Final Table Spot

[peterswellman]

This is from the final table of tonights Big €20 on .fr The final table hasn't been long running. I flat the UTG open purely for ICM reasons. UTG seems to be the guys steal spot though and he is opening quite a bit from there from what I have already noticed. Deespite him being quite wide I think 3-bet calling preflop is burning money. He is breakeven/small winning player from OPR. He seems to be playing pretty decent thus far and certainly has a small understanding of ICM at the very least just from the way he played a few hands against the other big stacks. What do people reckon is the best line here? Payouts are €2.6k, €1.9k €1.4k for the top 3 places and currently we stand to win close to €300.



Poker Stars No-Limit Hold'em Tournament, 15000/30000 Blinds (8 handed) - Poker Stars Converter Tool from http://www.flopturnriver.com

MrSwellman (MP1) (t1866098)
MP2 (t264927)
CO (t382774)
Button (t605752)
SB (t479656)
BB (t1080760)
UTG (t2839908)
UTG+1 (t760125)

MrSwellman's M: 41.47

Preflop: MrSwellman is MP1 with Q, Q
UTG bets t60000, 1 fold, MrSwellman calls t60000, 1 fold, CO raises t379024, 3 folds, UTG calls t319024, MrSwellman ???????

[Arazi]

Well played, you've trapped him so ship it in now.

[Guest]

Always a ship here, with the pot now inflated its a defo ship and hope he'll be stubborn and call.wit 99,1010,JJ! My experience of players like this will not very often have the ability to see the value in smoothing KK and AA in this spot

[bustamoves]

Ugh. Do we really need to be shipping here?
I think flatting would be fine. We're prob up against overcard(s) between the two of them.

I think we can expect UTG to play pretty honestly postflop if we flat.

For ICM reasons I think I see the flop. We've got position post flop. If flop is low I'm stacking off I guess.
I think this line gives CL more chances to make a mistake than if we simply shove.

[Guest]

Ugh. Do we really need to be shipping here?
I think flatting would be fine. We're prob up against overcard(s) between the two of them.

I think we can expect UTG to play pretty honestly postflop if we flat.

For ICM reasons I think I see the flop. We've got position post flop. If flop is low I'm stacking off I guess.
I think this line gives CL more chances to make a mistake than if we simply shove.

Why give him the opportunity here to catch up, by him flatting we have established we are ahead almost everytime here. The pot is 800k we are shipping 1.7m into an 800k pot. Seems super standard to me, there are alot of under pairs in his range so we are crushing his range, so ship and hope to get called by worse! Your shoving for value!!! Just because you have the 3rd biggest stack massively out chipped doesn't mean you should play QQ like a whale. I completely understand the mathematical value in ICM but I don't believe its relevant in this spot, flatting is -ev!! Your not playing 500bbs deep you have less than 50bbs ship it in and thank him for his 300k investment!!!
you mentioned he will play honestly post flop? If he barrels a super wet board board example J,10,8 with 2 spades and we got QQ no spade whats your line?
Do you shove QQ knowing your at best up against some straight/flush combo draw if he calls??
Only hands he calls pre and calls a shove on the flop are hands which have more equity and value now than they did pre flop!! My argument is why give him added equity??

[bustamoves]

Why give him the opportunity here to catch up, by him flatting we have established we are ahead almost everytime here. The pot is 800k we are shipping 1.7m into an 800k pot. Seems super standard to me, there are alot of under pairs in his range so we are crushing his range, so ship and hope to get called by worse! Your shoving for value!!! Just because you have the 3rd biggest stack massively out chipped doesn't mean you should play QQ like a whale. I completely understand the mathematical value in ICM but I don't believe its relevant in this spot, flatting is -ev!! Your not playing 500bbs deep you have less than 50bbs ship it in and thank him for his 300k investment!!!
you mentioned he will play honestly post flop? If he barrels a super wet board board example J,10,8 with 2 spades and we got QQ no spade whats your line?
Do you shove QQ knowing your at best up against some straight/flush combo draw if he calls??
Only hands he calls pre and calls a shove on the flop are hands which have more equity and value now than they did pre flop!! My argument is why give him added equity??

