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March 22, 2014
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Dear TPE Members,
I was recently involved in a high Bubble Factor Clash late in a tournament. We were down to 21 players (average stack was about 20bbs) & my opponent and I both had a top 5 stack.
I'll show the hand details and after that I'll share my tought process after having reviewed the hand this morning because I think it's an interesting spot & I'm still not sure what the optimal play is given this exact situation
FYI: I (chillian93; 61bb) was playing a fairly LAGgy style (opening a lot & 3b in good spots without risking a big chunk of my stack: the opponents left to act behind me just weren't giving me a reason to stop opening)
My stats at the time of the hand were: VPIP 33 (90/276) ; PFR 24 (65/270) ; 3B 11 (13/114) ; F3B 44 (8/18)
CB 82 (18/22) ; FCB 55 (6/11) ; FoldToTurnCBet 50 (1/2)
AttemptToSteal 64 (14/22) ; FoldToSteal 54 (7/13)
My opponent (mattyonuts, 67bb) had only played 18hands but he was twice involved in a BTN vs BB war where both times he 5b from the BB and the button folded. He was playing even more LAG than me:
VPIP 44 (8/18) ; PFR 33 (6/18) ; 3B (2/8) ; F3B 0 (0/2)
CB 100 (2/2) ; FCB 0 (0/1)
ATS 40 (2/5) ; FTS 33 (1/3)
PS: I'm sorry I couldn't convert the hand details. Below you'll find my tought process when I was reviewing the tournament
Preflop:
V opens & I see JJ. I decided to 3bet & am actually wondering whether this is questionable given this exact situation (in a vacuum this might be the correct play) : we're both a top 5 stack with 21 players left and average stack 20bb. So, this is a High Bubble Factor spot: with our stack sizes it'd be a disaster not to make the final table.
I decide to 3b (28k) & I really question it:
– He's not likely to fold to the 3b and could very easily 4bet (to 53k)
– Do I really want to 5b (to around 105k) & feel comfortable calling a 6b shove? Not really and especially not given these high bubble factors. I'd need the nuts to be happy calling the 6b (QQ+, Maybe AK)
– Do I really want to call the 4b and be facing – what will probably be – multiple barrels for big portions of my stack with a hand that's very vulnerable postflop?
–> I believe – but this is where I'm definitely not sure & I don't want to be results-orientated – it might be better to just flat the open here & play a smaller pot hoping to keep the pot fairy small (I can usually control the size of the pot because I have position) , instead of playing a bigger pot in a spot that's very marginal.
However, I do 3b and he 4bets, at this point I think flatting is probably the only option (but too late), I really don't want to 5bet/fold and 5bet/call isn't really appealing either. I call hoping to see a decent flop.
Flop: 6QTr (121k)
Ok flop: not great, but not bad either.
He bets (48k) & I think the only play here is to call. Raising doesn't make any sense because I won't get called by worse & folding is too weak because I'm still ahead of a decent portion of his range (AK; KJ, AJ, he could also 4b with low blockers, Ax (maybe Kx)
Turn: 3s (216k)
Opp bets (80k)
–> This is a tough spot here because if I call this bet he'll have about 2/3 pot left on the river & he'll shove on lots of rivers because my range is fairly capped (I don't have the nuts KK+ because I'd probably 5b pre & I'm not calling the turn with air). My hand looks exactly like what it is: JJ, KQ, maybe AQ, hands that don't really beat much if he shoves on the river. So, calling the 80k bet is essentially a bet for my entire stack.
In a cash game, I could definitely see me calling here because I'm still ahead of AK, KJ, AJ, but in this exact spot (huge bubble factors, a table allowing me to steal, if I fold I still have 44BB and room to manoeuver + – without wanting to sound like an ass – I'm probably one of the better players in the field) I think I should fold
I decide to call, which I think is the second big mistake I've made in the hand
River: 9s (375k)
Opp shoves for 218k
I know this is a long post but I'm still not convinced of what the best play is in the exact spot.
