Hey guys, don't know if you saw, but Doug Polk made a video also analyzing the hand. In it he points out some mistakes I made, makes some good points of his own. Basically it sucks but he should've called off KK

I still might've folded cuz I'm a ****ing idiot lol

I believe people who think calling there with KK is a clear no-brainer slam dunk are grossly underestimating how much the situation the players are in is likely effecting their actions.

It's the exact bubble of the final table of the highest profile poker tournament in the world and life changing money at stake for all of them (except Cada).

Assuming your opponents are probably playing these somewhat-disguised, optimal wider ranges is just not realistic.

Polk alludes to this briefly in his video. He says he does his usual analysis based on theory rather than trying to exploit a suboptimal play style. I just don't think this is a situation where optimal theory is as relevant as it normally is.

Even if you still think a call with KK there is correct, it's not slamdunk some are making it out to be.

If you're #1 goal is winning the tournament, even if it's not the best immediate EV play, than ya, you gotta call.

If there are players making those optimal theory plays shoving KQs 40bb, then yeah, maybe Doug is right. I think it's much better to assume that everyone is playing straightforward and tight considering they're not all-stars and weren't showing huge punt tendencies. The ICM really does have a huge effect on the profitability of the call. Not to mention, pretty sure Zhu made the exact same massive overshove pre with KK earlier in the coverage, early enough the rest of the players could've known about it

Tbh I am still in the "KK is a fold" camp

Also, is Manion really ever getting in 40bb effective with AK on the biggest FT bubble of his life praying to God he's dominating a weaker ace and not crushed by KK+ or, perhaps at best, flipping? I don't think so haha

It is not an optimal theory play.

Too often high-level analysis like Doug's discusses optimal/non-exploitable play, but the vast majority of players play a suboptimal, highly exploitable game that allows you to do things like fold KK preflop. This is one of those cases, and doesn't even factor for things like EV of final tabling, etc.

Another spot where even if superficially correct, this reasoning is just justifying what scared nits want to do.

If people really are so tight that they have only monsters here, anyone who is exploitatively folding KK here, should be opening practically every hand that is folded to them. Funny that the nits who advocate folding KK here are the same people who are also the nits who only shove KK+ for 40 BBs and open only about 12% of their range.

This isn't exploiting these guys. It's just 90% tourney guys being scared near big money and it's why 'spewy' guys like Doug, Joe Cada, Qui Nguyen types who win tourneys.

If these players are little blobs of quaking jelly capable of playing a hand only when they have exact nuts, then yeah maybe you are right...

It's easy to sound snide because you disagree with people's assumptions.

Apart from my error of copying your entire OP I demonstrated exactly what the problem with your ICM logic is. Doug just says "play to win" because why pure ICM is structurally flawed as an analysis tool is too valuable for him to casually advertise without being paid for it. All the top regs already know this. It would be nice if you realized the problem of using pure ICM as a base.

Yes we saw, it was 11 posts before this one.

-BD

This cannot possibly be right. AA is squarely in Zhu’s range.

^^^^ yeah, this.

There are a ton, a ton I say, of players who are jamming AA/KK here because they want everyone else to fold.

Has anyone discussed Lynskey's snap fold with TT?

Why should Zhu shove with AA as opposed to making a smaller 3-bet?

I personally would have made an ordinary-sized three bet from Zhu’s spot here, but I think there are plenty of players in that spot who simply want everyone else to fold and take down the pot.

People calling Zhu "the Chinese guy" dont understand the villains strength. Zhu got 80+ wsop cashes, gfy, 2nd best player at the table by icm-knowledge.

Zhu smash-shoving into Labats flat (when Labat playing abit Lagro), and a fishes open, coupled with Zhu extremely tight range at his # of BBs, his range shove range here is squarely KK/AA. Hes not overshoving anything all in except KK or AA there. He is not 3bet shoving QQ or AK, 0%.

