To those who are saying this was one of the best televised hands of all time....

it certainly would have been if Dwan had actually been bluffing with 77... Ivey soulreads than tank-ships the river with Ad6d, then Tom soulread tank-calls with dem pocket sebens to win.

Now that would be awesome.

Man ivey call would have been so awesome just to see the table go nuts.

+1, Ive been lurking tv poker for a while and it's pretty amazing he still discusses poker in these threads. I mean kudos and all but I would have slammed my head through a wall a long time ago.

Man I wanted to see Ivey call that sooooo sooo bad.

I was standing up at my computer pleading him to call lol.

is it just me or does ivey have 1 of the most beautiful smiles you've ever seen?

its just a carefree, innocent happiness. i think howard roark smiles like that.

nohomo

This pretty much sums it up.

Massive episode, jason mercier played ok but got caughed just bad luck imo, next week RaSzi, looking forward.

Wow, pretty insightful and so true...

I'm not sure how you came to that conclusion, or what 'once in a blue moon' means. Basically if Mercier's bluffing (or turning a hand into a bluff) there 25%+ of the time. I don't think he is. You point out that he's capable of making moves, and he didn't get where he is nitting is up, etc, etc. But you didn't retort what I said about how it's his first time playing this high with probably this much exposure and that he's playing tight, especially from the sb you would think.

But Ivey is kinda tied to the deck so to speak here - as you've pointed out. Because raising a normal amount isn't bad, and raise/fold with those stacks is bad. So it's a catch 22, really.

That's the second time you claim that. Ivey has plenty of money, from when he had won $16M from Andy Beal in 2006. He might have invested and gotten some from FTP but it's unlikely he has more than $50M. As for durrrr, before losing so much he had maybe won $10M total from online and live, both mostly from Laliberte. He probably invested half, and then lost the bankroll other half to Isildur1.

There's no way they have over $100M. Andy Beal's high stakes game was unprecedented and big news, and the high points were a $13M win and then a $16M loss. An additional $80M poker profit that nobody bothered to talk about is just too unlikely.

And don't overestimate the money they get from FTP. People like Lederer who set it up and people like Ferguson, Gordon etc. who helped develop and write the software obviously get a lot, but Ivey has no technical, math of computer background, all he knows is gambling. It's unlikely FTP would ship him millions a month for doing nothing.

Wtf are u talking? U really believe ivey is not worth 50 million? Is this a level? Once they said ivey could become the first poker billionaire. But u think he is not worth 50 million Rofl. He owns full tilt together with some other players but he just has like 20 million and plays 100k/200k with andy beal lol.

The money that was played against Beal was pooled from a group of players (The Corporation) who each had a piece of the action. Moreover, the $16M came after big losses to Beal, so the net win for each Corporation member was probably less than a million.

Matusow originally sang "Poker, poker, it's all skill; start with the worst hand and go uphill," fwiw.

too many Randroids itt imo

I'm pretty sure the only hands that don't beat 99 in Mercier's range are A4s, A5s, and MAYBE 45s A4o or A5o if he was REALLY stepping out preflop. I don't think he plays 88 like this postflop, but maybe. Probably plays 77 like this close to never preflop but more often than 22 or 33.

So, if we put in just A4s to account for the infrequency of these types of hands vs. 88+ then 99 is 27.5% and Ivey was getting about 3:1 so it's a call. If we add in A5s, 45s, and 77 then the 99 is ~32%.

I like Mercier's play here, because he has one of the few draws on a very dry board, but I think that the mistake Mercier made in this hand was betting so big on the flop given his stack size. If he was gonna bet/shove, he needed to bet smaller to make the shove closer to a pot sized raise.

Now, it's hard to know what Ivey will raise to but you can estimate it will be around 3x the bet as long as the bet's not 1/4 pot or anything. So Mercier had like 178k after the flop and pot was ~40k or so. He bet 28k and Ivey raised to 78k and Mercier shoved for 100k more into a 200k pot.

If he had bet 18k instead, and Ivey raised to 50k, Mercier could shove for 128k more into 135k which is a much tougher call by Ivey given there are very few hands that Mercier bet/shoves that flop with that can't beat 99.

Now whether Mercier actually does bet/shove that dry of a flop with AA is a different question. Since he is a great player, I can only assume that he would, given that he does it with A4s.

ur range assignment doesn't make sense, if you include A4s, A5s then you might as well include all broadways, small SC's, he might just call small pp's for value.
Mercier's squeeze range could've been all that, but the real range that we have to assign is his 3bet shoving range, Ivey read Mercier well. Honestly If i didn't see the cards I would think his 3bet shoving range on the flop is only JJ+.

Ivey insists on running it once because it adds to whatever pressure and intimidation factor he's already applying on his opponents.

A lot of the players in 500/1k games being underrolled, knowing that Ivey will refuse to significantly lower the variance if they ship against him or call his ship effectively increases his fold equity.

It might not be by that much, but poker is a game of small edges and at nosebleeds stakes, where being able to apply pressure is a significant success factor, I'm sure it ends up making a difference against the vast majority of players.

nice discussions so far on the mercier hand, me likey. see, i knew the hand could be dissected further unlike mr. 'i'm too cool and would rather just patronize everyone' pineapple888

Agreed

I fact, thats why I think I love watching Ivey and Durrr smash up high stakes.

You can easily tell all the degen gamblers that come onto the scene. Heck, HSP Season 1 was full of them (that asian chick reminded me of every degen at my local)

I'd love to see Ivey/Durrr felt a underolled degen, then take that $200k and give it to a charity.

I think a lot of the respect we have on 2+2 for Ivey/Durrr is because we know they have the skill and BRM responsibility that comes with it.

Who is the best all-around-Poker Player in the world?

- "Phil Ivey is the best Poker Player in the world"
- "Other than myself, I think Phil Ivey is the best Poker Player in the world"
- "I'd have to probably say Phil Ivey."
- "Phil Ivey is definitly the best all around Poker Player in the world"
- "Phil Ivey."
- "Phil Ivey."
- "I think Phil Ivey."
- "The consesus is obviously that Phil Ivey is the best all around player right now."
- "He's the most feared player pretty much in any game"
- "He's already, like one of the greatest in three different areas, so I give him a lot of credit and a lot of respect."

Kaplan: "Phil Helmuth couldn't quite bring himself to say it."

lol

wtf

what's all this business about 'three eighty three'?

A few thoughts:

I think that was hardly a soul read or anything by Ivey vs. Mercier. He wasn't too thrilled when Mercier shoved. Overall, it was a good play by Mercier, but the thing that I don't think Mercier took into account as much as he should have was that Ivey was so deep (and he's loaded off the table, obviously) that he's probably going to call in that spot when he's in doubt, especially since the shove wasn't for that much more.

Elezra was genuinely worried about Dario firing the turn or river, but he was BSing a little when he said that he would fold. He still COULD'VE folded, but he probably tanks for awhile and might end up calling.

[QUOTE=Fracchiolla;17515181]
It's nice to see Hellmuth's accountant show up here.

it's amazing how many people in this thread seem to be able to help ivey and durrrr a lot with their game.

with the amount of expertise here you'd think all these guys would be out there crushing all the games, but i guess they're such benevolent and noble people that they would give up all that money to spend time posting on a forum about all the mistakes that ivey and durrrr make playing hands.