[daneblazer]

Some "easy" stuff here for you tournament players. Both of these are somewhat similar situations. I'll see what the answers are then give my 2 cents.

1. You're playing in a $100+10 buy in tournament live or online with around 100 players. First hand, it's 9 handed, blinds are 10/20, you have 2000 chips and you're in the cutoff seat. UTG (under the gun) limps in, followed by two other limpers, it's your turn and you look at QQ. You raise to 100. Everyone folds around to UTG who shoves all in. Limpers fold. You've never seen the UTG player in your life. No tells at all. What do you do?


2. First hand in a 9 handed sit & go. $11 buy in. Start off with 1500 chips. 10/20 blinds and you're on the button. MP player raises to 60, you look at AKs (suited), you 3 bet (re-raise) to 180. MP Player jams and you call. MP proudly flips over TT vs. your AK. Was it a good or bad play by either player?

[BeerDog99]

Well, I am looking forward to some good analysis but in the absence of this, here are some of my thoughts.

1) Situation #1, I think is a much easier fold. You have less chips invested, it is a bigger buyin/payoff tourney and as you say, you have no information on the raiser. Also, I think that it is more likely you are up against AK, AA or KK. The guy might be a monkey shoving gambler but more likely he was expecting someone to raise and he wanted more chips in the pot before he took it.

2) Situation #2 is a little harder. its a flip. With a $11 buyin tourney, I would expect to see more of this type of hand. Really, it depends on your view on tourney poker. If you want to take coin flips to try and chip up, then I guess calling is OK. Anyway you look at it, the TT shoving is the "better" play because of the standard "by betting you give yourself two ways of winning, calling only gives you one..."

For both of the situations (assuming you survive), in my opinion, this is one way to send a message to the rest of the players on how you or your opponent plays.

Those are my first thoughts on this.

Thanks!

[yisman]

In the first situation, I'd actually call. It's the third best hand. You're favored over anything but AA or KK, obviously. I'd like to take my chances there and either bust out early or get the quick double. Also, it would make a difference whether it's live or online. Online, with no prior experience with the player, it would be difficult to justify folding, IMO.

I don't know how to answer the second one.

[tatddy]

I'll take the second part first..."2. First hand in a 9 handed sit & go. $11 buy in. Start off with 1500 chips. 10/20 blinds and you're on the button. MP player raises to 60, you look at AKs (suited), you 3 bet (re-raise) to 180. MP Player jams and you call. MP proudly flips over TT vs. your AK. Was it a good or bad play by either player?"

Not a huge fan of either play here. Personally, I'd prefer to keep the pot small at level 1 and I'd have smooth called the 60 with AK suited. You have position, you have 3 more streets during which you can obtain and act on information.

If you airball the flop you can:
A) Call a smallish bet and chase your overpair or float-call and see if the initial raiser checks to you on the turn
B) Just fold and get away. You have AK suited. Big deal. It's A high and you only invested 60

Now I can understand the 3-bet here. You want information....you have a big starting hand. But am I calling the reraise allin? Ehh...maybe...it's a 11 dollar tourney. But like I said I prefer the former.

Now on to the guy shoving with 10/10. You raise to 60, you get reraised to 180, you shove? Terrible play. What is your desired outcome here? You want the 3 bettor to fold and scoop a baby pot? You want a call? The only hands that are calling the allin either have you dominated as a 4/1 dog or you're in a race situation. If you are resigned to putting all of your chips into the pot with 2 10s at level 1, then you should be calling the 180 3 bet only and then shoving allin after the flop no matter what. It's called a stop-and-go (you all know this but you posed this as an elementary question so ...). Otherwise you just call the 3 bet (if you must play out of position) and then check on the flop if you don't improve.

As for the first part:

"1. You're playing in a $100+10 buy in tournament live or online with around 100 players. First hand, it's 9 handed, blinds are 10/20, you have 2000 chips and you're in the cutoff seat. UTG (under the gun) limps in, followed by two other limpers, it's your turn and you look at QQ. You raise to 100. Everyone folds around to UTG who shoves all in. Limpers fold. You've never seen the UTG player in your life. No tells at all. What do you do?"