I completely understand the mathematical value in ICM but I don't believe its relevant in this spot,

it's got to be relevant.

[Guest]

Why is it relevant? There are 9 people left, your passing up a massively +ev situation to try find a better spot??
This is pretty much the best spot your gonna get!! Your ahead and in position to go HU against a player when you are so far ahead of his shoving range, smoothing is not an ICM based decision but rather a results based decision where you're afraid to bust!! You said in a post earlier(too lazy to quote so paraphrasing) that "yeah I just get it in on a raggy board" that play is hardly +ev is it? Simply because you dont actually know where you are in the hand post flop but preflop u do! Your edge here lies preflop because of the inflated pot! As I said before your not playing 500bbs deep so your ability to play post is greatly diminished!! If I thought you are flatting here for value against a spazz id say ok maybe there is merit but your actually endorsing flatting QQ in a spot where you KNOW your ahead!! Leaving yourself 1.3m behind with 1m in the.middle, that is honestly regardless of ICM absolutely brutal!! I.mean that is inexcusably bad!!

[bustamoves]

Why is it relevant? There are 9 people left, your passing up a massively +ev situation to try find a better spot??
This is pretty much the best spot your gonna get!! Your ahead and in position to go HU against a player when you are so far ahead of his shoving range, smoothing is not an ICM based decision but rather a results based decision where you're afraid to bust!! You said in a post earlier(too lazy to quote so paraphrasing) that "yeah I just get it in on a raggy board" that play is hardly +ev is it? Simply because you dont actually know where you are in the hand post flop but preflop u do! Your edge here lies preflop because of the inflated pot! As I said before your not playing 500bbs deep so your ability to play post is greatly diminished!! If I thought you are flatting here for value against a spazz id say ok maybe there is merit but your actually endorsing flatting QQ in a spot where you KNOW your ahead!! Leaving yourself 1.3m behind with 1m in the.middle, that is honestly regardless of ICM absolutely brutal!! I.mean that is inexcusably bad!!

i think any time you're up against the chip leader in a hand where you have also one of the biggest stacks you have to think ICM.

even though i agree we are likely to be way ahead, i wouldnt trust chip leader to lay down Ax type hands.

we'll generally stack his lower pairs (when we flat) and hands we dominate like kq, jq, qt or say AT, KT, A9, A8, A7 when the flop comes xhi anyway.

i'm not saying i'm definitely right but i think it's poor to disregard ICM.

We still have 3rd largest stack if we have to fold or QQ post flop. Dont forget our equity in the pot is lowered with 3rd shorty in. I mean we are not guaranteed what's in the middle anyway. If we isolate and find we're up againt Ax or Kx from the shorty we're losing whats in the middle 30% of the time regardless.

[Guest]

i think any time you're up against the chip leader in a hand where you have also one of the biggest stacks you have to think ICM.

even though i agree we are likely to be way ahead, i wouldnt trust chip leader to lay down Ax type hands.

we'll generally stack his lower pairs (when we flat) and hands we dominate like kq, jq, qt or say AT, KT, A9, A8, A7 when the flop comes xhi anyway.

i'm not saying i'm definitely right but i think it's poor to disregard ICM.

We still have 3rd largest stack if we have to fold or QQ post flop. Dont forget our equity in the pot is lowered with 3rd shorty in. I mean we are not guaranteed what's in the middle anyway. If we isolate and find we're up againt Ax or Kx from the shorty we're losing whats in the middle 30% of the time regardless.

You wouldn't trust the CL to lay down Ax type hands are you joking?? If he doesn't lay down Ax except AK then that's just crazy however based on the opponent being a breakeven player I'm sure he reshoves AK maybe AQ and flats AJ/A10 and willing to fold to shove.
You also mention the shortie has Kx Ax then you only win 70% of the time which is very true however if you don't reisolate with QQ your equity reduces even further as 3 players are now in the pot so that argument is totally void and you have your equity backwards!!

