puxxy but I muck the hand and move on.

While I do not consider that as "weak" others may. So be it.

Good luck to you in the ME this year and rest assured you probably have at least a 50/50 shot playing a tight aggressive intelligent game of making the top 800 and the money this year. Can you "win it" mucking an AK in that situation - Not very likely.........but that isn't your goal. You want to outlast 9 out of 10 players and you certainly appear to have the mentality to understand what approach will give you the best shot at accomplishing THAT goal.

PS - PM me your real name so I will know when to push you all in on day 3 from the Button :-) LOL Truly the best of luck and don't let the chat box "pro's" wear on you. I found your personal assessment to be quite refreshing and probably an understatement of your ability/potential.

RealMcCoy

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Maybe we need another forum split. We should have a forum for disussion of how to avoid busting out and fold into the money in tournaments.

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betgo, i think it's easy to say that a LAG game is better than a weak/tight game, but i think its clear the OP lacks the skill at present to splash around in lots of pots with 68 of diamonds and whatnot. My advice to OP would be to play tight, but play super-aggressive when you pick up a hand. It takes time to learn how to play like betgo and others do on this forum, and its also clear that playing weak/tight doesn't win tournaments, however playing raise or fold poker can get you deep.

[betgo]

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Lapper: "Making the money at the WSOP main event would mean everything to me, and I don't believe it is an unrealistic goal."

After reading what I would consider some rather half axx condescending replies you final received some very good at realistic advice which made this thread actually interesting.

First YOU have defined your goal - To make the Money. On the specific hand you lost out on last year with AK from the bb that you now regret you deviated from the path that would probably best allow you to attain that goal. Based upon YOUR criteria then folding AK was the proper play. The risk return just wasn't there.

Do NOT miss interpret this comment to mean the decision was "wrong" only WRONG to accomplish your own goal.

You gambled on what you had to believed was a better than a 50/50 proposition and lost. That Lapper is as you know poker pure and simple. Truthfully I would prefer YOU pushed all in than CALLED all in with an AK but that is only my style and would not have changed the results in the least. Given the exact same situation as it was played with 60K chips at that stage I will let everyone scream and call me a Puxxy but I muck the hand and move on.

While I do not consider that as "weak" others may. So be it.

Good luck to you in the ME this year and rest assured you probably have at least a 50/50 shot playing a tight aggressive intelligent game of making the top 800 and the money this year. Can you "win it" mucking an AK in that situation - Not very likely.........but that isn't your goal. You want to outlast 9 out of 10 players and you certainly appear to have the mentality to understand what approach will give you the best shot at accomplishing THAT goal.

PS - PM me your real name so I will know when to push you all in on day 3 from the Button :-) LOL Truly the best of luck and don't let the chat box "pro's" wear on you. I found your personal assessment to be quite refreshing and probably an understatement of your ability/potential.

RealMcCoy

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Maybe we need another forum split. We should have a forum for disussion of how to avoid busting out and fold into the money in tournaments.

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betgo, i think it's easy to say that a LAG game is better than a weak/tight game, but i think its clear the OP lacks the skill at present to splash around in lots of pots with 68 of diamonds and whatnot. My advice to OP would be to play tight, but play super-aggressive when you pick up a hand. It takes time to learn how to play like betgo and others do on this forum, and its also clear that playing weak/tight doesn't win tournaments, however playing raise or fold poker can get you deep.

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OP almost cashed in the WSOP and may be a better player than me. I don't usually play LAG, except around the bubble and with other tight tables. Then I try to steal and also target other loose aggressive players as well as weak/tighties.

It's not a matter of playing LAG versus TAG, but playing good poker versus playing weak/tight.

People are advocating folding AK BB versus button with 30xBB against a strong aggressive pro. Villain had AA, but he could have put in a 3rd raise with practically anything here. You have pot odds, and you could easily be a 3-1 favorite.

Also, avoiding going allin and playing tight at the bubble are cEV- $EV- plays.

You don't need any skill to avoid making the mistakes advocated here. All you need is a basic strategic understanding and some courage.

I am one of the few willing to argue with all the weak/tighties in this thread. I suggested a separate forum to discuss strategies for maximizing your chance of cashing, since obviously there is a basic philosophic difference.

[jclin]

I apologize, Lapper, for being such a hater, but my earlier thoughts are that you always play tourneys to win.

