What is the right play here?

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NoFoldemJAS

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Ok, I am in this tournament and we are at the 3rd blind level. The first 4 blind levels are 40 minutes long. After that it goes down to 20 minutes. I am chip leader at my table and have a pretty good read on the other players. The blinds are 75,150. I limp in UTG with J,10 suited spades. A player two seats to my left has been very active and aggressive. I have noticed that he has overplayed, or over bet, a lot of hands relative to the blinds. He raises to 450. The button and both blinds call, so I call. The flop comes down 9,6,2 all spades. Both blinds check to me and I decide to check and see what my villain, the original raiser decides to do. He goes all in. The big blind looks reluctant to call but then decides to. The villain is setting with about 1/3 of the size of my stack. The big blind has about 1/4 the size of my stack. I think that there is no way that he would just go all in with a better flush than me. I didn't think that the BB was an advanced player disguising a better flush than me. I also figured that if he did have a better flush than the side pot would justify loosing the main pot. So I decide to call.

The villain has KK with a K of spade and the BB has A6o with the A of spades. Of course the 4th spade comes on the river. My question to the play is should I have represented the flush with a 1/3 or 1/2 pot size bet after BB checked to me? Is this another case of trapping myself? Also what are the odds of that 4th spade coming? I mean there are only 5 spades left in the deck at best if there wasn't one in another players hand or the burn cards. Should I just chalk it up to perhaps the BB has a Queen high flush and fold in that spot because it's so early in the tournament and look for a better spot?
 
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dble1meup

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So I just put the hands in pokerstove with the cards on the flop. So before the turn you had a 69% chance of winning. The guy with the Ace of spades had a 28% chance of winning and the guy with Kings and the king of spades had a 3% chance of winning. So those are the odds of winning. I hope this helps you out with the chances a spade would hit. Now, on that flop there is absolutely nothing you can do. If the guy has an Ace of spades he's not folding until the turn and river bricks and same as the guy with the King of spades. It's just unlucky another spade hit that board. Now, in my opinion you shouldn't have even been in that hand. UTG with J10 suited and blinds 75/150 you should be playing a hand range of something like top 7 to 10 percent so AQo+, AQs+, KQs, 88s+, but you can play 22s up to 77s as well to set mine but I wouldn't be calling off preflop for at best a flip. Now if you were in middle position, the hijack, cutoff, or button, and even the blinds if the price is right (pot odds) then yes you would be playing J10s in that spot, but I wouldn't be limping. Be consistent, only limp hands when passive players are behind but never UTG, UTG+1, and UTG+2. Just min raise with the J10s in the spots I described but if in the blinds calling is ok too. And if you see a reraise just fold because you don't need to force it when the blinds are 75/150 and no ante.
 
hobonc

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The Ace isn't folding to your bet no matter the size if he isn't folding to the original raiser's all-in.

I'm not sure I can fold as hand was played and the only other option is call. It just didn't work out this time.
 
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WillinNewHaven

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After the flop, it's all on rails* and you were very unlucky to lose. You should have won a big pot.

On the other hand, I would have seen the flop and said "why did I fold JTs under the gun?"
 
R3DRANG3R

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i think you did everything right you just got unlucky.

i dont like limping in utg in a tourney. either raise or fold especially with those blinds. but i limp alot in cash games lol
 
Mr Sandbag

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You played it right, just got unlucky. You checked, hoping the villain bets into you, and got even more lucky that he shoved and someone else called! Unfortunately your luck ran out right there.

As for everyone telling you to fold preflop, I don't know how they can say that. You didn't even specify the size of your stack. If you were deep stacked, I don't see anything wrong with the preflop play. I know you said you were chip leader, but what was the size of your stack?
 
stevenright

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really people are saying you did everything right?

If you had RAISED pre-flop the A6o woudn't even BE in the pot to begin with..

You open-raised and MAYBE called a 3-bet of villain if had good odds and go heads up to the flop, where you would win all his chips.
 
Mr Sandbag

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stevenright said:
really people are saying you did everything right?