Is there a street where my thought process is way of? Are there other/better lines given this exact spot?
Thank you very much & good luck at the tables!
TPE Pro
November 27, 2013
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With 21 left, bubble factor isn't really much of an issue because the lack of big equity jumps at this moment.
Preflop is a snap get in with him already 5b in such a small sample. The fact that he 5b 2x out of the bb when flatting the bb is the new trend likely means he's getting quite out of line. .
As played – Flop and turn are fine. River I am likely folding, given he doesn't have much fold equity and you are blocking combos of some of the only bluffs he has left in his range, AJ. I would like a call down much more if there was a flush otf or ott. River seems like he just has to have it, and the river also hits our perceived flop call range etc.
Sorry for any lack of detail, its 5am, and those are the thoughts that come to my head when reading this hand.
March 22, 2014
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Thanks for the response Benjamin.
I was just wondering if getting it all in pre in a 6b pot for 65BB with JJ and risking my tournament life would be the best play given the fact that I had a top 5 stack at a table where people were just letting me get away with opening a lot, 3betting small, taking stabs at pots post-flop etc
Thanks!
TPE Pro
December 6, 2012
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I'm not so thrilled about getting it in pre, this is a quite different spot than BB vs BN. It can't be too bad, but I like the decision to call. The fact that you can very comfortably call a 4B (not that it always leads to comfortable post-flop spots, but it's clearly better than folding) makes this a good hand to 3B. Either V will fold a lot or he'll call with a range you're crushing or he'll 4-bet with a range you're ahead of. All of those are better outcomes for you than flatting preflop. You have position, so I think you're giving him too much credit for being able to outplay you postflop.
I'd like you to think more about your own range from the time you see the flop, since V is a bit of a wild card and it seems like you're basically guessing about what he might have and how he might play it. Your 3-bet-calling range in this spot has got to be pretty narrow, so go ahead and enumerate it.
You're obviously not folding JJ on the flop, but look again at your whole range. Which hands would you fold or raise? What does your range look like after you call?
Where does JJ fall in that range on this turn? Top? Bottom? Middle?
What about on the river?
When you have a pure bluff-catcher, there's not usually an easy way to determine in a vaccuum whether you should have folded and if so when. You have to consider your entire range to see whether this particular hand is one with which you should call down.
August 4, 2014
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Tough spot. I will try to approach in a simple manner and just present what I am doing in these spots.
It is probably a wrong play in the long run, but I would fold this hand on the turn because:
- We dont have a lot of information about the villain. Sample size should be bigger to define his range.
- He is covering us.
- If they let me steal, I will keep doing that and guarantee a better spot and go after the short stacks with less risk.
I would have played it exactly the same till the turn.
Also, I would not want to reraise him again preflop because I can not put him on a solid range. At the turn, I still feel I am ahead, but I feel like he is not bluffing with total air either. Then why wouldnt I put him all in or put the pressure back at him? Because of the reasons he explained above. This is not the spot I will go for my whole stack.
After folding though, I will go to poker tracker and look at his equity percentage. That will give me a looot of information which I will use later to play under my terms.
Also, if we are preserving half of our stack, I am calling the turn. But folding the river almost all the time.
just my humble and practical opinion…
March 22, 2014
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Foucault said:
I'm not so thrilled about getting it in pre, this is a quite different spot than BB vs BN. It can't be too bad, but I like the decision to call. The fact that you can very comfortably call a 4B (not that it always leads to comfortable post-flop spots, but it's clearly better than folding) makes this a good hand to 3B. Either V will fold a lot or he'll call with a range you're crushing or he'll 4-bet with a range you're ahead of. All of those are better outcomes for you than flatting preflop. You have position, so I think you're giving him too much credit for being able to outplay you postflop.
