How do I play this spot?
Early Day 2 in the WPT Fallsview $2500 event. We're about 2 hrs away from the bubble.
I have 17BB in the SB and it folded around to me. I have KQ off. BB has 18 BB and he's been shoving medium-wide for a while in good spots. So I assume he shoves a wide range in this spot if he has an opportunity.
Eg. He 3-bet 30% of his stack vs a short stack who was all in for 5 BB and 2 deep stacks who had flatted the shove, and tabled A8 offsuit.
How do I play this spot, assuming my main goal is to cash?
I have 17BB in the SB and it folded around to me. I have KQ off. BB has 18 BB and he's been shoving medium-wide for a while in good spots. So I assume he shoves a wide range in this spot if he has an opportunity.
Eg. He 3-bet 30% of his stack vs a short stack who was all in for 5 BB and 2 deep stacks who had flatted the shove, and tabled A8 offsuit.
How do I play this spot, assuming my main goal is to cash?
Comments
Another option, this one is up to you, don't know what your pain threshold is, probably much higher variance but could yield more chips.
Is the limp, call if he jams. Leaving him open to bluffs this way and he will likely shove with a lot of hands you have dominated too.
Going back, and without knowing his hand, what are some options you like as to how to play that hand?
Now since the situation is close to the bubble, then probably limp with intention of folding to a jam is okay although probably the worst option in terms of chipEV. Rule of thumb, if you are going to call the jam, then jamming yourself is better, with some exceptions such as the guy is induced easily, but KQ isn't that strong so it wouldn't make sense to induce with that.
In general I would just 2.8x pre and play post, since its close to the bubble and people usually play fit or fold and also you take it down a decent amount. Since the guy is aggro/sticky just open jam, KQ is up there in your range and profitable to jam.
Imo vs that specific guy, i'd open jam, cross my toes and pray he didn't wake up with a good hand.
Then I thought limp, but I wasn't sure what I'd do when he shoved as I was sure he would.
Third option was to raise about 2.5x but then I have to call the shove.
Clearly, I can't just fold here, so, in sum, I don't really like any of the options. What I disliked least, was the raise-call option.
If he calls a shove this is for his tournament life too. So I expect you'll fold out a lot of hands that he'd gamble with under different circumstances. And if you are called you are +ev with a lot of his calling range.
If you do a small raise it sounds like he'll jam and you'll have to call. So you are just giving up fold equity.
If you just call, it sounds like he might be inclined to raise or jam. Either way you are calling. You might have a chance for a stop and go play if he he doesn't jam PF.
The other option is a 4 or 5 BB raise and call a jam or jam on any flop. I don't know how often this works.
I already know the result so ya...
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Edit: still think the best line, esp close to the bubble is to just open rip though.
LOL at me giving tournament advice.
Your goal should not be to cash. Your goal is to maximize equity.
I open shove against his random hand here.
So I ended up just raising to 2.5x, because if he shoves, I'm now crushing a much bigger part of his range than if I shove and he calls. He did indeed shove with 66. I called and didn't improve.
Now I know that my first instinct was probably right and I should have jammed, but in the end, I'm going broke here either way I played it as this guy is never folding 66 in that spot, but I wasn't sure if it was a punt or not.
Also, I had a boatload of medium pairs in this tournament (like 20) and every flop had 2 overs and I never made a set, so I'm a little pissed that the board ran out small when I needed the overs. But that's just how I run most of the time.
Thanks for the input. It was very helpful.
This hand as described, plays itself. Villain is never folding pocket sixes heads-up in this spot. The question is whether to jam or fold, because Hero has decided he is going to call a shove if he raises pf.
You say you're raising to induce and you've picked a fine hand to do so with. What you do want to ask yourself tho is what you would do with AA KK AK AQ or 1010, if you raise to induce with those as well you can't shove as many hands since you've taken out many of your best hands.
Another strategy to consider which I play around this stacksize is to limp jam instead of raising pre myself, I think that realistically will widen his range more than if you raise pre if he's aggro
Agreed, this specific hand does pretty much play itself. My uncertainty is in whether it's a good move to get it all in here, not knowing what V has at the time, and if so, what's the most profitable way to do so - limp, raise, or open shove?
this was exactly what I was thinking of at the time. If I have any of those hands, I'm 2.5 x-ing against this guy as I don't want to limp and give him a free flop on the off chance he checks behind.
