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Poker Video: MTT/SNG by AMT (Mid Stakes)

Time Link to 00:17:48

On the J10 hand you folded to the short stack shove. He only shoved 7BB (you said 15BB) and that seems like a pretty tight fold getting those odds. Are you mostly folding for 'stack preservation' purposes? I would think J10 does pretty well against his 7BB shoving range, even though he's been pretty tight.

Regarding the format:

I like this format a lot. I like that we got to see how you, specifically with your online MTT success, reacted in different spots. I'd also like to see how other DC members (good or bad) are playing these.

Last Man Standing was so awesome breaking down SNGs into early , middle, & late game and specific strategies for each stage. It seems like it'd be more complex, but it'd be cool to have a similar series for larger fields.

Hey I'm in the middle of a session right now so will check comments later. Just wanted to chime in and say that the c-bet spot with the A3s bvb on table 2 vs. the splashy guy: Really not happy with my play/analysis of this spot overall. I think it should just be a clear cbet on this board, it's pretty dry still and we don't have enough showdown value (or value otherwise) to try to get fancy I don't think. Would rather keep it simple here instead of the mess that might develop otherwise.
This was also my first (and perhaps only, depending on how you guys like it) 6 tabling trial for video purposes, so was a tad bit overwhelming trying to make sure I covered everything thoroughly/properly. Apologies in advance if anyone takes issue with it but hopefully you all enjoy and find it interesting.

I love the 6 tabling format. It's nice that you're able to have MTTs at various stages from early to middle (late stages would be nice obviously when available) going at the same time. A 'live play' with 6 tables might be a bit much, but since your session is pre-recorded and you can pause as needed, it works quite well IMO.

Thanks For the video.

This format seems a very good solution to see a lot of situations early in a tournament. It gives a good view on how you open PF in MTT.
I was surprised by 3 hands:
- 8'00. For me it is a bit tough to understand the 25BB shove in SB with A3s
- 33'00. Really surprised to hear that shoving 20BB AQs is standard after an unknowm early raise. I would be a bit too much of a nit here.
- the A3s hand but you answered here.

Around 25 minutes in you open 77 UTG to 90 on table 6 at 15/30 and get one flat in MP and then a cutoff squeeze to 240. I think you should definitely call here. You're 95 bbs deep, and will almost certainly be playing a 3way pot with the original flatter. The guy who 3bet you has a 3bet % of 4.2 and you are opening UTG so presumably his range here is super tight.

On the J10 hand you folded to the short stack shove. He only shoved 7BB (you said 15BB) and that seems like a pretty tight fold getting those odds. Are you mostly folding for 'stack preservation' purposes? I would think J10 does pretty well against his 7BB shoving range, even though he's been pretty tight.

Apologies for mis-speaking there with the 15bb statement. Either way though, meh, I think it's pretty close and can't possibly be that 'snap' of a call from this guy imo. I don't really think stack preservation is much of a factor, given we have a reasonable stack size and it's still relatively early on/middle game. I just have no real reason to believe he's shoving very wide, other than the fact the he's short (aka he hasn't been playing many pots, he's not even in a stealing position really, etc.) If he were just a tad bit shorter, maybe shoving 1 or 2 less bb's at most, we'd easily have odds to call. Even now I do think it's reasonably close I just don't really find it an attractive proposition to call a tight players 7-10bb jam getting 1.5ish:1 without any indication that he's shoving reasonably wide with JTo.

Text results appended to pokerstove.txt

5,239,650,240 games 4.694 secs 1,116,244,192 games/sec

Board:
Dead:

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 36.818% 36.27% 00.55% 1900516704 28631970.00 { JTo }
Hand 1: 63.182% 62.64% 00.55% 3281869596 28631970.00 { 22+, A2s+, K9s+, QTs+, A7o+, KTo+, QJo }


I think that's somewhat reasonable of an assumption from a tight looking player with a short stack in MP here. Even upping to close to 30% shoving ranges does not get us to the 40% equity required to break even here (cEV), and I think assuming he's shoving any wider than that would be pretty absurd.

Thanks For the video.

This format seems a very good solution to see a lot of situations early in a tournament. It gives a good view on how you open PF in MTT.
I was surprised by 3 hands:
- 8'00. For me it is a bit tough to understand the 25BB shove in SB with A3s
- 33'00. Really surprised to hear that shoving 20BB AQs is standard after an unknowm early raise. I would be a bit too much of a nit here.
- the A3s hand but you answered here.

