Correct Move?

[theskillzdatklls]

Hello - I started doing some real live games and they've been a lot of fun. I made it to the final 3 in this situation, I'm wondering what y'all would have done:

Blinds = 3000 / 5000

BB = me = ~16000 chips (5000 of these in play)
SB = ~100,000 chips
Button = ~19,000 chips

Button pushes
SB folds
I have K9o

I have a read on button player as semi-loose (he did an all in ~20-30 minutes previously w/ J9 and several more AI in between).

Edit: 3rd was for $80, 2nd $170 and 1st $240.. so there was a big incentive to get 2nd somehow but 1st was optional

 

[Kennyseven]

easy call

 

[SeanyJ]

Yeah you have to call this, you don't have time to wait for a better hand and if you win you're pretty much guaranteed 2nd place.

 

[theskillzdatklls]

it was the "should i wait for a better hand deal" type question. i sat there for a while thinking... i figured that i had to go in like the rest of y'all said instead of waiting for Ax etc. It was unfortunate when he flopped over A9 and the board came up dry.. but i guess that's poker. I was mostly making sure that I got the cards in right there because I've second guessed myself ever since. I feel great about making $80 twice in a row on my first 2 tourny's, but feel less great when $170+ was so close!

 

[ztw30]

Hi...and well played! this is an obvious call. You have an M of about 1.2 if you fold and you started with an M of 1.7. No matter the read this is an obvious push/call. If you are just trying to go for second and take a little extra money than i would recommend a fold.

If you are unsure about M strategy just ask!

 

[theskillzdatklls]

yes- what exactly is M strategy?

What went through my head is this:
Lets say the odds are he has Ax or low pocket pair or xx due to his chipstack and blinds and he isn't waiting around for AA +KK
Then my chances to win rival 40-50-(maybe)60% - and putting my money in there greatly exceed the chances of my odds of winning - is this M strategy?

And the fact that I went in with an actual (just guessing) 22% chance to win is the rotten luck of poker that one gets? I'd figure that if he had K9 and me A9 the same thing could / would have happened in reverse.

 

[AlexeiVronsky]

You're putting up 11k to win 27k, which is enough from a pot odds perspective to call with pretty much anything. And if you put him on a conservative range of pushing with top 1/4 of his hands you're about 3:2 with K9o, and you're getting 2.45:1 pot odds. The difference in prizes aren't enough to give up the good pot odds here. And it would just leave you in a worse situation if you were folding here.

 

[dj11]

Grossly oversimplified, 'M' is a measure of how panicky you should feel about your stack size in relation to the table and the game in general.

Specifically your 'M' is how many orbit/hands can you last at the current blind/ante level.

In the case you presented, we see no antes. So with blinds at 3k/5k before this hand started your 'M' was 2. This is considered the dead zone, and theory has it you shove with ATC (any two cards). Ideally you are first to enter the pot, so whatever cards you had last hand, regardless of what they were, would have been a better shove than a shove here. However, K9, 3 handed, is not horrible for a shortstack call.

had there been ante's, the easiest way to determine 'M' is to see the pot size immediately before the cards are dealt, but after the blinds are posted. This will include everyones ante, which coincides with how many antes/orbit you will contribute.

Divide that pot size into your stack size and you get your 'M'.

It's actually a little late to be considering 'M'. 'M' is best used long before the final table. At this point you're in panic mode.

Assume that when the tourney was still 2 full tables, you did the calculation and found your 'M' to be 12. Means you can see 12 orbits before blinding out. This may not be accurate because the blind levels might change during those 12 orbits effectively stealing an orbit or 2 from you. There is a variation known as Real M, which takes the changing blind levels into account.

At 12, your 'M' is in the yellow zone.

Zones are green, yellow, orange, red, and dead.
Green =20+
yellow = 10-20
Orange 5-10
red and dead are below 5.

Search the forum for much more in depth discussions on both 'M' and Real M.

 

[theskillzdatklls]

Cool thanks for the help guys.

The situation was there was a man just to my right with pretty much all the chips. At 5 people to go before the money, there were me and the guy two spots right with small stax, and there were 2 people with short-short stax - barely a round left in each of them so I pretty much had to stick it out.

My hand on the button pre-K9 was 35, and I figured it'd be better to just wait from there -- but is there consensus that I should have pushed 35 on the button rather than waiting to be BB AI w/ K9?

 

[AlexeiVronsky]

Personally I'd fold that 35 as you're very likely to be called anyhow and you're likely to have a much better hand in the blind. You pick up a bit of fold equity from pushing with it but I'd say it's better to just wait for the blind in that instance.