$Freeroll NLHE MTT: A8o vs ATo

[I Live Poker]

I wonder if it's too bad to flop A8 here and give up on any preflop jam.
Since if there was no raise or call , I would be playing in a post-flop position.
Post flop I wanted to see exactly that board. only set combos and AT were winning me. That is the issue of the fold preflop of these weak hands even when you hit it is always a danger.

pokerstars, Hold'em No Limit - 25/50 - 9 players
Replay this hand on CardsChat

makisag (UTG): 2,390 (48 bb)
martinlgs (UTG+1): 2,548 (51 bb)
babuin72 (MP): 3,907 (78 bb)
valentgll (MP+1): 2,565 (51 bb)
danilka19 (LP): 9,472 (189 bb)
1MilhaoSemNada (CO): 7,081 (142 bb)
Renake1980 (BU): 3,517 (70 bb)
Comboss599 (SB): 1,190 (24 bb)
poisonn_86 (BB): 2,880 (58 bb)

Pre-Flop: (75) Hero (1MilhaoSemNada) is CO with A♥ 8♣
1 fold, martinlgs (UTG+1) calls 50, 2 players fold, danilka19 (LP) raises to 200, 1MilhaoSemNada (CO) calls 200, 3 players fold, martinlgs (UTG+1) calls 150

Flop: (675) A♦ 8♠ T♠ (3 players)
martinlgs (UTG+1) bets 200, danilka19 (LP) calls 200, 1MilhaoSemNada (CO) raises to 1,425, martinlgs (UTG+1) raises to 2,348 (all-in), danilka19 (LP) raises to 3,573, 1MilhaoSemNada (CO) raises to 6,881 (all-in), danilka19 (LP) calls 3,308

Turn: (16,785) 6♥ (3 players, 2 all-in)

River: (16,785) 5♣ (3 players, 2 all-in)

Total pot: 16,785

Showdown:
1MilhaoSemNada (CO) shows A♥ 8♣ (two pair, Aces and Eights)
(Equity - Pre-Flop: 19%, Flop: 9%, Turn: 5%, River: 0%)

danilka19 (LP) shows A♠ T♥ (two pair, Aces and Tens)
(Equity - Pre-Flop: 42%, Flop: 62%, Turn: 76%, River: 100%)

martinlgs (UTG+1) shows 9♣ J♠ (high card, Ace)
(Equity - Pre-Flop: 39%, Flop: 29%, Turn: 19%, River: 0%)

danilka19 (LP) wins 16,785

 

[I Live Poker]

In this postflop hand I thought I could certainly be playing against a draw and one in a JAo + only the AT combo would be winning me. But even so the expected value of this very bad one can easily be beaten on the turn and river. I was wrong

 

[fundiver199]

Preflop
I like the idea of calling behind, when someone have isolated a limper, but I dont like doing it with this particular hand. A8o is just simply to bad. Even the limper might sometimes show up with A9-AJ and have you dominated, and you also need to deal with the guy, who have raised, and he certainly have all the good AX in his range. So here I would just fold and move on to the next hand.

Flop
I like the idea of raising this donk bet from the limper, especially when the other guy has called in between. However I dont think, you need to go full pot. The limper only started with 51BB, so its easy to get stacks in against him, and when you ask him to commit more than half his stack on the flop, he might actually find a fold and not pay you off. I would go around half pot here or 900 chips.

You did go very large though, and unsurpricingly the limper did not just call for 60% of his stack, he moved all in. As he should with any hand, we wants to continue with. Now however comes the really interesting point, because the other guy now backraised, and he did it for a min-raise committing around half of the effective stack against you.

This is just a super strong action, and the first thing to note is, he can never be bluffing, because the limper is already all-in, so he still need to beat him at showdown. There is absolutely no point for him in playing like this with a draw, so the only question left is, if he would ever do it with a made hand worse than yours. Like say AK or AQ.

And I really think, the answer is no. With those hands he might have raised the donk bet himself, and if he just called, he would not be to happy with the action behind him. His decision would be either to call again or even to fold facing this much crazy action in a multiway pot, where he is 142BB deep against you.

So even though you only lose to AT and sets, and there are only 13 possible combos of those hands, I dont think his range contain anything other than those exact 13 combos. It is a freeroll, so maybe once in a while you will see something crazy, but the core of his range is those 13 combos, and thats it. So I prefer a fold here, and its improtant to remember, you still get to see his hand, because he has to show down against the limper. So if he did in fact have something crazy, just take a note on it and get after him later.

Conclusion
You kind of said it yourself already. The issue with playing bad hands like A8o is, that even when you flop very strong like two pair, you still sometimes end up on the bad side of a cooler. Folding preflop gets rid of this problem, and even as played proper sizing and hand reading would have allowed you to get away relatively cheaply, when you face that backraise.

 

[I Live Poker]

Preflop
I like the idea of calling behind, when someone have isolated a limper, but I dont like doing it with this particular hand. A8o is just simply to bad. Even the limper might sometimes show up with A9-AJ and have you dominated, and you also need to deal with the guy, who have raised, and he certainly have all the good AX in his range. So here I would just fold and move on to the next hand.

Flop
I like the idea of raising this donk bet from the limper, especially when the other guy has called in between. However I dont think, you need to go full pot. The limper only started with 51BB, so its easy to get stacks in against him, and when you ask him to commit more than half his stack on the flop, he might actually find a fold and not pay you off. I would go around half pot here or 900 chips.

You did go very large though, and unsurpricingly the limper did not just call for 60% of his stack, he moved all in. As he should with any hand, we wants to continue with. Now however comes the really interesting point, because the other guy now backraised, and he did it for a min-raise committing around half of the effective stack against you.