I'd like you to think more about your own range from the time you see the flop, since V is a bit of a wild card and it seems like you're basically guessing about what he might have and how he might play it. Your 3-bet-calling range in this spot has got to be pretty narrow, so go ahead and enumerate it.
You're obviously not folding JJ on the flop, but look again at your whole range. Which hands would you fold or raise? What does your range look like after you call?
Where does JJ fall in that range on this turn? Top? Bottom? Middle?
What about on the river?
When you have a pure bluff-catcher, there's not usually an easy way to determine in a vaccuum whether you should have folded and if so when. You have to consider your entire range to see whether this particular hand is one with which you should call down.
Thanks for the response Andrew!
I believe my range is fairly capped when I call on the flop:
– I'm folding all of my air on the flop: underpairs to the T, probably AJ
– I'm probably not raising too often here with hands I didn't 5bet pre (KK+) & with a set I'm probably just calling because if he'd happen to have an overpair, the money is going in anyways on later streets and if he's bluffing, I want him to continue bluffing on turn and/or river
– I'm almost always calling my medium strength hands: JJ, KQ,AQ, AK,QJ
– I'm probably calling once with the weaker hands: JTs,KTs, ATs
–> So: Top: KK+ (unlikely because of preflop action) , 66, QQ or TT, maybe AQ
: Middle: AQ (if not in the top of my range) , KQ, QJ, JJ, maybe AK
: Bottom: JTs, KTs, ATs & AK (if it's not middle)
When I call on the flop & call his turn bet you could pretty much rule out the bottom of my range on the flop because I'm folding, top of my range would still be the same except AQ, that becomes Middle
With the Middle of my range (AQ, KQ, QJ,JJ) he can expect me to call one more bet but have a very tough decision on the river if he shoves.
On the river: the middle of my range on the turn is a bluff-catcher (AK), but I could easily be trapping with 66,QQ or TT (maybe KK or AA but probably not). If he shoves, he can get over 50-55% of my range on the river to fold so I guess this could be a “call-close your eyes- and hope he has AK”??
March 22, 2014
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NeverAA said:
Tough spot. I will try to approach in a simple manner and just present what I am doing in these spots.
It is probably a wrong play in the long run, but I would fold this hand on the turn because:
- We dont have a lot of information about the villain. Sample size should be bigger to define his range.
- He is covering us.
- If they let me steal, I will keep doing that and guarantee a better spot and go after the short stacks with less risk.
I would have played it exactly the same till the turn.
Also, I would not want to reraise him again preflop because I can not put him on a solid range. At the turn, I still feel I am ahead, but I feel like he is not bluffing with total air either. Then why wouldnt I put him all in or put the pressure back at him? Because of the reasons he explained above. This is not the spot I will go for my whole stack.
After folding though, I will go to poker tracker and look at his equity percentage. That will give me a looot of information which I will use later to play under my terms.
Also, if we are preserving half of our stack, I am calling the turn. But folding the river almost all the time.
just my humble and practical opinion…
Thanks for the response! I agree, I'd also air on the side of caution when I'm at a table where I'll have lots of better spots to slowly keep chipping up & hopefully win a big pot when I do have a monster (not like the JJ in this spot)
March 22, 2014
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NeverAA said:
Tough spot. I will try to approach in a simple manner and just present what I am doing in these spots.
It is probably a wrong play in the long run, but I would fold this hand on the turn because:
- We dont have a lot of information about the villain. Sample size should be bigger to define his range.
- He is covering us.
- If they let me steal, I will keep doing that and guarantee a better spot and go after the short stacks with less risk.
I would have played it exactly the same till the turn.
Also, I would not want to reraise him again preflop because I can not put him on a solid range. At the turn, I still feel I am ahead, but I feel like he is not bluffing with total air either. Then why wouldnt I put him all in or put the pressure back at him? Because of the reasons he explained above. This is not the spot I will go for my whole stack.
After folding though, I will go to poker tracker and look at his equity percentage. That will give me a looot of information which I will use later to play under my terms.
