What would you do?

This is kind of like a little test here in the tourney section to get the though process flowing around here. This is obviously a hand I was in and I will tell you what i did and what the best thing to do is. Remember stack sizes, blinds, etc....

Ok so you're in an 11$ double stack mtt at poker stars and there is about 90 ppl left out of almost 6k entered.

You have Q J os in the BB and have the CO and Button in action. Before you answer let me tell you some things about the button and CO.

The CO just recently won a big hand by sucking out on the river and has been decently loose, although we don't know how much he has been raising in the CO or button to the blinds.

The button has been a calling station calling a lot of raise PF and limping....

So what do you do?


pokerstars No-Limit Hold'em, 11 Tournament, 4000/8000 Blinds 1000 Ante (8 handed) - Poker-Stars Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

MP2 (t181834)
CO (t371096)
Button (t349526)
SB (t238872)
Hero (BB) (t531900)
UTG (t153080)
UTG+1 (t140924)
MP1 (t320093)

Hero's M: 26.59

Preflop: Hero is BB with Q , J
4 folds, CO bets t17195, Button calls t17195, 1 fold, Hero ?????, 2 folds

QJ easy fold for me in that spot

I would fold and let them fight it out, but I am a nit.

Looks like a squeeze play should work here....but... big but... Co has some chips now and is almost pot comitted and button has 50% of his chips comitted to pot.

If you push will both players fold ? ..I doubt it.

So lets look at chip stacks.. again I fold here

Your chip leader of your table whats your tourney standing?

the lab man said:

Looks like a squeeze play should work here....but... big but... Co has some chips now and is almost pot comitted and button has 50% of his chips comitted to pot.

If you push will both players fold ? ..I doubt it.

So lets look at chip stacks.. again I fold here

Your chip leader of your table whats your tourney standing?

Click to expand...

how does the Button have 50% of his chips commited? He has over 300k...

sorry i read wrong , squeeze can work here

I would consider making the call here because you're up over 500k and calling 2x the big blind, or 17k, would hardly put a dent in your stack if you want to see a flop and potentially get lucky. On the other hand, if you want to play passively and very tight as the chip leader at your table and stay in control of that chip lead, then fold. Personally I would call though.

squeeze them, perfect spot. Or you can call, your hand plays really well postflop, i'd probably prefer to squeeze with a hand that has no potential postflop.

Two questions -

Are you already in the money, and if not, how far off is the bubble?
Do you know the average chipstack for the tournament at this point?

The answers might change my strategy, but I'm thinking a bet of about 120,000 would be about right. If one of them goes all-in, then I can fold and still be 1st or 2nd chipstack at the table. But unless one of them has a huge hand, they're not getting very good odds to call. Also, they each would have to put in about 1/3 of their chips to stay in, so they would be pretty close to pot committed anyway if they have any kind of draw after the flop.

Am I close?

I bet 42K and fold to a reraise.

With a medium stack or less it's an instafold.

kcanuck said:

I bet 42K and fold to a reraise.

With a medium stack or less it's an instafold.

Click to expand...

That would give them about 3.5:1 odds to call and see a flop, and cost them less than 10% of their chips. I think that makes it too attractive to call with any fairly good hand.

I probably call and look to either flop big or catch a good draw. Button is a calling station so there's a good chance we get paid if we hit. Plus button is a calling station so if we raise here we'll almost certainly end up playing a bloated pot OOP which isn't the funnest thing in the world and everybody's deep enough that I just can't bring myself to fold preflop to what's barely more than a minraise.

I think about a raise to 90k or so seems about right to me, this bet stops you from being really committed if the CO shoves (I doubt the button is going to) one question to you kc how much of a callingstation is the button? if you make this raise how often would you see a call from him if the CO folds? this could potentially change the move..

imwatcher said:

I think about a raise to 90k or so seems about right to me, this bet stops you from being really committed if the CO shoves (I doubt the button is going to) one question to you kc how much of a callingstation is the button? if you make this raise how often would you see a call from him if the CO folds? this could potentially change the move..

Click to expand...

Generally stations like that will call a smallish bet, but fold to any real heat like this raise, i find it hard to see the button calling here with much of his range, and if he does call, we can probably just c-bet the flop and take it down a huge % of the time ( i haven't checked stack sizes, so i have no idea how committing the c-bet will actually be).

A cbet would be quite committing, i think the pot would be about 210k, a bet of 130k would be pretty standard if he shoved it would be 120k more into almost 500k..... which is why i'm not completely sure whether it is just a call or raise..... I do think the raise is better though because you will be getting more folds.. maybe a raise to 75k would be better.. if bb called pot would be 170k and a 95k bet might not commit you completely...

I would fold this unless I have a dead on read of both of the players involved in the hand. If we had like...oh i dunno, 400k less chips, i would consider shoving...but as it stands the only real option is to reraise w/o shoving, which gives them the opportunity to call and have position on us after we've committed a lot of chips. Just fold and wait for a better spot, since you'll have about 89374289320 better spots when you have nearly 80bb.

Note: If I was on the button I would probably do something here.

I fold and look forward to having the button!

x2486 said:

Two questions -

Are you already in the money, and if not, how far off is the bubble?
Do you know the average chipstack for the tournament at this point?

The answers might change my strategy, but I'm thinking a bet of about 120,000 would be about right. If one of them goes all-in, then I can fold and still be 1st or 2nd chipstack at the table. But unless one of them has a huge hand, they're not getting very good odds to call. Also, they each would have to put in about 1/3 of their chips to stay in, so they would be pretty close to pot committed anyway if they have any kind of draw after the flop.

