Stars WSOP $33 +R

Thief

Made my 4th final table in these events and am still empty handed. I was supposed to be in vegas last week at the wsop but fell ill and had to cancel. So i basically took a week off poker and returned to this sad finish.

PokerStars Game #1892901231: Tournament #8862411, Hold'em No Limit - Level XIV
(2000/4000) - 2005/06/13 - 18:45:22 (ET)
Table '8862411 8' Seat #3 is the button
Seat 1: GardnerBarns (72210 in chips)
Seat 2: sk8sby (181900 in chips)
Seat 3: pepedawg (67230 in chips)
Seat 5: i1aba1ab (24236 in chips)
Seat 6: Thief (50842 in chips)
Seat 7: lcrooks (73472 in chips)
Seat 8: ThomasToget (180080 in chips)
Seat 9: paalkraa (55530 in chips)
GardnerBarns: posts the ante 200
sk8sby: posts the ante 200
pepedawg: posts the ante 200
i1aba1ab: posts the ante 200
Thief: posts the ante 200
lcrooks: posts the ante 200
ThomasToget: posts the ante 200
paalkraa: posts the ante 200
i1aba1ab: posts small blind 2000
Thief: posts big blind 4000
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Thief [Ks Ac]
lcrooks: folds
ThomasToget: folds
paalkraa: raises 8000 to 12000
GardnerBarns: folds
sk8sby: folds
pepedawg: folds
i1aba1ab: folds
Thief: raises 38642 to 50642 and is all-in
paalkraa: calls 38642
*** FLOP *** [9d 4h Kh]
paalkraa said, "10"
*** TURN *** [9d 4h Kh] [Qd]
*** RIVER *** [9d 4h Kh Qd] [Ts]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
Thief: shows [Ks Ac] (a pair of Kings)
paalkraa: shows [Qh Jd] (a straight, Nine to King)
paalkraa collected 104884 from pot
ThomasToget said, "yikes...."
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 104884 | Rake 0
Board [9d 4h Kh Qd Ts]
Seat 1: GardnerBarns folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: sk8sby folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 3: pepedawg (button) folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 5: i1aba1ab (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 6: Thief (big blind) showed [Ks Ac] and lost with a pair of Kings
Seat 7: lcrooks folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 8: ThomasToget folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 9: paalkraa showed [Qh Jd] and won (104884) with a straight, Nine to King

God how I enjoyed being sick last week....

wader

Hey Thief
Tough one.......how many seats up for grabs?

apryllshowers

What a frikkin idiot that dude was. QJ for his tournament life at the final table of a tournament awarding a WSOP ME seat. I hate when dumb play is rewarded.

ScottyZ

I'm not sure that the play from the QJ is totally unreasonable.

The QJ is getting about 1.7 to 1 on his money, and is also on a relatively short stack (M-ratio around 8 or 9) in a winner-take-all tournament. That means that EV is far a more important consideration than variance since the usual reason to avoid variance in a tournament (to save your chips for later opportunities to showcase your skills) is gone. Also, folding the QJ here leaves your M-ratio in even worse shape than before at around 6 or 7. You getting close to the point where you are starting to get M-stuck by openning for a 3*BB raise, so if there was a mistake by the QJ in this hand, the open stealing was probably it.

The play is +EV if you figure your hand wins about 38% of the time against your opponent's range of hands. Against an unknown opponent who is also on a short stack, QJ doesn't look like it's worse than a 38% dog here. The call looks wrong to me only against a very conservative player.1 If Thief has been playing aggressively, the call is easier still.

ScottyZ

1That is, for example, someone whom you would not expect to move in with 99 here.

BBC Z

I'm not sure that the play from the QJ is totally unreasonable.

You think that getting all your chips in Preflop with QJo is reasonable? Regardless of your opponent type, you are behind here if not outright dominated AND you risk your tournament life to boot..

While you talk of a thin line of pot equity in the call, don't you think that there can be better opportunities taken down the road, even with the 12K loss?

And since when did you get so loose that a call that MIGHT a sliver of edge is one that must be taken at a 8-9BB stack?

ScottyZ

You think that getting all your chips in Preflop with QJo is reasonable?

Yes. Always.



Don't forget that there were two individual plays here. First, attempting a blind/ante steal, which may or may not have been correct depending on the pre-flop table texture; and second, making a 38-62 money call on a hand which is very likely to be less than a 50% chance to win. I guess my point was that while you may think that one (or both) of these plays is poor, I don't think that they are clearly so, or necessarily have to come from a "frikkin [sic.] idiot".

Regardless of your opponent type, you are behind here if not outright dominated AND you risk your tournament life to boot..

It's also a significant risk to blind off your chips in a top heavy payout structure when you have 55K of the ~650K in chips you need. In a top heavy payout structure you need to be far less averse to high variance plays than you would be in a typical tournament.

While you talk of a thin line of pot equity in the call, don't you think that there can be better opportunities taken down the road, even with the 12K loss?

That's definitely the general idea of tournament variance avoidance. I just think there may not be much more down the road here as one might think. Again, the fact that there is one (significant) prize matters a great deal.

And since when did you get so loose that a call that MIGHT a sliver of edge is one that must be taken at a 8-9BB stack?

I just think it's probably a pretty close decision. I didn't mean to say that you must call with the QJ. There are some players I might automatically call in this exact tournament scenario. Against most players I would fold. Against an unknown player I would proabably fold. An aggressive player who is capable of moving with a big range of hands puts the QJ to a tough decision I think. In fact, against the Dave-Scharf-brand-re-steal-package, a QJ might hold up well, since by "well", we mean 38% well.

Update: PokerStove says that QJ has about 46% pot equity against Dave's re-steal range of hands.

445,199,040 games 1.870 secs 238,074,352 games/sec

Board:
Dead:

equity (%) win (%) / tie (%)

Hand 1: 45.7922 % [ 00.45 00.00 ] { QcJd }
Hand 2: 54.2078 % [ 00.54 00.00 ] { AA-22, AKs-A2s, KQs-KTs, JTs-J8s, T9s-T7s, 98s-96s, 87s-85s, 76s-74s, 65s-63s, 54s-52s, 43s-42s, 32s, AKo-AJo, KQo }


ScottyZ