What do I do? Well I fold most of the time since we have zero information here. In these crapshoots I'd say 75% of the time the villan has AA, KK, JJ, or AK. Yes sometimes you see people overshove allin out of position with small pairs because they don't know how to play them after the flop if they miss. But you really have no clue here.

I'm not great tournament player but I feel as though I'm decent enough to fold here and find a higher leverage situation to shove in all my chips. Fold and you have 95 big blinds left and plenty of time/room to maneuver. Call and maybe you double up. But is a double up at level 1 really enough leverage to warrant the risk? Not for me.

[Duff85]

Some "easy" stuff here for you tournament players. Both of these are somewhat similar situations. I'll see what the answers are then give my 2 cents.

1. You're playing in a $100+10 buy in tournament live or online with around 100 players. First hand, it's 9 handed, blinds are 10/20, you have 2000 chips and you're in the cutoff seat. UTG (under the gun) limps in, followed by two other limpers, it's your turn and you look at QQ. You raise to 100. Everyone folds around to UTG who shoves all in. Limpers fold. You've never seen the UTG player in your life. No tells at all. What do you do?


2. First hand in a 9 handed sit & go. $11 buy in. Start off with 1500 chips. 10/20 blinds and you're on the button. MP player raises to 60, you look at AKs (suited), you 3 bet (re-raise) to 180. MP Player jams and you call. MP proudly flips over TT vs. your AK. Was it a good or bad play by either player?

Question 1 depends on the structure - its most likely a fold, but if this is a ship and flip and a lot of $100 live tourneys are - snap it off and hope he has like TT, JJ or AK.

Question 2 - I mainly play MTTs, so SNG strategy not so good. When he is on the front foot its not terrible. The AK call is more interesting. :-)

[ballahollic2]

Situation 1- Easy fold. the risk/reward is not even close to being right. a double up at level one doesn't at all warrant a call in such a marginal spot. your increasing ur stack from 1% of the chips in play to 2% of the chips in play. in later levels a simple raise and take it will increase ur stack by more then that.

Situation 2- Is the same situation just in different terms essentially. SNG's play weird. Your chip amount the 1st few levels isn't worth enough to justify aggressive lines.the 3 bet is putting in 12% of ur stack to essentially pick up .006% of the total chips in play. There's really no outcome from that we can find +EV. if he folds we pick up the .006% of the chips in play, if he calls. we now have put in 12% of ur stacks with a hand we are only meant to hit 33% of the time not to mention him calling the 3 bet semi polarizes his range and even when an ace hits we can't assume we are going to make anything else, and obv the worse outcome is he 4 bets back, in this case all in. now we have dumped 12% of our stack if we don't call off.


IF you have to call off in one of the two spots though situation 2 would be the call off. at least there a double up gets you a bit over 20% of the chips in play. Do not like either spot though!

[ballahollic2]

I actually didn't read anyones responses before i posted but more or less Tat is spot on with everything he said. Although the one thing I don't like is the "3 betting for information" I think thats a really poor excuse to ever 3 bet. I think the only two reasons why you should 3bet would be you are 3 betting for value ( your assumed range is ahead of their assumed range) or 3 betting as a bluff.

[Optional]

I'm not schooled enough to give thoughtful analysis but

1) I'd fold 99% of the time. I give up a fair percentage of chips in plays like that though so not sure I should so often.

2) Think both plays are acceptable but don't think I would have pushed in the TT position.

[Ian]

Hand 1: Fold. You'll usually be behind, and when you aren't you'll still usually just be racing against AK. Also, doubling up at this stage of the tournament doesn't dramatically increase your overall EV, but busting out (obviously) decreases your chance of making money to nothing.

