Folks, I’m curious to get the consensus here about the call vs. fold ranges when facing a shove in these two spots in recent WSOP online event.

Situation 1 – Blinds 1400/2800 (350) and shortly after the end of the re-entry period, with about 800 players left (so no ICM considerations). Hero has 245,000 chips and has a top-40 stack.

Hero has AJ in middle position and makes standard raise to 7350 (equal to pot including antes) and player two positions to Hero’s left shoves all-in for 42,000. No reads on villain as Hero had recently been moved to this table.

Call is 35,000 into pot of 56,800. Call or fold?


Situation 2 – Blinds at 3000/6000 (750). ~175 players left. In the money, for $975 with next pay jump (to $1072) at 153, so no significant ICM considerations.

Hero just won a fair sized pot with AA and was back up to 144,000 (had been as high as 335,000 and down to 95,000 after tough beat), so just over 20BB.

Hero has AJ in BB. Hand folds around to button with 66,000 (10BB), who shoves. No reads on villain.

Call is 60,000 to win pot of 82,000. Call or fold?

Personally, I would probably call in both situations but would like to understand your table image better to make a better decision in situation #1.

Definitely calling the 10BB button shove in situation #2. With 10BB remaining, villain's push range is very wide.

I can tell you’re too tight from few posts I’ve seen you make lately. I’m not saying it to make you feel bad but rather to tell you to look into it.

We gotta call AJo here vs normal 3betting ranges in these positions. We have ~40% equity even vs ATs,AJo,KJs,KQo,77+ and V can be much wider than that.

AJs hand is a supersnapcall. You have ~60% vs 30% shoving range and again villain can be wider.

Hand 1 is a marginal call unless you have reason to believe V is tight, in which case it’s a marginal fold.

Hand 2 easy call.

Hand 1 - I concur with other people. It a call but you are not super happy about it.

Hand 2 - This is a snap call.

I actually disagree with others here.

It's hand 1 that I see as a snap call. Hand 2 is the one I am less happy about. Still calling every time.

WTF, how is AJo not ahead of a 10BB BTN open shove range?

I just think it's a bummer when someone open-shoves 10bbs when you only have 20. If you win it's nice enough but if you lose it's a real drag. Also, I would have to think that A-J off is probably flipping against a 10bb shove range here, not too likely to be miles ahead, since it is only 65%-35% ahead of two random cards and his cards are probably somewhat better than random.

Which of the two is more of a snap? In hand 1 he's probably ahead, but the ask is barely 15% of your stack and this seems like a good enough spot to gamble. Hand 2 he's all-in for 50% of your stack and you're probably flipping against his range. They both seem like pretty standard calls to me, and I can't see hesitating too much over either play.

No one cares and you couldn't be more wrong about the 2nd hand.

1 is player dependant but mostly folding. Your open is too large. Not sure where you learned that weird pot total thing.

2 you should be cheering out loud before calling.

I explained why I would happier to call the first than the second. Why not try refuting my point if you disagree. Oh I forgot, no one cares. Well, in that case, Your Mother wears Army Boots and You have a Big Nose.

Two random cards isn't valid here. If V is shoving even remotely close to a Nash chart, then a huge amount of his range include AX and JX which you have dominated. Two random cards perform better against AJo than a standard hand from a push/shove chart.

His open is about 2.5 BB's, which seems like a pretty standard opening bet. Why is it too large? Are you saying that opening more than 2 BBs is incorrect? If so, why?

All I said is that A-J is likely flipping against a 10BB shove range. I doubt that A-J off is very far ahead of a 10BB shove range. If you think that a standard 10BB shove range is less that 35% against A-J off, I guess I would have to see some calculations to back that up. I mean a range that a reasonable, decent player would shove, not some wacky range constructed to prove me wrong.

But it's not flipping, that's wrong. It's like 65/35 or 60/40 (at worst).

As far as his range size in H1, 2.5 is OK I guess. 2-2.25x is probably optimal. The larger your open the more profitable a 3b is going to be by another player.

