$3.30 NLHE MTT: Do you call this all-in?

[vegasjj]

Please read the details - as it really is relevant!

Do you have to call this all-in?

- This is Bubble hand - 12 people left (12th gets Bi back - 11 get $22 value ticket to ME - Micro Mil)
- I don't have a screen shot of the lobby - but the situation was the ALL-IN guy was the shortest - and there was no material difference in chips between positions 7 to 11 all were around 4000-5000
- The ALL-IN guy had about 10K chips about 2 hands earlier - where he got into a big betting with a bigger stack and lost to flush

PokerStars - $3+$0.30|200/400 Ante 50 NL - Holdem - 6 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

ConsensusG (CO): 11,909 (VPIP: 12.36, PFR: 4.65, 3Bet Preflop: 3.03, Hands: 92)
Dolphin23594 (BTN): 4,282 (VPIP: 16.25, PFR: 8.70, 3Bet Preflop: 1.85, Hands: 287)
robbit_lt (SB): 2,360 (VPIP: 16.98, PFR: 5.66, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, Hands: 57)
vegasjj49 (BB): 4,929
WCT17 (UTG): 26,536 (VPIP: 25.42, PFR: 22.03, 3Bet Preflop: 8.70, Hands: 60)
Vanes Crazy (MP): 10,588 (VPIP: 13.89, PFR: 14.29, 3Bet Preflop: 10.53, Hands: 37)

6 players post ante of 50, robbit_lt posts SB 200, vegasjj49 posts BB 400

Pre Flop: (pot: 900) vegasjj49 has 8:heart: Q:heart:

fold, fold, fold, fold, robbit_lt raises to 2,310 and is all-in, vegasjj49 calls 1,910

 

[horizon12]

In a normal tournament easy call, in the satellite does not make sense to risk when in the game there players who have less stacks than yours, so only fold. You still has a playable stack and you can wait for a ticket. In the satellites more important is fold equity, without this you have to fold in most cases.

 

[MasterOfDisaster]

no you don't, i agree sometimes making "feel'' calls , but I think most optimal in a satty is just to fold and hope someone bust before you do,

agree with horizon

 

[papi1207]

this is sattelite so snap fold, why you should risk anything, for what ??? :dontknow:

 

[10058765]

I'm going with horizon and MOD, esp because alone at this table, when you fold there's still 2 players with a shorter stack, and they'll be under extreme pressure in the next orbit.
If you call and lose the hand you'll be the shortest stack and next hand you have to pay the small blind.
That will give the other short stacks the opportunity to just wait for you to bust, in other words, you take away the pressure from them and put yourself in a terrible position.
If you call and win the hand it's all said and done ofcourse, but in my opinion your hand is not even close to good enough to call here.
Look at it this way...you're not yet sure of the ticket when you fold, so your equity is not yet $22 , but with 2 shorter stacks you do have a lot more equity than the $3.30 you already locked.
Calling here you're at best a 56 % favourite when the other player litterally shoves any two.
Against a specific hand you dominate you're better (close to 70 %) but we don't know his hand so we have to think of a shoving range.
I don't think that player is capable of shoving wide (look at his stats) so I actually think we're flipping at best.

Long story short, by calling here I think you risk way more equity than you can gain, so I'd say just fold.

Maybe it's terrible what I wrote here, but than, let's see if someone has arguments to favour a call.

 

[bremensha]

would only call w/ QQ+

 

[vegasjj]

Well I sure have lots more to learn.

My thinking at the time was:
He is in a position to shove any 2, Being probably upset he likely really is shoving anything at all. The stats are not really relevant in this situation. If I fold, I put myself in the position to be second to last - as such increasing the target on my back (Now I was one in the pack of about 5 players), putting myself in danger. At the same time - I give him strength at no cost to him at all. There is a very good chance that I win the hand - and it is all done... Should I lose - I still have a chance to stay alive...

I guess I have to give a much higher valuation to staying alive in this situation - then I did. I see the point... in same situation I would fold next time - call only with much stronger hand.

As far as reality .... it is kind of funny:

6 players post ante of 50, robbit_lt posts SB 200, vegasjj49 posts BB 400

Pre Flop: (pot: 900) vegasjj49 has 8:heart: Q:heart:

fold, fold, fold, fold, robbit_lt raises to 2,310 and is all-in, vegasjj49 calls 1,910

Flop: (4,920, 2 players) K:diamond: 5:heart: 2:spade:

Turn: (4,920, 2 players) 9:diamond:

River: (4,920, 2 players) 6:club:

robbit_lt shows 5:club: 2:heart: (Two Pair, Fives and Twos)
(Pre 33%, Flop 93%, Turn 100%)
vegasjj49 shows 8:heart: Q:heart: (High Card, King)
(Pre 67%, Flop 7%, Turn 0%)
robbit_lt wins 4,920

