A Tough Decision At The 15K Bellagio Tournament

[Cornell Fiji]

[ QUOTE ]
The go and go move is AWFUL here. I had to speak up. Dave is going to end up agreeing with me and the two guys who posted after me. It's great to know that even players who are probably pretty good at poker would make sub optimal decisions. That means that any game will probably be profitable.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yo_Respek,
I just ran a search of your last 98 posts... you know, to see your credentials for saying that the go and go is sub-optimal because I didn't recognize you from the MTT forums.

I see now that this is your first poker strategy post so I would like to let you know that, in general when you make a statement so strong as 'a play is awful' and that it is the reason why you are profitable, then here at 2p2 we like to provide some logical support to our comments.

Please share your thoughts on the best way to play this hand in a $15k tournament and your reasons for doing so.

Steve

[TimTimSalabim]

[ QUOTE ]
The go and go move is AWFUL here. I had to speak up. Dave is going to end up agreeing with me and the two guys who posted after me. It's great to know that even players who are probably pretty good at poker would make sub optimal decisions. That means that any game will probably be profitable.

[/ QUOTE ]

If by go and go is meant calling and then automatically moving in on the flop no matter what, I agree that's a bad idea. I prefer calling and leaving my options open. The assumption is I'm one of the top players. That means I may well get a good read on my opponent postflop which will tell me what to do, in combination with the texture of the flop.

[Carded]

10 CALL

7 Reraise

5 All in.

Reasons I want to call, I will outplay the guy after the flop. If he hits a weak ace I will take him for alot with a better kicker. If he has a low pair I will take the pot away from him when over cards hit.

Reraising, I will get more information to where he is at. If he has a worse hand I charge him to suck out. Cons he might re-push and force me into a coin flip.

ALL in. I might only get called with a coin flip or a better hand. I am better than him, no reason to risk chips on a coin flip.

[Cornell Fiji]

I did not do a full analysis in my last post and decided that, since I believe the go and go to be easily the best play, to provide a more complete answer to this question.

I have only played in one WPT event but my interpretation of a "typical player" in a tournament like this is someone who has played in a few big buy in tournaments but has a 'real job' and is by no means a pro. This player has a strong understanding of the game but his biggest leak is his slightly sub optimal fear of busting which causes him to play a little bit too weak-tight when put to a decision for all of his chips. (David, please correct me if I am wrong on my interpretation of a typical player in this tournament)

The first thing that should be recognized about this situation is that the effective stacks are 45bbs deep, which is significantly deep enough to make pushing a pretty poor option. Pushing is a huge over bet. A general rule of thumb for MTTs is that you should not be pushing your stack in preflop unless you can increase it by 15%+, and even in those times it is often not the best play. A push here increases the hero's stack by less than 10% and it allows the villain to play closer to optimally (there is no need for him to ever be calling our huge over bet with AQo, while it is true that he will be folding some small/mid pairs to our maniacal push, a normal raise preflop would have the same effect)

A call here is also a bad play. The hero is an enormous favorite against the villain's button raising range and the hero will have no idea where he stands post flop if he smooth calls. While I am strongly against raising in shallow stacked poker for the sole purpose of gaining information (it normally costs more than it is worth) the fact that we have no information about the villains hand is a contributing factor in our rationale that a smooth call is sub-optimal. If you call preflop what is your plan for the rest of the hand? Are you willing to stack off with TPTK on a KJT board? On a KJ2 board? Are you planning on leading out for 5k on a blank flop? What are you doing when the villain pushes over the top of you? Again, I am not saying that the reason why we should not smooth call is simply to avoid difficult decisions; I am just saying that against a 'typical villain' in this tournament that we should be making him make the tough choices instead of us.

Sklansky's fundamental theorem of poker states that: "Every time you play a hand differently from the way you would have played it if you could see all your opponents' cards, they gain; and every time you play your hand the same way you would have played it if you could see all their cards, they lose. Conversely, every time opponents play their hands differently from the way they would have if they could see all your cards, you gain; and every time they play their hands the same way they would have played if they could see all your cards, you lose." While I believe that there are some rare exceptions to this theorem this hand is not one of them. Calling here preflop allows the villain in this hand to push over the hero's flop bet and makes the hero play sub-optimally.

