$CC FR NL HE MTT: Is 54 % equity enough to defend BB with about 10 BB

[Goggelheimer]

Game

Hold'em

Game Format

No Limit

Table Format

MTT

Buy-in

CC FR

Freeroll

1. Freeroll

Currency

$

Villain complaining about my call to his HJ steal push.

Push and Fold

I thought it was a coin flip.

After evalutaing the hand with equilab I think I have made the right decision.



Any thought's or comments.

 

[MK_]

Meh... Let em whine, seems pretty standard👍

 

[SpanRmonka]

I think you have to consider your opponents range, which will include all Ax with a better kicker than yours, all pairs most likely, or you could discount 55 and below, plus loads of hands similar to KTs, like JTs KJs etc. Not saying you made the wrong call as such, but just making the point that you need to be considering the full range and not just what he actually had this particular hand.

 

[fundiver199]

As SpanRmonka say, Villain has a range and not a hand. We can use software like ICMizer find our calling range. In chip EV, which mean not taking ICM or payjumps into account, the calling range from BB against a HJ jam for 10BB is 24% of hands or more specifically 22+, A4+, KT+, QJ, A2s+, K9s+, JTs+. So in chip EV A5o is a good call winning you 0,24BB. This is assuming, that Villain is jamming the Nash range, which is this case is 28% or slightly more hands, than you are calling. If he is not jamming all those hands, A5o can become a losing call.

However things change drastically, if ICM or payjumps are relevant. Lets say its a 9-man SnG with 6 players left, and everyone have 10BB. Now HJ is only supposed to jam 26% of hands, so slightly less than before, but not really all that different. BB however is only supposed to call 9,5% of hands or more specifically 66+, AT+, A9s, KQs. Now calling with A5o loses you 1,75% of the price pool, which count as a very significant mistake. And the reason for that is, that if you call and lose, you are out. But if you call and win, you can still only win one of the 3 prices and not the entire price pool.

A good way to illustrate this idea is to look at the game of chicken, where two hard-headed young men drive against each other in their cars. The one, who first turn away AKA "the chicken", is the loser and end in the ditch. However if none turn away, they collide and both die. When a poker player has moved all-in, its equivalent to one of the drivers taking off his steering wheel and holding it out the window for the other driver to see. That driver now know, he is not able to turn away, even if he wanted to, so he will need to do it to avoid the collision and survive. Which in poker mean folding.

So depending on, what stage of the tournament this was, and what other players stack sizes were, this might have been an ok but marginal call or a really bad call, even though you were slightly ahead of his actual hand this time. Of course it also depends on, if 10BB was your stack or his stack. If he was the one jamming for 10BB, but you had 40BB, then you can call close to the chip EV range, because losing dont end your tournament.

 

[Goggelheimer]

I think you have to consider your opponents range, which will include all Ax with a better kicker than yours, all pairs most likely, or you could discount 55 and below, plus loads of hands similar to KTs, like JTs KJs etc. Not saying you made the wrong call as such, but just making the point that you need to be considering the full range and not just what he actually had this particular hand.

The only read I had on him that he prefers to play weak Aces.
My defending range as BB as a not push should look more or less like this, where the not marked hands 99+, ATs/AJo+, are clear rejams.


Since it's a shove I should have made some adjustments that look like this.
the A5o is a marginal call but has the nut low street (wheel) potential .

 

[SpanRmonka]

My personal gut feel is that I don't want to call there.

Your screenshots above tend to show that too. For me personally I think we get persuaded by these programs to make marginal calls too often....
I may be wrong, but in my opinion, marginally correct calls are INCORRECT calls in most games we play.

My reasons for this:

As @fundiver199 mentions, many situations have ICM considerations, this table 'looks' like it could have due to only having 6 players on it. This should lead us to calling off way way tighter.

Other players don't play correctly, especially at microstakes.....this means there are far easier spots to win chips than making marginal calls. Players will over fold to shoves for example, they will limp fold too often, they will limp to your rubbish BB holding, over fold to 3 bets etc etc, all these weak plays can mean you don't have to make marginal calls for the majority of your chips.

Microstakes populations tend to be either too maniac or too tight....So actually you're likely either calling too often against maniacs, and them will eventually lose, or caling off too weak to tight player, and will often be behind. This is not about specific players, its more about the player pool as a whole.

