€200 MTT hand

Hectorjelly

This is a hand that bugged me afterwards, Im not sure I made the right play. Its towards the end of the tournament, a guy that I dont know but who looked tight guy makes it 4k to go leaving himself with 12 behind. Dave Masters calls from the button. Im on the BB with JJ. I cover them both AFAIR. I havent been at this table for long and dont know what Daves range is for calling, but im worried that he may have an bigger pair to mine, so I just call as I have the best position relative to the raiser. The flop is 789rainbow; I check, pfr goes all in. Masters thinks for ages and finally folds. My read on the preflop raiser is he is definitely not bluffing, he hasnt totally missed the board with AK or AQ.

The amounts might be slightly wrong, but it was almost exactly a pot bet all in to me on the flop

Daithio

Yeah I remember this hand. I was pretty surprised when you turned over JJ, I thought it was an autocall, whatever read I got off the original raiser was different to yours, I didn't think he was strong. I would have reraised preflop too, to about 16k, putting him all in but the right amount to get away from it if Dave M. had called with a big pair, but his calling range is quite wide so I don't think this is that likely. JJ is a huge hand at that stage of a tournament, and you don't really want to be going to a flop OOP against two players.

Gholimoli

i dont understand what you mean you have best position relative to raiser if you are on the BB.
i would not check this flop.
i would bet half the pot here which makes my future decesions very easy.
as played you say you think he does not have AK,AQ here.you also say he is tight .you also say he has not missed and has something.
well that leaves TT as the only hands you have beat so given your read i think its a fold but as i said i wouldnt play it this way.

RoundTower

With your read this is a clear fold, even with an expected six outs. If there is even a 25% chance your read is wrong it is probably a call.

roryc

I fold here. As Gholi said, the only hand you are really beating IMO is tens. Its not a badflop to you with an overpair and a gutshot, but based on your read it looks like KK to me.

I would have raised again pf to put Dave to the test.

fuzzbox

Gholimoli wrote:

i dont understand what you mean you have best position relative to raiser if you are on the BB.
i would not check this flop.
i would bet half the pot here which makes my future decesions very easy.
as played you say you think he does not have AK,AQ here.you also say he is tight .you also say he has not missed and has something.
well that leaves TT as the only hands you have beat so given your read i think its a fold but as i said i wouldnt play it this way.

Gholi - betting the flop does make future decisions very easy - but that doesnt mean that you have made the best play.

Hitman Actual

Tricky hand. My first thoughts as well were that the only legitimate hand you now beat is TT, so I think folding is fine. I think that to call would have to be purely on instinct/gut feeling, and based on your take of the 'flow' of the game (if that makes sense). So it's really situational imo, as on a bare analysis it looks like an easy fold.

Gholimoli

fuzzbox wrote:

Gholi - betting the flop does make future decisions very easy - but that doesnt mean that you have made the best play.

based on how the hand was played preflop i think a lead on the flop is best play.
if shory comes over the top i will call and if dave masters comes over the top i will fold.

kpnuts

Daithio wrote:

Yeah I remember this hand. I was pretty surprised when you turned over JJ, I thought it was an autocall, whatever read I got off the original raiser was different to yours, I didn't think he was strong. I would have reraised preflop too, to about 16k, putting him all in but the right amount to get away from it if Dave M. had called with a big pair, but his calling range is quite wide so I don't think this is that likely. JJ is a huge hand at that stage of a tournament, and you don't really want to be going to a flop OOP against two players.

Agree 100% with Dave's analysis here, HJ. Original raiser was in dire straits, you had him covered by a large margin, to my recollection anyway. Was shocked when you turned over hand as strong as JJ after thinking about the call. I think I would have instacalled in your position with 44, happy that the OR will usually have a missed blackjack 20/21 hand.

5starpool

Gholimoli wrote:

i dont understand what you mean you have best position relative to raiser if you are on the BB.

I believe he means that he can check the flop, see how everyone else in the hand reacts to the raiser going all in on the flop before it gets back to him.

Also, I believe the line was very conservative, and a safe but not always correct play. You don't mention relative stack sizes but I am assuming due to other posts that you well cover.

