Pricing in

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markrh13

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What are your thoughts on being "priced into" a hand in a tournament? I know in a cash game, if you are priced in you should go for it; as even though you most likely won't hit, over a large enough sample size the few times that you DO hit will result in an overall profit. However, in a tournament you will not play a large enough number of hands for this to happen.
In a hand I played the other day in my local pub league this caused great debate. Final table, 6 players left. Blinds were 1K/2K and I had 6K. I was the BB in this hand so essentially once the hand started I was down to 2BB. The guy UTG shoved for 3K and all other players at the table called. The pot was offering me 17-1, and yet when I looked down at 2 4 offsuit, I folded. After the hand I was asked what cards were so terrible that they didn't justify those odds and was sternly told that was a bad fold (the fact that the flop was A35 probably didn't help lol). Yet I would stand by my decision that in a spot like that, it's better to throw away a bad hand regardless of what odds you're being given. What do you think?
 
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Dezastor

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depends. It makes sense to me in a rebuy tournament or if you have a big lead on your opponents, say 5/6 times more chips than them.
Otherwise it wouldn't make sense to me as you'd quite likely go out and all those hands you've been wining up until that Point would have been all for naught.
 
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markrh13

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That's what I was thinking. So long as you have enough chips to absorb the losses until a win comes (as you would with a cash game) then it makes sense, but otherwise you're almost gambling your tournament life on something that more than likely won't happen.
Do I take it from your comment that you would have folded too in the hand that I mentioned? Thanks for the reply :)
 
Largebalance

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As you said you were at the final table and short stacked I would fold as well. The pot odds definately said call but if I was in your seat i would never call there, in the situation you described I would either fold or push and pray.
 
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Caissa

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You are absolutely right. In cash games you simply reload your stack and keep playing. In tournaments you can't do that. If you lose your stack you lose everything.

In a tournament 1 chip does not equal $1 (or whatever) like in a cash game. If you are the player who wins all the chips you do not win all the money due to the payout structure. It's called the Independent Chip Model.

So you have a couple of calculations to do. It's really complex. I just kind of estimate it. So you look at three things:

What happens to my expected payout if I fold?
What happens to my expected payout if I call and win?
What happens to my expected payout if I call and lose?

See the chips and the pot odds don't really matter any more. What matters is whats going to happen to your expected payout.

What happens to my expected payout if I fold? I have 1 BB. EV is positive. You still have equity in the tournament.

What happens to my expected payout if I call and win? I have 8.5 BB. EV is more positive. How much more equity in the tournament you would gain depends on how many chips the others hold and the payout structure. This is complicated math which I don't know how to do.

What happens to my expected payout if I call and lose? EV is 0, no equity in the tournament.

So if the five players before you are all playing any two cards you have less than a 10% chance of taking down the pot, leaving you with 9.5 BB so your chances of staying in the tournament are actually much slimmer. Not worth it to gain a stack size under 10BB that late in the tourney. Especially since someone might bust out on the very next hand.

I'm kinda new at this but I have been studying hard. If any of you grinders read this and I'm off base let me know, but be kind about it :)
 
suby_rafael

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Good fold ... if one or two players go bust in this hand which is very likely to happen then you are getting a pay jump and that is what matters most.

You can get it in in the next hand unless two players go all in again. In that case even if you will have less than 1 big blind then you should fold again because you might get another pay jump if one player goes bust. :)
 
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markrh13

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Thanks guys, what you've said was pretty much what was going through my head when I made the decision. It was just the guy berating at me afterwards for the fold; he looked at me like I'd just fallen out of a tree or something and he did actually make me doubt myself. There again... maybe that's why I finished higher up the league table than him (that game was the last in the season) :D
Thanks again for putting my mind at rest :)
 
Arjonius

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I pretty much ignore any "advice" that opponents give me at the table. Most of the time, it comes from people who have their own interests at stake and/or who have just had a negative outcome from whatever you did or didn't do. In either case, it's not as if what they're telling you stems from a sincere desire to help you improve.

As for the example hand, the pot odds of 17:1 have to be assessed vs the card odds of beating 5 opponents with 4 2 off while also factoring in value of finishing higher up the prize table.
 
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