I played a 30+3 multi tonight on Stars. I don’t usually play non-deep stack multis, and I felt pressured to build my stack as quickly as possible. Twelve minutes in, I picked up AQo in late position. Three people limped for 20 and I raised to 165. The guy next to me calls my raise, and then the next moves all in for 840. Two of the limpers fold, but the third flat calls the all-in. What do you do?
Ordinarily, I throw away my hand here. But I felt compelled to play because of my hunger for chips. For some reason I felt like the flat call did not represent a huge hand, because most people in these small buy-in tourneys just aren’t that sophisticated. I ended up reraising all-in to 2030. To my dismay, both the other players in the hand called. The original all-in guy showed AKs, and the guy behind me had pocket tens. The flat caller showed AJo.
How terrible is this all-in by me here? Was this pure impatience, or is there a compelling argument for getting involved in this hand? My reason for moving in is certainly not that I think I have a better hand than all three of these guys. By pushing I’m hoping that two of them will fold and I’ll be heads up against the guy who is all-in already. Thoughts?
Results are unimportant, of course, but I ended up flopping a queen and rivering a set, just for good measure, and becoming the chip leader. Of course the absurd structure was too much for the crappy run of cards that ensued and I busted before the money.
In other news: The WPT is sponsoring the new card room at Foxwoods. Good for poker? Good for Foxwoods? I just hope it somehow improves the wait time for a damn seat.
ATLARGE NEXT WEEKEND! Woot!
7 replies on “Gamble gamble?”
Personally, I think I would have just moved all-in.
I think you probably know this, but folding is definitely the best option there. I agree the flat call probably means a medium pocket pair, but the original pusher has a hand most of the time—either AK or JJ or better. Even though I understand the desire to accumulate chips in MTT online, you still have more time than you might think, and usually someone will donk off all of their chips to you when you are a big favorite
Lack of time in a tournament almost never means you have to resort to a negative chip-EV play. In other words, tournaments are about good decisions, no matter what the structure is. Here, the best decision is to fold.
P.S. Mike, I don’t know if this is one of your oh-so-subtle jokes, but I’ve played with you enough that I’d be stunned to see you move in there.
Zoinks!!! (and thanks for reading my blog so regularly Matt)
PS All right, all right I actually read the hand this time and I would be hard pressed to argue with Matt on this one. (Hey, come on there are just too many blogs for me to read them all before posting comments, even the ones from cute female bloggers).
To Mr. Mike May:
You and my six-year-old brother have the same notion of subtlety. However, he and I share the same sense of justice. Therefore: I linked you, so you link me! And quit your whining. I’m only letting you get away with it because you acknowledge my cuteness.
(I always knew cute girls were suckers for being called cute.)