At the end of the day if you generally trust your reads and instincts then as RT says, it is a correct fold. However based on the fact that he is a shorty, however tight, this does open up his range to a lot of hands that you do beat, especially if he knows that people perceive him as tight. I think given the fact that I believe your stack could have taken the hit if you are behind, in this situation it would have been a call, especially since you got your best possible situation on the flop, him betting and everyone else leaving the hand, getting 2/1 when there are only a few hands beating you and you having 6 clean outs if you are behind.

eggie

Hey Hector, nice to put a name to the face. I was the raiser in this hand, I almost folded this pre flop but decided i had to make a move soon with only 16k (costing 2700 per round aprox) and the blinds moving up soon.

Your check on the flop made me think you didnt have a very strong hand here, but think you still beat me, and i'm thinking dave will be squeezed out in the middle if I push representing an overpair (a complete bluff is possible but highly unlikely).

Unfortunately you were relatively knew to the table and I had shown only very strong hands all night (which obviously you were unaware of). I pushed for 12k with 12k in the pot. Without much previous knowledge on me an my chip count i think your call was fine, i was actually hoping you'd fold.:(

Hectorjelly

I had a good few chips at the time, but any reraise preflop would commit me to the pot. I couldnt make it 15k more and fold to a all in as I would of put at least 1/3 of my chips in. Preflop I was pushing or calling.

I had good poisiton relative to the raiser because I could check and get to see what both players did, with the PFR first, before deciding what to do.

If Dave Masters had of folded I just would of put Eggie all in, but I was literally terrified that Dave had flat calledwith a monster. There is no hand bar AA KK QQ that I am going to flat call in his spot, I was amazed when he said he had AT. I hadnt played with him much, I thought his range would be much tighter. Maybe AQ at worst. Cold calling 1/4 of someones stack preflop with AT is just not something I would expect, clearly I know differently now!

Then the flop came and Eggie pushed. I was watching him as he did it and I got the impression that that was either a good flop. (Which it was for him) or he didnt care about the flop. I think leading there is horrible, firstly Ive underrepresented my hand which is going to make a decision a little bit tough. If I was Dave M and the BB led at that flop I would definitely push all in with AT and I couldnt of called. Secondly Eggie has 12k left with a pot of 12k, no matter what I bet if I bet I have to call his all in. Lastly the reason I just called is Dave M would be forced to act before me if I checked. Also its terrible in terms of CEV.

When eggie bet and Dave finally folded I realised I was getting 2:1 with at least 6 outs. I wasnt really sure what he had so I called.

I just checked poker stove and even if hes only pushing with a set an overpair or AT im still 45% to win it, I didnt realise it was that high at the time. I thought a set was pretty unlikely so I left out 77 & 99

Text results appended to pokerstove.txt

237,600 games 0.060 secs 3,960,000 games/sec

Board: 7c 8d 9h
Dead:

equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 45.9470 % 44.00% 01.95% { JJ }
Hand 2: 54.0530 % 52.11% 01.95% { TT+, 88, ATo }


I posted this hand because I dont think I played it well and was wondering what other people would do. Nice to meet you Eggie!

Gholimoli

Hectorjelly wrote:

I had a good few chips at the time, but any reraise preflop would commit me to the pot. I couldnt make it 15k more and fold to a all in as I would of put at least 1/3 of my chips in. Preflop I was pushing or calling.

I had good poisiton relative to the raiser because I could check and get to see what both players did, with the PFR first, before deciding what to do.

If Dave Masters had of folded I just would of put Eggie all in, but I was literally terrified that Dave had flat calledwith a monster. There is no hand bar AA KK QQ that I am going to flat call in his spot, I was amazed when he said he had AT. I hadnt played with him much, I thought his range would be much tighter. Maybe AQ at worst. Cold calling 1/4 of someones stack preflop with AT is just not something I would expect, clearly I know differently now!

Then the flop came and Eggie pushed. I was watching him as he did it and I got the impression that that was either a good flop. (Which it was for him) or he didnt care about the flop. I think leading there is horrible, firstly Ive underrepresented my hand which is going to make a decision a little bit tough. If I was Dave M and the BB led at that flop I would definitely push all in with AT and I couldnt of called. Secondly Eggie has 12k left with a pot of 12k, no matter what I bet if I bet I have to call his all in. Lastly the reason I just called is Dave M would be forced to act before me if I checked. Also its terrible in terms of CEV.

