40BB Shove with JJ Analysis? (3 Viewers)

[Preditor]

Playing in a casino mystery bounty tournament with 20K starting stacks (but importantly not in the money yet, so mystery bounties not in play). Blinds are 300/600 with a BBA. 8 handed. I am at about 28K on the button.

I get dealt JJ.

Lojack (a LAG player) is RFI. He raises to an unorthodox 3K (this is the third hand in a row he's done this). Folds to me; I flat the 3K with my Jacks.

Small blind (a young kid who admits his first time playing in a casino) 3-bets to 7K. Our stacks are about even. This seems odd given his play until now; feels like a major overplay. I feel like he's repping a marginal or weak pocket pair; but not a premium hand (Maybe AK or QQ at best; 66s-10s most likely).

BB folds. LJ (initial raiser) also folds.

I have about 25K left behind - about 40BB deep. With 14.2K already into middle, I decide to jam with the Jacks hoping for a fold, but also believe I am ahead if he calls, and can get a nice payday to help me when the mystery bounties are in play.

But SB calls. He turns over 99s so I am a 4:1 favorite. Of course, he hits a set on the flop, covers me by 500, and knocks me out.

I am not afraid to shove it all-in, but I usually am wary of shoving anything more than 25BB. But even though I lost, this seemed like the right move to me; I don't think I can fold JJ here and don't think I want to play JJ post-flop in this bloated a pot where I just flat, even with the button. But man, this bad beat stung.

Even though I got a bad beat, was this the right play?

 

[SwissChip]

Not with Jacks! ; )

 

[Preditor]

Not with Jacks! ; )

I knew this would be the first response...

 

[Saoliver]

Obligatory.

 

[DrStrange]

Best to proceed step by step through the hand, getting opinions about each decision point.

Most of all -don't tell the result. You'll get terribly results oriented replies in most cases.

Hero makes a pivotal decision to flat vs the LAG's raise. I think a raise is in order to isolate the LAG while on the button. Hero will learn a lot more about the SB's hand when he is facing a 3-bet vs seeing a squeeze opportunity after Hero flats.

What was Hero's plan when flatting? Was hero trapping? Or was he set mining? Perhaps waiting to see a safe flop before committing his stack?

As played. Flatting the 3-bet as a set mining plan I guess is +EV. Folding seems wrong. Jamming in a raise of 33 bb into a pot of 18 bb is bold. I worry about this becoming a reverse implied odds situation where villain folds the weak end of his range while calling with the best of hands.

Hero's read seems more hopeful than anything else. I wouldn't have ruled out any of the monsters. It is quite hard to range inexperienced players as they make "wrong" plays all the time.

I kind of feel hero has turned his hand into a bluff. First the flat then 4-bet jam vs 3-bet sounds pretty strong. Hero gets a fine result - villain calls off as a huge dog. But hero is unlucky.

 

[grandmeme]

JJ is a premium in a bounty MTT with 40BB. Most of the money is in bounties, which you will need to fight for, instead of ladders. Given a LAG LJ and aggressive blinds in front, you need to 3! 100% of the time and mostly call it off against a jam. I would rather bust early and go have a pint compared to playing short stack while my opponents are drooling over my bounty.

 

[Preditor]

What was Hero's plan when flatting? Was hero trapping? Or was he set mining? Perhaps waiting to see a safe flop before committing his stack?

Good question here. This guy had RFI'd to 3K (5BB) the 2 hands before this. The first time it went to showdown with another player; he had pocket Kings and won a huge pot. The second time, everyone folded pre-flop to his 3K raise.

I felt the third time in a row doing this he was LIKELY taking advantage of the huge stack. But still, this is a very unorthodox bet sizing. I would have 3-bet if he had a more orthodox 2-3BB RFI sizing. But when he RFI's to 5BB, I knew a 3-bet worth getting him to fold would be more than 33% of my stack.

Given his unorthodox sizing, his polarized range, the fact I had position, and the blinds left to act behind me? Flatting felt better than a 4-bet. If it calls down, I would have stabbed with draws and/or if the JJ had been an overpair; not just if I hit a set.