When you say limp-shove, are you referring to preflop assuming he just raises or on the flop assuming he checks, or both, and do you call if he shoves?
The lower variance play IMO is just jamming in pre. Unless he's someone that understands shove/fold/call range very well, he's going to be making some mistakes folding hands he shouldn't be. Your shove range realistically should be super wide here as well if you're looking at it from a pure equilibrium perspective.
1. If the player is solid and plays to win, doesn't care about squeaking into the money an open 2 or 2.x raise is going to be so exploitable because if I see you playing scared I'm going to 3 bet jam on you with as low as 65 suited and make you call it off. Which most times your not going to and if you do I still have good equity against calling hands.
Option 2. The only time I'm opening on this player is if I think he is the player listed above and knows to exploit this situation. Therefore I go slightly above standard open size, ex. Your standard open size is 2.2x then I'm opening 2.8x this spot to induce his bluff shoves. This is only a good spot with nutted hands and if you do this with kq suited you now must be prepared to accept the following, you've committed to calling it off and your a. Behind slightly, completely crushed or 60 40 most spots or less.
So my point is by open jamming sure he may wake up with a calling hand and A3 etc may look good there for bb, it is in fact a fold in this spot on bubble. And if he calls you have great equity to double up which should be the goal here.
If he also calls it off with 77 and lower he is flipping virtually 5050 for his tournament life and you've made him make that decision not you. And you have good equity to win.
The goal at bubble is to make the other person make the mistake and if you see someone make a mistake to exploit them in order to chip up. His stack size is the perfect example.
That said I'm open jamming all nutted hands on him all the way to 10 9 suited as he's more likely folding and every once in a while he's gonna wake up with a nutted hand and you should at least have a decent amount of equity jamming hands like 10 9 s j 10 s etc.
You will get knocked out time to time, most times you will pick up the blinds and antes and a few times your going to double up. Odds are in your favour to open jam this spot.
I disagree with some of what you just wrote but this part right here, that's the whole argument of raising to induce even though it doens't allow you to play as many hands. It's only going to be exploitable if your opening range is unbalanced, so make sure it's not and you're good.
And also folding is out of the question, limping and folding to a jam is the most exploitable thing I've heard all day, not only can you now not play J7s in any realistic way so you end up giving him a bunch of walks but you're also folding out a hand with a ton of equity vs villains jamming range, a hand that even dominates a good part of it.
There is some merit in jamming and hoping to fold out A3o, realistically you're never folding out 44+ unless villain is super terrible so the range you're attmpting to bluff out is basically weak aces and 22-33 which seems extremely thin to me. Again, limping is not the only way to go, but if you do you're not playing passively postflop, if the flop favors your range, most importantly your actual range but also important to consider your percieved range then you do a bunch of betting and double barreling and if you do flop a top pair on any reasonable board you're never ever folding unless you really want to give away your money. Oh and also if we get it in vs 65s we stand up, fistpump and run around happy
I have also seen many many times these same players will photograph their weaker hands in these positions by raising a slightly higher than usual amount to try to steal blinds even harder and not staying balanced on bet siding.
Now if sb opens and the BB flats it can be very exploitable by the SB since they get first action on the flop and if the flop favours their range paired or not a cbet will most likely take the pot down and if called on flop check it and fold to any further bets unless improving.
So now if I'm in the SB and I'm playing against a solid player that knows how to play very good short stack and bubble play, the best thing to do is to open jam to this player and remove his ability to exploit you and force him to wake up with a hand. At 17bb Ace rag is definitely a fold unless SB has shown to be a cannon. But given this conversation I'm going to assume SB table image is much tighter than a cannon. It's reasonable to assume that Ace rag will fold as they should but if it happens that Ace rag calls kq still has sufficient equity to run 5 cards in this spot for a chance to double up.
It would also be reasonable to assume that 22 and 33 even up to 55 would fold as they have enough blinds to pick a better spot to get their chips in on the bubble.
66 to 99 is a possible call and can go either way without question here but even if they call kq still has appropriate equity to run all 5 cards for a chance to double up.
So if I am now the SB player and I feel that the BB is a solid player and has shown the he is willing to rejam a late position standard open to a smaller than avg stack more than 12 to 14 bigs than I know he is doing it wider like I would expect him to do and my line would be to trap him by inducing with a slightly larger than usual open and expect to call it off when he jams. I Will also reasonably expect bb to fold in this spot as well but this line is trying exploit the BB who is jamming wider to exploit the SB. It's a trap I'm setting but this is best to run with much much stronger hands than kq.
