How badly did I play this?

[Spaceman Spiff]

Playing in a little bar tourney last night. Lots of guys from my regular game and new faces. 23 players total, $20 entry, no rebuys, start with T1500.

Toward the end of level 1 (5-10) I catch UTG. I raise to 35, the standard opening raise at our table. UTG+1 re-raises to 100. I'm not too worried about him as I don't think he's played much. He tried to raise me by just throwing in a 50 chip (don't ask) and we told him he had to go to at least 60. He just threw out another 50 chip. With QQ I wasn't too worried about getting into a string raise semantics argument.
OK, CO calls and the BB calls. Both of them had won some pots and were above average. The CO actually doubled up on hand 1.
Obviously I don't want this many players along with QQ, so I re-re-raise 500 more to a total of 600. Pot now contains 900.
UTG+1 folds, CO folds, BB goes into the tank for a minute and calls.

The BB is one of the regulars at my home game, so I have a decent idea of how he likes to play. Based on his behavior, I'm 99% certain he doesn't have AA or KK and I would expect him to insta-call there with AK.

Pot is 1400. Flop comes Kxx rainbow. BB checks.

He generally bets when he's got something, ANYTHING, as far as a piece of the flop. He loves suited cards, so I'm figuring he was hoping to flop a draw and he missed. Maybe a suited A? I'm not thrilled about the K out there though. I've only got about 700 left. So I push all-in. Insta-call and he turns over . Blank-blank and I'm done.

Couple of things I see that I could have done differently. Re-raise all-in preflop. I imagine he would fold to that, but I can't believe he called 500 with K9s in the first place, so who knows. I really thought my re-raise would take things down right there.

Postflop- It seems weak, but should I check after his check there? Knowing the junk he likes to play I really don't want to give a free card there. I gain no information and give him a chance to maybe catch a little 2 pair or even a flush or straight draw on me.

With 1/2 my chips already in the pot and only 700 left, I can't see a bet of anything less than all-in. If he has nothing I'll take it down with any bet, but he's got any kind of draw he'll call and I'll basically have no pressure left to get a fold later on. I felt my best chance to get him to lay it down was there with the all-in.

It was all I could do to bite my tongue and not blow up, but I did my best. Situations reversed, there's no way I call a raise, re-raise, call, call, re-re-raise with a freakin' K9s. Eevn after the flop, based on the betting, I've got to figure that 9 kicker is in trouble.

Crap, now it makes me mad again just thinking about it.

[austin5string]

I certainly wouldn't have pushed all in w/ the K out there. Granted, his huge call with K9s isn't the best play, but you almost have to put him on a high pair, or at LEAST a couple high cards.

You say you had half your chips in so you pretty much had to push all in. Not sure I agree with that. First round, blinds at 5/10, 700 chips is still a lot to work with. It would be a pricy laydown, but you'd have still been in the tourney.

That's my two cents.

~John

[yeltzen]

I think the preflop raise killed you. Maybe a raise to 300 would have been better (you probably would get called by everyone if they all played like this)... when you raised to 500 you committed yourself to the hand. When a "maybe" flop like that comes up the only way to know where you're at is to go all in, and you're only getting called if you're beat. Just too early in the tournament to blow through chips like this when the rif raf are still in.

This is just my opinion, though. I would wait for our resident tournament expert jojobinks to weigh in before you make any conclusions.

[Spaceman Spiff]

I think you nailed it. I felt that if I only raised to 300 I'd get callers all around. However, at least then I'd be almost 100% certain I was beaten when an overcard came on the flop. I wanted to take it down or at least isolate with the big raise. I got what I wanted, it just went poorly. I'm 70-30 to win there though and more often than not it will work, so I just had to bite my tongue and tell him what a great call he made.

In retrospect, I also thought about the chips I would have had left and the blinds. They were due to go up to 10-20 shortly, but that would've still left me with 35 BBs and M>20 if I don't put another chip in. Like austin said, probably a decent amount to work with. I just felt like taking it check-check at the time was a weak play and I'm trying to break as many of my weak habits as I can. Guess I just dialed it up at the wrong time.

[tomb1]

I think preflop raise was OK -- could be a little bit too much, but definitely the right idea. K9's call was totally "wrong" but far be it from me to tell someone else how to play his stupid cards!

But post-flop with a K out there, it tough to push all-in no matter how much of your money is in the middle. (It's what is still in front of you that counts more.) It might be the "right" play with players who are playing the "right" way, but that "wrong" call back pre-flop turned the whole hand screwy.