Like I said, Show me a calculation that says that.

What range are we even talking about? I'd say a range like Like 22+, A-8s+, A-10o+, K-9s+, K-10o+, Q-9s+, Q-10o+, would be reasonable. Is A-Jo 65% against that kind of range? I'd have to see the calculator results to believe it does that well against a proper shoving range...

AJo vs. a 45% range is 60/40.

You're coming up with way too tight of a range for an unopened pot to be shoved by a BTN with 10bbs. You're describing like a <20% shove range.

I think the easier way to resolve this is for you to study your Nash charts. You're shoving way too light and calling way too tight if you're applying those ranges. If you shove an unopened BTN with 10bbs and nobody calls, you're increasing your stack by like 25-30%. Even shoving any two cards is better than only shoving the range you're describing. If you're shoving that tight you're going to be blinded off to death.

Okay, so I just dug out a Nash chart and it says that the equilibrium shoving range with 10 bbs at a full ring table is 22+, A8s+, A5s-A4s, A-10o+, K9s+, KJo+, Q9s+, J-10o, J9s+, and T9s. So I was only a little too tight. Anyway if someone could put that in a calculator and tell me how A-J does, I am willing to stand corrected. In my mind, anything under 60/40 might as well be considered a flip.

None of this refutes my point that I would rather gamble for 15% of my stack with A-J than call a push for half of my stack with it but whatever. I stand by my assertion that I would call both of these bets without much hesitation. Talking about which of them is more of a snap call is just quibbling.

What's your link for that range? Cause that's a super tight range for BTN with 10BBs. Are you sure you're not looking at a chart without antes included?

Here's the most popularly referenced chart:

https://floattheturn.com/wp/pushfold/

This one is also common and is just slightly tighter than the one above:

http://pokersides.com/poker-push-fold-charts/

AJo has ~53% equity vs 17,9% range (your range) but that is ridiculously tight. Villain can shove +40% range otb w/ 10bb. It is unexploitably +ev.

To your point about stacksizes I’d like to just point out that while 10bb stack isn’t great, 30bb stack plays way better in many spots than 20bb stack.

Well the open is 2.625x not 2.5. Either is (slightly) too large.

Honestly not sure where I got that chart, I just have it in an old folder of Nash/Game Theory stuff. Printed off some website and I wrote "Nash push/fold" on it so there you go. It (the chart) refers to the number of players (in this case 9, ranges get looser as number of players goes down,) but not to position, so obviously not the best chart. But the range is almost identical to the chart at the second link you posted so there you go. (My range was slightly looser, ie 22+ instead of 33+ etc.)

Hand 2 is a snap ez call. Villain should be shipping around 40% of his hands here and should be super wide.

Hand #1 is a tough spot. I feel you can make cases for both. Depends how tight villain is. I would say open less. I feel sizing is too big pre.

You are missing my point.

As I said before, I think both hands are pretty automatic calls. I cannot imagine folding hand 2 ever, and I think folding hand one would be SO NITTY, because there are times when you should take advantage of a big stack and gamble a little, if you want to go deep.

People are saying that Hand 1 is a crying call and hand 2 is a fist-pump GII. I say hand 1 is a call you usually make if you want to win tournaments and hand 2, it's a drag that you have to call off half of your chips in a spot like this but so it goes.

Nah, you’re not reading the 2nd chart right. Read the range for (2) which is referring to the number of people left to act. Its range is only slightly tighter than the range from the first chart.

I agree that both calls are standard. I also agree that it’s Nicer to make calls that are 15% of our stack rather than 50%.

What I don’t agree with is the profitability of the spots as you see them.

Calling the first hand nets us ~1bb on average vs tight range of ATs,AJo,KJs,KQo,77+.

Calling the second hand nets us over 2bbs on average even vs 25% shoving range and ~2,5bb vs ~40% range.

Did the math on the fly so it’s not 100% accurate. It will however illustrate my point just fine.