When eggie bet and Dave finally folded I realised I was getting 2:1 with at least 6 outs. I wasnt really sure what he had so I called.

I just checked poker stove and even if hes only pushing with a set an overpair or AT im still 45% to win it, I didnt realise it was that high at the time. I thought a set was pretty unlikely so I left out 77 & 99

Text results appended to pokerstove.txt

237,600 games 0.060 secs 3,960,000 games/sec

Board: 7c 8d 9h
Dead:

equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 45.9470 % 44.00% 01.95% { JJ }
Hand 2: 54.0530 % 52.11% 01.95% { TT+, 88, ATo }


I posted this hand because I dont think I played it well and was wondering what other people would do. Nice to meet you Eggie!

i disagree with alot of this.
first of all you say you had better position than Dave ralative to the raiser!
this still makes no sense to me even after you explianing it.
you act first by checking ,then Eggie,then Dave so Dave gets to see what you all do before he has to make a move so i think Dave here is in a much better position .
i dont think your definition of "relative position" makes any sense.
if your argument was true then every time your out of position in a pot you can say "oh im in a better position cuz i can just check and see what the other dude does first" !!!

as for the play of the hand you still have not given any stack sizes.
the only stack size we know is Eggies stack size but we dont know yours or Daves and this information is vital IMO on how to play the hand.
depending on the stack size it could be correct to make a reraise pre-flop .

as for leading for half the pot i dont think its a bad play at all.
if you lead there and eggie pushes then Dave will deffo fold and you can easily call .

if you lead and eggie folds i doubt Dave M will move all in for his enitre stack and if he does it usually means that your hand is no good and you can fold.
in this case we obviously know that your hand is better but i think due to the fact that you didnt raise pre-flop ,Dave can take advantage of his position and your bound to fold the best hand here some times against a good ,aggressive player.

Hectorjelly

I cant really remember how many chips I had, I could comfortably call the 12k and lose, but any reraise preflop and I was pretty much committed.

I didnt make that concept up, its an accepted concept in poker. Because most players will check to the preflop raiser, any players who cold call a raise preflop and then check to the raiser havent really shown weakness yet- so Dave has no idea how strong or weak my hand is because my check doesnt mean anything. Allthough he has position on the PFR his position is very bad because I havent leaked any information with my check. Thats why its often very bad to be the one cold calling a raise preflop directly in positon to the PFR, because if anyone else calls at the seats before him you will be in very bad relative position.

The way this hand played out is a good example of this, Dave M made a marginally bad fold with AT (he was getting 2:1) precisely because he was worried about me.

Gholimoli

im not saying you made up the concept .im saying you are misunderstood the concept or not saying it well because the way you are describing it here makes it seem like being out of position is actually good cuz you have "relative position".

Dave did not make a bad fold here .he made a fold because even though he was getting 2:1 he didnt fancy his hand with you yet to act.
a more aggro player in that position could have moved all in (after seeing you check) and could have easily got you to fold the best hand.

i have heard of relative position (i think Sklansky was talking about it in one of his books ,cant remember which one though) but i as i said i dont think it refers to what you say here.

so if i limp on the CO and button raises me and i cold call ,then by checking the flop to the PFR i have just done what you have described ,so does this mean i have "relative position" to the PFR and even if i do does that mean its to my advantage?

cardshark202

Gholimoli wrote:

so if i limp on the CO and button raises me and i cold call ,then by checking the flop to the PFR i have just done what you have described ,so does this mean i have "relative position" to the PFR and even if i do does that mean its to my advantage?

This situation is very different. You have already limped, then called a raise, not cold-called. A cold call is a call when you have yet to act in the hand.
When a good player cold-calls a raise from the blinds in a spot such as this he usually has a strong holding. So a check does not mean he is weak at all.

Gholimoli

cardshark202 wrote:

This situation is very different. You have already limped, then called a raise, not cold-called. A cold call is a call when you have yet to act in the hand.
When a good player cold-calls a raise from the blinds in a spot such as this he usually has a strong holding. So a check does not mean he is weak at all.

its not different at all.
the point here is who acts before who.
checking is an act and thats what matters.
for example checking by HJ here means we can be almost certain he does not have a set becuase of the draw heavy board.
thats information that the players acting after HJ can get for free simply becuse he has to ACT first.
im almost certain that this idea of relative position is wrong.
i think what would be a correct definition of it would be if HJ was between PFR and Dave M in that case even though he dosent have absolut position but he has relative position on the PFR.

also i just noticed your definition of a cold call which i think is wrong.