Hi Olivier,

Thanks Glad it was enjoyable. As for your comments:

8:00- As I mentioned in the video I wasn't *all* that comfortable in that spot, and I don't know if it's optimal, but I'm definitely OK with my line. The reasoning is mainly that we're OOP vs a player playing many pots, and we have a hand that is really strong BvB in that we're usually ahead of him, but it's not going to play so well vs. ranges. If we open small, we basically have to do one of a few things: fold to shoves from tons of worse hands, call shoves when we're often going to be ahead but never that far ahead (AKA never more than ~55-60% equity at absolute best), or get called, and have to play with this hand out of position with an awkward stack size. Basically all of these options really sucked to me vs. this opponent, so I decided to eliminate the possibility of him thinking he has fold equity with JT or 65s or something, and taking that ~40-50% of pot equity away from him when he has to fold pre instead of shoving over a raise is pretty big for me.

I'm not sure if this specific player does it, but the other potential advantage is getting him to fold a hand like A6o or 33 which would be huge, and which he certainly would not fold to a small open. Again, not totally certain that it's optimal here, but I think the arguments make sense and it has to be more profitable than folding IMO.

33:00- Yeah, wasn't happy about the 3x from EP vs. an unknown with AQo, and in a lower buy in it's probably fine to just throw it away until we get more information, but it has to be really close. AQs is definitely really really standard. I doubt he has to be opening more than ~10-12% of hands/calling off 8% of those to make AQs a clearly profitable resteal. These are just estimates but it shows people can still be pretty tight in a spot where you can still rejam a hand like AQs profitably. I don't think in today's aggressive games in most situations we can afford to assume that everyone is a nit. I think it should be more the other way around as far as expanding our value reshove ranges to a hand like AQs (and AQo usually as well), and if we have some reasonable evidence/information to suggest a really tight range, we can adjust to that. In this example it might have been illustrated by throwing away the AQo, but even with that would never have dreamed of folding AQs without that reason to from a random still 3xing with these stacks. (In fact, interesting to note that I'd prefer him 3x when I decide to jam here instead of 2x or 2.5x- it shows that he's probably not good enough to be considering his raise sizing here, and also puts more dead money in the pot to steal).

Hope that helps, thanks for posting.

Around 25 minutes in you open 77 UTG to 90 on table 6 at 15/30 and get one flat in MP and then a cutoff squeeze to 240. I think you should definitely call here. You're 95 bbs deep, and will almost certainly be playing a 3way pot with the original flatter. The guy who 3bet you has a 3bet % of 4.2 and you are opening UTG so presumably his range here is super tight.

Yep I mainly agree with this. Probably was too busy trying to make sure recording was going right/tending to other tables off-screen and didn't consider a call enough with the player behind and squeeze size.
Somewhat relevant to consider that we're OOP vs. both opponents and even though we'd be playing almost exclusively for set value, it is definitely hardest to extract value from thinking players in this spot. Given that flatter is probably not that great and its a knockout tournament though, it's definitely a clear call, thanks for pointing the hand out.

Regarding the format:

I like this format a lot. I like that we got to see how you, specifically with your online MTT success, reacted in different spots. I'd also like to see how other DC members (good or bad) are playing these.

Last Man Standing was so awesome breaking down SNGs into early , middle, & late game and specific strategies for each stage. It seems like it'd be more complex, but it'd be cool to have a similar series for larger fields.

Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it and appreciate the constructive feedback.
As far as an LMS equivalent for MTTs, we've thought about putting out a similar series for the games. Frankly, though, I personally have *no* idea how to go about doing it. Even with my experience making videos and producing LMS, playing different types of tournies etc.., I'm really just not yet totally sure of how to organize an MTT series like that. There's just so much information and everything is a lot more dynamic than SNGs, really just not sure how to effectively prepare such a project. Still going to try to figure something similar out for a more series-oriented format, and suggestions are always welcome!