I woulda checked on the turn, and folded to another big bet. Maybe that's wussing out, but with a good pile in front of me early in a tourney, I'd rather live a few more hands. QQ is a little better than that dreadful JJ but not much!

Waiting for jojo to opine...

[TheMightyJim2k]

your 500 preflop raise was the mistake. If you see yourself as committed when an overcard hits on the flop then you should have just moved all in preflop.

There are three better plays...

1. just call the 100. If rags flop you can bet strong and be almost certain noone limped with AA or KK, and most of the time you are going to take it down. I know this is risky as you are letting small pockets get a shot to hit a set on you, but it is less risky than the play you made on the actually flop. You can always get out with a minimum loss if you just call.


2. Raise to about 300-350. You would probably get a couple of callers so you would be in a three way pot and no exactly what kind of situation you are in if an A or a K flops (you are pretty much done with the hand especially in middle position). You still have over half of your stack and are alive albeit unlucky to lose with QQ.

3. Just move all in. If you are going to mentally commit yourself to the pot even if an overcard flops then you need to go ahead a push now. You have the best chance of winning a sizable pot, (450) and are probably ahead if you get called.


All three of these moves are viable and should give better results for you. Knowing my game I would prefer 1 or 3. I would rather see a flop for relatively cheap and try to win it there, or just take my chances and move in. I dont like the 300-350 raise because its positives (limiting the field without committing you to the hand) dont outway the negatives (if you get second caller they could have a great variety of hands including low pkt pairs, suited connectors or K9s) to me.

I feel like your play was a poor one only because about 2 weeks ago i did the same thing in two different tournaments. Once with AK and once with QQ. The AK I pot commited myself by raising and then making a continuation bet that was too large after the flop. With the QQ I made a mistake very similar to yours and it crippled my stack.

please feel free to critique my ideas.

gl at the next tourney.

[SpeakEasy]

Pre-flop:
All in. All of the other players seem weak, especially UTG+1. I'll take a 340 pot for QQ, without seeing the flop. This hand is actually a candidate for a limp-re-raise, which is effectively what you did, except you raised just enough to get a caller and get in trouble. Think ahead to the flop. If you are saying to yourself "If he checks, then I'm all in" then you might as well go all in PF and win the pot there.

On the flop:
Check. Your read of BB is "insta-call pre-flop with AK," but his play still smells like AK. It obviously wasn't as strong as AK, but I'm still checking with the K on board. I am absolutely not moving in my remaining 700 on the flop. As has been stated, he only calls if he has a king, and he folds if no king.

Re-raising PF to about 300 just invites more trouble. Then you have a nice, hefty 4-way pot, with no idea of what anyone else has.

[VARoadstter]

I'm feeling ya man. I have done this sort of thing (or worse) in the past more times than I'd be willing to publicly admit. Long story short, you probably have to go all-in preflop instead of giving someone a chance to draw out on you.

The odds of a king or ace showing up by the river are about 50%. Now, you stated your read told you your opponent did not have AA, KK, or AK (which he didn't, good read) so really the only hands here you are worried about him having are things like AQ and KQ when an ace or king flops. Questionable if it would have been right for him to call your preflop raise with an AQ but I personally would have pitched a KQ there. Even suited, he should not be playing AJ (or lower) or KJ (or lower). He did - he's a freaking clown who hit a lucky flop.

In the end, it looks like he got dragged into playing the hand through the series of raises and reraises. I do that too. I have a really difficult time letting a hand go when I've got my chips "invested" in it. Postflop you were victimized by the way the hand had played to that point and the fact that he hit his hand enough to beat you. I agree with what others have said, only hands that beat you will play with you on the flop so you committed suicide there.

Most important - what do you learn from the hand? Well, a few things. There's some good bet-sizing information, post-flop aggression, and most of all - that guy is a total fish who can't let go of a hand. I think you should definitely use that against that guy in the future. You're pretty likely to be able to turn that piece of information into some cash at his expense.

Good luck.

[dnmkemps]

I agree with VAR about using that information in the future. On a side note, you might be giving a tell when you have QQ or JJ. He is one of the regulars at your games. Could he have picked up something from you? But does that explain why he would call a big raise like that with "knowing" what you had?

[yeltzen]

If he knew what he had... then that would have made it an even dumber call.