November 4, 2013
This is a hand I played in the Main Event, one of the few that went my way. It was a new line, that was introduced to me in a coaching session, so I want to pose this to TPE and see what hand range you guys give me. I'll give it a day or two and then post the actual hand along with my thinking/plan.
Blinds are 100/200 in WSOP ME.
Important stacks:
BB(Hero): 25k-ish – I haven't gotten too involved. This is actually my first major pot, I have a fairly tight image.
UTG: 22K-ish – Sean Drake, winner of Employee event in 2011, 3rd in Monster Stack. Psycho Aggro who only knows how to raise so far.
MP1: 35K-ish – Late 30's asian dude. Solid, but not great. He got my vote for weakest spot.
Hero is dealt ?? on the BB after sending two black chips out for sacrifice.
UTG raises to 525, MP1 calls, BTN Calls, BB Calls, Flop is Ts7c5s.
BB checks, UTG bets 900, MP1 calls, BTN folds, BB calls. Turn is 5d.
BB checks, UTG bets 1700, MP1 calls, BB raises to 3800, UTG is confused and tank calls as does MP1. River is Ks.
BB bets 7800, UTG and MP1 are still confused.
The only thing I will say about this hand so far is that I actually messed up my bet sizing on the turn. I didn't realize it until MP1 was tanking, and I started running the numbers he was getting in my head… he had really good pot odds. Post hand I feel I should of raised more along 4400-4800.
I'm not too concerned with what they likely had. I'm more curious what the TPE Nation puts my hand as, and I will explain why in a day or so.
April 26, 2013
Interesting. I would love to see TT just flatted, in a spot like this – when played well post this gives a chance to win a huge pot with a very well concealed set. Against the aggro-bpsycho from UTG you can even extract value when he likes to just fire-fire-fire with almost all his range when the board doesn't look too scary. That said, when I see you just call on a very connected and flush-draw flop, I am not sure you would play it this way. Although, the problem with raising flop vs. 2 players is that you show enourmous strength and will have some difficulty extracting value on future streets from worse hands. Your turn raise with a boat is nice, still it's so small that any over pair could probably call with implied odds for a river-boat. Sizing is still great as aggro-man should have a hard time folding almost any pair.
Yeah, lol I guess I am miles away from a much sicker line with probably air. Interested to see the results. : )
How was your ME experience? Would like to hear more about that, it was your first time if I'm not mistaken?
July 7, 2014
I'd be hard pressed to believe you are slow-playing your strength in this spot on the flop given all the draws out there and the guys in the pot who probably aren't folding a thing when they bet/call on the flop. Therefore I'm leaning towards a ton of draws in your range heading to turn, also some weak pairs. When the turn brings a card that presumably doesn't help your range, your c/r looks really semi-bluffy with the top part of your drawing range (7xss, Axss, 89, 64ss) and some 5x. So obviously when the flush completes on the river and you bet out there your range is heavily weighted towards flush.
Ok, posting this BEFORE I read other responses so I am only thinking for myself here.
BB calling range here PRE is very large. Almost any related cards. I'll estimate as open as any suited or unsuited 1 gapper, suiter 2 gapper.
FLOP
UTG Bet and a flat and you elect to CALL. At this point, with there being 3 in the pot, it seems like the UTG had a solid starting hand and the FLAT is either something marginal or a draw. With you flatting after that, I want to take monsters out of the range… A combo draw could go either way 3 handed (raise or call), so I am reluctant to remove this.
TURN
UTG fires second barrel and MP Flats AGAIN?! with a 3 way pot, he either decided to play a strong draw passively or he really is getting money in bad. You now raise the on the “disclose street”, telling everyone you have a hand that is solid now. You could be representing a 5 here, and your raise size is mis-sized, but I expect you to be strong here or have a killer double read.
UTG could be calling here with a big pair… but MP still looks like a monster combo like 8s9s. Yet you know this making that bet, so I figure you to have a 2 pair hand that made a boat on the turn… T5, 57, etc. I just dont expect utg or MP to be good here? (although the raise was smaller than expected, you explain that in the post)
despite tendancy of UtG to be a psycho raiser, he is calling the raise knowing (assuming?) that MP will also.
RIVER
Lead for 7800 into about $15.6k, quite a strong lead (and the spade draw got there with MP drawing). still consistent with flopped 2 pair and the miracle turn 5 for the nuts. you have over half your stack in now, so I also will assume you have a hand that can call a shove.