Hand 2: This is a lot different than the first situation because now doubling up is a big boost to your EV. I think the AKs player played it fine. He's ahead of a fair amount of the shover's range and doubling up will greatly help his chances of taking down the SNG.

TT, however, is being overaggressive and turning his hand into a bluff. There's no worse hand that will call his shove, every overpair except JJ insta-calls (and JJ might call too), and most hands he's racing with will either call or wouldn't have 3bet in the first place.

Just my opinion...

[jrose2106]

situation #1 fold and suck it up, to limp UTG in a big tourny then shove with a re raise you have to be thinking AA KK or Ak, in which case ur in trouble, sure he could have JJ or A Q and just be a donk, but first hand, not worth it that early at all
situation #2 Played it fine, 10 10 if anything was over aggressive first hand of sit n go knowing that if he gets a call he's either behind or flipping, and with small amount invested not worth the risk
IF it was me = I wouldve folded the QQ, some donk would flip over AQs proudly thinkin he's a sharp pro
situation #2 flop comes 10 number number, and i instantly walk out for a smoke and wonder why it seems to always happen

[The Giant]

Situation #1: If you have three limpers, you have to raise a lot more than just 100. I would make it 200. If the guy then shoves on you, I think I would call. Two reasons: I think the shove looks pretty weak from him, and he could be just some maniac thinking that you are trying to steal. If he made it 600 or 700, I might consider folding.

Situation #2: This one is tricky. I think that the shove is probably worse than the call. Calling off all your money with AK suited and 75 big blinds isn't great, but it's not horrific either.

[thetrinity]

Situation #1: If you have three limpers, you have to raise a lot more than just 100. I would make it 200. If the guy then shoves on you, I think I would call. Two reasons: I think the shove looks pretty weak from him, and he could be just some maniac thinking that you are trying to steal. If he made it 600 or 700, I might consider folding.

Situation #2: This one is tricky. I think that the shove is probably worse than the call. Calling off all your money with AK suited and 75 big blinds isn't great, but it's not horrific either.

i wouldnt even make it 100 personally.

1. anyways id probably call online and fold live without tells. online the guy is more likely to have jj or 1010 because of the "embarrasment factor" (hed look more foolish if he had to show his face). id expect to see ak a lot in this spot anyways and
i dont see the point of racing this early. also, if this is a very fast structure, id be more likely to call.

2. 11 dollar tournaments guys go crazy all the time, im not getting rid of ak heads up. the tt reshoving is worse IMO.

[daneblazer]

Excellent answers so far. Trinity, Ian, ballaholic, and tatddy gave some great analysis on what to do in each scenario...so I won't really go into a hand analysis since they've covered it very well.

The reason I posted those two scenarios was to point out something that happens very often in tournaments...Putting yourself in marginal situations early on in tournaments. I see scenario 2 happen very often.

Both scenarios are the first hand, there is plenty of poker to be played. Scenario 1, the UTG could have TT JJ, but he could also have QQ, KK, AA, AK. You're tied against QQ, heavy favorite against TT JJ, heavy underdog against AA KK, and a slight favorite against AK.

Scenario 2 neither one are very good plays. AK calling there is flipping or an underdog against a huge range of hands. A player shoving TT there can only hope for a flip at best as JJ-AA are the most likely callers to his shove.

So why should you avoid marginal situations? For simplicity, let's say that we are playing a $100 buy in sit & go, winner take all, with 10 people in a vacuum meaning all players are of equal talent. Say scenario 2 unfolds except instead of TT the guy has 22. It doesn't really matter that much if he has TT, QQ, 99, 66, or any other pocket pair. If you are calling with AK there you are an underdog against every pair but 22 where you are basically flipping. Some may say I want to win a flip in this situation to double my chips so I can be more aggressive at the table and put myself in a better position to win the whole thing. An argument could be made for that, especially if one doesn't have a skill edge on the rest of the table, but usually putting yourself in a marginal situation early on to either double up or be knocked out isn't ideal because chips are worth more as the tournament goes on. Chips do not equal money. Just because you double your chip count, doesn't mean you double your tournament equity (amount you expect to win).

