I have two hands I'm curious about and no friends that play poker, hoping for some feedback. I'm a rec player now, don't play many tournaments. Used to play a lot 10 years ago.

Hand 1:

Day 2 of the WPT main at Commerce. I sattied in. My table is very tough, with Darren Elias, Ali Imsirovic, Ben Yu, Jake Schindler. Blinds are 1k/2k/2k bb ante. I'm in BB with QJo and 38k behind. UTG limps (he's done this a few times), lady next to act limps, Ali raises to 9k or so. Folds around to me and I shove. Ali is a very aggressive, great player obv. I'm trying to pick up what's in the middle, and if I get called by AK or something, I'm doing Ok. Def more variance, but I'm not as skilled so I was thinking it would be an alright play. Was it a punt? The lady who overlimped had AA.

Hand 2:

Day 2 of the $2200 quantum millions. We're ITM with about 75 players left. I again have 20bbs or so. The ante is on the button in this game. Folds to me in the sb, I limp. BB raises to 4bbs. I shove w A5o. Thoughts?

Thanks.

Hand 1 is a big punt. QJ is a really easy fold.

Hand 2 I’d rather just shove the first time. Do you have any reads on this player?

No strong reads--has been somewhat active in a verrry small sample as he's pretty new to the table. Funny enough, we were involved in one other b v. b and he bluffed the flop with 9 high and showed. I was assuming he'd be raising at a high percentage so wanted those chips which is why I didn't open shove myself--that was the thought process anyway, I'm not suggesting it was correct.

Thanks for the input!

Edit: Forgot to mention his stack size, which was around 40bb.

BTW for hand 1 I'd probably go with 99+,AJs+,AQo+, but I could see arguments for widening that up a little.

Yeah, hand 2 is fine either way IMO.

Cool, thanks man.

+1

H1 in particular is really, really, really bad. Like picking up pennies in front of a steamroller.

H2 is an open jam, but AP we should expect V to be bluffing with an assortment of air such that l/j is appropriate. His sizing is a lil bigger than necessary (we're not walking him w/ anything except bottom 10-15% hands, therefore he only really needs to go ~3bb to shed your range of that remaining air like K2o, Q2o-Q5o, etc that you're completing with in order to start profiting with his BB raise vs SB complete strategy) but it's live poker so I think we can still confidently put V on enough air to make l/j viable. L/c ok too though. Again, that's just on a AP basis. For sure I'm ripping this the 1st time around AINEC.

Agreed, thanks for input.

I think I just spazzed and thought it was a great spot to pick up 30% more chips, but I should've been patient considering how good the structure was.

Hand 2 I still kind of prefer the limp jam, but it seems like the consesus is open jam. Will keep that in mind next time.

Hand 1 I think they got to fold like 30-40% for it to be break even without icm considerations so you probably want 50ish%. In my experience people actually fold more in that spot especially if you have a tight image. I’d imagine first limper calls like 10% if I didn’t read summary I’d say 2nd limper like never calls and isoer only calls 20-30%. Hand selection wise I think it’s pretty good for card removal and equity vs jj/ak+ which is probably their calling ranges.

Hand 2 I don’t know enough about the player but when he sizes that large I’d probably shift from my original plan of c/shove to c/fold. Just a live thing when people size bigger in spots like that their range is usually narrower and stronger then what it should be. Obviously from an unexploitable strategy wouldn’t take that line but I deviate pretty far and in live games you should if your maximizing your edge playing vs people with very unbalanced strategies.

Edit:I just read his description in another post. I’d limp/shove vs a guy who’s active even with the larger sizing

GTO would snap fold #1 and shove #2 I'm sure, but both of these spots seem v gameflow/opponent dependent.

i don't hate on hand #1 jam as much as others here. we have 18BB after posting the BBA and 17BB if we fold. we're starting to lose our resteal utility, and at this stage of mtt we should be looking for good spots to 3! jam with blockers and FE. they don't come much juicier than this in a single raised pot + two limpers + a raiser that can be wide + two blockers to JJ+AQ+. whether i'd run with this depends on gameflow and live reads, but it's a candidate. if UTG/UTG1 are limping to see flops rather than trap, and raiser is adjusting to this but still capable of folding 99-AQ- to a shove, then we can exploit. it's a whole bunch of important conditions tho...

also prefer the l/j to j in hand #2 against most live opponents

YW, please post more HS spots.

Jam in #1 isn't great, but at a really sick table we should be more gambly than normal and I can sort of get behind it if Ali was raising in late position and we think the initial limpers have weak hands in their range.

In #2 I think we want to play a mostly limping strategy vs BB that we think is going to raise lots and A5 is probably fine as a limp/shove.

What position did Ali raise from?

TBH it doesn't really matter to me, I would just flat even if he was on the button, but it might matter for others' answers.

Flat 1/4 of your stack OOP with QJo vs a good player and more people to act? lol

"1/4 of your stack" completely irrelevant

Oh actually one thing I failed to take into account is that in a big buyin the limpers might actually have a pulse and know the hand rankings, in this case it's close but you're probably not giving up too much with a fold

Please troll some other forum please

Buddy you are folding KQs and 88 to a button iso, I'm pretty sure it's not me that needs to stop posting here

I said in the post that I'd be open to widening up that range. Either way there's no way shoving a littler tighter costs us more chips than flatting QJo OOP. Get over yourself. You're bad.

Ok. I understand that you're just trying to improve the quality of discussion here and I respect that. I promise I'll stop posting here, if you crossbook me in the Stars $10m next week.

