In over my head.
I played a higher buy in tournament, that I gained entry through a satellite into against players in my area who usually play higher stakes and they punished me repeatedly. The first hand was a spot in the big blind where I had Js9s. We were playing 300/600 with a 300 bb ante. I had 60k IÂ’m chips and the small blind had about 85k in chips. The small blind made it 1700 to go and I defended. The flop was 10s8s6h. He led out for 2500 and I raised to 8000. He called. The turn was 5c and he checked. I fired again for 10,000 and he called. The river was 2h. I have a busted draw and checks again, I bet 15,000 and he tanks. He looks at me and says you have I call because you J9 and shows me Q3 for Q high and the winner. Obviously I gave off some tell in this spot.
The other hand that I ended up making a bluffing mistake was my last one. I begin the hand with about 28k in chips and we are playing 1k/2k with 1k bb ante. The player in middle position opened to 4k, I called on the button with pocket 5Â’s, and the big blind defended. The flop was 9h7c4c. It checked to me and I jammed, the bb tanked and folded and middle position snapped called me with a set of 9. This ended my tournament.
I ran only a handful of bluffs in this tournament as they were all getting picked off, the other bluff I lost some on early in the tournament was when I bluffed as if I had the flush with the ace in hand to get called by second pair on board. Against much better players are these my lines or physical tells is more of what I am wondering.
6 Replies
First hand is fine, that's a completely crazy call by him. I have no idea what you might have given off because I haven't seen you play. Maybe he just wanted to be a hero.
Second hand should be jam or fold pre, you can't be calling that much of your stack off with a hand with such poor postflop playability. At 14BB you should have very few flat calls of a raise at all.
First hand, yeah he just wanted to be a hero. Maybe just smooth call the flop though, who knows.
Second hand, you had seven orbits left so that’s a fold imo.
You’re almost certainly bluffing too much that early in the tournament.
First hand there must have been a tell. Nobody calls with Q high on a river bluff. Maybe another problem was sizing though. The flop c/r was perfect sizing. The turn bet was maybe too small. I would likely have made it 14,000 if I had c/r'd the flop. The river is likely either a jam or a check. Since we block all draws I would probably just give up on the river. I'm guessing Villain had Q3s otherwise why would he have called the flop or turn? Still the only way Villain calls with Q high is because he knows you are bluffing and the final bet sizing is less than half pot and he is thinking its OK if he loses and he is reading you wrong.
Second hand with 14 blinds facing a raise it has to be a jam preflop unless you are BB and it is a minraise (then I would call). I don't like 3-betting with 55 for 14 blinds all in preflop because we don't have a lot of fold equity and are likely up against two overs or a bigger PP. So it is really -EV. Villain could have 22-44 but will fold those some of the time. I prefer playing 55 with <15 blinds as an all in when we are first raiser preflop. But to be fair I got knocked out Day 1 of a multiday tournament moments before end of day 1, when I jammed 55 on the BTN first in and was insta called by JJ in the SB. We weren't going to be in the money until some hours later on Day 2 and I thought I was OK with not having to come in for Day 2 with a short stack... On the bright side one time in the WSOP Main Event last hand before the end of Day 1 I jammed with 44 in the CO with about 22 blinds (like 13,500 chips) and got called by AJo in the SB and I held...
First hand there must have been a tell. Nobody calls with Q high on a river bluff. Maybe another problem was sizing though. The flop c/r was perfect sizing. The turn bet was maybe too small. I would likely have made it 14,000 if I had c/r'd the flop. The river is likely either a jam or a check. Since we block all draws I would probably just give up on the river. I'm gues
Not a check-raise. OP is BB and this is blind vs. blind.
Second hand with 14 blinds facing a raise it has to be a jam preflop unless you are BB and it is a minraise (then I would call). I don't like 3-betting with 55 for 14 blinds all in preflop because we don't have a lot of fold equity and are likely up against two overs or a bigger PP.
Disagree on not having fold equity, particularly the later in position the opener is, as their range will get wider. You'll also have the suited wheel aces opening for sure. But it's unlikely someone is raise/calling 14BB with, say, T9s unless they're super deep and just want to gamble.
Now, jamming is not necessary in this particular hand. It would depend on what I think of the raiser, both the raising and calling ranges. Folding is fine, and depending which "MP" seat the player was in, I'd probably do that. Calling is definitely the worst option.
lol q3? Is this real life? Maybe he saw your hand or something but even so you were the favorite on the flop. As played I might check back river - him calling the raise and the turn bet while you block all draws means he probably has a fair amount of Tx+,8x,two pair+. All the obvious draws missed so I think you get called most of the time. Hand 2 jamming is OK - I probably call like you did given you have position. On the flop I'd just bet small - jam accomplishes nothing
Hand 1 appears terrible on all streets from the villain. As played, his worst 1 pair hands that he can call with should be like 8x on the river. Obviously this villain is probably stationing with worse 1 pairs. Villain cbet sizing leans a bit more toward Tx, over pairs, and air. We can certainly play aggressively on this board, but I somewhat like flatting this cbet with our equity because he should be super wide and have a ton of give ups on the turn. Raising is totally fine though.
Early in the tournament, we're probably getting called down wider and we have fairly bad blockers, aside from blocking 97. I think as played we can check the river with J9ss and J9 one spade. Can see an argument for jamming river with J9o no spades. He should be folding all of his missed spade draws except exactly 65ss.
On the river, I don't like any sizing besides jam. If we want to take this line with AT, KT, two pair hands, and our sets thats good as well. QT and JT too against this opponent I suppose.
Trying to think what hands we want to be bluffing 3 streets with when basically all of the draws miss like this. Maybe our gutters when we decide to raise them on the flop. I guess 33 and 44 as well. Maybe A3hh and A4hh if you're cute and wanna take that line...but those look better as give ups when we don't turn any additional equity. So many draws out there that I don't think we need to find any cute bluffs on the flop.
Could make an argument for having zero bluff jams on this runout when we're early in a tournament.