This is just a super strong action, and the first thing to note is, he can never be bluffing, because the limper is already all-in, so he still need to beat him at showdown. There is absolutely no point for him in playing like this with a draw, so the only question left is, if he would ever do it with a made hand worse than yours. Like say AK or AQ.

And I really think, the answer is no. With those hands he might have raised the donk bet himself, and if he just called, he would not be to happy with the action behind him. His decision would be either to call again or even to fold facing this much crazy action in a multiway pot, where he is 142BB deep against you.

So even though you only lose to AT and sets, and there are only 13 possible combos of those hands, I dont think his range contain anything other than those exact 13 combos. It is a freeroll, so maybe once in a while you will see something crazy, but the core of his range is those 13 combos, and thats it. So I prefer a fold here, and its improtant to remember, you still get to see his hand, because he has to show down against the limper. So if he did in fact have something crazy, just take a note on it and get after him later.

Conclusion
You kind of said it yourself already. The issue with playing bad hands like A8o is, that even when you flop very strong like two pair, you still sometimes end up on the bad side of a cooler. Folding preflop gets rid of this problem, and even as played proper sizing and hand reading would have allowed you to get away relatively cheaply, when you face that backraise.

Thank you very much man! You have helped me a lot. You and 300HPGOD are my official coaches! The day I become a millionaire I will remember that!

 

[jaworek1405]

Hello, I agree in the large part with fundiver. Hand A8o against almost every position before you is a fold. Sometimes you can play a8s from late positions like CO or button. In freeroll tournaments you can play sometimes a8s. As played - IMO in freeroll tournament we can go allin with top two pair, because it is tournament for free and there are a lot of beginner player. There are many crazy situations and usually two pairs on the flop is a monster hand. GL

 

[fundiver199]

As played - IMO in freeroll tournament we can go allin with top two pair, because it is tournament for free and there are a lot of beginner player.

Hero had top and bottom pair not top two, and in this particular spot that makes a rather big difference. Even so I agree, that in a freerool it cant be that bad to get it in with top and bottom for 142BB. I do however assume, that when people share freeroll hands, then they are interested in improving their game and eventually play something other than just freerolls, which I know, OP already does. Therefore its interesting to analyse, what we should do, if we faced this kind of action is say a 3,3$ or 5,5$ tournament. And then I still kind of like a fold on the flop as played.

 

[I Live Poker]

Hero had top and bottom pair not top two, and in this particular spot that makes a rather big difference. Even so I agree, that in a freerool it cant be that bad to get it in with top and bottom for 142BB. I do however assume, that when people share freeroll hands, then they are interested in improving their game and eventually play something other than just freerolls, which I know, OP already does. Therefore its interesting to analyse, what we should do, if we faced this kind of action is say a 3,3$ or 5,5$ tournament. And then I still kind of like a fold on the flop as played.

Yes indeed, but I end up expanding my range a little because of the range of villains in the Freerolls but I shouldn't do that in view of the fact that the CC has great players. probably at 3.30 and fold pre-flop.

 

[jaworek1405]

Sorry fundiver, I was thinking about top pair and bottom pair. I still think that in freeroll tournament with two pair on the flop we can risk and we can go allin. I agree with you that in real money tournaments, we can fold this two pairs. In real money tournament hand a8o against raise before us, we should fold this hand. I agree with fundiver that opponent who isolate he will have better ace than a8o. So we should fold this hand and wait for better situation to win some chips.

 

[fundiver199]

Truth be told it is a little bit difficult to not get results oriented, when the results are shown. And I agree, that this stack off cant be that bad, not even in a paid tournament. He is representing a hand stronger than top and bottom, but sometimes people are just bad and do crazy stuff.

A few day ago I played a hand, where I turned two pair with K9 on KQ4-9. I bet for value, and then of course I got raised. I sigh-called putting him mostly on hands like JT or a slowplayed 44/KQ. When the opponent jammed on a blank river giving me almost 3:1, I really wanted to fold, because I felt, I was surely beat. At the end I digged out an absolutely crying call though, because I felt, K9 was just a bit to high in my range to fold. And much to my surprice he had Q9 for a worse two pair.

And going back to this hand maybe a bad player could sometimes be doing this with T8 for a worse two pair or AK thinking, this trap has worked, and so on and so forth. It would be much easier to find a fold here, if we just had top pair even with the AK ourselfes. Whereas if we fold A8, we are really putting our opponent of a range of only nutted hands.

 

[DaMooca]

In the early stages of tournaments it is where we find the players that bog down the stack with only one top pair and some other crazy things, not only freerolls, but also in micro tournaments too, so I think two pairs on the flop, in some situations it is very strong and enough to go all-in.
But the problem with this hand is all the action he had before, the action of HJ is indicating that he has a very strong hand, so I would prefer to fold in this situation.

 

[liviuplayspoker]

Only Bad run, well played

 

[okeedokalee]

Playing weak aces is not good.
If you flop the ace you are left with a weak ace and no draws.
You won't flop two pair hands often enough to make this a seriously useful pocket, and as happened a more connected two pair may still beat you.
Try not to play these hands and your success rate will improve.
Read online what, Tommy Angelo, has to say on the subject.

 

[theANMATOR]

Fold weak aces pre - unless your opponents limp into you or give you an absurd cheap price to call - like a min raise.
But as played on the flop never gonna fold 2 pair - especially in a freeroll, unless it's completely obvious I'm crushed by a flush/straight or something else obvious.