In the end - I did win a ticket... had QQ - my all-in called by AJ - was a bit scary flop AJx...Q...x
So I hung in and someone else went out

 

[matiusaa]

You have to fold because its a satellite, if you loose you are going to be the shortstack, so its not worth it

 

[WiZZiM]

calling here seems pretty easy if he's jamming wide. we win like 40% here minimum vs pretty much any range, so 40% of the time we make the money, 60% of the time we are left with a 2k stack and still a chance at making the money considering there are two tables still running. Since we have 400 already invested, and only have to call another 1.9k, the pot odds we get, and the fact our hand runs pretty well in all in pots all points to a call imo. But i'd be interested to run this one in an ICM calculator to find out (which is the only way to review this situation)

So i think you have this hand pretty much worked out vegas, i would have called also with a very similar thought process to yourself, but quite open to be proven wrong here, if i had an ICM calc i would have run it, maybe someone could run it for discussion purposes and post results?

 

[10058765]

calling here seems pretty easy if he's jamming wide. we win like 40% here minimum vs pretty much any range, so 40% of the time we make the money, 60% of the time we are left with a 2k stack and still a chance at making the money considering there are two tables still running. Since we have 400 already invested, and only have to call another 1.9k, the pot odds we get, and the fact our hand runs pretty well in all in pots all points to a call imo. But i'd be interested to run this one in an ICM calculator to find out (which is the only way to review this situation)

So i think you have this hand pretty much worked out vegas, i would have called also with a very similar thought process to yourself, but quite open to be proven wrong here, if i had an ICM calc i would have run it, maybe someone could run it for discussion purposes and post results?

Glad you jumped in....I responded with my thoughts, you respond with your's.
Responses like clear fold or clear call are of no value here....it's the reasoning behind our thinking which help.
You might be right, but unfortunately I have no ICM calculator either.....
I might be wrong saying I'd fold, but I gave my reasons why I would and looking into it again I'm pretty sure the decission whether to call or fold are pretty close to eachother.
My main reasons to support a fold were the equity we risk with a soso hand and doubting this guy would push ATC.

I actually did think about the fact we would still be in, even after losing the hand, but also kept in mind the pressure would be on the shorter stacks if we just decide to fold.

 

[WiZZiM]

yes well it's highly dependant on villians range here, but if he's ATC it's hard to find a fold with a well over top 50% hand since we're getting odds and we will win the pot so often. even vs a 80% range we win like 50% of the time and it's rare for him to have a range strong enough that we're less than a 40% dog to win the hand and burst the bubble.

All of that aside, all i'm really thinking here in game is " he's short, i still have a stack if i call and lose. the upside of winning this is that we burst the bubble and cash, and there is no guarantee that if we fold that we will cash, so i'm going to call wider than i normally would vs his range" now with that thought process, i can now play vs his range and estimate how wide i can call here, vs an 80% to ATC range this would be near the bottom of my range for calling, as stated it's an "easy" call vs a ATC range, that was just bad wording on my part, this isn't an easy call, but vs an ATC range this is gonna be around a 55% favourite (roughly, pokerstove it!) so more often than not i win a flip here. Now if this is a tight guy, we're gonna win like 30% of the time and suddenly this isn't in my range for calling. All of this is based on experience working with ICM calcs in lots of SNG bubble spots, and while it's not always 100% accurate, it's the best "guess" i have at this stage.

It will change with what i think villian is capable of shoving however, like if h'es only 50% this would be a fold for me, and i would tighten my range to around a top 20% hand range, so plenty of Ax, broadway and pairs. If he's top 30% then i might tighten to something dramatic to like AT 88+ since he's gonna have a lot of stuff that runs well when all 5 cards come out. So it all just depends, but as you mention, it's the thought behind moves that counts more than actually being correct here in this one spot.

 

[WiZZiM]

oh ya and this also changes if there is another extreme shortstack in play who is very likely to bubble this tournament. It also changes if the villians stack in this case leaves us with an unworkable and without FE stack size, the stack we're left with here is the absolute minimum i would want to call off with to have a decent amount of FE in future hands. calling this also has more merit on tables where we have more of the 4-5k stack sizes which we have the most amount of FE vs, here when we have a few bigger stacks who we have much less FE vs, it has less merit, making me think about calling a slightly tighter range in general than what i first thought. (in fact the fact we have a 25k stack and a 10k stack who won't think twice about calling 2k shove probably leans this bottom of my range call into a very close possible fold)

Really cool spot this actually, thanks for posting the hand.

 

[10058765]

I 'pokerstoved'...and looked at ATC down to 40 %.
I'm still not sure you know.
I mean it's a satty and folding seems to me the safest way to heaven.
I think it's pretty damn close and both a call and a fold are ok...

Though, one thing Wizzim mentions is the big stacks and believe me I say I looked at that in posting my opinion too.
Actually, that's why I mentioned the pressure the other SS have...they have those big stacks to take care of and in these cheap satties the big stacks want one thing....finish it of, so I'm pretty sure they will put the pressure on, knowing the shortstacks just can't call without an extremely strong hand.

