We are on the bubble and have just started hand for hand mode. We have a comfortable stack of 550K.
Villain hasn't done anything crazy. He has played hands but is not a bubble abuser. We have a player that is trying to abuse the bubble but failing (he folds UTG in this hand).

it's 1005 and 1000 get paid with a lot of baby stacks in the room.
We are 9 handed

Villain has ~ 700K
Hero 550K
Blinds 4k/8k with 8K ante

Preflop: Hero has J J in the BB
Villain in MP1 raises to 16K, CO calls, 2 folds, Hero raises to 75K, Villain calls, CO folds

Flop: 7 5 4
Hero bets 75K, Villain calls

Turn: 3
Hero?

I think we have a few options. Comments please

Going into check call mode. Don’t think it’s worth bloating a pot on the bubble here even though villian should have almost no 6x other than 66 here (which they shouldn’t honestly have as they don’t have 15-1 to set mine here pre but it’s live so people do things wrong).

I think by checking, you give villian some rope to bluff in a spot where hero should have no 6x. I think betting turn and being raised here is a nightmare.

I also think flop sizing is a little meh. 178k in pot. Think I would go chunky and make it like 90k-126k as a cbet. Don’t see a huge problem with 75k but think I would rather go a tad bigger here on a coordinated board. Think we can get value from 88-10-10 which villian should have more often than QQ+ (Which IMO, I think villain should not have kk Or aa here really ever due to pf action)

You might flat call preflop. By 3-betting, you build the pot OOP against a bigger stack on the bubble, and what do you do if 4!?

I do not see how we play pot control OOP with 1.3xpot left. He can easily take you allin in 2 bets. I do not see how you bet/fold given pot odds. You are crushed by QQ+, 33-77. and some low-mid suited connectors, none of which he "should" have. I would just push the turn with the two flush draws and straight draws out there. You could and probably should do that with either flush draw, and maybe AK/AQ and straight draws. I would not be thrilled about it, and you might bust on the bubble, but what can you do?

Do you really wanna play JJ 3 or 4 ways though honestly and hero most likely has the best hand pre a high % of time. I also agree that just calling pre seems cool at times but jj is much easier to play heads up. Playing JJ against a bb defend and co flat seems really tricky. Think op just has to be careful to navigate here on the bubble. I would rather go crazy after the bubble when we have a min cash locker up which is a fairly nice amount of money for most people.

If you are going to play careful on the bubble OOP, you shouldn't 3! and get a SPR of 2.4-1 on the flop. You cannot play careful with an overpair on a wet low board with a little more than pot left. It is not good to fold probably the best hand getting huge pot odds. Then say, at least I have half my stack left and I can mincash. If you are going to play that way, then do not 3! preflop.

First congrats on getting so far, especially with a decent stack.

This is a tough spot. I like your fearless 3-bet sizing pre-flop.

Sadly we don't take it down pre. So OOP vs villain it is a dicey flop but I guess better than any overcards. Assuming villain can have QQ but not KK+ we are about 50% ahead of villain's calling range when we bet 75k on the flop.

I typically bet 75k on the flop but have started looking at 60k to induce more. But with JJ I prefer 75k because I think AK/AQ will fold more frequently.

On the turn it is difficult. If I am not giving up I will bet/fold 180k but those are the last chips I will put in the pot. If we check the turn I think there is a possibility 88-TT and even QQ will check it back given we can still have AA/KK. But I also think that 88-TT and QQ will also bet some of the time for protection to get AK to fold. So I might call a turn bet and check/fold the river (which I hate to do - I would rather just fold to a turn bet).

The actual times I have been in this spot I have checked the turn and called a smallish bet. Then called a larger % bet on the river. I do think if villain bluffs the turn they will also bluff the river. However, I don't typically win. Even when I am ahead on the turn somehow I get sucked out on.

Hope you made it to the money.

I like the 3! preflop since the CO cold-called, but I also see merit to just calling and playing more passively this close to a huge bubble (with a healthy stack). That said, I prefer the 3 bet, definitely.

However, once he calls our 3! and this flop hits, I’m starting with a check. This flop is much better for his range as he has all the sets and we don’t have any (I don’t think either of you had any straights). I think he’s far more likely to have flush draws than we are, which makes any spade turn a bit awkward. I think he can float this flop with a lot of holdings with the plan to either improve on the turn, or try to bluff you off your hand. If we check we can keep the pot small so we don’t jeopardize our stack, and we can get him to put some chips in with inferior hands that are drawing slim (one pair hands and overpairs smaller than ours).