Everyone put in $100 to start the SNG mentioned in the paragraph above. So there's $1000 of tournament "prize money". Say in this example Lou has AKs and Sam has 22. It's a flip. You have folded and are sitting out. Lou hits an Ace on the flop to take it down.
Sam loses all $100 of his equity, but Lou doesn't gain all of Sam's. Lou will gain say $90 of equity and the other $10 is dispersed to the other players at the table just because there is one less player at the table. The $ Lou gains in this coin flip isn't worth as much as the $ Sam loses. Just by sitting back, you are improving your equity.

Let's say in this ridiculous example Lou goes on a tear. You get AJ AQ AT four hands in a row and fold all of them. Lou shoves pocket pairs against over cards and wins them all. With each player who gets knocked out, you gain more and more equity (the amount you expect to win) just by folding.

# of players / Lou's Stack / Your Stack /Your equity (estimation)

10 / 2000 / 2000 / $100
9 / 4000 / 2000 / $102
8 / 6000 / 2000 / $106
7 / 8000 / 2000 / $114
6 / 10,000 / 2000 / $130

So in the crazy example here, if this is a winner take all, you've increased your equity by 30% just by folding. You can go a little more in depth on this by reading about the Independent Chip Model (ICM) here.
http://www.sitandgoplanet.com/sitandgo/sng_bubble/Introduction_to%20ICM.html

If you play SNG's it's a must.

While the affects aren't as profound in larger tournaments as they are in SNG's, the principle remains the same. The more people that are knocked out, the longer the tournament goes on, the more your chips are "worth".

Hopefully this has helped some players...this is just my opinion from my experiences. I've already gained info from reading your responses as well. Everything in poker is fluid. Best of luck!

[stefan084]

1. fold
2. not sure
PS--the guy in your avatar used to be the most powerful player in the World of Warcraft at one time--gotta respect that

[daneblazer]

PS--the guy in your avatar used to be the most powerful player in the World of Warcraft at one time--gotta respect that

He's moved on to concentrating on winning the SBR Poker title.

[thetrinity]

i will say in scenario 2 id get rid of the ak if it was a bigger buy in (way more likely to be racing then be dominating). i think folding is bad because you see some maniac plays early on in smaller games, you are unlikely to see that in 50+ plus buy in, 10 dollar not as much, the opponent could realistically be very wide. plus we have some invested in the hand in scenario 2 which makes calling it all with ak a better play then if we had nothing invested.

[JAKEPEAVY21]

a limp UTG and then a reraise is almost always AA, KK or AK as others have stated..I would fold in that scenario and wait for a better spot. I also tend to be a bit more conservative in MTTs than SNGs.

The $11 sng with AK suited is a call for me. SNG strategy is different for me than MTTs and I try and get a stack or just fire up a new one.

[RudyRuetigger]

fold preflop

[downsouth]

Scenario #1, hate to do it but it is an easy fold with QQ there. Knowing nothing about your opponent and it being a decent level buy in you'd have to assume flipping is your best option. Plus, doubling up at that level has a minimal effect on your EV.

Scenario #2, Im not laying AK down in low level SNG's. Guys at that level have such a wide range of hands they will play and will treat AJ, AQ like its AA. My experience in this level SNG says this play is +EV.

[MoneyLineDawg]

Scenario 1- I actually call here.....Classic limp-shove monster hand of AA or KK is possible first of all......But I feel like the very first hand of tournies where people shove like this, they are usually maniacs with anything. With no read, I tend to think my QQ is +ev in this exact situation...... The early limp-shove move usually means a monster in later stages of a tournament, but the very first hand can mean something completely different. Being the very first hand of the tourney, I really don't see such a big re-raise to all in with KK or AA too often. As someone said earlier, a re-raise to 500 or so scares me much more than all-in.

If they have KK or AA I tip my cap and move on, but I'd like to think someone shoving like that cannot beat QQ most of the time.