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Late Stages Strategy/Mentality
So this is a bit of a general question but i'll use a HH to make it easier for people to comment on (hopefully). Basically i'm not sure if i'm getting the right balance towards the latter stages of MTT's.
Put simply: I play to win in any Tournament I enter. But I think I get confused in certain situations on how to proceed given my aim to win the tournament and in terms of the old adage 'find a better spot'.
Like I said i'll give a HH to make it easier to explain. So this is last night's £5 MegaStack, we're 3 or 4 off the money. I know that if I double-up i'll have just above average when the bubble bursts, and since we're well ahead of the blinds that'll have me in a good place to make a tilt at the win.
The villain in question is guilty of mis-using his big stack from what i'd seen up until this point IMO. He's being aggressive, but often in the wrong spots, yet still being strangely passive in odd spots. As an example, he called a flop c-bet in position with KQ on a dry, 9 high flop and with only a backdoor straight draw to speak of. That's fine if he tries to take the pot away for me when I show weakness on the turn/river, sure, but he checks behind on both streets as if he's thinking the KQ high is good (the turn and river didn't hit my perceived range at all). Of course on that occasion he runs in to the bottom of my range in that particular hand and the KQ is good - but he's still played the hand weird.
So my instinct is to shove. However, given my stack I don't think the villain is ever folding to the shove, which means a very high percentage of the time i'm flipping for my stack. I get that you'll very rarely get through an MTT without having to flip for your or someone else's stack at some point, and it goes without saying you'll need to win those flips if you want to win the whole thing.
But is folding and waiting for a better spot a viable option here? I feel as if this villain with his stack is an accident waiting to happen and folding here still leaves me with ~20BB's which should give me enough time to find a better opportunity. Because (if i'm right in my read) flipping with a bad player for my stack is clearly not optimal. But then I feel as if folding is too nitty and is the move of someone who's desperate to make the min cash.
Just calling is horrible IMO because we'll just have to check/fold so many flops and with only ~10BB's left we're relying on getting pretty lucky to get back in a position to go very deep.
Comments/criticisms welcome please!
Put simply: I play to win in any Tournament I enter. But I think I get confused in certain situations on how to proceed given my aim to win the tournament and in terms of the old adage 'find a better spot'.
Like I said i'll give a HH to make it easier to explain. So this is last night's £5 MegaStack, we're 3 or 4 off the money. I know that if I double-up i'll have just above average when the bubble bursts, and since we're well ahead of the blinds that'll have me in a good place to make a tilt at the win.
The villain in question is guilty of mis-using his big stack from what i'd seen up until this point IMO. He's being aggressive, but often in the wrong spots, yet still being strangely passive in odd spots. As an example, he called a flop c-bet in position with KQ on a dry, 9 high flop and with only a backdoor straight draw to speak of. That's fine if he tries to take the pot away for me when I show weakness on the turn/river, sure, but he checks behind on both streets as if he's thinking the KQ high is good (the turn and river didn't hit my perceived range at all). Of course on that occasion he runs in to the bottom of my range in that particular hand and the KQ is good - but he's still played the hand weird.
| Player | Action | Cards | Amount | Pot | Balance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| YoungUn | Small blind | 1000.00 | 1000.00 | 39575.00 | |
| Villain | Big blind | 2000.00 | 3000.00 | 124865.25 | |
| Your hole cards |
| ||||
| hhyftrftdr | Fold | ||||
| GREGGER01 | Fold | ||||
| bernie1968 | Fold | ||||
| YoungUn | Raise | 4000.00 | 7000.00 | 35575.00 | |
| Villain | Raise | 13000.00 | 20000.00 | 111865.25 | |
| YoungUn | ???? |
But is folding and waiting for a better spot a viable option here? I feel as if this villain with his stack is an accident waiting to happen and folding here still leaves me with ~20BB's which should give me enough time to find a better opportunity. Because (if i'm right in my read) flipping with a bad player for my stack is clearly not optimal. But then I feel as if folding is too nitty and is the move of someone who's desperate to make the min cash.
Just calling is horrible IMO because we'll just have to check/fold so many flops and with only ~10BB's left we're relying on getting pretty lucky to get back in a position to go very deep.
Comments/criticisms welcome please!
Comments
What you've explained is pretty much exactly what I was thinking. My only problem was I followed it up with "Well, I want to win this tournament, and maybe folding is just too nitty", so I shoved. As you (and I) suspected, he called with KJ and I think binked a J on the river. Whatever it was, I was out.
I saw you post on the AJo with 20BB's thread that you limp 100% of your range with those stacks - I presume you'd do the same here? I'm wondering would that be the better play in my example too, given that we're agreeing we should fold to the 3-bet? Outside of the early stages of MTTs I only ever raise or fold when its folded to my SB regardless of stack sizes, which I'm starting to think now is a leak because there are awkward stack sizes (like in the OP) where limping could be better?