Isolating Mistake?

peter27

Here's a hand from a low buy-in bounty hunter. Pretty standard stuff until the flop. I hit top pair, top kicker and chris1963 shoved with just over six big blinds. Because of this I thought his range was quite wide so I decided to shove all-in too in order to isolate the bet and take the bounty. There were two stacks to act after me, but they were still half decent stacks so I expected them to fold. Sadly, I got called. Was shoving to isolate the wrong thing to do or was I just unlucky that DAD666 hit two pair?

Player	Action	Cards	Amount	Pot	Balance
DAD666	Small blind		75.00	75.00	5960.00
chris1963	Big blind		150.00	225.00	1095.00
	Your hole cards	J A
BIGDAVE321	Fold
peter27	Raise		300.00	525.00	7780.00
waldo64	Call		300.00	825.00	1900.00
DAD666	Call		225.00	1050.00	5735.00
chris1963	Call		150.00	1200.00	945.00
Flop
		J 7 9
DAD666	Check
chris1963	All-in		945.00	2145.00	0.00
peter27	All-in		7780.00	9925.00	0.00
waldo64	Fold
DAD666	All-in		5735.00	15660.00	0.00
peter27	Unmatched bet		2045.00	13615.00	2045.00
DAD666	Show	J 7
chris1963	Show	9 A
peter27	Show	J A
Turn
		10
River
		6
DAD666	Win	Two Pairs, Jacks and 7s	13615.00		13615.00

ff55hh

I'd probably go bigger pre-flop (like 380-420) as not to obligate the blinds to call generally. Not cos I'd hope to fold out worse hands but I like  to avoid multi-way action.

Pretty unfathomable that the BB / short stack just called a third of his stack. Normally he would jam there, you'd call and J7 folds.

Once you re-shove you're seldom getting called by worse and folding out his Pair+draw hands. Depends on the player of course.

You probably had the same brainwave that I sometimes have, 'If I win this pot I'll be the guy with crazy stack at the top of the leaderboard, so I'll go for it' when playing the long game is probably better
 

F_Ivanovic

Seems fine although you could consider just min-r and potentially folding to further action from DAD666 depending on any reads you may have.

I think min-r pre is fine given the stack sizes of waldo + chris. As a general rule in MTT's if I have more than 20bb eff with my opponents I will min-r BTN, then somewhere between 2-2.5x CO, then any early position I make it 2.5-3bb. Min-r from every position regardless with more than 20bb is bad because very often you'll end up inviting mulit-way pots which is not really what you want from early position.

craigcu12

It may sound strange but in these low buy in BHs, players will most of the time treat their chip stacks the wrong way.
we would be thinking that with a large chip stack he is going to be really tight now and just preserve chips, but they don't see it this way, in their view 300 is just a tiny amount to loose when they have a chip stack of 5K,  all they do is take each call as a separate loss with no thought on how much all them bad calls effect their chip stack overall until they actually have got a small chip stack themselves.

so now that they have cost themselves so much with all them bad calls they now go into panic mode thinking that if they were to jam the chances are their tournament is over because the number of hands that they have called and lost with will out number the amount of hands that they have called and won. so rather than go for an all or nothing jam pre, they will play the hit or miss style where if they hit the shove and if they miss they fold.

ff55hh

In Response to Re: Isolating Mistake?:

Seems fine although you could consider just min-r and potentially folding to further action from DAD666 depending on any reads you may have. I think min-r pre is fine given the stack sizes of waldo + chris. As a general rule in MTT's if I have more than 20bb eff with my opponents I will min-r BTN, then somewhere between 2-2.5x CO, then any early position I make it 2.5-3bb. Min-r from every position regardless with more than 20bb is bad because very often you'll end up inviting mulit-way pots which is not really what you want from early position.
Posted by F_Ivanovic

Salient, jargon infused points there F_Ivanovic.

With regard making bigger opening raises from earlier positions, you would be bloating the pot OOP all of the time.

Not saying thats blatantly good or bad but do you think the benefits outweigh the drawback I mentioned???

Interested to here your views....

F_Ivanovic

In Response to Re: Isolating Mistake?:

In Response to Re: Isolating Mistake? : Salient, jargon infused points there F_Ivanovic. With regard making bigger opening raises from earlier positions, you would be bloating the pot OOP all of the time. Not saying thats blatantly good or bad but do you think the benefits outweigh the drawback I mentioned??? Interested to here your views....
Posted by ff55hh

Well we're only OOP if someone not in the blinds call. Just because we're OOP doesn't mean that bloating the pot is bad. If we have a stronger range then we want to be building the pot.

ff55hh

In Response to Re: Isolating Mistake?:

In Response to Re: Isolating Mistake? : Well we're only OOP if someone not in the blinds call. Just because we're OOP doesn't mean that bloating the pot is bad. If we have a stronger range then we want to be building the pot.
Posted by F_Ivanovic

I see what you're saying however,

Bloating the pot UTG isnt bad as you'd generally only have premiums to play OOP.
Surely though the fact that you're playing UTG is enough of  a sign of strength and the increased bet size only reinforces that strength to opponents so you fold out lots of marginals and attract only strong holdings.