Jamming in a raise of 33 bb into a pot of 18 bb is bold. I worry about this becoming a reverse implied odds situation where villain folds the weak end of his range while calling with the best of hands.

A fold at this point would have been a big win giving me a 50% increase on my stack. I didn't feel that insane at the time, but maybe I am wrong.

Hero's read seems more hopeful than anything else. I wouldn't have ruled out any of the monsters. It is quite hard to range inexperienced players as they make "wrong" plays all the time.

I played next to this guy for 90 minutes before this. Saw him do some classic "Slowplay AA/KK; overbet with marginal hands" often.

So when he 4-bet, it felt more him trying to protect a marginal hand OOP rather than getting value with a premium hand. I put him on 66s-10s, and maybe QQ/AK. So when I thought of all his possible hands, I felt ahead on the majority of them.

 

[drdr]

From the writeup seems you made the right play within that hand, since you got it in good for the right reasons. But to me it seems a simpler question of whether it's the right move for the tournament. You say 4:1. So you are comfortable losing a fifth of tournaments in this spot if it means 4/5ths of tournaments you have doubled stack and a bounty?

/Probably should ignore me (low cred) unless others confirm there's merit in this pondering.

 

[grandmeme]

If you were a tournament grinder, so much of your EV is in first place. In a bounty tournament, there is even more emphasis on accumulating a big stack and hunting for bounties. I would be shocked if a min cash is even worth a double up of your entry fee.

I would imagine in a mystery bounty tournament like this, around 50% of the prize pool is situated in the bounty. Therefore, you need to play way more aggressive than usual, and also go for much closer spots when you are covering. Even if mystery bounties are not in play, you still need to fight for a big stack.

 

[chippitydoodah]

 

[NotRealNameNoSir]

Yeah agreed with above, no way am I flatting in a tournament against a LAG with people to act behind. It may feel counterintuitive but not raising is the higher variance spot, I want to isolate the raiser and avoid playing a multiway pot against A7s or whatever is behind me. If you 3bet and SB calls, you may still lose your stack when he flops a set to your overpair but when he misses, you cbet that board in position against two mooks and take a large pot.

'A 3bet worth getting him to fold' is a dangerous way of thinking. You're way ahead of his raising range so you're getting more money in and taking advantage of his wide range, and will cbet the flop when you both miss. You're not just getting him to fold, you have a stronger range, position, and you have the betting lead against someone who plays too many hands.

Your shove allows them to play perfectly, folding their bluffs/marginals and calling with monsters. If its his first time in a casino he's not going to be rigid in his behavior patterns.

Good result getting the call from an underpair and I like the reads. Thanks for the write up.

 

[Legend5555]

This seems quite standard a dive with the dead money and an uncomfortable kid raising to an amount that is obviously not strong. His call is awful.

 

[HiveKueen]

I looked at this in flopzilla.

AS of the SB's re-raise, and before hero's shove, I assigned the following ranges...

I gave RFI a range of KK-77,AKs-A9s,KQs-KTs,QJs-QTs,JTs,AKo-AJo
I reason he doesn't raise 5bb with AA (i'd have put KK in this group too except you say he did 5x with KK earlier). If you thought he had some junk in his range, let me know what to add - tho this player's hand is irrelevant once SB 3 bets and RFI folds.


I gave hero a range of AA,JJ-77,AKs-ATs,KQs,QJs,AKo-AJo,KQo
I reason he doesn't just call with KK or QQ. He might trap by calling with AA

I gave SB a range of AA-99,AKs-AQs,AKo-AQo
I only included 99 in this range because that's what the player actually had otherwise I'd have left it out!

So, with these ranges before the 3bet and shove, the SB has the strongest range and 42% equity. Hero has the weakest range and 28.5% equity. RFI is in the middle of these but only a hair more equity than hero at 29.3%.


When I fold out RFI after SB's 3bet, the equities change to hero = 40% and SB = 60%.
Here is where I'd like to do a little EV analysis when I get a few more minutes - specifically, was hero's shove +EV and, if not, what adjustment to SB's range makes it +EV. You said the RFI's raise was 5bb, so BB=600, so pot was 300+600+600 (SB+BB+BBA) when RFI put in 3K?