"A cold call is a call when you have yet to act in the hand."
how can you ever be in a position to both call and yet act in the hand.you either call(which means you have acted in the hand) or are yet to act(which means you couldnt have possibly call).

cardshark202

Gholimoli wrote:

its not different at all.
the point here is who acts before who.
checking is an act and thats what matters.
for example checking by HJ here means we can be almost certain he does not have a set becuase of the draw heavy board.
thats information that the players acting after HJ can get for free simply becuse he has to ACT first.
im almost certain that this idea of relative position is wrong.
i think what would be a correct definition of it would be if HJ was between PFR and Dave M in that case even though he dosent have absolut position but he has relative position on the PFR.

also i just noticed your definition of a cold call which i think is wrong.

"A cold call is a call when you have yet to act in the hand."
how can you ever be in a position to both call and yet act in the hand.you either call(which means you have acted in the hand) or are yet to act(which means you couldnt have possibly call).

I don't see much wrong with checking a set in this spot given the pot size and HJ's position, and his read on Dave M.

As regards to cold-calling: If I open-raise UTG and you call on the button, thats a cold-call. If you limp UTG, and I raise on the button and you call, thats a limp-call.

Gholimoli

cardshark202 wrote:

I don't see much wrong with checking a set in this spot given the pot size and HJ's position, and his read on Dave M.

As regards to cold-calling: If I open-raise UTG and you call on the button, thats a cold-call. If you limp UTG, and I raise on the button and you call, thats a limp-call.

well i see alot wrong with the check in that spot with a set but i guess we play differently.
as for the cold call it has no effect what so ever on the idea of "relative position".

marius

Hectorjelly wrote:

This is a hand that bugged me afterwards, Im not sure I made the right play. Its towards the end of the tournament, a guy that I dont know but who looked tight guy makes it 4k to go leaving himself with 12 behind. Dave Masters calls from the button. Im on the BB with JJ. I cover them both AFAIR. I havent been at this table for long and dont know what Daves range is for calling, but im worried that he may have an bigger pair to mine, so I just call as I have the best position relative to the raiser. The flop is 789rainbow; I check, pfr goes all in. Masters thinks for ages and finally folds. My read on the preflop raiser is he is definitely not bluffing, he hasnt totally missed the board with AK or AQ.

The amounts might be slightly wrong, but it was almost exactly a pot bet all in to me on the flop

I don't like flat calling with JJ here - you are more or less playing them for set value, was this your intention? I think it only worked out as pfr pushed and Dave folded, if the action had gone any other way you would probably have had to fold the best hand.

5starpool

Gholimoli wrote:

well i see alot wrong with the check in that spot with a set but i guess we play differently.
as for the cold call it has no effect what so ever on the idea of "relative position".

Gholi, I think the relative position HJ is referring to is seeing how everyone else acts to the likely act of the PFR going allin on a flop before he gets to act, thus getting information on the strength of their hand or otherwise as opposed to them who have to worry about the blind calling a raise and then checking into the PFR which is often a logical thing to do, both if you have missed, and if you have hit a monster flop.

Limp calling is, as Reggie is saying, a much different thing as you have twice shown your hand to be a non premium holding.

cardshark202

Gholimoli wrote:

well i see alot wrong with the check in that spot with a set but i guess we play differently.
as for the cold call it has no effect what so ever on the idea of "relative position".

Bleh I just wrote another reply but it was waffly didn't make much sense, I'll leave this one for HJ to explain, or maybe fuzz might pop in for a chat.

eggie

Hectorjelly wrote:

I was literally terrified that Dave had flat called with a monster.

This was a distinct possibility and he had previously done this. On this occasion i was thinking he was flat calling more because of his position rather than his holding. This is one of the reasons I pushed, as he would have to risk a push against yourself to isolate or simply fold with only 4k invested on the pot, and he's still in good shape tourney wise.