I can understand why someone could exploit UTG/MP as UTG with an overpair might stack off and MP may be hanging on with a draw or even worse TP, but I am 95% of the time going to give you credit for a hand that can beat my AA or K-flush.
November 4, 2013
I'm really glad I waited to answer this, as columbo's reply was a fun one to read. I like the way you reduced ranges throughout the actions of the hand.
I can't say any one person got closer than the other, as you all pretty much guessed the same kind of ranges, and you were all wrong. My entire table put me on 77. This hand was one we discussed for a good 5 min afterward, although I never disclosed my actual holdings to them. It was QsTc, but that's irrelevant. I could of been holding 23off for all it actually mattered.
My thinking went along these lines;
Pre – decent enough hand to see a flop with. Don't want to 3b and thin the field of the hands i'm beating while opening up to a 4b from the hands I'm not. UTG is going to barrel every single flop, and we should be able to get a caller at minimum so I can flop and evaluate.
Flop – I have top pair on a draw heavy board. This is not good. It's possible that my QT is leading here, but at this point it's pretty much already a bluff catcher. UTG bets with his entire range, because he was never one to miss an opportunity to fire. MP1 call has me slightly concerned. His most likley range is weak flush draws and 2nd pair/weak top pair. He knows that UTG likes to barrel, so those are hands he's going to want to bluff catch with. I consider check raising at this spot, but I'm not wanting to give either of these two a real chance to steal the pot back with a raise on T/R, as I'd then have to barrel at the hand on both streets. Therefore I decide to check raise 80% of turn cards.
Turn – Great card. This can't really help their ranges, but it certainly helps mine. It's very possible for me to be sitting on the exact range that Columbo mentioned, so 5's are in there. The flush didn't show, so if one of them is chasing, I should clear them out with a c/r here. UTG continues to follow his trend and barrels. MP1 flats again, which somewhat confuses me. I can't really put him on 2nd pair anymore, and I don't like having a lot of weak T's in his range, but a hand like JT or T9 is still likely. I definitely messed up my sizing. Oops. It's possible this worked out to my advantage and makes my hand look even stronger.
River – I was somewhat worried with this card. MP1 could of gotten there, but if he did it's not very strong. Having the paired board helps a bit. Basiclaly I have a hand with marginal showdown value, but there is no way this is going c-c-c. Since my plan the entire time was to c/r turn and barrel river, I can't back out now. Your reponses and the table discussion confirmed to me that no one can ever give me anything light/bluff here. Which is exactly what I wanted. I found a spot where no one can give me bluffs in my range, and bluffed there. They both folded fairly quickly.
The basic idea in this hand was to rep the absolute top of my range, and having MP1 flat made it much easier to that. At no point did I think QT was going to win at showdown, so I need to get the better hands to fold. I turned a hand with marginal showdown value into a bluff. It looks insanely strong when I flat the flop and c/r the turn into two players. This was a new line for me, because it was one I would have never considered before my coaching. It was a line that we discussed in length, and after taking it and the discussion afterwards, I can see why it's so effective. If they can't find a hand in your range you are bluffing with, then they won't ever put you on a bluff. I can't count the times I've heard “well you either had the nuts or air”.
I'll be honest that part of this post was a validation of sorts – I respect a lot of your thoughts and the way you all work through things, so it's nice to see that in this spot I'm getting very strong ranges. That was the intent of playing the hand that way. I hope that sharing the line is a fair enough trade for my new weapon 🙂 I also hope the discussion doesn't end here, as there is a lot more to this concept.
July 7, 2014
Your play was def ballsy and highly variant but given you have the Qs for some card removal I love it. Kudos to you your line is one that I feel we all think of doing in certain spots, but just take the easier path with pretty good showdown value with top pair decent kicker and race to showdown. Definitely a line more seen in cash games than tournies. But you see it in cash games bc it works. This is a great concept highlighting the relativity of showdown value. I agree with you that you are rarely good at showdown and running a bluff is considerably higher EV for sure.
The only issue with the play is when you pull it off and what tourney you are pulling it off in. In a super soft field and early on, your timing for the move wasn't the best. Still, sometimes you gotta grab your stones, man up, and make the high EV move and not chicken out and rely on your cards to do the work for you. You made the right play.
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