I never said disregard ICM in play at all as you will see but I think you simply don't understand ICM properly to be honest.
You are flatting QQ to fold and giving up your preflop edge so you can fold post flop if the board gets scary!!
You are basically looking for an excuse to fold. However the pot is too big, there is 1m or more in the pot and you have 1.3m back if you smooth!!
You would rather smooth QQ and 40 bbs in on a J high flop????

To be honest without being harsh you are totally wrong, you are dissecting the hand too much and looking for potential reasons to fold when in fact the hand is extremely straight forward!! Its a shove end of!!!

[shanno66]

With all the money being in the top 3 spots i dont think we really need to consider icm at this point,anything other than reshoving here is bad imo.Were crushing hes range in this spot and getting it in pre just makes the game so much easier and flatting will just get us into bad spots too often post flop,No need to get tricky with 50bbs in this spot but w/e i might be wrong im just a turbo fish

Ship/hold/ship tourney

[bustamoves]

dont see what all the fuss is about seeing the flop. flop anxiety or what?

if there's a A on the flop we're prob beat, still have our stack and are stiil in with a great chance as 3rd in chips to get to the serious cash prizes.

so we're crushing his range preflop..we'll probably be crushing it postflop too.

i want the CLs chips too dont forget. yes we're letting him catch up with alot of hands but thats the risk i take. i never really mind this type of situation postflop.

CL is never going to bluff Ahi flops and he's going to stack off with junk so often i'm happy with flatting QQ here.

[GaryT]

i think any time you're up against the chip leader in a hand where you have also one of the biggest stacks you have to think ICM.

even though i agree we are likely to be way ahead, i wouldnt trust chip leader to lay down Ax type hands.

we'll generally stack his lower pairs (when we flat) and hands we dominate like kq, jq, qt or say AT, KT, A9, A8, A7 when the flop comes xhi anyway.

i'm not saying i'm definitely right but i think it's poor to disregard ICM.

We still have 3rd largest stack if we have to fold or QQ post flop. Dont forget our equity in the pot is lowered with 3rd shorty in. I mean we are not guaranteed what's in the middle anyway. If we isolate and find we're up againt Ax or Kx from the shorty we're losing whats in the middle 30% of the time regardless.

Do you really think he flats the shove with all them? I'd expect everybody here to be a lot tighter than you seem to think they are.

Any reads on CO? Is he decent? Any history or either of you doing good/bad things?

Do you think he realises that you are only flatting reasonably strong hands here? For instance you're never going to show up with 78s or 22 etc. here as you would pretty much have to call off some of the stacks behind if UTG folded. Is this right? Or would he just decide oh there's dead money and he'll think he has fold equity so shove super wide?

This is the widest I'd expect CO to shove 77+, AJ+, KQ+. Maybe ATs but I don't see him showing up here with A5s or anything like that.

So we can assume UTG who is opening wide would call pretty tight. 88+, AJs+, AQo+ I don't think he can show up with KQ or anything worse very often with you behind. AJ is possibly optimistic also.

He more than likely calls then folds to your shove with 88-99. Not sure about TT-JJ he could iso some % of the time. AK I'd imagine he would iso. AQ I don't know if he'd call/fold, call/decide or iso. QQ-AA he could be inducing with some of the time.

I'm not sure if this makes much sense as I'm very hungover might do a bit of work on this later with a few different ranges as it's quite an interesting spot that I never feel like I play well.

[Guest]

dont see what all the fuss is about seeing the flop. flop anxiety or what?

if there's a A on the flop we're prob beat, still have our stack and are stiil in with a great chance as 3rd in chips to get to the serious cash prizes.

so we're crushing his range preflop..we'll probably be crushing it postflop too.

i want the CLs chips too dont forget. yes we're letting him catch up with alot of hands but thats the risk i take. i never really mind this type of situation postflop.

CL is never going to bluff Ahi flops and he's going to stack off with junk so often i'm happy with flatting QQ here.

Ok gonna give this one last lash, btw if you can find someone who's really good at ICM etc like Lappin then I'm all ears and willing to retract everything!