I was more worried about what you had. I didnt think you had a set because of your check but i did think TT, JJ, AK - AJ - all of which are ahead of me but foldable to a push, otherwise i gotta check fold and be even shorter. It would have been better for me if Dave came over the top causing you to fold and we would have split it.:)

I could also have had a better holding and played it the same, sometimes your ahead here but sometimes you would lose also. I think my stack size was the compelling factor for a call.

Congrats on the win by the way! WP

Gholimoli

folks,
i would think this is really simple but maybe im missing something.
having position on some one basically means acting after them .
checking your options is an act .
now most often its good to havbe position on some one(acting after them) and sometimes its best to act before them(for stop&go for example) but the fact remains that having position on some one means to act after them not before them.
in this case weather we elect to bet or check we are doing this with 0 information about the remaining players but other players know that we have checked.
is there something im missing here?

Hitman Actual

Gholimoli wrote:

folks,
i would think this is really simple but maybe im missing something.
having position on some one basically means acting after them .

Strictly speaking that's correct, but in this case I think HJ is saying that the best position to be in was to be effectively making the final decision in the hand. I think this thread is turning into a semantics lesson.

5starpool

I think that is why relative position is different to position. I am not espousing to be an expert is any of this, but I can see where this can come in. HJ's position here is better in this particular hand than if he was on the button with the raiser the CO and Dave somewhere in BB, as people often check to the raiser for a variety of reasons as you well know.

If Dave checked in the above scenario and the CO went all in, then JJ is hard to play from there as Dave , whereas as the hand played, HJ gets to see how Dave (with the stack dangerous to HJ) reacts to any all in before it gets to him after he checks the flop. If HJ had hit a J on the flop (AJ3 for example) then he would check this knowing it was quite likely that the PFR would go allin, and he would have a better chance of getting more chips off Dave this way than leading into a PFR and a cold caller of a raise after the flop.

Also, if the PFR goes allin and Dave calls/raises then accoring to what HJ had been thinking then he was 90% behind and could get out cheaply in the hand.

Hectorjelly

Gholi, when someone raises preflop they bet the flop most of the time. This means that checking to the preflop raiser is not the same as checking normally because most of the time the betting will be reopened and you can act again on this street. Look at how this hand developed, Dave couldnt call with AT because I was still to act. If he was in my position he could of. Technically he was in better position to me, the accepted way of saying it is that he had absolute position, but my relative position was better.

Gholimoli

Hectorjelly wrote:

Gholi, when someone raises preflop they bet the flop most of the time. This means that checking to the preflop raiser is not the same as checking normally because most of the time the betting will be reopened and you can act again on this street. Look at how this hand developed, Dave couldnt call with AT because I was still to act. If he was in my position he could of. Technically he was in better position to me, the accepted way of saying it is that he had absolute position, but my relative position was better.

HJ,
as i said before Dave didnt call because of his holdings rather than his position.
what if Dave had gone all in forcing you to fold the best hand ,would you be saying the same thing?

Gholimoli

5starpool wrote:

I think that is why relative position is different to position. I am not espousing to be an expert is any of this, but I can see where this can come in. HJ's position here is better in this particular hand than if he was on the button with the raiser the CO and Dave somewhere in BB, as people often check to the raiser for a variety of reasons as you well know.

If Dave checked in the above scenario and the CO went all in, then JJ is hard to play from there as Dave , whereas as the hand played, HJ gets to see how Dave (with the stack dangerous to HJ) reacts to any all in before it gets to him after he checks the flop. If HJ had hit a J on the flop (AJ3 for example) then he would check this knowing it was quite likely that the PFR would go allin, and he would have a better chance of getting more chips off Dave this way than leading into a PFR and a cold caller of a raise after the flop.

Also, if the PFR goes allin and Dave calls/raises then accoring to what HJ had been thinking then he was 90% behind and could get out cheaply in the hand.

Dom ,
your only thinking of this hand and specifically how it played out.
what if eggy was deeper in this situation and a bet from him would not have been an all in bet?what if there was to be more betting on the turn and river?
what if eggie had checked here and so did Dave?

see what i mean,when HJ is speaking of a concept he was taalking about it pre-flop with out knowing what is going to happen post flop and as i said had situation been a little different then HJ's posiion here is bad compare to the rest of

NickyOD

I like the way HJ played this hand. It's also a perfect example of why live hand analysys is so much more interesting. The line you took is one you probably wouldn't normally take purely because you're putting faith in your ability phyiscally read the villain for his hand and there's nothing wrong with that.