Apologies for mis-speaking there with the 15bb statement. Either way though, meh, I think it's pretty close and can't possibly be that 'snap' of a call from this guy imo. I don't really think stack preservation is much of a factor, given we have a reasonable stack size and it's still relatively early on/middle game. I just have no real reason to believe he's shoving very wide, other than the fact the he's short (aka he hasn't been playing many pots, he's not even in a stealing position really, etc.) If he were just a tad bit shorter, maybe shoving 1 or 2 less bb's at most, we'd easily have odds to call. Even now I do think it's reasonably close I just don't really find it an attractive proposition to call a tight players 7-10bb jam getting 1.5ish:1 without any indication that he's shoving reasonably wide with JTo.

Text results appended to pokerstove.txt

5,239,650,240 games 4.694 secs 1,116,244,192 games/sec

Board:
Dead:

equity win tie pots won pots tied
Hand 0: 36.818% 36.27% 00.55% 1900516704 28631970.00 { JTo }
Hand 1: 63.182% 62.64% 00.55% 3281869596 28631970.00 { 22+, A2s+, K9s+, QTs+, A7o+, KTo+, QJo }


I think that's somewhat reasonable of an assumption from a tight looking player with a short stack in MP here. Even upping to close to 30% shoving ranges does not get us to the 40% equity required to break even here (cEV), and I think assuming he's shoving any wider than that would be pretty absurd.

Wow, that's a great explanation and makes a lot of sense. Thanks for taking the time to respond. This is probably a leak in my game as I would typically call in that spot.

Anyway, great video and I'm looking forward to more (hopefully the conclusion to this video too).

Time Link to 00:45:27

I love it!!! learned alot. would love to see follow ups.

Time Link to 00:33:17

cash game player asking : what about a call there with AQ ? 15% of our stack isn't that much when we miss and vilain keeps being aggro is it ? The fact is that I don't see many worst hands calling our shove preflop or better hands folding.

Jaimestaples,

Thanks!

Adebisi,

cash game player asking : what about a call there with AQ ? 15% of our stack isn't that much when we miss and vilain keeps being aggro is it ? The fact is that I don't see many worst hands calling our shove preflop or better hands folding.

Well, as I alluded to in the video/earlier in the thread comments, it's pretty marginal of a shove with no reads facing the 3x from EP, but it's definitely close no matter how you slice it.
The fact is I would basically never call here and I think it's very very clearly a push or fold situation. With 20bb's you are indeed risking a lot to take a flop, 15% is not a marginal figure, *especially* if you're planning to play 'fit or fold' post flop. I mean if you're willing to get it in on ace high flops, I have to imagine it's because you think there are enough worse Ax hands or random lower pairs/draws that he'd stack off with, meaning it is increasingly likely that re-stealing preflop would have shown a clear profit, and likely moreso than any other option (aka it would've been optimal if those conditions hold true post flop).
As I indicated earlier, opponents don't have to be *all* that loose to make shoving AQo here profitable, and again while there are plenty of tight players 3x'ing in EP with this stack where this is a pretty clear fold pre (and I probably should've just folded it here as the absolute nuts of my folding range), there are plenty who don't understand bet sizing with 20bbs and are happy to open 3x and call it off here with the AJ or KQ type hands that we hope for. There are yet other opponents who might even call off AJ but fold 55, which are obv. the best kind of villain to have in this spot! Not saying it's the norm but it happens quite a bit, and certainly enough so that I felt it close enough of a shove to just stick it in here begrudgingly (note: if I had folded, it also would have been quite begrudgingly).
edit: I think it's reasonable to say that an evil looking cat avatar with 4-5 stars showing is a clear shove here with no additional information. Questionably calmer cats showing 2 stars can get the fold Wish I was joking but I think it's reasonable to consider these things absent any more solidified reads/info.

Hope that helps clarify my position a bit.

edit: also noticed you said "The fact is that I don't see many worst hands calling our shove preflop or better hands folding."

While this is relevant and I spoke to it a bit above, it's not really what push/folding or restealing in tournaments is about. We make our money from all of the hands that they open and decide to fold, in addition to the times they may fold better or get it in with worse specifically. They can still open a pot, fold a worse hand to your resteal, and you still may well have made the most money that you could have on that hand AKA you'd have taken the best line possible (AND can often be happy that they folded a worse hand, believe it or not!) We simply aren't in the cash game dynamic where we can take a lot of flops light against varying stack sizes. Even in cash games I doubt it's right to peel in position with any frequency against really short stacks as opposed to taking away their ability to win the pot post flop/helping to negate the edge lost while having to play against short stackers. Of course this depends on a litany of factors but I think it's a generally reasonable assumption in my experiences.

