Crucial Poker Hand Question
January 31, 2010Poker experts, what do you do here? Please leave a comment below with your thoughts.
Live deep stack tournament. Blinds are 300-600, I have $14,200 and open the pot to $1500 in mid/late position with As7s. It folds to the SB, who calls. BB folds. HU to T76, two spade flop. He checks to me, I bet $2500, and he shoves for $7400 more. My read on opponent is that he’s pretty nitty, but capable of shoving hands like AT, QQ, JJ here… maybe even a big spade draw.
If I call and win I’ll have $26,200, which would be a top 5 stack in the tournament with 35ish remaining.
If I fold, I’ll have $10,200 for an M of 11.33.
If I call and lose, I’ll have $2800 left and will have to shove the first decent hand I get dealt before the blinds go through me again.
I’m getting a little over 2 to 1 to call and based on my read, I think I’m a favorite over about 30-40% of his range here.
What do you do?
The Bat Cave 
[…] full post on poker « WordPress.com Tag Feed By: The Sport Commentator Date: January 31, 2010 17:55 Categories: PokerPost tags: […]
Call. Bout the best chance you will have to put yourself in contention for the tour., if you lose so be it.
Agreed. You’re starting to learn. It’s not about sticking around and cashing… it’s about putting yourself in the best position to take it ALL down and that means taking risks and gambling.
It was recommended to me to not even play the hand in the first place… but that’s way too passive for my tastes. As7s with only four people to act behind me, at a tight table no less, is plenty good enough to try to take the blinds at the 300-600 level. I would raise in that spot with much worse hands. I don’t want the two people directly behind me, but I don’t even really want the blinds to fold. I’ll invite anybody to play No Limit Hold Em against me out of position. Bring it.
Tough call but I’d fold and find a better place to get your chips in. With 10k left, you still have time to find a better opportunity. Mathematically, I think this is the best move although that is just one factor here. I am assuming that your read on the player being a nit is correct. He, being a nit, check-raised you with a better hand than your middle pair flush draw. Either he has JJ/QQ and is trying to protect against your flush draw or possibly he flopped the straight holding 89 suited? Either way, he felt comfortable enough to check raise but didn’t want to string it along because he didn’t have the nuts. So, assuming you are behind, the only way your probably winning against the all-in is to hit your flush. With two cards to go, you are 35% or about 2.86 to 1 to win while you are facing 7400 to win 16k for 2.16 to 1 to win. So, just going by math alone makes this a gamble vice a good bet. If you thought you were ahead or this was later in the tourney, I’d say call — but here I would begrudgingly fold 😦 and make it up later in the tournament.
I don’t think 98s is in this guy’s range.. so I’m ruling out the straight. I do think the sets are in his range… as well as the overpair. Against QQ-JJ, I think I need to get it in here. I never think I have the best hand here, but I do think I’m the favorite some of the time. If I was worried about being check-raised, I wouldn’t have bet the flop, but when you raise with As7s and flop a pair and the nut flush draw, that’s about as good as it gets. I’m looking for action. I do think your argument for folding has validity if only for the fact that with 10K left in chips I have plenty of play left… but my goal in a tournament is to build a massive stack.. not to hang around for a cash… so I think calling is more suited for my tastes.