Facing a short stack all in

why would you want to check the hand down? Shouldnt you want to kick out the third player to increase your chances of beating the all-in? Even if the other guy calls then you add more money to the side pot which, if you have a good hand, you can win too

You will only have difficulties in this situation if you are playing weaker starting hands than you would otherwise, we can all fall into the trap of playing poorly against weaker (small stacks) or people we perceive to be of lower ability than ourselves.
I would try to disregard the all-in player in this situation, continue to play the hand against the other caller as you would if you were heads up.
If you have a strong enough starting hand you can always re-raise the all-in bet and hopefully isolate yourself and the all-in player.

Unless I have a significant chip advantage over the short stack or if there were some sort of KO bonus, i would not call unless I had a decent hand. In any case, if you have a hand raising would be the best situational option.

agree with that, forget the short stack player and keep playing like its heads up if you have a strong hand

I actually ran into That last night In a Full tilt 100$ freeroll. 2700 people entered And it was down to 17 people. Well a short stack went all in and there was 3 other callers including myself, well the flop came and I moved all in with a pre bluff. The other 2 guys folded and caused a big scene over this Because they felt It should of been checked down to try and eliminate the short stack all in. My Idea on this whole thing was WHY would i want to sit there and check the hands down and give the other 2 guys a chance to win????? I WANted them outta of the hand. ME VS 1 SHORT stack is alot better than ME vs 3 Lol. Im Not trying to eliminate 1 short stack I WANT EVERYONE"S CHIPS lOl but thats just me .

This is all about ev. Some times you gain more ev by eliminating that player than actually winning that small pot, and of course you have a better chance of eliminating him with more players in the pot. Say if you are on the bubble in a SnG and there are 4 players involved in a pot including the short stack being all in. IF there is no sidepot, it is almost always +ev to check the hand down and take a chance of 3 people beating the short stack rather than 1. It is much more valuable to be guaranteed in the money than to maybe have a few extra chips.

(note: this is speculative, i'm assuming that it is a super short stack and winning his chips doesn't have a large affect on your stack)

However, say there was a raise and 3 calls and there was a side pot (lets use 2k as an example and a main pot of 600) then it is often best to play for the side pot still.

Hope this clears everything up just know that this play WILL make you money in the long run.

IMO not the best play. What happened was that you were heads-up with all-in guy, but if you bluffed then I suppose you had nothing and all-in guy could had had something. In this case he improves 4x. If flop missed him as well, then it is a coin flip, which does not sound much better. Moving 2 other guys out improved your chances to win, but it also dramatically improved all-in guy's chances to stay in, and you did not get any additional chips for doing that.
BTW did you win that?

I was in a similar situation yesterday in the CC freeroll at FT, about 50 players left a very short stack went all in , 2 callers including me with A10, i cant remember the flop but i got nothing , but the other guy went all in and he had a bit more chips than I so IMO it was an easy fold, he had a straight draw and the short stack won with A2, ace high, i just can't understand why the 2nd caller would go allin right there if he had a draw, i could somewhat understand if he had bet out reosonable bluffs and went allin on the turn or river but allin on the flop? so IMO everyone should check unless they have something.

Depends on the hand you have.
If you strongly believe you have the shortstack beat you might raise yourself. If you doubt it, than maybe you should fold.
There's always the chance that you think the shortstack will beat you, but you're better than the third player. In that case you might want to take some of his chips to compensate for the ones you are losing to the shortstack.

If you feel that you have the better hand by a long shot, then you have to shove, but what to do when you feel you may not be able to beat the TAg? unfortunately I feel that all you can do is get the hell outa the way and curse him out if he loses lol. it sucks when it happens but if you feel you can't hit it then you really have no other choice

If you have good hole cards then you should raise it and try to push the others out if not

I see a lot of big stacks taking a gamble, just because they can, with terrible cards. I'd only call if the short stack wouldn't hurt my stack much, and I was in the BB, as I do not necessarily have to have the better hand to justify a call. However, I'd still need something decent, like K10 suited or higher. If I have a premium hand, I'm going to probably raise preflop depending on my position and how good my hands is so it's just the two of us. I have played quite a few of the double up sngs, where top half gets paid. If I'm chip leader, and there are many short stacks, I might just gamble depending on how small the shortstack is since I'm probably going to place anyway, and if that short stack doubles up, I can usually count on 2-3 others bubbling really soon.

