Five Handed All-in

[Morfulus 0]

This weekend I played in a 1-table tournament with some friends of mine. Not all of them play as much as me, so I have made some good money. We started out 8 players with 1500 chips each. After many ours of play the blinds get 100/200 with no antes, so the starting pot is 300, with five players left the table looks like this:Player A: 3100 chips - Have made $400 in online cashgame from money he won in a freeroll, he playes very tightPlayer B: 1800 chips - I would say he is a callingstation, he is stuck a lot in our homegamesPlayer C: 3200 chips - A good aggresive playerSB: 800 chips - Me, just looking for a double upBB: 3100 chips - a lose aggrresive player, makes a lot of moves, and a lot of bad moves.Player A picks up A7 offsuit, and moves all-in, it's folded around to the BB who calls with AT offsuit and doubles up to 6300 to eliminate Player A.We have talked a lot about this hand, player A says his move is "standard" with 15BB. But e got a very tiht image, and I don't think even the lose BB would have called with a hand like A6 or worse. He could raise to 600, or 800, and not get called unless someone had a better hand, and then he could have folded without risking the whole tournament.It is a risky play, he got a marginal had, under the gun, no idea what the other players got, and he got four players to act behind him. But then again he defends the play, what do you guys think?

[TrueAce13 18]

He is right in this situation....If he is "known" as a very tight player, everyone is giong to be folding out marginal hands and he will be able to pick up the pot. If he makes a standard raise, he leaves himself with an awkward stack if he misses. And, if you say that the BB is a bad player, there are many times bad players will call of KQ, KJ, KT, QJ, etc.I like the move, I wish I would be able to stop nitting it up late in tournys

[bigbluffzinc 0]

It's not what I would call a horrible move but it's probably not very good unless you're friends are garbage... He should know with those stacks hes getting looked up by better aces and most pairs but raise folding is something most players don't like either so its mildly debatable from a later position, utg i think its bad. Is it winner take all or what because the pay out structure is important with you and player B on such short stacks.

[Morfulus 0]

oh, I forgot, in this tournament the buy-in was 200, the winner got 1200, and second place 400.. I know it's not the best structure, but that's what we agreed on.

[bigbluffzinc 0]

If second place gets paid the move is garbage and he can pick a better spot.

[TrueAce13 18]

If second place gets paid the move is garbage and he can pick a better spot.

He can pick a better spot if he wants to just cash, we looking to build a stack and put ourselves in a position to win and with the image of hero in this spot being a very tight player, he will get folds more often that calls

[offset 0]

it's a horrible move, unequivocally. People on this board don't know what they're talking about.

[TrueAce13 18]

it's a horrible move, unequivocally. People on this board don't know what they're talking about.

Please justify your answer with why...not just "its a horrible move". Give some explaination

[JSpencer 0]

Player A = Tight Player with A 6 offBB = Loose Player A 10 offIn this situation, I don't know if I would have shoved pre flop, especially with so many aggressive players at the table. I mean, it's not a horrible call, but I think a decent sized raised would have achieved the same desired effect without said risk.I'm not sure what the flop was, but had he raised something like 1250-1500 pre flop and the BB called, the flop comes out (hypothetically) 8s Ks Jc, he can either try another raise hoping to get the BB to fold which would be much more effective in this situation since he didn't hit anything and Player A raised pre flop and is known to be tight. Or he can check it down, see what the BB does, and go from there.Seems like the shove is a unnecessary risk.

[Morfulus 0]

I don't remember the flop, but on the river he won with ace, ten high, no pair for either player. So in this case he would have won if he bet on the flop, but if an ace came he would have lost all his money either way (unless he folds). I hope some of you that just says it's garbage, can say why you think so. Myself I would naver done it, I think it's a bad play.

[SwolyswoND 1]

It's bad because there are 4 players left to act, and you don't even beat half the Aces that might call. The ones that you do beat you sometimes are chopping with anyway (A7 vs. A2 is not your typical domination scenario b/c you chop a decent % of the time). Your equity if you get looked up is terrible, so you are basically hoping to take it down PF. With two shortys who need a double up and will call off lighter, this isn't as likely, not to mention the loose player in BB. Also, yes 2nd getting paid makes a difference, in single table tournies you play to cash first, and only then you play to win. This is an EZ fold IMO.