We could extrapolate the FTOP to our decision to raise this hand to 8600 preflop (obviously we are calling if he pushes over the top of us.) Raising preflop (and pushing all in on any flop unless we have a spectacular tell) is the optimal play as explained below.

First, lets consider the calling range for the villain if we raise here: he knows that we know that he has a wide preflop raising range and therefore we do not necessarily need group one hands to be restealing on him. However, he also should know that we are likely to keep the pressure on him on the flop. The villain should also be wary of putting in 1/3 of his stack preflop but if he has a hand like AQo or 99 he could justify calling 6k more chips and reevaluating his hand on the flop thinking that he is 'in position' (actually I would argue that the hero is in position in a hand like this because he will just stick his stack in and put the pressure on the villain. In tournaments acting first when you have the initiative is often a better position to be in). Now if I were the villain I would be moving in with 99+, AQ+ (and maybe more hands than that) but, as I described earlier, the biggest leak that the "typical player" in these tournaments have is their fear of putting in their last chip and therefore it is more than likely that the villain will just call our preflop raise (if he has a real hand and not something like KJs) and reevaluate from there.

Now an important part of our plan is to push any flop. This allows the FTOP to come in play a second time because if the villain called preflop with 99 and the flop comes down Q62 and we open-push he could definitely find a fold thinking that we have AQ or a higher pocket pair than his. It is also possible that if he has a hand like 99 and the flop comes down 234 that the villain will fold to our flop push putting the hero on an overpair, a set, or at the very least 2 overs and a gutshot. My point here is that the "typical villain's" greatest leak in these tournaments is the fear of going broke. Therefore giving him two opportunities to make a bad fold is much better than just giving him one.

What about reraising preflop and simply leading out for a 1/2 pot bet and folding to his raise? Given the stack sizes and the pot size after our raise this option would make no sense. We would be getting pot odds to call if we thought both of our overs were live and why would we want the villain to think that he has folding equity if he wants to push with AQ or a mid pair? Remember, one of the best parts about our play is that it allows us to exploit a weakness that many MTT players have, the fear of busto. It would not make any sense to give up this advantage.

[Yo_Respek]

[ QUOTE ]
I did not do a full analysis in my last post and decided that, since I believe the go and go to be easily the best play, to provide a more complete answer to this question.

I have only played in one WPT event but my interpretation of a "typical player" in a tournament like this is someone who has played in a few big buy in tournaments but has a 'real job' and is by no means a pro. This player has a strong understanding of the game but his biggest leak is his slightly sub optimal fear of busting which causes him to play a little bit too weak-tight when put to a decision for all of his chips. (David, please correct me if I am wrong on my interpretation of a typical player in this tournament)

The first thing that should be recognized about this situation is that the effective stacks are 45bbs deep, which is significantly deep enough to make pushing a pretty poor option. Pushing is a huge over bet. A general rule of thumb for MTTs is that you should not be pushing your stack in preflop unless you can increase it by 15%+, and even in those times it is often not the best play. A push here increases the hero's stack by less than 10% and it allows the villain to play closer to optimally (there is no need for him to ever be calling our huge over bet with AQo, while it is true that he will be folding some small/mid pairs to our maniacal push, a normal raise preflop would have the same effect)

A call here is also a bad play. The hero is an enormous favorite against the villain's button raising range and the hero will have no idea where he stands post flop if he smooth calls. While I am strongly against raising in shallow stacked poker for the sole purpose of gaining information (it normally costs more than it is worth) the fact that we have no information about the villains hand is a contributing factor in our rationale that a smooth call is sub-optimal. If you call preflop what is your plan for the rest of the hand? Are you willing to stack off with TPTK on a KJT board? On a KJ2 board? Are you planning on leading out for 5k on a blank flop? What are you doing when the villain pushes over the top of you? Again, I am not saying that the reason why we should not smooth call is simply to avoid difficult decisions; I am just saying that against a 'typical villain' in this tournament that we should be making him make the tough choices instead of us.