5starpool

Gholimoli wrote:

Dom ,
your only thinking of this hand and specifically how it played out.
what if eggy was deeper in this situation and a bet from him would not have been an all in bet?what if there was to be more betting on the turn and river?
what if eggie had checked here and so did Dave?

see what i mean,when HJ is speaking of a concept he was taalking about it pre-flop with out knowing what is going to happen post flop and as i said had situation been a little different then HJ's posiion here is bad compare to the rest of

Of course every hand is different, but If he is going to bet 1/4 of his stack preflop, it is a likely scenario that whatever the PFR has he is going to shove it with 2 flat callers preflop, after the flop. HJ knew this. If the stacks were deeper for all involved it would have been different.

Are you saying you would have led that flop in that situation? Reraised preflop, maybe. But if cold called, would you lead that flop? I doubt you would have, especially with another decent stack to act after the PFR but before you.

Gholimoli

5starpool wrote:

Of course every hand is different, but If he is going to bet 1/4 of his stack preflop, it is a likely scenario that whatever the PFR has he is going to shove it with 2 flat callers preflop, after the flop. HJ knew this. If the stacks were deeper for all involved it would have been different.

Are you saying you would have led that flop in that situation? Reraised preflop, maybe. But if cold called, would you lead that flop? I doubt you would have, especially with another decent stack to act after the PFR but before you.

no no no
what im saying is the size of ppls stack dont have an impact on your relative or absolut position.
HJ said he has relative position here to PFR and you and him are using the way the hand play put to justify his idea of "relative position" .
im saying had the stacks been different then the hand would play differently with HJ being in the worse position possible.

once again position is a a rather constant term in holdem and the size of ons stack does not define good position or bad position even though in certain situations it actually may be to your advantage being in a worse position or being out of position such as when you want to make a stop&go move.
in stop&go you are still out of position but it serves you to be in that situation.but you cant say that you have relative position here to your opponent.

5starpool

Gholimoli wrote:

no no no
what im saying is the size of ppls stack dont have an impact on your relative or absolut position.
HJ said he has relative position here to PFR and you and him are using the way the hand play put to justify his idea of "relative position" .
im saying had the stacks been different then the hand would play differently with HJ being in the worse position possible.

once again position is a a rather constant term in holdem and the size of ons stack does not define good position or bad position even though in certain situations it actually may be to your advantage being in a worse position or being out of position such as when you want to make a stop&go move.
in stop&go you are still out of position but it serves you to be in that situation.but you cant say that you have relative position here to your opponent.

If you are saying that 99% of the time it is best to be on the button in positional terms, then by golly (ghloi, geddit?) I think you are right. I also note that you like arguing for arguments sake. All I am saying it that I can see the value in this example of being the only person in a multiway pot who gets to act before the preflop raiser who is shortstacked.

Gholimoli

5starpool wrote:

If you are saying that 99% of the time it is best to be on the button in positional terms, then by golly (ghloi, geddit?) I think you are right. I also note that you like arguing for arguments sake. All I am saying it that I can see the value in this example of being the only person in a multiway pot who gets to act before the preflop raiser who is shortstacked.

oh shut up Dom,
im right and you are wrong(gna na nana na).
if you fail to accept the above statment i will get Ian after you.

5starpool

Gholimoli wrote:

oh shut up Dom,
im right and you are wrong(gna na nana na).
if you fail to accept the above statment i will get Ian after you.

ah go back where you came from you muppet

Daithio

Hectorjelly wrote:

I cant really remember how many chips I had, I could comfortably call the 12k and lose, but any reraise preflop and I was pretty much committed.

I thought you had about 80,000 at that stage, I must have been wrong. You obviously haven't played against Dave much, he flat calls with quite a wide range. This includes AA/ KK / QQ, but also alot of other hands. From memory I thought that you could have comfortably made it 15k preflop and folded if Dave pushed, but I must have your chip stack wrong by memory.

As played I think the flop check is correct and so is the call. To me it looks like the kind of flop that Dave could have hit with his range, so you want to see him fold before you're putting any more chips in.