Hand 1: It's a massive punt most likely, but you left out a lot of info. Keep in mind the following. If you think Ali is strong, like he might have AQ+, then he also probably has hands like TT+. Your equity is complete garbage against a strong rage. It's like 25% equity against a strong range like TT+,AQ+. But even against a weak range like top 20% of hands, you only win 39% of the time. You are risking way too many chips in this spot.

When I'm in a hand I pay attention to the following details that you left out.
* What position did Ali raise from? This is important because it affects what hands he could be raising with. On the button it could be pretty wide. In LJ, he's probably raising decently strong hands.
* What are opponent stack sizes? If you're shoving 20bb, it really matters what the two limper and Ali's stack sizes are. This affects how likely they will call you down. The bigger their stacks are the more comfortably they can call your shove with strong hands.
* Of course I don't do all the math in game. But I'm just trying to guess what is my fold equity roughly and what is my equity when called. If I'm in a spot where I think opponents are folding 40% of the time and when called I win 30% of the time, chances are pretty good that my play is going to be +EV.
* In this spot once Ali raises 9k, with all the dead money, your fold equity gets close to 0%. This is why the math looks really bad for this play.

Here are really rough EV calculations to help you understand this spot.
* Dead money: 1k+2k+2k+2k+2k+9k = 18k. If everybody folds to your shove, you win 18k.
* If you shove and get called by Ali and you win, you win: 47k. 18k dead money + 38k your stack - 9k ali already put in.
* If you shove and get called by Ali and you lose, you lose: 38k
* If I'm super generous, I'm giving you a 10% chance that your shove goes through. This should never happen because Ali is probably committed and you have two early position limpers you also need to get through.
* Let's pretend Ali is calling you with a top 20% hand. Once again, probably generous. His position at the table greatly affects my assumptions for his raising range. You have 39% equity against this range. http://www.propokertools.com/simulat...0%25&s=generic

EV calculation
* Everybody folds 10% of the time and you win 18k = 1.8k
* You get called by Ali and you win. 90% * 39% * 47k = 16.5k
* You get called by Ali and you lose. 90% * (1-39%) * -38k = -20.9k
* You add up the EVs and you get -2.6k.
* If you change assumption to Ali folds 0% of the time, you lose -5k everytime you make this play.
* This doesn't even include the fact that if one of the 2 limpers actually has a big hand, the EV is way worse because you're against a stronger range.

When you want to evaluate the quality of a play in tournaments, you want to pick spots where your ROI might be something like at least 10% but probably more when you are risking your whole stack. You will find many spots if you start thinking this way where your ROI is 20% or higher. These are the spots you want to find.

So avoid neutral EV and marginal EV spots for all your chips. That's about the worst play you can make in tournament poker.

I'll post another response for Hand 2.

Hand 2: It helps to know what BB stack is. Very big difference if BB has 15bb, 30bb, 100bb in terms of the chance BB will call off when you re-shove. I'm just assuming BB has 50bb stack

Let's Start With Open Shove:
* You need to make some assumptions for BB calling range. If BB calls with top 5% of hands, A5o has 28% equity.
* If you open shove and he folds, you win the dead money which is 2.5bb. This happens 95% of the time.
* If you open shove, get called and lose, you lose 20BB. This happens 5% * (1-28%)
* If you open shove, get called and win, you win 22BB ( 2.5BB + 19.5BB ) . This happens 5% * 28%
* I plugged in those % and open shoving wins about 2BB on average for a 10% ROI.
* 10% ROI seems pretty reasonable and you're only risking your stack 5% of the time.

Limp Shove:
* I assume BB still calls off with top 5% of hands. But the big question is what hands does he raise your limp with and how often does he raise fold?
* I'm just going to pretend he raises with 15% of hands and calls off with 5% of hands so he is calling 1/3 of the time.
* These numbers are rough, but if BB raise folds, you win 6bb and this happens 2/3 of the time. = 4BB
* If he calls your shove, you win 22bb and this happens 33% * 28% = 2BB
* If he calls and you lose, you lose 20bb and this happens 33% * ( 1 - 28% ) = -4.75
* The weighted average is close to 1.25BB.
* If you assume BB only calls 20% of the time, then your weighted average goes up to 3BB.
* So the profitability of your play depends a lot on what % of the time you think villain is going to fold to your shove.

GL

It's honestly extremely close. The solution is probably anywhere from {66+, ATs+, AJo+, KJs+, KQo} to {88, AJs+, AQo+, KQs}. Maybe 55 are also a ship. If you can prove we can get away with shoving wider, I'm listening.

QJo isn't even in the right stratosphere. It's breathtakingly off the mark.

What isn't close are your posts when it comes to giving anything that can be considered remotely constructive advice.

Reread what you've written ITT and realize how butt****ing ******ed you sound

Seems like a reasonable shoving range. What's your flatting range?

EDIT: FWIW, seeing as you called me butt****ing ******ed, I'm also cool tossing some value your way by extending my crossbook offer to you

I don't have one. Having a flatting range is terrible.You strategy is likely binodal--either jam or fold. There isn't a single hand you wanna VPIP that prefers to flat over jam. Not a single one. Go ahead and toss out some candidates and I'll try to explain why they're better as either jams or folds

No, I called your body of work ITT butt****ing ******ed. Because it is. GL tho, friend. Go get some titty-rubbing money.

I do understand why you're saying this. Let's start here: what range do you think Ali is iso-ing from the button? I think this is probably the disconnect.