Obviously there are two schools of thought on this topic:

1) Everyone checks down to make sure that there is somebody left that can make a good enough hand to knock out the short stack

2) Who cares about the short stack! It's every man for himself, and it's best to play your hand as you normally would against the other players still in it.

I have been berated before for following 2) when I have had a monster hand, and I know that I have left money on the table by following 1) when I have had a solid hand, checked down, and didn't get the raises in that I normally would have, so I'm inclined to go with 2) although I don't always and am open for suggestions why I should not do so.

I usually look at the overall situation: how small is the short-stack's stack, how far along is the tourney (are we close to the bubble or ITM?), how good are my cards and will folding waste an excellent hand, what kind of game am I in and who with, etc. and decide what to do from there, but if there's a universal rule of conduct that I'm not aware of, I'm all ears!


(This happened to me on bodog Friday night, when a short stack had gone all-in and it was just me and the chip leader, who was very aggressive, left in the hand. He said "check it?" in chat, and I said OK with pocket 7's (not exactly a monster). Got a set on the flop and we both checked; board paired on the turn giving me a full house but I went along and checked (I said that I would, right?); and then after a rag on the river and a loooooong pause the jerk made a raise that was over half of my stack! I shoved, he insta-called and was no longer the chip leader. Great outcome for me, jerk play by that guy! )

It also depends on the stage of the tournament.

If there are 2000 players left, it doesn't make that much of a difference eliminating one player, so ignore the All In and play the hand accordingly.

If it is down to the final stages, it makes no sense to push the other players out unless you hit a monster and are certain you have the All In beat.

By pushing the other players out, you are basically providing protection for the All In Player which makes no sense, especially on a bluff bet. The goal in the final stages is to eliminate players and accumulate chips to help you win. By allowing protection for a small stack, you not only let him stay in which could come back to haunt you later in the tourney, you just showed the more experienced players at the table that you don't understand the basic concept of late tournament play and they would feel they have an advantage over you....and they most likely do.

Just my thoughts....

will in tourney and a small stack push and get a few callers people usually check to the river to try to elimanate the player who is small stack. betting only usually happen when one of the players who call actually have a hand from the flop sometimes this is not the case and makes the short stack win which is a bad move you see this all the time if you watch the world series tourneys but theres always a few time were a wise guy bet with nothing hopeing the short stack have nothing. i think its bad poker

PLEASE help us out with some punctuation in your posts, Janon!!

Short stacks are the scary people, especially when the blinds are big. They can constant double and quadruple up. I'm sure I'm not the only person but I lot to short stack when I had commanding chip lead. Retarded donk just keeps pushing all in and sucks out all the time. My pocket kings against his 2 8, flops trips. doubles up and nxt round, 7 8, hits against my A 4, he hits his 8. nxt hand, all ins with Q 7, against my pocket js, hits his Queen. Short stack can be very scary people because they're deceptive to make you call.

If you are going to call a shortstack you shoulda have atleast a semi descent hand depending on his stack compared to yours but it is said that if he has less than 10% of your stack your spose to call with just about anything

haha sorry about my post i like to write things fast, without proof reading and such. I'll try to work on it some more

The basic idea is that in a tourney, you don't get money for winning chips, like you do in a cash game. You get chips for finishing in a higher position. 3 people calling the short stack make it pretty likely he's going home and you all increase your EV. If you bet everybody out and the SS quadrupled up through you, you have at best kept your EV about the same and may have decreased it depending on the former SS's position relative to you.

My thoughts on that are bet if you think you have everyone beat. If they can't draw out on you, size your bet so they have to call. If you know you have the SS beat but can be drawn out on, don't give them odds to call. I tend to assume people get this idea, and make note of those who don't at the table. I count it as predictive of other bad plays.

Long story short, knocking the short stack out is always +EV. Raising sometimes is if you really have a hand.

RF