If you had RAISED pre-flop the A6o woudn't even BE in the pot to begin with..

You open-raised and MAYBE called a 3-bet of villain if had good odds and go heads up to the flop, where you would win all his chips.
Click to expand...

A6o called the villain's preflop raise. Are you suggesting a 3bet with J10 OOP would be the right play??
 
Arjonius

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fold pre-.

Given what actually happened, bet a normal amount when it's checked to you, say 60-67% of the pot. You flopped very well in a situation where it looks like there's a good chance someone will be willing to play for the max with a draw or an overpair. So build the pot, and don't fall prey to fancy play syndrome by checking or betting smaller.

Also, if you're really asking how you could have lost less on the hand by playing differently after you limped, that's the wrong question. The right one is how you should have played the entire hand regardless of the result. And the answer to that is fold pre-.
 
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WillinNewHaven

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Mr Sandbag said:
You played it right, just got unlucky. You checked, hoping the villain bets into you, and got even more lucky that he shoved and someone else called! Unfortunately your luck ran out right there.

As for everyone telling you to fold preflop, I don't know how they can say that. You didn't even specify the size of your stack. If you were deep stacked, I don't see anything wrong with the preflop play. I know you said you were chip leader, but what was the size of your stack?
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Stack depth does come into it. With deep enough stacks I could open-raise with that hand UTG and even with slightly smaller stacks around the table if there are a lot of people at the table who seem to think I'm tight because I'm old and I've been running all over them.

At most tournament stack depths, I fold this hand 100% of the time. Limping with it in a cash game is something I do even though I don't like it.

There probably are stack depths where I ought to limp with this hand UTG but I don't know what they are. :)
 
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WillinNewHaven

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Arjonius said:
fold pre-.

Given what actually happened, bet a normal amount when it's checked to you, say 60-67% of the pot. You flopped very well in a situation where it looks like there's a good chance someone will be willing to play for the max with a draw or an overpair. So build the pot, and don't fall prey to fancy play syndrome by checking or betting smaller.

Also, if you're really asking how you could have lost less on the hand by playing differently after you limped, that's the wrong question. The right one is how you should have played the entire hand regardless of the result. And the answer to that is fold pre-.
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This
 
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JaguarJT

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Unfortunate ending but you played it almost correctly if you consider limping the suited connectors utg within your range. Just a river game sometimes
 
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NoFoldemJAS

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Thank you for all the responses. As for my stack size at the time, I had about 15K and we started with 4K. As far as not raising UTG, I'm not a fan of that move on a full table as I will be out of Position in the hand and 1 caller creates odds for everyone else. I was trying to keep pot control. I like to raise UTG when we are 6 handed or less
 
stevenright

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Mr Sandbag said:
A6o called the villain's preflop raise. Are you suggesting a 3bet with J10 OOP would be the right play??
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nope.

I'm saying 'if' he's feeling like gambling he shoudve RAISED the pot and not limped in, the KK guy woudve re-raised him, everyone would fold and he could call if he likes to be heads up with that hand, wich would give him the best flop in this case and woudve gotten all the villains chips
 
NeverEnough

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Fold or raise pre. Don't limp UTG w/that IMO.
 
rivernickels

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I agree, I'm not sure about limping there. Raise or fold imo. But you were at the table and I wasn't and I can imagine tables that I limp more than others. The river spade is unfortunate, but you gotta get your chips in on that flop with that kind of action.
 
Loonbat

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NeverEnough said:
Fold or raise pre. Don't limp UTG w/that IMO.
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rivernickels said:
I agree, I'm not sure about limping there. Raise or fold imo. But you were at the table and I wasn't and I can imagine tables that I limp more than others. The river spade is unfortunate, but you gotta get your chips in on that flop with that kind of action.
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Yes and yes. Given you're 100 BBs deep, nothing wrong with exerting some table pressure from any position. I prefer the raise to the fold and hate the limp. If you limp/call this hand, you're playing a bloated pot OOP and are likely to lose more chips than if you raise/fold to a 3B (depending on the opponent).
 
