Archive Pick: Pocket pair facing all in re-raise, Poker Stars Sunday Million

DailyHandQuiz

Game type: Poker Stars Sunday Million, $530 buy in
Stage of tourney: ITM, near bubble
Avg stack: ~420k
Your image: Aggressive
Opponent’s image: No strong read, solid winner in PokerDB
Your hand: J♦J♣

View the original quiz and comments here.

This hand is taken from actual game play between DarthRazor and superpokemon in the Stars Sunday Million on 4.27. You’ll be standing in for super

The setup: You’re near a bubble worth about 1k in the Sunday Million when the following hand comes up. UTG folds and a super-short stack calls all in. The next player makes it a little less than 3x to go. The next player flat calls. One fold and then the action comes to you. You make it a little over 3x the raise at 108k. The table folds back to the original raiser, who times down and then shoves all in. The caller folds and the action is back on you.

You don’t have a history or strong read on this player, but you do know from their poekrDB stats that they’re a solid MTT winner. It’s about 220k for you to call.

What’s your play with jacks? Would your answer change substantially if you held tens?

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8 COMMENTS (Jump to comment form)

DHQ Staff

What we said then: While you could read the initial raise as designed to isolate, it would be a mistake to think of the subsequent four-bet as anything but a premium hand. The initial raise is strong anyhow, since there’s not any real money coming in with the short stack and the raiser is still EP. Even if they were LP, to come back over the top of a flat caller and your three bet just screams a premium hand. Yes, it will be AK sometimes, but I don’t think enough to justify the call, even though you’re getting better than 2-1.

This is one of those spots where a premium hand is pretty much forced by the action to play in a very obvious manner, and while abandoning 20% of your stack isn’t any fun, I think it’s a must in this spot.

What actually happened In the real hand, super held tens and called. Darth showed QQ and held up to win the pot.

[Reply]

kaimano

It depends on the read about the initial raiser. His raise could mean an attempt to isolate the short stack with dead money in the pot but being in early position it could be dangerous. Our reraise from the cutoff could be seen as an attempt to resteal but here it comes the read on the opponent. If he’s capable of shoving with less than a premium hand knowing that he’s representing a premium hand…well, JJ is ahead. But if he’s a straight player, fold those jacks and live another day.

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Richard P

We only need a 23% to call which means we break even if opp has AK in the mix. If we call and lose we we still have an M of 5-6 so won’t be too desperate but there is no way I will call in this situation as with the fold we still have a big stack to take itm (just under av stack) and the chips we could gain are less valuable than the chips we could lose.

If calling then no real difference between JJ and 10 10 as opp will have overs (higher pp or AK) but I guess there is one more straight with the 10s!

[Reply]

Cristiano

JJs is one of the toughest hand to play, for it is strong enougth not to be folded most of the time, and still not that strong a hand :p
This is not a hard situation to let them go, since one is probably ahead only if the Jack trips. With that in mind I ask what would people do with AK?

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Richard P

I would throw AK into the muck as can’t see opp 4 betting with queens in that spot.

[Reply]

Rhycar

I very narrowly voted fold in this spot, largely for the reason’s given by staff. That 4 bet just screams QQ or better. Maybe it’s AK, but I doubt it (I wouldn’t risk my tournament life on AK facing a 3-better). Though it sucks horribly, I think you have to fold here; it looks like you’re a 4-1 dog with 2.4-1 pot odds.

If I had tens, I think I wouldn’t wait as long to fold. If I had AK, I would probably call. It’s a coin flip against QQ, 2-1 dog against KK and 10-1 dog against AA. Since I would be holding AK, there are only 3 possible AA combos, 3 possible KK and 6 possible QQ. With my pot odds, I think a call here with AK would be justified.

[Reply]

_CityBorn_

I voted fold. Jacks are just not good enough given the action. Youre up against queens or better. Personally I had him on KK or AA. Hurts to throw away the chips, but be glad he did you the favor and let you know now before you saw all unders and got in serious trouble. He saw you reraise a raiser and caller with a guy all in….theres no way he’s putting you on a garbage hand, and as a solid player, hes not making reckless moves in dangerous spots. Hes got us beat, and he’ll have to show so we get to feel good about our laydown when we see it too. Love that.

[Reply]

superman

why not just flat pre and see the flop in position? As played fold it, raiser is showing extreme strength, his range is full of QQ+, he doesnt reshove with AQ imo and some players would throw away AK there so that is a posibbility but not a big one. def looks like QQ+ to me

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