Once we bet the flop and get called, I would probably bet again on the turn and fold to a raise. I don’t like checking the turn once we bet flop since I think he’s going to bet the turn with almost his entire range. By the turn he’s the only one that can have a straight, so he has the nut advantage. I think he folds his A ♠️ x/ K ♠️ x hands that might try to steal it from us on the scare card, etc. Finally, if we bet turn he’d have to have balls of steel to bluff us off our hand as he’d have to essentially commit 500k chips. If he’s capable of that, my hats off to him.

So, to sum it up, I like the 3bet preflop, but I’d check this flop (obv calling if he bets). Once we bet the flop, I’d bet the turn as well.

Congrats in the run!

I would not 3! pre. Are you folding to a 4!? I am not sure you will be balanced with many bluffs OOP against a bigger stack who is not raising real light.

Some people are saying the 3! is good, but then are going to maybe fold on this board. Would you play it that way if it was not the bubble or in a $50 tournament online? If you build the pot and then play weak tight, then you are losing huge amounts of $EV. You should not be 3!ing much to avoid playing for stacks, but once you do, you cannot be playing this hand that differently because it is the bubble of the ME.

Yes, villain has all the sets, but this is a good flop for JJ. It is better that he can have sets from low pps he should not have that often than if the flop comes with overcards. You are not going to flop a set that often. You can play it different ways, but you pretty much have to go with JJ this shallow. Particularly, this is a wet board with lots of draws, but not that many of his likely hands that beat you.

As far as cbetting, yes, he has all the sets, but OP should have a huge range advantage, as JJ+ is a big part of his range and some of his bluff might hit this flop. The caller is unlikely to have low cards or a big pp. I do not like giving a free card on a wet board where we are usually way ahead.

Congratulations on making it through 30+ hours of tournament poker, hope you made the money. What you describe as a comfortable stack is actual 2/3 of average stack of 900k. So while you have some room to maneuver you have the stack size subject to being put in a pickle by an above average, more comfortable stack.

Your probably losing a player every 1-2 hands here. Wait 7-10 hands and then 3b your jj after you min cash.

There were 6650 entries, 1000 places pay, and initial stack of 60,000. Therefore, the average stack close to the bubble should be about 400K. I do not see how you get 900K. So OP has about 12 buyins and the mincash is 1.5 buyins. I understand it is the ME and the mincash is $15K. However, the mincash is really not that significant. Try to look at it like it was a $50 online tournament.

Really, you should not be playing that high if you cannot make clear decisions because of the money involved. If you cannot make clear decisions on the bubble, what are you going to do with millions on the line at the final table? Maybe OP has money, makes a lot per year at poker, or sold a lot of his action in the ME.

It is borderline whether to 3! JJ here anyway, so I would prefer to flat. The mincash is somewhat significant and you may not make good decisions maybe playing for stacks at this stage.

Absolutely terrible advice ITT, suggesting folding an overpair on this board. Play careful by checking the turn with 1.2xpot left? Then what do you do x/c and fold the river? No one would ever give this advice if you said it was a normal tournament and not on the bubble. You 3! JJ, flop an overpair, you generally try to gii this shallow.

Is jamming the flop crazy given the draws and the ICM implications of busting on the bubble with this stack? Even if he only calls with sets, it could be profitable depending on how many hands he's calling your 3-bet with. I might even like making it more pre to make this less of an overbet and to more narrowly define villain's range.

Is jamming the turn the best play? Can't be thrilled about checking it through, especially if a spade, club, or 2 comes on the river.

One good question we haven't really figured out is what we think villain's range is here. Is he only calling pairs and big aces? Does he fold smaller pairs? Does that include suited aces and suited Broadway? Is he calling with anything he's opening with?

I have not set on the right play; I'm asking because these are questions I'm thinking about that I haven't seen addressed or considered in this thread yet.

Some people may have big leaks if you get so worried about it being the bubble. There are ICM issues on the bubble, but usually you want to pick up chips exploiting people playing weak tight or correctly tight due to ICM, as well as big stacks playing over aggressive.

As far as it being a $10K and the ME, OP could be a high stack player, a reg at high rollers, and old school or other big name, or a cash game player who often buys in for more than $10K. Getting effected by the effective stakes late in a tournament is a big leak.

The 3! is probably just a mistake. Because you are squeezing and OOP, you have to make it about 15% of your stack, so there are limited number of hands you can gii against a shove or smaller 4! with. Normally, you could include AK/JJ. There is a question whether the opener would 4! lighter having you covered or tighter thinking you have a strong range. I would tend to think the opener would be afraid OP had a very strong range and would 4! tight. I assume OP intended to gii preflop, and it would seem bad to 3!/fold JJ, but I do not like getting it in preflop in this situation because villain's range may be tight and ICM issues with the bubble.