Sklansky's fundamental theorem of poker states that: "Every time you play a hand differently from the way you would have played it if you could see all your opponents' cards, they gain; and every time you play your hand the same way you would have played it if you could see all their cards, they lose. Conversely, every time opponents play their hands differently from the way they would have if they could see all your cards, you gain; and every time they play their hands the same way they would have played if they could see all your cards, you lose." While I believe that there are some rare exceptions to this theorem this hand is not one of them. Calling here preflop allows the villain in this hand to push over the hero's flop bet and makes the hero play sub-optimally.

We could extrapolate the FTOP to our decision to raise this hand to 8600 preflop (obviously we are calling if he pushes over the top of us.) Raising preflop (and pushing all in on any flop unless we have a spectacular tell) is the optimal play as explained below.

First, lets consider the calling range for the villain if we raise here: he knows that we know that he has a wide preflop raising range and therefore we do not necessarily need group one hands to be restealing on him. However, he also should know that we are likely to keep the pressure on him on the flop. The villain should also be wary of putting in 1/3 of his stack preflop but if he has a hand like AQo or 99 he could justify calling 6k more chips and reevaluating his hand on the flop thinking that he is 'in position' (actually I would argue that the hero is in position in a hand like this because he will just stick his stack in and put the pressure on the villain. In tournaments acting first when you have the initiative is often a better position to be in). Now if I were the villain I would be moving in with 99+, AQ+ (and maybe more hands than that) but, as I described earlier, the biggest leak that the "typical player" in these tournaments have is their fear of putting in their last chip and therefore it is more than likely that the villain will just call our preflop raise (if he has a real hand and not something like KJs) and reevaluate from there.

Now an important part of our plan is to push any flop. This allows the FTOP to come in play a second time because if the villain called preflop with 99 and the flop comes down Q62 and we open-push he could definitely find a fold thinking that we have AQ or a higher pocket pair than his. It is also possible that if he has a hand like 99 and the flop comes down 234 that the villain will fold to our flop push putting the hero on an overpair, a set, or at the very least 2 overs and a gutshot. My point here is that the "typical villain's" greatest leak in these tournaments is the fear of going broke. Therefore giving him two opportunities to make a bad fold is much better than just giving him one.

What about reraising preflop and simply leading out for a 1/2 pot bet and folding to his raise? Given the stack sizes and the pot size after our raise this option would make no sense. We would be getting pot odds to call if we thought both of our overs were live and why would we want the villain to think that he has folding equity if he wants to push with AQ or a mid pair? Remember, one of the best parts about our play is that it allows us to exploit a weakness that many MTT players have, the fear of busto. It would not make any sense to give up this advantage.


[/ QUOTE ]

You wrote enough of Dave's book in here to make it copyright infringment.

[Dave D]

[ QUOTE ]
I pull a go and go here.

Make it 9k to go and then stick in your remaining 18k on any flop (hit or miss.)


Raise 6k more and push any flop: 10+

Raise 6k more and c-bet 8k and fold if raised: 0

Push: 5

Call: 6

The villain open raised the button here. His range is huge. Raising to 9k will keep in AQ who we dominate and some pocket pairs who will fold when we push the flop (this is where the value comes from in a go and go.) Now a great player is not calling with 99 here and then mucking the flop because he should see the go and go coming but against this standard opponent it is a good play.



[/ QUOTE ]

Ok, here's why a "go and go" is awful. By your logic, you're trying to keep in villian the times he has AQ and other hands we dominate, this is an argument for pushing PF, not an argument for letting him see 3 cards and potentially outflopping us. Villian should pretty much NEVER fold PF b/c of hte odds he's getting, so all you do by raising to what Sklansky said is giving him odds to call.

Raising to 9k is transparant to any reasonably player. We're talking about a fairly big buy in tourney, not an online $10, so presumably most people have some clue what's going on. You raise 1/3 of your stack to do what on the flop? They'll see it coming. Also, there's no way AA/KK/QQ plays it that way. Those hands reraise pf, maybe push, and then c/r the flop, or push the turn if villian checks through, or at least bet the turn. Pushing the flop says "please don't call me, I have nut no pair."

Again, if your plan is to push the flop, make it inexploitable and push PF, especialy because villian I think might call AQ there, but not on the flop.

