Quote:
Originally Posted by Vinny80
I'm pretty confused by these spots as it seems I'm pretty much always wrong no matter what I chose. I'm pretty readless as I'm new to these stakes and it's the beginning of the match, but sb seemed fishier and bb reggier.
Is it ok to go broke with TPGK even 3 handed here? I mean, I'm cbetting a bit bigger because of the board texture with the intention of going with my hand, but with this action, I'm doubting myself.
[converted_hand][hand_history]Poker Stars, $14.25 Buy-in (10/20 blinds) No Limit Hold'em Tournament, 3 Players
Poker Tools Powered By Holdem Manager - The Ultimate Poker Software Suite. View Hand #37226369
BB: 600 (30 bb)
Hero (BTN): 430 (21.5 bb)
SB: 470 (23.5 bb)
Preflop: Hero is BTN with K J
Hero raises to 40, SB calls 30, BB calls 20
Flop: (120) 9 K 6 (3 players)
SB checks, BB checks, Hero bets 70, SB calls 70, BB raises to 560 and is all-in
This is definitely a close spot. In theory BB's range should be very strong since both you and the BU have fairly strong ranges in this spot, and so if he takes that into account our hand will likely end up a borderline bluff catcher (since his value range shouldn't include worse hand then ours because of the situation). That being said, many weak players will not take these factors into account and will shove worse value as well as a good amount of draws. These means that in many situations we happily call, but sometimes we can make a fold--the exact decision will end up depending on population tendencies at the specific site and stake together with any reads you have on villain. While this can be an unsatisfying answer since it can be tough to assess the extra information, it's worth noting that whenever a situation ends up close like this it means that the EVs of the two options will usually end up fairly similar so you can't make a big mistake here. It also means that these kinds of decisions can be easily decided using small reads since our regret of acting on small samples is quite low since EVs will run close anyways.
Another sway close decisions one way or the other is to consider win-rate maxing. Win-rate maxing is the concept that when you assume you have edge in a tournament, maximizing your chipEV in every spot does not maximize the probability of winning the tournament. Essentially since we assume we have edge, the longer the tournament lasts the more time we get to exert that edge (for the same rake payment) and so a strategy with low in-game variance, and therefore high average game lenght, is preferred to one with a similar chipEV (or even a little higher) but with higher in-game variance (and therefore lower game length).
In this case folding clearly has lower in-game variance then calling so if we are looking to win-rate max (for example in a high multiplier) and we believe the EV of calling and folding is fairly close (or we believe that we're unable to estimate the two EVs and have to guess between the two options) we should choose to fold. So in a high-multiplier I would be very inclined to fold this (especially since players tend to be more tight passive in high-multipliers so BB will be bluffing and value betting thin less often). In a low stakes 2x vs a BB we know is very weak, it's likely a call.