Winning chips is less good than losing chips is bad, as in it harms our chances losing this hand more than winning the one pot increases our chances of winning.

I'd rather be shoving and having 2 chances to win than calling and having to hold or get lucky.

Now though to answer your original point, despite the fact I don't think I'm calling here, I also don't think the call is in any way bad enough to be berated by another player.

This hand has created a great study opportunity, but it also throws up one more point which I think could benefit from. Don't give any F**ks what other players think about your game. Most times the players mouthing off are wrong anyway, or just think they are GTO experts in the micros, which is next to pointless in my opinion. Worrying about other reactions is what can lead you to not making correct decisions. I'm saying this as someone who still feels like this, especially playing live, its like I intimidate myself into not wanting to look stupid.....play your game, be able to justify your decisions to yourself, and that will help your game. I'm still working on that!

 

[fundiver199]

Most times the players mouthing off are wrong anyway, or just think they are GTO experts in the micros, which is next to pointless in my opinion.

Or even worse in a freeroll on a play money site, which was the situation here. But yeah. Every time someone goes off in the chat about, how someone else made a bad play, that instantly earns them a fish tag and a pack of tissues, if I play on pokerstars. If nothing else its bad for business to berate other players, because only two things can come from it:

1) They get insulted and stop playing
2) They think "hey maybe he has a point", and then they study and become better

 

[fundiver199]

Other players don't play correctly, especially at microstakes.....this means there are far easier spots to win chips than making marginal calls. Players will over fold to shoves for example, they will limp fold too often, they will limp to your rubbish BB holding, over fold to 3 bets etc etc, all these weak plays can mean you don't have to make marginal calls for the majority of your chips.

This is very true, and in real time, if we are in dought, its always better to lean on the side of folding. If SB jams for 10BB, there are few situations, where I am not snap calling with A5o. But when its HJ jamming, I would rarely be calling here. I will say though, that in a freeroll it can be ok to use a "go strong or go home" approach. In this particular spot I would probably still not be calling, since it seems like, the final table might be getting near. But in the early game I rarely make big folds in a freeroll. If someone can beat for instance my top pair good kicker, then good for them. Now I can do something else, and I only invested a little bit of my time

 

[Goggelheimer]

My personal gut feel is that I don't want to call there.

Your screenshots above tend to show that too. For me personally I think we get persuaded by these programs to make marginal calls too often....
I may be wrong, but in my opinion, marginally correct calls are INCORRECT calls in most games we play.

These are in noway correct tournament ranges, or ICM ranges. Since the play around 10BB is mostly push or fold,
at a short handed table with antes, stealing, and steal shoving is crucial, to keep the stack healthy. If you get too far below the 10 BB your options are very limited, as they are right now. It is a phase where playing too tight may be the wrong way.

This hand has created a great study opportunity, but it also throws up one more point which I think could benefit from.

Thanks.

Don't give any F**ks what other players think about your game.

It's more or less always so, most play poker in their view of the game.

Most times the players mouthing off are wrong anyway, or just think they are GTO experts in the micros, which is next to pointless in my opinion. Worrying about other reactions is what can lead you to not making correct decisions. I'm saying this as someone who still feels like this, especially playing live, its like I intimidate myself into not wanting to look stupid.....play your game, be able to justify your decisions to yourself, and that will help your game. I'm still working on that!

GTO is a fine thing if you play against a computer, but I think there are not many humans that are able to play GTO perfect.
I think a playing style that is a mixture of exploitative, GTO, ABC is perhaps that works.
It's more about adapting to things you have seen or noticed about your table players. Tournament is a more complex strategy game because of the different stages of a tournament (early; middle, late) and the situations you are in, in those stages.
A hand like this can be the turn point in a tournament, giving or destroying momentum, what can also be a great factor in the endgame.

 

[fundiver199]

These are in noway correct tournament ranges, or ICM ranges. Since the play around 10BB is mostly push or fold,
at a short handed table with antes, stealing, and steal shoving is crucial, to keep the stack healthy. If you get too far below the 10 BB your options are very limited, as they are right now. It is a phase where playing too tight may be the wrong way.

This is true, but with 10BB you can still fold your big blind and hope to get a spot to open shove during the next orbit. Or a chance to call a shove with something just a little bit better than A5 offsuit, which is either far behind or only slightly ahead, as was the case here.