Moral of the story for the SB is the least exploitable play in this spot is to open jam on the BB and force the BB to call it off and accept they are taking a flip as long as they don't wake up with a monster then their decision will be hard and most likely get a fold.
Anyways just my .02 but I will agree to disagree with you that 90% of what I'm saying is wrong.
P.s. online and live play here varies greatly.
But if you miss flop it's also ok to check down or check fold unless you improve.
So I can tell you first hand I watched one of the best players in the world do exactly what I'm saying above and exploited many players at bubble time and chipped up huge at our table.
Take it for what it's worth as it is very dependant on stack sizes at the table players and their tendencies, your own perceived image and tendencies you should be aware of and then of course distance to the bubble and avg stacks and so on. There is no perfect plsy in any one scenario but the best plsy is the one that allows you to play against the players frequencies and tendencies in the least exploitable way and in a way that puts you in a spot to exploit the mistakes of others.
Anyway, you might from the sound of it be playing with some of the weakest fishes on the planet, fuck if I know but you're moving away from what OP asked. OP even describe himself as one of the scared players you so love to shit on but even he went to exploit disrespectful tendencies of players like you're describing in this spot. If you start jamming K9o and 89s here OP is printing money from you. The wider BB jams the happier OP will be and from the sound of it he doesn't do a lot of raise folding out of the SB here, certainly not so that you "expect him to fold 90% of the time" or some other major exaggeration. It's his limping range you want to attack not his raising range for this particular player
And as i've said over and over I really don't believe it's gonna be hard to realise the equity of your hand either if you get called pre or if you limp and get checked behind on. Especially when your hand is as easy to realise as KQ. If you wish to talk about SB raising ranges in this spot for a general player or how i myself would play it I can say with certainty that I can design ranges such that I won't be getting exploited no matter if I limp full range or have a mixed limping and raising strategy
That said, who is being shit on? The entire game of poker is about exploiting weaker players, scared players. Read every book on bubble play and it will specifically say to find these players and target them in order to chip up. Exploit them. How do you feel I am shitting on anyone?
Maybe I was playing the worst fish ever, as my last post sums up it is so very situational and there is no one size fits all.
And if you'd like an example, in the 2500 I'm in the SB and it's folded around to the button who opens. I have him as a short to medium sized stack and will fold a lot when played back at. I look down on my turn and see A9s. That's my hand to 3 bet him here out of position. BB wakes up with a hand tanks for a bit and shows player to his left and folds. Button Insta folds once bb folds. Perfect that's what I was going after. I ask BB what he had that he folded and showed buddy on his left, he says I folded 1010 I just didn't want to play a pot with you. He was the largest stack at the table and I was second or third.
Moral is he had position and a great 4 getting hand but he mucked it. Once I knew that and player to his left verified, he was now a target to me regardless of his chips.
There is a lot of bad play at the fallsview and my eyes are finally opening to it. There are reasons why Mike Leah can make final table so often and I was lucky enough to watch it first hand.
Take it for what it's worth, and if you feel it is arrogant than so be it. I will once again agree to disagree.
alex...... just glad you are back posting here.
Can't even remember why he left... Getting old...
I don't think OP is very unbalanced from the SB here, sure he may be giving away too many walks, but there's absolutely nothing to indicate that he'd raise exploitably wide or not be aware that the BB would be tempted to rip it in so there's no way in hell you can claim that OP doesn't handle this particular BvB spot properly just because he doesn't jam and give you an easy decision to fold with hands you might otherwise spew
Anyways I'm pitting my thoughts on this to bed. If you choose to point out how wrong you think you are I can accept that we disagree and choose not to indulge further. This is just my. 02 worth and can accept your opposing views as equally valid.
Goodnight
This part is very overblown, the decision to put in your money was made the moment you put in the first 2.5x, you're not getting put in a tough spot, you wait and see if your trap works and then fistpump if you get it in as a 2 to 1 favorite, Or rather it's overblown for players who are competent. don't you think this is exactly what OP went for? Did he ever claim having to call when shoved on was a "hard call"?. There should be very very few "bet and see what happens" plays in poker. The only way you get put in a tough spots is if you open without a plan to call or fold because BB takes action. Then again k8s may have been a bad example because that hand should probably call a shove as well