S
ssbn743
Visionary
Silver Level
This hand occurred in a normal Saturday deep stack tournament at my local casino. The buy was $210 for $30K starting stacks and 30 minute levels.
There were 102 entries and the bubble burst at 13th. We were down to the final table bubble and I busted on that bubble at 11th place.
It had been a good day, I was seeing some cards, but was more importantly finding myself in positions of opportunity; one time, taking full advantage of a tilting player when we were in the low 20 players remaining and more than doubling up to about $150K. At that time, the average stack was probably more like $200K, but $150K was a good stack with several weak players sitting around $50 to $70K.
Anyway, we were down to 11 and I started my final table run. I was getting monster hands in a 5 handed game too; AJ, AK, JJ from late positions or the blinds, so, I kept raising. Blinds were $6K/$3K/$1K and I raised 3 consecutive hands in a row and simply won the blinds and antes, plus maybe a limp here and there every time. This moved my stack up to around $210K with the average stack probably around $250K.
From UTG I’m dealt
Not a bad hand, in fact, one of my favorite hands. I was going to raise but just kind of got a vibe like that wasn’t a good idea – I had raised the 3 previous pots. So, I made my mistake and limped for $6K – the only time in the whole 9 hour game that I opened limped. I normally, do not limp at all, but for some reason it just felt right here; 5 handed games kind of change your perspective.
UTG +1 (Chip Leader - ~$450K stack) raised to $17K and everybody at the table called – specifically why I felt raising for the 4th consecutive time was not a good idea. So, I called the $11K on top of my limp and went to the flop.
Pot: $90K
Flop:
The small blind checked. My immediate thought was to check raise as I was nearly certain that UTG +1 would bet here. I checked, and he didn’t disappoint with a $60K C-Bet. Everyone folded around to me. I very calmly and methodically took my time and stated “all-in” to which I received a snap call from my opponent.
UTG +1 showed:
“Yeah that’s what I thought you had” he said as I’m just like “really, and you snap called anyway?” But, that’s just what I was thinking – I didn’t say anything.
Pot: $476K
Turn:
River:
And my night was over in 11th place for a whopping $350 on a $210 buy-in.
“Yeah, that’s the danger of playing that stuff.” said my opponent. I just rolled my eyes as I’m thinking “Yeah, 75/25 sucks man.” whatever, as I just left without saying anything.
So, I guess it comes down to one big question:
Was limping UTG in a 5-handed game the wrong path?
Obviously, it’s easy after knowing the result to say I should have open folded 9 10 UTG – or raised it like I normally would if I was going to play it. However, we know now that I almost certainly would have been 3-bet pre-flop if I had done so; and I couldn’t call OOP. I did get the money in, in nearly an 80/20 situation; so my line here can’t be terrible, but I’m just wondering if I screwed up really bad at the worst possible time or if I just got unlucky at the worst possible time.
There were 102 entries and the bubble burst at 13th. We were down to the final table bubble and I busted on that bubble at 11th place.
It had been a good day, I was seeing some cards, but was more importantly finding myself in positions of opportunity; one time, taking full advantage of a tilting player when we were in the low 20 players remaining and more than doubling up to about $150K. At that time, the average stack was probably more like $200K, but $150K was a good stack with several weak players sitting around $50 to $70K.
Anyway, we were down to 11 and I started my final table run. I was getting monster hands in a 5 handed game too; AJ, AK, JJ from late positions or the blinds, so, I kept raising. Blinds were $6K/$3K/$1K and I raised 3 consecutive hands in a row and simply won the blinds and antes, plus maybe a limp here and there every time. This moved my stack up to around $210K with the average stack probably around $250K.
From UTG I’m dealt
Not a bad hand, in fact, one of my favorite hands. I was going to raise but just kind of got a vibe like that wasn’t a good idea – I had raised the 3 previous pots. So, I made my mistake and limped for $6K – the only time in the whole 9 hour game that I opened limped. I normally, do not limp at all, but for some reason it just felt right here; 5 handed games kind of change your perspective.
UTG +1 (Chip Leader - ~$450K stack) raised to $17K and everybody at the table called – specifically why I felt raising for the 4th consecutive time was not a good idea. So, I called the $11K on top of my limp and went to the flop.
Pot: $90K
Flop:
The small blind checked. My immediate thought was to check raise as I was nearly certain that UTG +1 would bet here. I checked, and he didn’t disappoint with a $60K C-Bet. Everyone folded around to me. I very calmly and methodically took my time and stated “all-in” to which I received a snap call from my opponent.
UTG +1 showed:
“Yeah that’s what I thought you had” he said as I’m just like “really, and you snap called anyway?” But, that’s just what I was thinking – I didn’t say anything.
Pot: $476K
Turn:
River:
And my night was over in 11th place for a whopping $350 on a $210 buy-in.
“Yeah, that’s the danger of playing that stuff.” said my opponent. I just rolled my eyes as I’m thinking “Yeah, 75/25 sucks man.” whatever, as I just left without saying anything.
So, I guess it comes down to one big question:
Was limping UTG in a 5-handed game the wrong path?
Obviously, it’s easy after knowing the result to say I should have open folded 9 10 UTG – or raised it like I normally would if I was going to play it. However, we know now that I almost certainly would have been 3-bet pre-flop if I had done so; and I couldn’t call OOP. I did get the money in, in nearly an 80/20 situation; so my line here can’t be terrible, but I’m just wondering if I screwed up really bad at the worst possible time or if I just got unlucky at the worst possible time.