A tournament hand i'd like to discuss

[SS810]

Hello everyone.

This is my first post on the 2+2 fourm, I'd like to say it's a greatly appreciated priveledge to be able to post on a forum like this, with so many winning players helping eachother out. I have been playing poker fulltime for about 2.5 years now but unfortunately the past year has been the worst, my performance has been so poor the only cash games i could beat were on world poker exchange. However living expenses have finally caught up with my lack of results for the past year and i'm almost broke. I am no longer playing cash games and I am now %100 committed to multi table sit n go tournaments. (I like to have every table open so i can observe everyone with PT, I can't do this in the big field tourneys) I have read all 3 of harringtons books and will be re-reading them again and again as long as im in the game because they are the best poker books I have ever read. I would now like to discuss a hand that resulted in me busting out where I feel i may have made the wrong decison and I would like some opinions on them. Here we go;

Situation:
final table of a 45 player $10 sitngo on full tilt, prize payout for remaining players is as follows

1st 171
2nd 112
3rd 72
4th 45
5th 27

<font color="red">Seat 1: SmokeMorePot (17,753)</font>
Seat 4: Pokerschorsch (5,550)
Seat 5: chrismk (17,240)
Seat 6: stiesnking (7,725)
Seat 8: khamp666 (19,232)
chrismk posts the small blind of 300
stiesnking posts the big blind of 600
The button is in seat #4

*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to SmokeMorePot [Ad Ks]
khamp666 raises to 2,100
SmokeMorePot has 15 seconds left to act
SmokeMorePot raises to 5,300
Pokerschorsch folds
chrismk folds
stiesnking folds
khamp666 raises to 19,232, and is all in

he was representing a big hand, this was a bigger then normal raise for this player. Perhaps i should of just called the raise instead of reraising him because then i could of avoided this preflop situation, but that is no longer relevant, this is the situation ive created. I'm getting about 2;1 on my call and if i call the winner of this pot will most likely win the tournament, If i call and lose im out and i get a very small prize. I know aces and kings are very unlikely because i have one of each in my hand but it is still possible, I believe he most likely has queens or perhaps jacks so im a 13 to 10 dog if so. If i fold i will have about 12k left and be in 3rd place and have a decent chance of finishing above the 2 short stacks. I decided I wasent interested in playing with 12k and being forced to gamble more so I elected to call.

SmokeMorePot calls 12,453, and is all in
khamp666 shows [Qc Qh]
SmokeMorePot shows [Ad Ks]
Uncalled bet of 1,479 returned to khamp666
*** FLOP *** [8h 6d Qd]
*** TURN *** [8h 6d Qd] [Kc]
*** RIVER *** [8h 6d Qd Kc] [3s]
khamp666 shows three of a kind, Queens
SmokeMorePot shows a pair of Kings
khamp666 wins the pot (36,406) with three of a kind, Queens

Did I make a mistake in this situation? would the proper play been to of called the preflop raise and not risk my whole tournament? My goal in every tournament is to win, not get some puny 4th place prize or worse. However, If i just called then mucked on the flop I would most likely get a least 3rd place, which was a much higher payout then 5th.

[Cornell Fiji]

welcome to the forums.

read the anthology sticky there is good advice in those threads. download pokerstove (its free) at www.pokerstove.com and start putting your opponents on hand ranges (like TT+/AQ+) in this hand.

your raise to 5300 was not very good. It is better to raise to 6200 or even call or shove.

after he 3-bet you obviously want to get all in.

you were destined to go broke on this hand and there was NOTHING that you could do about it.

in the future do not post the results of your hand

[Sherman]

[ QUOTE ]
welcome to the forums.

read the anthology sticky there is good advice in those threads. download pokerstove (its free) at www.pokerstove.com and start putting your opponents on hand ranges (like TT+/AQ+) in this hand.

your raise to 5300 was not very good. It is better to raise to 6200 or even call or shove.

after he 3-bet you obviously want to get all in.

you were destined to go broke on this hand and there was NOTHING that you could do about it.

in the future do not post the results of your hand

[/ QUOTE ]

Steve pretty much said it all, so I'll contribute one other things not about the hand. Regarding your strategy of keeping all the tables open while you play:

We often forget when playing poker that a better ROI is not necessarily the most $/hour. So if opening all the tables of a tournament is costing you multi-tabling capabilities, it is probably costing you $/hour (although it may be slightly boosting your ROI).

Anyhow, keep in mind that it is $/hour that is important, not ROI.