As a general aside; No matter how well we re-steal, we will indeed run into the nuts some % of the time, get into pretty close spots with others given the short and mid stack dynaics of MTTs, etc... and while of course important to consider all the dynamics present in the specific spot, we can't be so results oriented that we end up missing out on picking up tons of chips in the middle game. I mention this because I see a lot of regs run into a big hand and then nit it up for far too long after and end up costing themselves a lot of money unnecessarily, in large part due to a standard cooler that happened several orbits before.

Time Link to 00:30:37

vs crisbus on table 6, you checked back the flop. You commented about saying you should cbet here but didn't. Do you have a thought on why you did that in game or was it just an error in judgment at the time? I agree that it should be a pretty standard cbet spot, seeing as we could get floated by some worse ace highs and we could also get pocket pairs 22, 44-77 to fold.

On the last hand w/ the 99, I don't think he could really rep anything either given how passively he played the hand to that point. He had to think that you're calling down with all your Ace highs or you're bluff catching the bad run out, because like you said you can't rep much value and betting would just put you in a bunch of stupid spots even if you did have a hand like JJ or KK there and for some reason didn't bet the turn.

vs crisbus on table 6, you checked back the flop. You commented about saying you should cbet here but didn't. Do you have a thought on why you did that in game or was it just an error in judgment at the time? I agree that it should be a pretty standard cbet spot, seeing as we could get floated by some worse ace highs and we could also get pocket pairs 22, 44-77 to fold.

On the last hand w/ the 99, I don't think he could really rep anything either given how passively he played the hand to that point. He had to think that you're calling down with all your Ace highs or you're bluff catching the bad run out, because like you said you can't rep much value and betting would just put you in a bunch of stupid spots even if you did have a hand like JJ or KK there and for some reason didn't bet the turn.

No I don't really know why I checked back in-game, lots of reasons possible for little mistakes like that. I know I had a couple other tables going off screen, and that AQo re-shove spot popped up at the same time so I might have gotten distracted, or just relied on getting to a cheap showdown or something and took the pansy line. I think it was probably just a lazy check back, happens sometimes. I don't think he'll fold any pairs on the flop but getting him off chops or hands like QJ that will still have reasonable pot equity/him calling with worse ace highs or FDs or w/e still makes it a reasonably standard spot. Wouldn't do it with 100% frequency or anything though, so we can pretend it was one of those other times

And yeah the 99 spot was pretty standard, realized he was probably just thinking what I was thinking about his hand. Was planning to cut the video before the hand as you could probably tell but wanted to squeeze in some explanation just cause it was another hand where I got to showdown with a reg and figured showing everyone as many hands as possible was reasonable.


edit: and sorry for those that wanted a continuation of this video, I really don't have one prepared, this was just more a random review of a chunk of play. Apologies if that's a let down, but if you want a more structured multi-part review, I can do that for the future (but there's another vid that's already been put in that was recorded a while ago so it won't be immediately!)

Thank A, I figured it was fluke at the time but since it pertained to the rest of your analysis of the hand I figured I'd ask.

As for the video, I liked the format a lot and think you did a good job on it. I hope you continue to do things like this. Also, I hope you continue to get some run good in.

Great vid. I like this format.

Maybe its camtasia or whatever, but i notice in this you have two mice on the screen, i was wondering how you do this.

Maybe its camtasia or whatever, but i notice in this you have two mice on the screen, i was wondering how you do this.

As far as I know, it's just the recording. I had pre-recorded the actual play, and dubbed over with the audio some days later, so you'll probably see both the mouse taking action at the tables, and then the one I'm moving around while I'm indicating the spots in review/futzing with the mouse when I'm talking through hands and the like.

This video seems to be fubared now, with all kinds of green and purple static. Not sure if it's the video itself or my browser, but the rest of the videos on the site seem to be just fine.

This video seems to be fubared now, with all kinds of green and purple static. Not sure if it's the video itself or my browser, but the rest of the videos on the site seem to be just fine.

It's working fine for me. Might be your flash settings or flash updates needed? I had a problem with green and purple static on videos before I updated my flash stuff, but if it's still not working repost here or probably best in the main forums (research and dev. or something) to make sure Rob or another techie on the team sees it and is able to prompt in the right direction.