Am I close?

Click to expand...

Ok so I've seen it multiple times now and yes a squeeze play is what I wanted the majority who didn't want to raise in this spot to see. Average stack at this point I wanna say 250k, but I am not exactly sure. The bubble is long gone as the top 866 got paid and we were under 100 left.

This was an 11$ mtt so not really dealing with pros here either.

Other than the half descent notes we have on the villians, we also have a good table image(showed down good hands or didn't show at all) and have the chip stack to execute this right.

Another thing to notice is the bet he made compared to the blinds. 17k is barely over a min bet here, and from my experience, and the fact that I do the same thing, this is a ploy to make an odd bet look big in order to steal in position.

So all signs are pointing to stealing from the CO. But what about the calling station. Easy, IMO. Make a raise big enough that you haven't seen him call. which is close to 120k...and exactly how much I popped it.

They both instantly folded.

With that raise, you're putting in 115k (1/4 of your stack) to win 44k (less than 10% of your stack)...which means you need a 70% fold rate here just to break even on your raise.

IMO this is a bad decision. It will work sometimes, just like everything works sometimes, but long term it will probably cost you some money.

Bwammo said:

With that raise, you're putting in 115k (1/4 of your stack) to win 44k (less than 10% of your stack)...which means you need a 70% fold rate here just to break even on your raise.

IMO this is a bad decision. It will work sometimes, just like everything works sometimes, but long term it will probably cost you some money.

Click to expand...

this is understandable, i hardly play on ps so im getting them to send my HHs from that tourney and I was guesstimating on my bet when I answered. Interesting to see that you say why you dont like it, but not how you would do it....

KingCurtis said:

...close to 120k...and exactly how much I popped it.

Click to expand...

Yeah!:star: What do I win? :crickets chirping:

Just wondering, if one of them does call, what do you do on the flop? I'm thinking check-fold with anything less than 2-pair or an A or K on the flop, all-in with 2-pair, and check-raise with anything better.

im pretty aggressive so im either c betting in EP or check reraising certain flops even with an Ace or King.

Also like I said above i might be wrong on the 120k pop, im waiting on the HH and what I actually did....

Lol I was completely wrong on the 120k....
you like this bet better Bwammo?

PokerStars Game #52183168888: Tournament #338010494, $10+$1 USD Hold'em No Limit - Level
XXIX (4000/8000) - 2010/11/04 19:18:07 ET
Table '338010494 147' 9-max Seat #3 is the button
Seat 1: rivermen123 (181834 in chips)
Seat 2: mikelong11 (371096 in chips)
Seat 3: HeCk}l{y04 (349526 in chips)
Seat 4: mennatime45 (238872 in chips)
Seat 6: KingCurtis67 (531900 in chips)
Seat 7: Txeitx (153080 in chips)
Seat 8: Heathwood45 (140924 in chips)
Seat 9: iamhiv (320093 in chips)
rivermen123: posts the ante 1000
mikelong11: posts the ante 1000
HeCk}l{y04: posts the ante 1000
mennatime45: posts the ante 1000
KingCurtis67: posts the ante 1000
Txeitx: posts the ante 1000
Heathwood45: posts the ante 1000
iamhiv: posts the ante 1000
mennatime45: posts small blind 4000
KingCurtis67: posts big blind 8000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to KingCurtis67 [Qh Jd]
Metranos is connected
Txeitx: folds
Heathwood45: folds
iamhiv: folds
rivermen123: folds
mikelong11: raises 9195 to 17195
HeCk}l{y04: calls 17195
mennatime45: folds
KingCurtis67: raises 47916 to 65111
mikelong11: folds
HeCk}l{y04: folds
Uncalled bet (47916) returned to KingCurtis67
KingCurtis67 collected 63585 from pot
KingCurtis67: doesn't show hand
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 63585 | Rake 0
Seat 1: rivermen123 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: mikelong11 folded before Flop
Seat 3: HeCk}l{y04 (button) folded before Flop
Seat 4: mennatime45 (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 6: KingCurtis67 (big blind) collected (63585)
Seat 7: Txeitx folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: Heathwood45 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: iamhiv folded before Flop (didn't bet)

Bwammo said:

With that raise, you're putting in 115k (1/4 of your stack) to win 44k (less than 10% of your stack)...which means you need a 70% fold rate here just to break even on your raise.

IMO this is a bad decision. It will work sometimes, just like everything works sometimes, but long term it will probably cost you some money.

Click to expand...

Actually, It's not quite that bad.

He's BB, so he only needs $112k to make that bet, and the pot is $54,390 because of the ante, so he needs them to fold just barely over 2/3 of the time to break even. If he's got a good read on the situation, then this probably works most of the time as long as he doesn't do it too much.

And even if they don't fold, if one or both just calls instead of shoving, then Hero can win the hand outright with a good flop and that would probably put this well into +EV territory.

KingCurtis said:

Lol I was completely wrong on the 120k....
you like this bet better Bwammo?
...
KingCurtis67: raises 47916 to 65111
mikelong11: folds
HeCk}l{y04: folds

Click to expand...

Okay, so it worked this time, but there's a larger set of hands that can call this than with the larger bet. It's just 10% of their stack to call at 2.8:1 odds for a 33% increase in their chips.

With the 120k bet, about the only hands you would get shoved back at with are hands that they would have raised more preflop (unless they're being really tricky), so I think it probably has a much higher chance of working.

All this being said, I don't think I've ever made this type of play (at least not consciously) but I just recently got through that section in HOH vol. II, so I'll certainly try to look for it in the future.