Then I adjust hero's range for the shove to AA,JJ,AKs-AQs,AKo which gives hero 54% to SB's 46%

This analysis definitely suggests SB made a very bad call of hero's shove - a call hero always wants.

HK

 

[TheBigTater]

Obligatory.

No matter how many times I've seen that video I still LMAO.

 

[HiveKueen]

Even though I got a bad beat, was this the right play?

I took a look at the exact situation hero described.

Hero put the SB on TT-66 and had JJ himself.

Flopzilla indicates the equities were SB=18.7%, hero=81.3%.

Now for the EV calculation for hero to call versus hero to shove

Call $4K....
What you can win ...
$14,200 * 81.3% = $11,544

What you can lose...
$4,000 * 18.7% = $748

$11,544 - $4748 = $10,796
So calling is +EV


Shove...
What you can win .
$14,200 * 81.3% = $11,544

What you can lose...
$24,000*18.7% = $4,488

11,544 - 4,488 = $7,056.

The EV of calling the SB is quite a bit higher than the EV of shoving on the SB. So pre-flop and based purely on the probabilities for the JJ verses TT-66 range, the call was the higher EV play.

Next, I was curious about what the breakeven equity was for hero in the call and shove cases. In other words, what amount of equity would have hero indifferent between callign/shoving and folding.

Hero's call breakeven equity was ~22%

Hero's shove breakeven equity was ~63%.

Next, a thought experiment. What if hero was wrong about SB's range? Well, if SB has in his range any two of the pairs higher than JJ, hero's equity for the ~63%.

So, it looks like the call was the better option than the shove and that even the call is not +EV if in fact the SB has any two of the 3 bigger pairs in his range.

I had fun working on this as it gave me an opportunity to apply the stuff I'm learning in Split Suit Sweeney's workbooks. I'm assuming I applied the lessons correctly - let me know if you find an error.
HK

 

[HiveKueen]

Still thinking about this interesting hand. Now from the perspective of the SB.

He chose to raise a small amount, apparently in a situation where he was willing to get all his chips in the pot pre-flop (since that is what he ultimately did). So the question becomes should he have folded, called, raised (and if so, how much) or shoved?

Let's assign RFI this range
KK-77,AKs-A9s,KQs-KTs,QJs-QTs,JTs,AKo-AJo (No AA because the 5bb raise just scares worse hands away)

So, let's assign a range to hero based on his call of RFI's 5bb pre-flop raise.
This seems reasonable...again, no KK or QQ or AK 'cause those should have re-raised. AA is a reasonable trap, especially with position.
AA,JJ-77,AQs-ATs,KQs,QJs,AQo-AJo,KQo

Now, SB can fold, call, raise or shove - which has the highest EV? This analysis requires us to suspend our knowledge of what he actually have and assign ranges to each of the actions he could take. Let's not look at the fold option.

Call $2,700 (3k-SB)
reasonable range here for SB is
JJ-77,AQs-AJs,KQs,AQo,KQo (all the bigger hands re-raise in this situation)

The equities here are
RFI 35%
Hero 33%
SB 32%

EV of the call is +$564. so a call is reasonable, especially since it closes the action. But is it the optimal action?

Raise - $4000 (the actual raise) putting $6,700 into the pot
how does this change SB's range? what would he raise with that he would not just call with? For hero, this small raise narrowed his range to TT-66. But is there any world where AA and/or KK are in the range with whcih he raises to 7K?

Let's look at both ranges

TT-66
SB's equity drops slightly to 31%
EV is -$2,298

AA-KK,JJ-77,AQs-AJs,KQs,AQo,KQo
SB's equity goes up to 36%

EV of the raise -$1,588

Shove assuming SB has same stack hero had at start of hand = $28,000, so the shove is for 27,700.
how does this change SB range?
This seems reasonable...
AA-TT,AKs
and his equity goes to 51%
his EV is -$9,748

So SB calling is his most optimal first action. He really messed up this hand and got rewarded for it. D'oh!!!