Hey guys!

Just finished second in a micro MTT tourney but still contemplating whether the correct play was made in a key situation.

The situation was the following -

We started the heads up battle with approx. 4 million each. Blinds at 50,000/100,000 (don't remember the amount of the ante). The general strategy was to raise a lot pre-flop, pounce on some weak textured flops and slowly pick off his stack. This had worked effectively against the player during the short-handed play.

Once our duel commenced, the villain employed his own strategy. Shoving all-in every time I raised as a counter measure. 8/10 he revealed an ace as one of his holecards (Yes, I counted and yes, he was very generous with sharing this type of information). At this point, I felt pretty comfortable with including Ax in his range.

I'm dealt 99 and he raises 300K. I re-raise 625K. He shoves, I call, lost the flip against KQ off. Next hand A5 off against his KJ off, busto.

What is your preferred play against a passive player here with the 9s? Calling and playing the flop? Accepting the all-in proposition even when most of his range will probably be a flip?

99 is 60/40 over a range of broadways, pairs and any ace so if he wants to get it in go for it.

What you describe is neither nitty nor passive.

Seems to me like you played both hands correctly. Congrats on 2nd place.

Also, a nit is someone who is tight and doesn't like big pots/gambling/shoving with Ax.

This

And shoving 9's HU all day long

Did you really both have 40bb? Stacking off any ace when you could see a flop with those stack sizes seems loose aggressive, not nitty/passive. Once you're down to 20bb though, getting it in with Axs, A6+, KQ, and any pocket pair is fine.

Welcome to tournament poker. Your opponent was playing a tough aggressive style that isn't too far from optimal play.

You might get some better advice in the HUSNG forum but playing HU 40BBs deep you can't have a big edge against a super aggressive strategy.

This is by far one of the biggest leaks on 2+2...

Too many players have no real sense of what all the poker terms actually mean. They throw around all these terms and poker speak without understand what the hell they are saying.

I hate when someone says, "Yeah, villain was tight but making moves when he sensed weakness..."

Ummm that's not tight.

"Villain was a TAG that limp/called a lot preflop..."

ummm that's not a TAG

But the worst offender is the label "Nit".

A nit would never shove or call a shove w KQ ever. A "nit" has a very tight preflop raise/call range and post flop they only only ONLY continue with TPTK hands or better and in fact, if you shove OTT of them then they only continue with the nuts or near nuts...

But over the years, the term "nit" has been diluted to the point of uselessness. Now "nit" basically means, "a player who refuses to donk off his money to me or pay me off when i'm huge..."

Yep.

I think it's part of the tendency to label the opponent in a derogatory manner because we're annoyed that they beat us. There are only so many words to do this with so if we can't use 'donk', 'fish', 'maniac', well then we are stuck with 'nit'.

The best thing you can do is to start playing HU matches in the micros, 2NL HU and then work your way up to 5NLHU, 10NLHU...

Think of a tournament like an MMA fight. MMA fighters have to have multiple abilities, striking, wrestling, ju-juitsu, wrestling, submissions, etc...

Well, tournament players need to have a similar range of abilities. Need to be able to play deep stack, normal stack, short stack, bubble play, blind stealing, blind defense, final table play and then HEADS UP!!!!

If you go to pokerprolabs they have a rating system that I feel is decent in terms of gauging your abilities. They rate you from a Duece (low) to an Ace (high)

Play HUs matches until you can get a rating of a Jack or better (probably take you around 50 - 100 matches).

Anyways, being a decent HU player is a HUGE advantage in tourney play.

GL

Lol he's right though- congrats on 2nd place. U played those two hands fine

Wow, didn't foresee this much response. Ok, fair enough I directed the nit term erroneously in this context. Pre-HU, he did exhibit passive traits. As you've all corrected me on, post-HU he opted with a more loose aggressive tactic. So I get the impression that under these circumstances it was an acceptable play. Good. Just too bad about being so deep (yes, 40 bbs it was) and being put in that spot as flop play would've been preferable. Thanks for the insightful replies and going easy on me! Also awesome fighting analogy dgiharris!