Blinds: 1000/2000
54/189 left, top 21 pay
Hero has 88K, average is about 70K

Hero is in the BB with K10 4x 5x

UTG raises to 6,500
UTG + 1 calls
Folds to hero who defends

Flop: J 6 3 x

Hero checks
UTG bets 8,500
UTG + 1 pots to 45,000
Hero ??? (Calls)
UTG folds

Turn: 2

Hero ???

I would fold preflop and shove or fold flop. It may be a fold, as you are in bad shape against a nut flush draw and flipping against a set. No point in calling leaving 1/4 pot behind. As played, I guess push, as you don't want to give him a free card for the board to pair.

Generally it depends on the field.
No idea how small stakes live plo plays but from what Ive seen online people peel too much and stack off too light.

So I think its fine to 3bet jam and yeah pre is marginal.
Folding in tougher fields I guess in both spots.

fold pre, fold to the flop pot raise.

I flat pre. Absolutely no issues seeing flop with 2nd nut flush potential including straight flush with K-10, and both low and high straight potential including the 5 and the 10. (That part is important.) I will gii on the flop with open ended low straight draw, 2nd nut flush draw, and backdoor high straight draw long before I am flatting over half my chips or folding.

IMO folding pre or flop is a cash game mentality. Tournaments are a different animal.

After further consideration, I think it's closer between push and fold on the flop than i did before. I still lean towards pushing it.

Why should you be making loose losing play in an MTT you wouldn't make in a cash game?

Disagree with this. The play is not tight but I do not think it is a loser. In fact it is the kind play you have to make to actually win a tournament. Unless your plan of attack is to wait for A/A/K/10 two suits and fold everything else?

You will not be winning Omaha tournaments if you do not take a few draws, my opinion is that you have the equity here.... Assuming that you are doomed is a little defeatist IMO.

I don't think we should have to go too deep into the differences between Tournament and cash-game play here, although we could go on for pages with that discussion. Suffice to say that IMO there are many hands that are foldable in a cash game that are playable in a tournament, and the opposite is also true.

Of course if you insist it is a losing play then it comes down to weather you think you have the number here or not. Since you are risking about 80 to win over 100, I think you have the odds.

I don't think you have 45% equity, as you are against nut flush draw with a pair or straight draw or against a set too much. If villain is stacking off really light, you could have just 45%. You also don't want to take really close gambles in MTTs, although of course you have to gamble.

Preflop, this hand is really marginal, as your cards or not well connected and your 2-flush doesn't contain an ace. I might call a straight miniraise, but you aren't getting the right price to play a junk hand OOP.

I disagree with your take on preflop. Since the ask is 4500 into a 16000 chip pot you are getting 4 to 1 on a call. I consider a double straighted hand with a good flush draw and including both the 5 and the 10 is worth a 1 to 4 call. If the hand did not have the 5 and 10 I would agree, as I don't like to play for a straight pre-flop if I don't have the maker in my hand. But I have those cards.

As I said in my second post, I think the flop play is close. But I don't assume that utg1 is potting spades here, I assume he is potting a set. I think my draws are good. I have been wrong about such things many times in the past. But I have been right often enough that I still lean towards pushing. If you say you would fold, I wouldn't say you were wrong, just that you made another choice.

You can only make 6 straights, AQJ, QJ9, 876, 763, 632, and 32A, versus 20 with a gapless rundown like JT987. The low straights lose to higher straights often and the low cards make bad pairs and two pairs. So this is a very weak straight hand.

I'm not saying it's a monster. I am saying that with 4 to 1 on the call, 40 big blinds back and three tables of runners to go to the bubble, it's worth a preflop call. At this stage with a rapidly diminishing stack and increasing blinds you have to make some hay and you need to make it now. If you don't you're gonna be short in a hurry. And that means playing some hands pre-flop that are not double suited multi-connectors with a pair of KK's +.

As for post flop, these are the kinds of hands that win or lose you a tournament. The times you get it right you win. When you're wrong you lose. Simple as that.

Snap fold pre. You want connectivity in your hand, and drawing to non-nut flushes should be for bonus equity, not your goal in the hand. You still have 40BB and are playing a no ante game... absolutely no reason to get involved OOP with hands this weak.

As played, fold on flop. You hit a good flop, but with a bet and pot in front of you, this is no good.

Okay, we call. 2s. Now we have a trivial shove. We've come this far for some reason, can't get away now. Shove and hope we get a roll eyes call from a set or lower flush. No sense in checking and potentially letting him draw to his boat for free/fold river when we are occasionally ahead.

What range of hands do you think the villain is potting here on the flop?

Sets and combo draws.

This is where we disagree about post flop. I think he just has the set. I think if he has the draws he flats and if he has both he's making a value raise, not potting.