Your two statements here seem contradictory. If he's actually a good player who isn't completely scared money, his 3-bet range should be much wider than KK+.

That ^^^

He was second to short stack. A good player knows they need to find spots to chip up and not be terrified of bubbling.

Zhu is a good player. But it is not any tournament, it is the main event FT bubble time,He obviously plays scared and really wanna get into the final 9. He called with AK a couple hands ago and went to showdown. So yeah, AK is definitely not in his 40bb jamming range. It is either AA or KK. He just wanna take the pot down and didn't wanna face any tough decisions playing post-flop. If he makes a normal size 3bet to 4.5-5 million, then after facing 2 allins, he may be able to get away with it.

Everyone keeps emphasizing how its the ME Final Table Bubble. I guess I'll take the other side and say it's not as big a deal compared to years past when there was the November 9, a two month break, and making the Official Final Table was a huge deal for media, sponsorship, etc.

That isn't the case anymore, the unofficial final table of 10 players is playing right through with no break down to a winner. So the whole "OMG ME FT Bubble" I think isn't such a big bubble like before with "November Niners".

And honestly compared to Top pay spots of $8.8M and $5.0M for 1st & 2nd, the 10th, 9th, 8th pay spots laddering maybe $100Kish each isn't relatively that big a deal to pass up spots with KK just to try to ladder from 9th to 8th for example, you have to play to accumulate for 1st and 2nd.

Agree with what you said. You should always try to win this thing. But different people value the ME FT differently. As you can see at the final 10-handed table, there are people who play close to their normal game, there are people who play really scared. Zhu just belongs the the latter group.

this is no longer relevant.

a decade ago you could make some plays that ignored ICM (more "play to win") because there's more sponsorship dollars and EV that came with winning the bracelet.

winning main event doesnt mean anything anymore. i sincerely doubt the sponsorship opportunities you get from winning the main come out to more than like 25k or something.

i could be wrong on this, but i dont see anyone jumping at the bit to get main event winners doing photo ops or play as the celebrity in some tournament. even if they are, i think earnings on that are low (hence 25k estimate).

maybe theres value if you're a negreanu type who already has the sponsor and the means to extract extra pageviews, but outside of that goooood luck.

I have to wonder if he'd still have called if he wasn't the biggest stack.

this guy gets it

there are shorter stacks around, and if you have a hand like AK/QQ there can be more value in just picking up the pot preflop as opposed to inducing a hand like AK/QQ to get it in cuz of ICM implications (small as they are since the first few rungs are relatively small payjumps)

so if you have a massive incentive to jam your QQ/AK hands, and your range in this spot to begin with is relatively tight, then how do you balance? you either jam all your playable hands, or you put in the small 3bet with the top of your range and toss in some Ax hands as bluffs.

speaking as someone who has gone deep in this once (the brags are humble), your brain becomes a sentient potato by day 6 or so. its really hard to consider mixed range strategies. i dont find any fault with the simplest strategy in this spot, esp when its unexploitable.

i dont get why everyones hating on zhu. guy is a grinderrrrrrr. he plays all the games and plays tight solid. he has a tight solid game. that doesnt = scared. he's just making the best play that fits his tight solid game. his ROI is higher than all the non-scared heros posting in this thread.

This situation is ultra rare. Any other tournament I can justify calling but it's the bubble for the Main Event Final Table. Zhu shoved with 40BBs and Manion shoved with 60BBs!! I believe Manion is a recreational player. Would a rec player shove a huge stack without AA (He also shoved quickly)? Every recs dream is to be at the final table of the Main Event. ICM reasons I am folding. Extremely touch decision for Labat. I would probably call the clock on myself and let it time out lol.

LOL . Where is the hate coming from? I just point out an obvious fact. I totally understand his strategies,even though not optimal for winning this thing. I think most people would play a little scared at that stage, just one spot from final table and under all the spotlight, including you and me.