Avoiding all-in and folding at bubble cannot be -$eV if your goal is making the money. Sorry to bring up last year, but you probably could have folded ITM at 60K and M=15 at that point, considering only 20% of 700 need to drop out and the median (not the mean) is well below 100K. You need IMO either KK or AA to keep picking up any chips. There is probably some formula that you can use based on M, % of people needed out to make the money, and pace of game to determine if you can make the money just by folding, or only playing AA or KK to make the money. I don't think AK or maybe even QQ is good enough to play if you want to make the money based on your M last year, but I am just guessing.

What Foucault and others said about making the money is very logical.

[betgo]

I don't have links to threads in my guide, but I will have to add this one. This should also be in the anthology.

[curtains]

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if you play to make the money, you won't make the money...

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Im sure if I played to "make the money" Id be a lot more likely to make the money than normal.

[Apathy]

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if you play to make the money, you won't make the money...

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Im sure if I played to "make the money" Id be a lot more likely to make the money than normal.

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That's obv different then telling some random to play for the money, nit.

[betgo]

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Many of the answers so far have been along the lines of that I have given up already and that trying to make the money is in itself a self defeating strategy. Your post was the only one that suggested something that I already have used to my advantage in playing satellites, in fact I used it to win the satellite that got me into the WSOP.

Last year, when I almost made the money, I did exactly as you suggested, played only +EV situations on the first day of the tournament, loosened up a bit on the second day, but contrary to your suggestion, I did not try to limp into the money. In fact, I calculated that I would need about 100,000 chips to make it to the money and when I got busted out, I had about 60,000. I'm regretting what I did, because I think I could have limped into the money had I not made the decision that I did.

Sean (The Sheik) Sheikhahan was at my table and I picked up AK in the small blind when he was in the cutoff seat. The blinds were 1 and 2 thousand and the ante was 100 so my M was about 15 at that point. He was chip leader at the table with more than double what I had. The table folded to him and he made a standard 3 times the BB raise that looked to me like a steal, so I came over the top and doubled his raise, at which point he went all-in. He had me covered, so I probably should have folded and just limped into the money with the 48000 or so that I had left, but I had him figured as a very aggressive player who could have been making that play with just about any two cards. I really figured him on a pair such as 10-10 or JJ and I thought that at worst I would be racing off and if I got lucky and won the race, doubling to 120000 would assure me of making the money. So, I called and he showed pocket As and knocked me out. Was that such a terrible play? I don't know, all I know is I didn't make the money and it hurt. I have spent the last year studying all I can and playing more tournaments and I now think I am a better player than I was last year, but I'm still not sure what I would do if presented with the same situation again.

Also, to address your issue of whether I care about the money, of course I do. Also, to say that I have not spent the time to make myself a better player is not really correct either. I do spend a lot of time trying to better myself as a poker player, but I guess it is just part of my nature to be aware of my own limitations. I have made the final table in probably 6 or 7 small local tournaments, where the prize pool is usually chopped, so I can't say where I would have ended up. I have confidence, but I also have a keen awareness of the vagaries of this game.

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You have a problem with fear of winning or fear of success that goes beyond your weak/tight poker play.

Here you were getting 1.55 pot odds to call and AK was the favorite versus Shiek's likely range.

If you had won the hand, you would have had 120K, which was 1.5x the average stack. This was close to the bubble period, so you likely could have picked up additional chips and had a good chance of going deep in the ME.

Rather than thinking about how close you came to having a reasonable shot at making the final table, you are worried about how you blew your chance to fold into the money.

You need to think more in terms of opportunities and less in terms of dangers and stop putting artificial limits on yourself.

[Lego05]

I just couldn't believe that hand. It just annoys me....a lot. And I heard that she actually took 10+ min. although they cut it down for TV.

Yea she's like...I called with this hand earlier in the tournament and I doubled up....unless you have pocket aces. But I don't think you have pocket aces.

What? Unless he has pocket aces? What if he has KK, QQ, JJ, AK, AJ, KQ? And those are just hands that had her dominated. I'm not sure what the stacks were but AQ and TT are probably very realistic hands for him to have had that would also be ahead of her and maybe some smaller pairs too. KJ was definitely an auto-fold that should have taken no longer than 5 seconds.


It just pisses me off that someone this ridiculously [censored] won so much money in the ME.

[JCCARL]

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It's like if you are bum of the month in a boxing match against the world champion. Which is the better strategy? Try to survive as many rounds as possible by playing defensively avoiding getting knocked out; or go for the knockout blow knowing it is your only chance to win? Which puts more pressure on the champion?

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Betgo,
This evokes memories of Peter McNeely? Who? Yes, the journeyman who charged across the ring swinging wildly at Mike Tyson, fresh out of jail. Not sure if McNeely lasted one round or not.
Just a thought re. your proposed stategy.
Regards,
Carl

[Lapper]

I agree!