If it was me I would be uncomfortable having to make a larger c-bet OOP also

Is this a strategy you would advocate or just something you've picked up for yourself??

Sorry for the interrogation, just that you seem pretty switched on and have a different opinion to me here so I'd be (even more) foolish not to check it out )))

peter27

Thanks for all the replies guys! Very helpful :-)

In Response to Re: Isolating Mistake?:

In Response to Re: Isolating Mistake? : I see what you're saying however, Bloating the pot UTG isnt bad as you'd generally only have premiums to play OOP. Surely though the fact that you're playing UTG is enough of  a sign of strength and the increased bet size only reinforces that strength to opponents so you fold out lots of marginals and attract only strong holdings. If it was me I would be uncomfortable having to make a larger c-bet OOP also Is this a strategy you would advocate or just something you've picked up for yourself?? Sorry for the interrogation, just that you seem pretty switched on and have a different opinion to me here so I'd be (even more) foolish not to check it out )))
Posted by ff55hh

I would also like to know your thoughts on this please, F_Ivanovic.

F_Ivanovic

If it was me I would be uncomfortable having to make a larger c-bet OOP also

When we raise more pre we decrease something called SPR (stack to pot ratio) - which is basically just the size of our stack compared to the pot. ie. if the pot is 300 and our stack is 3000 the SPR is 10. The lower the SPR, the easier the hand becomes to play OOP. Lets give a hand example. Suppose we have JJ and the flop is 942 and our c-bet gets raised by someone IP. SPR is low because we've raised more pre and our decision to shove becomes fairly easy. However, now imagine that the SPR is still really big (eg. 25+) we bet and get raised, now what? Shoving would be too big and is likely only being called by better. But suppose we call and turn is a K, then what? We check and our opponent IP can bet again. Not a nice spot to be in.

Surely though the fact that you're playing UTG is enough of  a sign of strength and the increased bet size only reinforces that strength to opponents so you fold out lots of marginals and attract only strong holdings.

It depends how good our opponents are really. If I see someone opening UTG (providing they aren't a maniac) and I hold QJo I'm folding regardless of it being a 2x open or a 3x. It's a hand with bad reverse implied odds against an UTG range. If however I'm holding a pair or a SC like 78s I'm much more tempted to peel against a 2x open providing I'm deep enough. If you're sat UTG with AA, do you really want someone peeling with a hand like a pair or 78s that can potentially crack your AA? Not really - so by making it bigger we give them worse odds to do so. 

If you find people are always folding to your 3x opens UTG then you can adjust to this by just opening much wider in that position. But I'm pretty sure you'll always find a few people at your table willing to call 3x opens just as much as a 2x open

peter27

In Response to Re: Isolating Mistake?:

When we raise more pre we decrease something called SPR (stack to pot ratio) - which is basically just the size of our stack compared to the pot. ie. if the pot is 300 and our stack is 3000 the SPR is 10. The lower the SPR, the easier the hand becomes to play OOP. Lets give a hand example. Suppose we have JJ and the flop is 942 and our c-bet gets raised by someone IP. SPR is low because we've raised more pre and our decision to shove becomes fairly easy. However, now imagine that the SPR is still really big (eg. 25+) we bet and get raised, now what? Shoving would be too big and is likely only being called by better. But suppose we call and turn is a K, then what? We check and our opponent IP can bet again. Not a nice spot to be in. It depends how good our opponents are really. If I see someone opening UTG (providing they aren't a maniac) and I hold QJo I'm folding regardless of it being a 2x open or a 3x. It's a hand with bad reverse implied odds against an UTG range. If however I'm holding a pair or a SC like 78s I'm much more tempted to peel against a 2x open providing I'm deep enough. If you're sat UTG with AA, do you really want someone peeling with a hand like a pair or 78s that can potentially crack your AA? Not really - so by making it bigger we give them worse odds to do so.  If you find people are always folding to your 3x opens UTG then you can adjust to this by just opening much wider in that position. But I'm pretty sure you'll always find a few people at your table willing to call 3x opens just as much as a 2x open
Posted by F_Ivanovic

Very interesting post, thanks a lot Ivanovic