Harrington on Holdem 3: The Workbook REVIEW

[ChrisV]

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I've finally gotten around to reading the book and have just reached the SNG Bubble portion. Since you only mentioned this problem of that section, does that mean the rest of the analysis is correct? It seemed really tight to me. I don't have the book in front of me. But he said to fold to a push unless you have AA and KK if you are tied with the big stack, with two short stacks. The reasoning is the huge difference between the 4th place prize and the third place prize.

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I'm assuming this is correct since he probably used SNGPT to come up with that result. You can check it yourself if you have SNGPT. I found a couple of the results surprisingly tight, but not shockingly so. (The hand you describe was not one of them. I definitely knew it would be AA/KK there).

[ChrisV]

ninjabump.

I dug this post out for someone who wanted to know if HOH3 was worth buying. I was interested to see that after playing a stack of cash games, my opinion on some of these hands has changed. In particular, I think I was wrong about Problem 3. The only big plus from betting again is if you get a pocket pair between 8 and K to fold, but this is very unlikely since he's not likely to flat call preflop with those hands and may not fold the turn even if he has. You're pretty likely to be losing and I disagree with July 06 ChrisV that you can't fold the river if he makes a (substantial) bet. The few hands you beat (A5, etc) are likely to check the river or maybe make a small blocking bet. So betting the turn is a bit spewy, I think.

[FuriousD]

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Problem 18: Live MTT, Blinds 1500/3000, Antes 200 (total 6300 in pot). Pro on button moves in for 10K, you have 30K in BB and 65o. Pro has a $5K cash bounty on his head. While Harrington gets the answer right (call), my jaw dropped when he simply added the $5K (cash) to the $T pot when calculating pot odds. HUH??? He also, while working out an opponent range, informs us that the correct play for the pro on the button here is to move in with any two cards, even though he’s in the process of proving that we’re going to call him with 100%. This doesn’t compute. Pushing with 72o can’t possibly be right if we’re up against 100% in the blind. How he doesn’t see this I’m not sure.



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Maybe he doesn't see this because people in real life don't actually call 100% of the time here. After all, in the example the BB folded.

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Problem 3: Early in a SNG, we raise on the button with 9 8 , the SB calls and the flop comes K 5 4 . SB check calls our continuation bet. Turn is the 8 and SB checks. Harrington wants to check here. I much prefer betting again. Our hand is vulnerable and if SB was planning to checkraise, it’s probably with a hand we’re drawing dead against, and if we check here we are probably going to have to call a river bet. I’m not putting him on a king just because he check called the flop.

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You misread the book here. Harrington did recommend betting the turn. Even if he didn't that seems like an awefuly flimsy example of why this book is supposedly deficient. Checking may be wrong but it's not terrible.