You are making the suggestion shoving means post flop anxiety which is pretty much the most ridiculous statement of this thread!!! You are the one who's anxiety is affecting his decision making!! Your willing to give up the edge so you can fold and ladder!! If you shove and hold(cos u are ahead) you have a greater chance of winning!!
You are making very little sense to be perfectly honest, you say you want the cl chips and you want to get them when you are ahead?? Then you should shove

[bustamoves]

Ok gonna give this one last lash, btw if you can find someone who's really good at ICM etc like Lappin then I'm all ears and willing to retract everything!

You are making the suggestion shoving means post flop anxiety which is pretty much the most ridiculous statement of this thread!!! You are the one who's anxiety is affecting his decision making!! Your willing to give up the edge so you can fold and ladder!! If you shove and hold(cos u are ahead) you have a greater chance of winning!!
You are making very little sense to be perfectly honest, you say you want the cl chips and you want to get them when you are ahead?? Then you should shove

i'm saying what i would do. i'm NOT saying i'm definitely right...said that from the outset.

i'd love to hear Doke or Lappin or many others on here too, I'm all ears.

you seem to be getting all het up with me highighting your ICM comment. It's just my opinion. shoving QQ may be the right thing but disregarding ICM cant be right. It's got to be a factor in these situations and i'm of the opinion its quite a big (factor) in this case (and again am open to correction fwiw).

[Arazi]

Brady, I think you've been X'd here.
Have you not read Busta's footnote under each of his posts?

[sligoboi]

if there's a A on the flop we're prob beat...

[x] Genuine lol


[/contribution]

[Fiend]

Arazi is right. You've trapped him. Now SHIP!!!

[Foxy]

Shipshippidyshipship.

My arguable maths works out that to shove profitably(presuming he calls) in the 3way pot we need 41% equity or more. The only situations where we get less than 45% is when someone has AA or KK or when they both have suited connectors plus a few randomish hands that'd be really weird for him to wake up with, this not even taking into account the times that the shorty miraculously has one of these hands and we win the side pot for North of a milly anyway. And still not even taking into consideration the times that you shove and the big stack folds. If he trapped with AA or KK well then okay fair enough but that doesn't happen near often enough to be able to stop a shove with the QQ here.
I do think flatting here is actually not a good idea. Post flop, he's folding the hands which if we had made him commit pre we'd be beating anyway and thus losing out on vital chips. You're allowing him to get away with more of his stack intact if his AX etc missed by flatting.

If this makes no sense at all and I have the IQ of a crack-baby, do tell. Also, I worked that out on a sheet of paper so if someone has more accurate figures I'd be willing to say I'm wrong on that. I was going to mention the Implied value of having a big stack in late tournament play but that could just end up in me rambling (and that's not a good thing!)

Tournament play is full of massive variance, sometimes you just gotta go with these little edges

[peterswellman]

With all the money being in the top 3 spots i dont think we really need to consider icm at this point,

Considering our stack this is the exact time to consider ICM because being second in chips here and busting out 8th would be horrific ICM suicide.

Anyway, I shoved after he flatted because I just didn't see it being a trap and felt it was being pretty honest here. C/o had AK and I lost the flip. Came 3rd in the end.

[Mellor]

"for ICM reasons" is getting thrown about a lot without anybody explaining their reasoning.

For ICM reasons I think I see the flop. We've got position post flop. If flop is low I'm stacking off I guess.
I think this line gives CL more chances to make a mistake than if we simply shove.

Flatting is really bad imo.
I don't understand the ICM reasons you are getting at.

you seem to be getting all het up with me highighting your ICM comment. It's just my opinion. shoving QQ may be the right thing but disregarding ICM cant be right. It's got to be a factor in these situations and i'm of the opinion its quite a big (factor) in this case (and again am open to correction fwiw).

I think what brady meant, (he'll correct me if i'm wrong), was that ICM isn't a big enough factor here to deviate from the standard shove, rather than ignoring ICM completely at this stage.

My arguable maths works out that to shove profitably(presuming he calls) in the 3way pot we need 41% equity or more.