Also what combo-draw? Does he have the 4-5 too? I guess he could have 66-4-5 with spades but is he potting that?

If he has a combo draw, he probably has the nut flush draw. You also aren't getting odds if he always has a set. The set can also have a draw.

It might be a good play to pot yourself with this hand as a semibluff, but you have to fold to the bet and pot.

In fact, if there was just a bet or a bet and call in front of you, potting it would be the play. You get enough folds that it is a profitable play, even though you are 40% or so on average when you gii. Gii after a push is just taking a slightly unfavorable gamble for your stack, which is bad.

Preflop Q963 makes 8 straights versus 6 for KT45, and the king high 2-flush is a little better than if you had a T-high 2-flush, but not much. It isn't a good call.

There is a big difference between the two hands that you are not acknowledging. You may have more possible straights with your trash hand, it's true, but I can guarantee you that I will make my 6 straights at a much, much higher rate than you will, for this reason: you cannot make a straight that does not contain either a 5 or a 10. All other cards can be replaced by another number and a straight remains possible, but without a 5 or a 10 a straight cannot be made. I don't pursue hands where a straight is a big part of what I'm looking to make unless I have the 5/10 in my hand. I would muck a hand like Kjss67 to a raise here without a second thought. But with OP's hand in BB, a connected 5 and suited Broadways with a 10, looking at a 4k call to make a 20k pot, not folding.

As for post flop, I guess this is what the Big Thinkers call an inflection point. I'm an old school guy in my 50's and I've been playing poker for over 40 years. As much as everybody tells me the game has changed, I still see the same things happening over and over again. I think he has a set and I think the draws are mine. That may be a little too optimistic, and I've been wrong plenty. But in my experience you can't sit around in a tournament and wait for monster hands. With 40 big blinds you need to make things happen.

Granted almost all of my Omaha play is online, and only 6 or 7 tournaments live. But I've been on either side of this hand a thousand times. This is the equation that Omaha tournaments come down to. Your set versus my draw. You win the hand and you go into the run for the bubble with over 100 blinds. You lose and you walk away saying "should have, would have, could have." That's the nature of the game.

So 9876, KQJ9, and AKQJ are not good Omaha hands because they don't have a T or a 5? Not sure about this T and 5 theory.

It is nice that you think he has a set. However, he can have a higher flush draw with a set or a wrap, and you can be in bad shape.

ProPokerTools Omaha Hi Simulation

820 trials (Exhaustive)

board: 963

Hand	Pot equity	Wins	Ties
ksts5c4h	16.59%	136	0
as9d9c8s	83.41%	684	0

ProPokerTools Omaha Hi Simulation

820 trials (Exhaustive)

board: 963

Hand	Pot equity	Wins	Ties
ksts5c4h	24.02%	197	0
as7s6h8c	75.98%	623	0

You should give my 5-10 theory a little more thought. You may find you hit your straights more often. BTW the theory is not mine.

All three of those hands are playable hands in some circumstances, obviously, but I wouldn't call a raise in the BB with the first two. Maybe with the second one. I wouldn't often play 9876 before the hi-jack nor without at least one suit, since it will rarely make you the nut straight.

Maybe I'm too optimistic with pushing the flop. My point is that there are other factors in play here. As I said before, I think push/fold is close. I'm not sure what computing the outcome of villains worst possible holdings proves, as those two hands are only a small part of his range and its pretty obvious that if villain has the worst possible holdings then OP is doomed. I have already acknowledged that. I am proceeding on the (perhaps misguided) belief that the draws are mine. Also board was J/6/3, not 9/6/3, and OP's OESD is to the nut straight on both ends but whatever.

Also we seem to be forgetting that Omaha is primarily a post flop game. If you disagree, then try putting a best possible holding like AAJ10 two suits versus something terrible, like K972 rainbow, into your calculator. And no, I'm not saying that you should be calling K972 rainbow.

The crux of this hand is not whether he made a loose call pre-flop, it's what he did thereafter. And while it is true that his decision to call pre-flop led him to this tough decision, it's pretty hard to say that making a 4 to 1 call pre-flop with any half-reasonable holding is a mistake in Omaha.

+1

People aren't showing up to a 45k pot bet there 3-handed without a set or NFD. MAYBE a fish is donking it with two pair but I would have to have a solid read on someone to jam in there.

Honestly, even if continuing in this spot is the theoretical best play vs good players ... I'm hesitant to make that play in this spot. PLO live is sooooooooo bad I think you can find better spots for your chips here.

As played you have to get it in now. If you thought your spades were live you can't fold when a spade hits. Jam and charge him if he has a set. But don't be surprised when he shows up with the nut flush half the time.