Abedin120

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Whatever you do the villain will call you anywhere I think. It's no matter did you bet 1/3 or 1/2 of the pot, because the villain had KK and I think that nobody will throw away that cards where the flop is 9,6,2, and especially when the one of the kings is spade. So you played well but you didn't have very lucky.
 
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NoFoldemJAS said:
Ok, I am in this tournament and we are at the 3rd blind level. The first 4 blind levels are 40 minutes long. After that it goes down to 20 minutes. I am chip leader at my table and have a pretty good read on the other players. The blinds are 75,150. I limp in UTG with J,10 suited spades. A player two seats to my left has been very active and aggressive. I have noticed that he has overplayed, or over bet, a lot of hands relative to the blinds. He raises to 450. The button and both blinds call, so I call. The flop comes down 9,6,2 all spades. Both blinds check to me and I decide to check and see what my villain, the original raiser decides to do. He goes all in. The big blind looks reluctant to call but then decides to. The villain is setting with about 1/3 of the size of my stack. The big blind has about 1/4 the size of my stack. I think that there is no way that he would just go all in with a better flush than me. I didn't think that the BB was an advanced player disguising a better flush than me. I also figured that if he did have a better flush than the side pot would justify loosing the main pot. So I decide to call.

The villain has KK with a K of spade and the BB has A6o with the A of spades. Of course the 4th spade comes on the river. My question to the play is should I have represented the flush with a 1/3 or 1/2 pot size bet after BB checked to me? Is this another case of trapping myself? Also what are the odds of that 4th spade coming? I mean there are only 5 spades left in the deck at best if there wasn't one in another players hand or the burn cards. Should I just chalk it up to perhaps the BB has a Queen high flush and fold in that spot because it's so early in the tournament and look for a better spot?
Click to expand...

I think an argument can be made for your going all-in on the flop. Odds are that you aren't going to fold no matter how the players to your left react, but it's possibly that you generate enough fold equity because you're the big stack that you get a player with a smaller chipstack to fold. Given the quality of the players you described, probably not --- but at least you give yourself a CHANCE to utilize your big stack/fold equity. Calling never allows that.

The best poker advice that I ever got was the following: you need a much stronger hand to call a bet or raise in poker than you do to bet or raise, because betting and raising can win the pot RIGHT NOW while calling never can (unless play has reached the river, of course). Your play here didn't allow you to wield your big stack. I doubt the results would have changed, but you may have been able to prevent your opponents from drawing out on you.

Just food for thought. Run well.

-HooDooKoo
 
stevenright

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stevenright said:
really people are saying you did everything right?

If you had RAISED pre-flop the A6o woudn't even BE in the pot to begin with..

You open-raised and MAYBE called a 3-bet of villain if had good odds and go heads up to the flop, where you would win all his chips.
Click to expand...

Mr Sandbag said:
A6o called the villain's preflop raise. Are you suggesting a 3bet with J10 OOP would be the right play??
Click to expand...

stevenright said:
nope.

I'm saying 'if' he's feeling like gambling he shoudve RAISED the pot and not limped in, the KK guy woudve re-raised him, everyone would fold and he could call if he likes to be heads up with that hand, wich would give him the best flop in this case and woudve gotten all the villains chips
Click to expand...



Sorry, i didn't realized one of the K was spade... so i guess this hand was bound to end his chips lol
 
PurgatoryD

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Your mistake was the UTG limp. In my opinion, you only had two real possible plays there:

(1) Fold.
(2) Bet enough to get any A-rag to fold. Based on your read of the other players, only you can know what it would take to get that to happen. If you've got a calling station behind you that will never fold A-rag, then the right play is to fold.

Disclaimer: I have been known to be a bit nitty at times! :)
 
Airburn

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I think this was the right play , Just unlucky! keep playing smart and right, it will pay off!! =)
 
soncheebs

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Being the chip leader relatively early on in the tourney u played everything fine, besides maybe folding to the initial pre flop raise which I would of done.
 
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That seems like a very good tournament structure. Where was this tournament?
 
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