Opionion wanted on this hand from the WSOP Seniors Event

[Double Eagle]

I played with the gray hairs in the Seniors Event at the WSOP last week. Playing 10 handed with 4,128 of my closest friends. This hand came up about halfway through the first level with blinds at 25/25. We only had $3,000 in our starting stack.

I was in the BB with A4o. Two limpers to the button who also limps, SB checks, I check.

Flop comes AJ2 rainbow. Checks around to the button who bets $100, SB folds, I call and everyone else folds. The button and I are now heads up. Pot is now $325.

Turn is a 4. I checked, the button bets $200, I check raise to $500 and the button flat calls. Pot is now $1,325.

River is a 3, no flush possible. I bet $800, the button moves all in and has me covered. I have about $1,400 behind. I have no read on the button’s playing style as it is just 30 minutes into the tournament.

Question 1: What would you do?
Question 2: What do you think the button has?

[DrStrange]

Button limping preflop makes me discount AA a lot and AJ/JJ somewhat.

Button bets out on the ace high flop, let's give him Ax, JJ, 22, a wheel draw semibluff but not J2, plus donkey cards

Button bets again on the turn and flats the check raise. Let's drop the sets and AJ since he didn't reraise. Range is now Ax (but not AJ), a wheel draw+pair, a made wheel plus less likely donkey cards.

Button raises all-in on the river. Let's drop most of the Ax hands, but leave some chance of Ace-face, the wheel, two littler pair, A-5, plus a remote set of donkey cards.

A quick look at the pot odds, I think hero needs to be good 30% the time to call here. Mostly Hero is going to see the wheel plus an occational A5. Hero should fold.

Street by street:
Hero's preflop check is fine.
Hero should snap fold the flop.
Hero's $300 turn check-raise into a $1,025 pot is too small.
Hero's 800 value bet might be a bit large but generally ok.

I hope you had fun, regardless! -=- DrStrange

[JM]

Why check the flop here? IMO you should be leading out with such a weak holding that actually connected. If you lead out, you could take it down right there or at least get a feel for what a caller may have. You don't want to go down this road against another ace when you're OOP like this with no kicker.

I don't think you can call here.

[Ronoh]

Originally Posted by DrStrange

A quick look at the pot odds, I think hero needs to be good 30% the time to call here.

Major flaw in poker thinking IMO. Pot odds are fine and dandy in cash games but tournament poker is a completely different animal. The 30% of the time that you end up with more chips do NOT cancel out the 70% of the time you hit the rail.

Large field tournament poker is ALL about survival, especially in the early stages.

Doubling up to 6,000 chips in a tournament where there are 12 MILLION chips in play doesn't get you very far and as the math shows the majority of the time your game is over early. Major risk for so very small of a reward.

[pltrgyst]

Tournament? Bet on the flop to find out where you are, or fold to the bet.

Clear cut.

When you have small hands you play small pots. Sh*t kicker out of position, early level = tiny hand.

[bergs]

Originally Posted by Double Eagle

I played with the gray hairs in the Seniors Event at the WSOP last week. Playing 10 handed with 4,128 of my closest friends. This hand came up about halfway through the first level with blinds at 25/25. We only had $3,000 in our starting stack.

I was in the BB with A4o. Two limpers to the button who also limps, SB checks, I check.

Flop comes AJ2 rainbow. Checks around to the button who bets $100, SB folds, I call and everyone else folds. The button and I are now heads up. Pot is now $325.

Turn is a 4. I checked, the button bets $200, I check raise to $500 and the button flat calls. Pot is now $1,325.

River is a 3, no flush possible. I bet $800, the button moves all in and has me covered. I have about $1,400 behind. I have no read on the button’s playing style as it is just 30 minutes into the tournament.

Question 1: What would you do?
Question 2: What do you think the button has?

I think I'd call. The only hands with a 5 in them that I can see the button betting is A5 or J5 or 55. I don't think he can call the turn check-raise (and I like that move there) with those hands. I think he raises AJ OTB preflop. A2, A4, A5, A6, A7, A8, A9, and AT (if unsuited) make sense. So does KJ, QJ, JT.

Maybe I'm in the minority, but I call. I'm betting he either rivered the set or you won the hand.

[Ronoh]

Originally Posted by rhbergman

I think I'd call. The only hands with a 5 in them that I can see the button betting is A5 or J5 or 55. I don't think he can call the turn check-raise (and I like that move there) with those hands. I think he raises AJ OTB preflop. A2, A4, A5, A6, A7, A8, A9, and AT (if unsuited) make sense. So does KJ, QJ, JT.

Maybe I'm in the minority, but I call. I'm betting he either rivered the set or you won the hand.

Major problem with this mentality (in addition to what I've already posted) is that you're already looking for reasons to call off all of your chips because you "might have the best hand" in the first level of a 4000+ man game. You can't win the game at this point, hell you can't even give yourself much of an advantage over the rest of the table with this hand... but you certainly can find the rail with it and all is takes is a single card to send you there.

There is a time and a place for this, and now is nowhere near that time.

[EasilyFound]

River bet seems unwise to me.

[bergs]

Originally Posted by Ronoh

Major problem with this mentality (in addition to what I've already posted) is that you're already looking for reasons to call off all of your chips because you "might have the best hand" in the first level of a 4000+ man game. You can't win the game at this point, hell you can't even give yourself much of an advantage over the rest of the table with this hand... but you certainly can find the rail with it and all is takes is a single card to send you there.

There is a time and a place for this, and now is nowhere near that time.

This is part of the reason I hate tournaments, but he's already stuck a decent portion of his stack in there with the check raise on the turn. I think this conversation is dramatically different with a 10K stack, but at 3K, meh, stick it in.

We need to double up at some point, right? As described, I can't really put the villain on a hand that beats us.

The question is the turn. If we don't want this kind of variance this early in the tournament, we're supposed to check fold when we improve to 2 pair after betting the flop? Barring a major strength read on villain, I don't get it.

I probably check the river, but if shoved on anyway, I'm calling.

[JM]

Originally Posted by rhbergman

we're supposed to check fold when we improve to 2 pair after betting the flop? Barring a major strength read on villain, I don't get it

check - called flop, check raised turn, which I think is backwards fwiw, but if you you're not going to bet the flop (which I think is the best option of the 3) then at least check raise when it comes back to you.