I have finally put enough time between me and my last MTT to discuss it. Four table MTT and due to a poor showing the previous week in a 3 table MTT, I vow to play perfect.
We are down to 3 tables, the level is 200/400/50 and I am in the SB with $14k in chips. ( M=14, Q is around 1.)
EP standard player raises to $1200 UtG. Folds around to me and I have QQ. I make what I consider a standard raise here to $3k. Villain moves in for $8k.
I thought only briefly about this, thoughts of building a stack in my head. My two choices:
FOLD and have $11k left. (A very weak play here in my opinion)
or
CALL off $5k more to win the pot of $17k or so. (This would put me at $23k and very comfortable.)
Is this an easy of a choice as I made it? More importantly, would you RAISE there with QQ vs. and UtG raiser with $9k?
I call and he tables AK, which hits an ACE and takes 65% of my stack... BUT, I am not out yet... I build it back up. By the time we are down to two tables, I am back at $14k, but the levels are now 500/1000/100. I Call a short stack all-in with TT, only to see that she flopped a flush draw. Turn = boom and I am again now at $8-9k and hanging on.
I grind back up to about $12.5k and finally get KK, but in EP. I cant really fool around and make it $3k to go. The BB is the only caller. But that $3k call + $500 SB + antes will take me to $17k if I take it down on the flop. Not great but not bad.
The flop is 8d9h9d and the BB CHECKS. Can emphasize this enough. He CHECKS. I have only $9500 behind and bet $4500. He then ASKS what I have behind and I state, just $5k. He then CHECK-RAISES me all-in on a OESD. WTF? GREAT for me as I am going to double to... Oh wait, TURN is a TEN and his 67 sends me home. He might of even had 6d7d but I didnt even care to make sure, as I am NEVER folding KK to a single BB caller when I am short-stacked and the flop is 899.
So, frustration and despair results. But overall was happy with my play. Still, second guessing, could I have just CALLED with QQ? (No I still dont think so).
5 comments:
I like your play with Q-Q. You have to win flips like that to take down the tournament.
Ray, you are focusing on silliness with the QQ hand. That is the easiest call in the world. Probably if you weren't in the pot for anything yet, and most definitely given that you only needed to call another 5k to win 17k. It's not even close. Like Mojo said, you have to beat QQ with AK and you have to beat AK with QQ if you want to win a tournament, that's just how it happens.
Btw, surprised you did not just push allin preflop with the KK hand, if you had only 12.5k and the blinds were seemingly higher than 500-1000 at that point already. I mean, sure everybody likes to win the extra 3k when you make the guy fold on the flop, but he presumably doesn't even stick around for the flop if you raise it allin there. And plus, at that small of a stack, I assume there were other hands you were open-pushing in with by the last few rounds there, right?
"And plus, at that small of a stack, I assume there were other hands you were open-pushing in with by the last few rounds there, right?"
There were two factors that led me to play the KK this way.
1. I needed to get value out of the best hand I had all night.
2. No one was open shoving. Sometimes (and this table was indeed a case of this) the players dont understand how low their Q is because chips flowed to the other tables and to one stack. So if 5 players have around $15k, no one will shove.
I'm not sure what stakes these are but I wanted to say that I would definitely play the queens in the same way.
It's easy to be results orientated when this happens, but there are so many hands he could be raising with UTG that you are way ahead of (99, TT, JJ, AK, AQs). Once he shoves it's obviously an easy call anyway.
I look forward to reading more of your posts anyway :)
Craig
(craighopperpoker.blogspot.co.uk)
Post a Comment