[RyanUSF]

You have AK five handed and a player raised 3.5 BB UTG. Unless you have some read on him that he's uber-weak tight preflop, even five handed, I'm popping this to 6-7k. When he goes all-in in that situation, you'll be getting ~2:1 which makes it an easy call.

[binions]

You fold, and you have more chips than 4th or 5th put together, with blinds at only 300-600, you'd have 20xBB and still be able to steal blinds and play some flop betting rounds against the bigger stacks.

Chipwise, in order to call getting 2:1, his range can be AA-QQ + AKs. Your AKo has 33% equity against that range. If his range is wider and includes AKo, JJ, AQs or worse, then you are getting an overlay on the last call. If his range is narrower, you aren't getting the right odds.

However, you are only getting 2:1 because of your self-weighting raise. If you look at all the money that went into the pot on the flop round, you are putting in 48.7% of the money, and need 48.7% of the equity to have breakeven EV on the betting round as a whole.

No one really focuses on this in no limit, and I believe it is overlooked. In limit, for example, we often talk about putting in bets and raises multiway on the flop with a flush draw. If 4 people put in 4 bets each, we are putting in 25% of the money on the betting round with a 35% chance to hit the flush, so we make money on each bet.

To have 48.7% equity against his range, he needs to make this move with AA-TT + AK-AQ or worse. At this stage of the tournament, this range might be accurate. Depends on the player. Depends on how much he adheres to the motto of not tangling with other big stacks without a big hand.

For me, whenever I feel I barely have the proper odds to call all in on the last bet, but feel I am putting in too much money versus his range on the betting round as a whole, it is a difficult decision especially when each player eliminated means more money.

As it turns out, we were in a parlay situation. We had to be racing instead of dominated, and we had to win the race. Racing is fine if the table is tough and we want to embrace volatility. If the table is weak and we have an edge, that factor weighs against racing for all our chips on one hand.

In retrospect, we should have called the preflop raise in position, and taken a flop. Hindsight is 20-20.

[SS810]

[ QUOTE ]

Steve pretty much said it all, so I'll contribute one other things not about the hand. Regarding your strategy of keeping all the tables open while you play:

We often forget when playing poker that a better ROI is not necessarily the most $/hour. So if opening all the tables of a tournament is costing you multi-tabling capabilities, it is probably costing you $/hour (although it may be slightly boosting your ROI).

Anyhow, keep in mind that it is $/hour that is important, not ROI.

[/ QUOTE ]

Thats not what i mean, I'm not multi tabling, im playing 1 tournament with all the tables on the tournment open (with every table except the one im playing at minimized) so I can get information on all the players. I am impressed with the quick responses guys, I appreciate it.

[Sherman]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

Steve pretty much said it all, so I'll contribute one other things not about the hand. Regarding your strategy of keeping all the tables open while you play:

We often forget when playing poker that a better ROI is not necessarily the most $/hour. So if opening all the tables of a tournament is costing you multi-tabling capabilities, it is probably costing you $/hour (although it may be slightly boosting your ROI).

Anyhow, keep in mind that it is $/hour that is important, not ROI.

[/ QUOTE ]

Thats not what i mean, I'm not multi tabling, im playing 1 tournament with all the tables on the tournment open (with every table except the one im playing at minimized) so I can get information on all the players. I am impressed with the quick responses guys, I appreciate it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Right. I am suggesting that you don't open all the tables to gather information. I think it is less valuable (in terms of $) than multitabling 4+ tournaments at a time.

[icallseat3]

This is an off question. Have you been playing $10 tournaments for the last 2.5 years??? Or is it because your bankroll is getting lower? If so why dont you try moving up in buy ins.

[Cornell Fiji]

SS810,

I would be careful about multitabling. Especially jumping up to 4 tables as Sherman seems to be suggesting.

It takes a while to adjust to playing online and to playing multiple tables online and it should go unsaid that you should only play one at a time if you are only comfortable playing one at a time.

Having other tables open to get reads is a fine idea, I might also suggest writing down notes on anytihng of significance that you observe. Simply training yourself to concentrate and pay attention has a lot of value above and beyond any reads that you will receive

[SS810]

[ QUOTE ]
This is an off question. Have you been playing $10 tournaments for the last 2.5 years??? Or is it because your bankroll is getting lower? If so why dont you try moving up in buy ins.

[/ QUOTE ]

I played fixed limit for the first year and a half (blame it on the city i live in) I got all the way up to 20/40 (I made 5200 one night!) before i started running consistently bad. I then started playing 200 and 100 nl on WPX, I've cashed out about 10-11 grand from the site, but thats obviously not enough for the 6-8 months ive been playing on it.