Agreeing with Wizzim this is a very interesting hand/spot.

 

[WiZZiM]

sure your putting it in correctly? i get "equilabs" to 56% vs ATC range. don't have pokerstove but it does the same thing... unless i'm not putting it in correctly, but i can't see that i've made a flaw in any way...

MP2 43.98% 42.38% 1.60% random MP3 56.02% 54.42% 1.60% Qh8h

 

[10058765]

56 % against ATC is what I got in stove.

 

[WiZZiM]

but ya, folding can't be bad no matter what, but always good to look into if calling might be way better or not considering we have 400 chips invested, the pot is now 3k and we have 1.9k to make a call to knockout shortest stack and cash the tourney, considering also we have already have our buyin back i just don't see a downside to calling this.

 

[10058765]

But we're not talking a regular hand.
In a cash game if you think villain would shove ATC it's a call.
In a regular tournament, considering ICM it might be both a call or a fold.
In a satty, looking at the equity we have and the equity we might lose, no matter we're a favourite to win the hand, we maybe still have to fold.

Jeeez...whose idea was it to come with this and make me think that hard on a freaking Monday

 

[10058765]

but ya, folding can't be bad no matter what, but always good to look into if calling might be way better or not considering we have 400 chips invested, the pot is now 3k and we have 1.9k to make a call to knockout shortest stack and cash the tourney, considering also we have already have our buyin back i just don't see a downside to calling this.

Sure we have those invested, but there's another shortstack who will have to invest it too within a short time, and with those big stacks sitting there he'll be the one in trouble.
In a regular tournament we want to try to gain chips when we're ahead.
In a satty, on the bubble we just want one thing....save our chips and survive...

 

[WiZZiM]

yes i'm well aware of the differances between satties and cash games etc... In regards to the ICM in play here that equity is determined by how our stack size is in relation to others in the tournament, obviously with a flat payout structure the upside of winning isn't as large, but in this particular spot the upside of winning is very large when we think about our actual chances in this game.. So in this instance it will look at the upside of the equation, which is winning a $22 seat, and then also the downside of losing, which is being left with a 2kish stack size. It will also take into account the pot odds we are directly recieve and the fact we already have our buyin back which in this case was $3.30, so in this case we don't really stand to lose much apart from equity in the tournament. the stuff it cannot account for is the fact that we don't have as much fold equity vs whole table shoves, since we have bigger stacks at the table both of which are on our right, but that is also another reason to call this shove, since we cannot make any light shoves in future situations and we will be forced to fold a TON of hands hoping that someone else makes a mistake.

Anyways, we can babble about this all night, but without any actual figures from a well setup model in an ICM calculator it's kind of not worth discussing further.

 

[WiZZiM]

Sure we have those invested, but there's another shortstack who will have to invest it too within a short time, and with those big stacks sitting there he'll be the one in trouble.
In a regular tournament we want to try to gain chips when we're ahead.
In a satty, on the bubble we just want one thing....save our chips and survive...

Ya, but the thing is, blinds are big and will get bigger, so while you save your chips and survive, others will be doing the same pretty much. Obviously it's great when players go nuts and shove lots and spew equity to each other, but in the real world most of the stacks will be playing very tight with a very similar thought process to yourself here... Point is, you are never guaranteed to cash even if you play tight here, of course spewing equity isn't something we want either. What we really want is to make profitable plays according to ICM and the flat payscale in play here....

Since i haven't play all that much sattelite games or messed around with the ICM all that much with it, i can't say for sure if i'm on the right track here. But it seems like this is that one juicy spot to knock a player out as the downside of losing is less that the upside of winning.

 

[WiZZiM]

and if we're talking equity, that 2.3k stack is now a 3.3k stack and we have 4.5k stack, so we just gave him a ton of equity and future EV for basically nothing.

anyways that's all i got to say at this point, unless some ICM calcs come into play that solves this little mystery

 

[vegasjj]

WOW

I can tell you both for sure that I would have never gone through all these thoughts on my own!
Fantastic! Loved reading this!
And yes - this is what I hope for when I post a hand - some sense of the toughts behind the decision - not simply "the decision"

THANK YOU ALL VERY MUCH!

 

[MasterOfDisaster]

Fold and this player WCT17 (UTG): 26,536 (VPIP: 25.42, PFR: 22.03, 3Bet Preflop: 8.70, Hands: 60) will prolly bust another than you or someone at other table busts before you do.

 

[SwiftHax]

Hard to say, if you think he's on tilt from the last few hands then why not fold and let someone do the dirty work in another hand he's sure to shove again?

By winning you get yourself a $22 ticket and by losing you're the likeliest to finish 12th and get your 3.30 BI back, I don't think the call favors you.

 

[sharon mckee]

I would have folded in that situation although part of you knows hes got a bad hand.