MTT, QQ on AKK board.

[F Paulsson]

Third level of blinds, this is the second hand I get involved in and my stack took a little hit in the last one so I'm down to about 1100. Player UTG - who has me covered - min-raises to 100, and I make it 300 with QQ in middle position.

Everyone but him folds, and we see a flop with 675 in the pot, and my stack is 800. He's sitting on something like 2500.

The flop is A-K-K. He checks.

 

[F Paulsson]

Btw, the only other hand I had seen him involved in, he got all his chips in with KK vs. QQ preflop. He was the person who made the last raise.

 

[Irexes]

Interesting....

From reading a post you made elsewhere, this is a freeroll. So I'm not giving him credit for having a read on you.

For simplicity say his range is either Ax or any pair.

Any ace is calling whatever you do and is also quite possibly checking the flop.

However any pair is quite possibly checking the flop as well. You have the further complication that you are quite probably checking an ace yourself and are definately checking a King here.

Essentially you have zero fold equity on any hand you beat but run the real risk of checking and being bet off the hand on the turn by a lower pair or any random nonsense he got involved in the hand with.


It's a horrible situation given your stack.

For want of a better answer I say push and let god sort it out.

 

[F Paulsson]

Yeah, this is a really sucky situation. The freeroll, for what that may be worth, is for Stars Platinumstars so whoever's playing is, if not good, at least likely to be experienced. Not necessarily at MTTs, though.

 

[F Paulsson]

(And I went out in 2400th place, but not on this hand)

 

[Irexes]

Yeah, this is a really sucky situation. The freeroll, for what that may be worth, is for Stars Platinumstars so whoever's playing is, if not good, at least likely to be experienced. Not necessarily at MTTs, though.

ooo... that changes things then.

Hmmmm......

.....errrr......

I'd still push here as a kind of blocking bet to avoid losing it on the turn to a worse hand. In his position I'd represent the Ace if you checked the flop.

You have so little room for manouevere, if he has the ace you are dead, I think he doesn't have it enough times to make it long term the right move given the size of the pot.


Other option is to try and check it down, but I'm not convinced that would happen much.

 

[F Paulsson]

With a stack of 600, I push every time. With a stack of 1000, I'm willing to check-fold. But here... Meh.

 

[Irexes]

With a stack of 600, I push every time. With a stack of 1000, I'm willing to check-fold. But here... Meh.

Meh indeed.


I feel your pain.


It's pick the least worst option time.

 

[alan1983]

With the preflop minraise and the flop check id say that tips the balance towards me thinking he has a pp. Id push i think.

 

[titans4ever]

The only hands you have beat is smaller pocket pair or suited connectors. Given the plat status of the tournament, I think this is an easy check/fold.

Way to many hands that can kill you and you are only drawing to 2 cards if not dead if he has a K.

 

[hott_estelle]

Well, with 800 chips at 25-50 blinds you're not in a horrible position. I don't know if you said you had any reads on the way he bets, ect, but the min-raise UTG might be disguising strength of his hand. He may just not like A-J and have played that soft, easily could have done the move with A-K as well.

But even so, this would be so tough to fold given the situation of our chip stack.

I still would check, and then just play it by how you feel. You're not going to beat many hands here, and at 25-50 blinds, you still have enough to manuver.

 

[NineLions]

I can never figure out what a minraise means, especially UTG. He's got a monster, and he wants action? If he's usually a standard raiser, that might be the case, and he just wants to trap you. In which case, if his read on you is that you will c-bet, his check is a good play. All obvious stuff with this crowd, I'm sure.

 

[joosebuck]

check & see what the turn does. minraise can mean a lot of hands, possibly including a turn that he will bet with a weaker hand.

 

[F Paulsson]

Btw, the only other hand I had seen him involved in, he got all his chips in with KK vs. QQ preflop. He was the person who made the last raise.

Perhaps this was a bit cryptic, but what I meant by this was that the only other hand I saw him play, he was the aggressor with KK. Therefore, he - at least that time - did not seem like the kind of player who would minraise KK and not re-raise when I came over the top.

I checked behind and folded when he bet 250 on the turn, by the way. I just felt that I was desperately behind. In retrospect, perhaps calling the turn bet and folding to a river follow-up might have been best; calling might have seemed to him like a slowplay if he didn't have an ace or a king himself.

Perhaps I should take consolation in that "the close decisions don't really matter." Good to know that more than me seems to think that this is a close decision!