Also, if we are preserving half of our stack, I am calling the turn. But folding the river almost all the time.
just my humble and practical opinion…
November 4, 2013
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I really want to 5b/call with this guy. After reading the responses and everyone's thoughts, I don't necessarily think that would be the best laid plan, but it's still the line I would likley take; Reasons being: He's shown to be quite LAG and very combative – he seems to want to use his stack to bully people around, as is evident by his BTN/BB wars that you noted. It's a fairly good strategy given his stack size relevant to the field. His only real concern is going to be you, as you are the one who can essentially bust him. I don't disagree with how you played it, but I think I'm more often than not taking the 5b/call line with this villain – I'm also a high variance fish in low buy in tournies because the small pay jumps tilt me.
Given how you played it, I would look to raise the flop. I'd be looking right around 118-123k. I'm doing that with intentions of folding to his shove, because his shove range there should be crushing us. He really only has two possible draws that we are ahead of, and if he's shoving his Tx combo's over our raise – he's a bloody madman. If he flats our flop raise, I'm shipping the turn 100% of the time.
I don't dislike your turn call, as the 3 doesn't improve his hand. If you thought we were winning on the flop, then we are still winning on the turn. I think shoving here would be a mistake more often than not.
Have to fold this river. There is literally nothing left in his range that we are beating, besides suicidial 3 barrel bluffs. Not a lot of 11$ players are capable of doing that.
I also have to mention that I don't dislike flatting his original open, given his history. I think it's a much more low variance and safer line to take(I know this is the complete opposite of my opening statement), but we can feel pretty sure he's going to 4 bet us if we 3b. So if our plan is going to be to flat his 4b, we should be wanting to keep the pot smaller, to allow for more options post flop. As you mentioned, there are going to be much better spots to pick up chips, and we have position on him, so there should be lots of places where we can come after him with suited connectors and drawing hands which can cripple him.
Fun hand though, sad to see it went sideways on you.
TPE Pro
December 6, 2012
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Ot1T,
If you think V will fold to a flop raise often enough for it to be profitable, then do it with air, but don’t do it with JJ. JJ is clearly strong enough to call a flop bet, so by raising you take a reasonably strong hand and turn it into a bluff.
November 4, 2013
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Ah, I see where you are going with that – If we plan to raise flop, we should never be folding to his shove unless we are raising as a bluff(with our air) – which we aren't here. So if we raise the flop with JJ here, we have to call off? Or is raising flop just a really bad decision when we have JJ?
TPE Pro
December 6, 2012
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OneTime1Time said:
Ah, I see where you are going with that – If we plan to raise flop, we should never be folding to his shove unless we are raising as a bluff(with our air) – which we aren't here. So if we raise the flop with JJ here, we have to call off? Or is raising flop just a really bad decision when we have JJ?
Your raising range should consist of two types of hands: those that you are excited to get all-in with, and then an appropriate number of bluffs to balance them. JJ clearly does not fall into the first category, so the question is whether it belongs in the second. I would argue that it does not, because even if raise-folding it is profitable, it is less profitable than calling with it. It is better to raise-fold with hands that are not strong enough to call.
September 14, 2014
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just wondering how 66 in the top of your range? given the pre flop action i think it's very much unlikely you would call a 4-bet with this hand. When you call flop the top fo your range will look like QQ/TT and AQ imo
ul btw
November 4, 2013
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If you aren't going to call a 4b from this villain with 66, then don't 3 bet it. 3b 66 vs him isn't going to always be the best option, but it isn't a horrible one. We are plenty deep enough to fold if he does something really wacky.
TPE Pro
December 6, 2012
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66 probably just needs to be folded preflop at the first chance you get.
March 22, 2014
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folding_aces_pre_yo said:
just wondering how 66 in the top of your range? given the pre flop action i think it's very much unlikely you would call a 4-bet with this hand. When you call flop the top fo your range will look like QQ/TT and AQ imo
ul btw
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