I would bet larger on the flop, as the other poster suggested, but with the intention of setting up a pot sized shove on the turn. OP has a huge range advantage. I think checking would be bad, as villain usually checks. You give free cards and lose value, but then have to gii anyway if villain has something and wants to bet. Pushing the turn represents a draw or something like AK semibluffing. I would push the turn anyway with the turn card that creates more possible draws and is not an overcard.

Thanks for the responses. So I didn’t want to reveal too much, because this was actually on the stone Bubble 1001 and 1000 get paid. I didn’t Bubble so obviously it worked out.


I thought about it and decided that it is possible that the villain has QQ - 88 and also even might have peeled AQ or AK. The river has too many scary cards that we don’t like and the pot is too large.

Rather than just jam the turn. I went for a CRAI. I checked he bet 120K and I ripped it in. He folded and said he had TT.

wow, well done.

How did you finish?

+1 nicely done. Not too sure in game that I would have the courage but with your assigned range it has to be a +eV play.

Hope you went DEEEEP!

Yeah my math is terrible. Average stack was around 510k as they were paying 15% of the field. I still wait 7-10 hands for the bubble to burst

Damn deuce, I wanna live in your world where $15k doesn’t mean **** lol.

Trying to play so as not to bubble isn’t about playing scared, it’s about playing proper tournament strategy. Bubbling with the kind of stack we have would be a total punt, whether it’s the Main Event or a $50 online tourney.

I’m not quite sure what your advice is for the flop. I get that you would’ve just called the pfr, which kind of conflicts with your passion about not playing scared on the bubble imo, but whatever. And it sounds like you’d just bomb the turn as well. But I’m guessing you’d bet the flop as well? If we get called on the turn, what hands call us that we beat? How do we have a huge range advantage by the turn? The villain has all the sets, we don’t. I get that we have more/all of the premium pocket pairs, but that’s not our entire 3betting range. To me, at least, villain has the nut advantage in this hand.

Not a huge fan of the check/jam to be honest. Glad it worked out though and congrats on cashing the main! That’s always exciting.

Edit: Also wondering if the villain said he had 1010 after you told him (or showed him) you had JJ? If so, I’d be skeptical of that.

What was your plan if 4! preflop?

I do not like the x/shove on the wet board, but it might be fine on a drier board outchipped on the bubble. He should not be bet/folding much on this board, and might check back or shove draws.

I’m folding to his four bet. I’m not comfortable getting 70bbs in with JJ preflop regardless of the bubble. The bubble just makes it easier.

I don’t think fear of a four bet is a legit reason not to 3 bet. Like you, I don’t think the villain will 4! us very often because: 1) He’d have to put us on a tighter range since we’re on the bubble and he can stack us, 2) his range isn’t necessarily that strong to begin with since he can probably raise like 75-80% of his hands with his stack/position/bubble and 3) we have a big stack ourselves so he can’t just jam low pocket pairs like he could if we were at 20-30 bbs.

Unless you have reason to believe this plsyer will come in light, fold, JJ is a bluff catching hand when it comes to big stack pushing.

He should be 4!ing AK, which is one reason I do not like 3!ing JJ in this situation. You can 3! bluff if you want. No need to put JJ in your 3! range.

There might be no need to (in this very specific situation) but there are plenty of reasons to.

And I assume you’re only talking about this specific hand when you say ‘no need to put JJ in a 3 betting range,’ because if not then I don’t think you’re in any position to berate the advice ITT.

I think you could craft an argument that unless he finished better than 603, it was a poor risk choice, even if it worked. I do find it amazing ITT that a lot of players are treating the bubble of a 10k with 6600 entrants just like a $100 tournament spot.

Nice run.

That is quite a poor argument. What happens after the bubble bursts has no bearing on his decision. It is the equity he has in the tournament after this exact hand that matters.

C/r all in on the turn is not something I would have considered.

But giving it some thought it I think that it can be effective against specifically QQ which should represent about 25% of villain's hands that are ahead of us (aside from the 4 sets and straight with 66). I'm not sure that villain would fold 100% of the time with QQ but I do think that villain would fold most of the time.

So the c/r does maximize our equity in ways that other plays might not.

I think that villain can also trail with AK/AQ/AK/AQ and this play will force villain to call the all in if villain bets 30% of the effective stack as he did here. Maybe the AQs fold some of the time to the shove.

But if we are going to c/r jam it might be better to just jam the turn outright (as deuceblocker suggested) and increase our chances of survival and taking down the pot. All of the flush draws will fold. QQ will likely fold or at least should fold as often as it will to the c/r.

And by checking the turn we offer villain a free card if they have a flush draw.

So I have mixed feelings here. I prefer the c/r to my original plan of betting out 180k. I think I would rather just jam the turn than check (to minimize losing to AK and especially flush draws). But the checking has another benefit in that it can induce 88-TT to make a small value bet on the river if not on the turn. Either way it was extremely gutsy on the bubble.