[ QUOTE ]


Calling is fine if you play scared poker and want to keep the pot small but in reality it doesn't make much sense with a hand this strong against a button raise.


[/ QUOTE ]

That's not the point. The call says to a thinking opponent that you have QQ+, after all, what would you do with AA here? At the same time, against a bad or not very good opponent, just calling disguises your hand so you can get him to committ with AQ on a Axx flop. It's not about playing scared, it's about taking advantage of your post flop skills, and trying to get villian all in with the worst hand.

[ QUOTE ]

No need to flip with him when we don't have to and by raising and then pushing the flop we are representing JJ+. Would any of you push with AA/KK in this spot?


[/ QUOTE ]

Fundamental flaw here. Flipping here is +EV, as always, we're not really thinking about "tournament life", we're thinking about +EV. Also, as someone else said, we'll still have an M of 10 if we lose here. I think its likely that a push only gets called by TT-AK, and I'm fine with that because we win a fair amount when villian folds 88.



[/ QUOTE ]

Overall, I call here and play poker, that's a 9 in my book (or at least there's no better play),

followed by push PF=7 (hoping to get a call from a worse hand)

followed by raising 1/3 of our stack=2, ie retarded


Additionaly, pushing PF is what a weak player would do, or someone not confident in their post flop skills against the other players. It's inexploitable, with the 2nd/3rd best hand in the game there's no way it's "wrong", it just doesn't maximize EV probably because of the time that you force villian to correctly fold.

[Arbitrage]

push 10
reraise 7
call 6

[Dave D]

[ QUOTE ]


are you willing to stack off with TPTK on a KJT board?


[/ QUOTE ]

Yes. Exactly like 4 hands beat us or something. He could have KQ, or Ax or a FD. Easy call if you check and he pushes.

[ QUOTE ]

On a KJ2 board? Are you planning on leading out for 5k on a blank flop? What are you doing when the villain pushes over the top of you?


[/ QUOTE ]

I'm C/Ring here like pretty much every time. I want to play the part of looking timid and ready to c/f the flop. When villian c-bets, if I paired my A or K, I'm going to the felt (and he'll probably call b/c he's obligated to, but it's huge if he folds too).

The only time I'm folding is if I check a blank flop, and he pushes and I have like no draws.

Donking out here is pretty bad all around. What's it going to make villian do? Fold? Great, you could have done that PF. Call you? Great, but you probabably extract more by C/Ring if you have TPTK etc, and if the flop has nothing for you, he's just going to call you, which sucks, or push back at you, which sucks.

So yeah, in summation, call PF, C/R just about every flop for me.

[Yo_Respek]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The go and go move is AWFUL here. I had to speak up. Dave is going to end up agreeing with me and the two guys who posted after me. It's great to know that even players who are probably pretty good at poker would make sub optimal decisions. That means that any game will probably be profitable.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yo_Respek,
I just ran a search of your last 98 posts... you know, to see your credentials for saying that the go and go is sub-optimal because I didn't recognize you from the MTT forums.

I see now that this is your first poker strategy post so I would like to let you know that, in general when you make a statement so strong as 'a play is awful' and that it is the reason why you are profitable, then here at 2p2 we like to provide some logical support to our comments.

Please share your thoughts on the best way to play this hand in a $15k tournament and your reasons for doing so.

Steve

[/ QUOTE ]

A go and go might be a good play in some situations in a cash game. This would be if you had Aces or Kings and wanted to make the pot bigger because you were 99 percent sure that nothing could make you fold on the flop. The go and go is not a good play in this situation with AK in a cash game or tournament. The reraise becomes the best play in the cash game. Also there a lot more flops that can have me dominated when I have AK so I couldn't possibly just go all in on the flop.

Usually in this situation you are looking at a blind steal with a weak or medium ace or small pair or even king or queen high. By going all in preflop you might get someone who has a hand like AQ to consider calling because your play looks like you want a fold.(which you do) They also would be way more likely to fold smaller pairs that you don't want to face because a small pair would be concerned that you have a higher pair.

[Piers]

R6K 10
RAI 9
CAll 5

The ration of RAI to R6K is a function of how you rate in the top N%.