I don't think so.
Our equity 3 ways is irrelevant, well to an extent. We need to be >30% or so to be +ev in the main pot. But the hand (assuming he calls) is won or lost in the heads up side pot.
Imagine the villains have KK and JJ, it doesn't affect our 3 way equity who has what, we are 18%. But the EV of the whole hand will vary massively depending on the CL having KK or JJ. Nearly a 2million difference in EV.



As for the hand, push now. Hope for dead chips.
As an aside, had the CL shoved, I'd have folded, just.

[Winning!]

Fairly standard jam to isolate, break-even players will iso CO with the nutted end of their range a lot of the time and go call/fold with the rest. It doesn't really matter that we're turning our hand face up, even if UTG does trap a small % he's call/fold so often we're not ICM punting. I'd probably iso JJ+,AK fwiw and flat some other decent stuff in pos since UTG shouldn't really get out of line in a dry side.

[LAPPIN]

This is from the final table of tonights Big €20 on .fr The final table hasn't been long running. I flat the UTG open purely for ICM reasons. UTG seems to be the guys steal spot though and he is opening quite a bit from there from what I have already noticed. Deespite him being quite wide I think 3-bet calling preflop is burning money. He is breakeven/small winning player from OPR. He seems to be playing pretty decent thus far and certainly has a small understanding of ICM at the very least just from the way he played a few hands against the other big stacks. What do people reckon is the best line here? Payouts are €2.6k, €1.9k €1.4k for the top 3 places and currently we stand to win close to €300.



Poker Stars No-Limit Hold'em Tournament, 15000/30000 Blinds (8 handed) - Poker Stars Converter Tool from http://www.flopturnriver.com

MrSwellman (MP1) (t1866098)
MP2 (t264927)
CO (t382774)
Button (t605752)
SB (t479656)
BB (t1080760)
UTG (t2839908)
UTG+1 (t760125)

MrSwellman's M: 41.47

Preflop: MrSwellman is MP1 with Q, Q
UTG bets t60000, 1 fold, MrSwellman calls t60000, 1 fold, CO raises t379024, 3 folds, UTG calls t319024, MrSwellman ???????

For ICM reasons and squeeze-inducement reasons, I do like the line of flatting. Sure he is chippy but he is raising UTG so if you 3bet, you have to ask yourself how do you play against his 4bet-inducing 5bet shove range. The answer to this will depend hugely on his style but in a vacuum, I would hazard that you play fairly well. I would also venture that by 3betting, you are potentially losing value in the hand if he is opening super-wide so again, versus certain types of villains, the flat and navigational route can be most profitable (your hand strength is concealed, you are deep enough to play a multi-street hand, you have position).

The other advantage to flatting is you potentially induce squeeze plays. In this instance this is what happened. While it is of course possible that the villain has AA or KK, the likelihood is you are ahead and potentially able to go HU versus the shover's range needing only 30% and probably having over 65%.

It is possible to crunch the numbers and construct guesstimate ranges for each villain but without going into that long-handed process, I can promise you that either raising or shoving is correct. Flatting is better than folding but if he does have AA or KK, you are probably getting it in on most flops anyway, AK would surely have raised himself and even if he didn't and calls you off, so be it - you are 55% for the more important sidepot. The big worry is exactly what someone else in this thread pointed out - that a wet board brings his equity close to a flip versus a hand that would have folded pre. It also opens the door for you to be bluffed off the best hand by 88-JJ on a K73 type board.

[DFinneran]

Don't intend to de-rail this thread at all but I can't find an answer to this question anywhere..

When you say you're playing on Pokerstars '.fr' is that a different site totally to the normal Pokerstars? What differences are there between the two?

[eamonhonda]

Don't intend to de-rail this thread at all but I can't find an answer to this question anywhere..

When you say you're playing on Pokerstars '.fr' is that a different site totally to the normal Pokerstars? What differences are there between the two?

It's French pokerstars. Different site same software, higher rake supposed to be softer. Do a search for pokerstars.fr there's a thread on it