[JSpencer 0]

It's bad because there are 4 players left to act, and you don't even beat half the Aces that might call. The ones that you do beat you sometimes are chopping with anyway (A7 vs. A2 is not your typical domination scenario b/c you chop a decent % of the time). Your equity if you get looked up is terrible, so you are basically hoping to take it down PF. With two shortys who need a double up and will call off lighter, this isn't as likely, not to mention the loose player in BB. Also, yes 2nd getting paid makes a difference, in single table tournies you play to cash first, and only then you play to win. This is an EZ fold IMO.

Also a very valid point.

[melaskins 0]

From my limited knowledge, here is what I see. This is a worst case scenario to be shoving. Why push against an equal sized big stack in the bb that you know is a loose player?

[donk4life 34]

If it's a 1 table tournament, or in other words, an SnG, your goal is too cash.

[Yahkin 0]

Is BB loose, or just bad?If you are BB and you have a tight player that's just shoved from UTG, can you really believe your AT is good?

[JSpencer 0]

Is BB loose, or just bad?If you are BB and you have a tight player that's just shoved from UTG, can you really believe your AT is good?

Well yea...but the worse play was shoving all in when there are 4 players left to act, and 2 of them are known to be very lose. If anyone calls you, more then likely you will be screwed.

[Yahkin 0]

Well yea...but the worse play was shoving all in when there are 4 players left to act, and 2 of them are known to be very lose. If anyone calls you, more then likely you will be screwed.

I'm not a fan of racing in this spot, but having a couple loose players calling you light is not necessarily a bad thing. Perhaps that's his thinking. I've got an ace and these idiots will call me with any K, so I'm in the lead.

[JSpencer 0]

I'm not a fan of racing in this spot, but having a couple loose players calling you light is not necessarily a bad thing. Perhaps that's his thinking. I've got an ace and these idiots will call me with any K, so I'm in the lead.

Well yea, I still think its an unnecessary risk. A big raise would have accomplished the same thing and you would still be in the lead and in position to raise post flop. Also, if by chance one of the tighter players calls pre, and nothing helps you on the flop, you can probably safely assume that you are behind.

[Morfulus 0]

Is BB loose, or just bad?If you are BB and you have a tight player that's just shoved from UTG, can you really believe your AT is good?

He is a loose and a bad player (nice combination ). a player that went out earlyer in the tournament folded QQ preflop against the same tight player, and he showed KK, that is how tight he is early in the tournament, so I woulden't call in the same spot myself, you can't really believe AT is good. But the BB is a bad player, everyone knows that.But I agree with the most of you, no great play from neither player here, maybe that's why I make so easy money in this tournaments

[kkot 0]

If it's a 1 table tournament, or in other words, an SnG, your goal is too cash.

Our goal is to make +EV decisions. Sometimes this means risking going out on/near the bubble.Also this isn't a standard 50/30/20 payout structure, so we'll have to deviate from standard STT play. With the payouts at 75/25 we'll have to make more attempts to accumulate chips because the value of each chip won't decrease as much.

He is right in this situation....If he is "known" as a very tight player, everyone is giong to be folding out marginal hands and he will be able to pick up the pot. If he makes a standard raise, he leaves himself with an awkward stack if he misses. And, if you say that the BB is a bad player, there are many times bad players will call of KQ, KJ, KT, QJ, etc.I like the move, I wish I would be able to stop nitting it up late in tournys

I pretty much agree with this. Our stack is really awkward here. Raise/folding kind of sucks and our hand is hard to play postflop. Folding here sucks too.I like the push, especially if the table views him as tight and will adjust their ranges at all. A really small raise to 425-475 planning to fold to a 3bet from Player C or BB is definitely another option. We would have to call it off if Player B or SB shoves though.

Well yea, I still think its an unnecessary risk. A big raise would have accomplished the same thing and you would still be in the lead and in position to raise post flop. Also, if by chance one of the tighter players calls pre, and nothing helps you on the flop, you can probably safely assume that you are behind.

A big raise is pretty bad unless we plan on calling it off or getting it in on any flop.

[kkot 0]

I ran it through SNGWiz, and it looks like it is a little bit loose to be pushing here. Playing around with the ranges it looks like A9s+ should be about as wide as we're shoving here, but depending on how tight or loose they are calling that could change quite a bit.

[Morfulus 0]

In Dan Harrington's second book "Harrington on Hold'em" Expert Strategy for No-limit Tournaments he shows a way to calculate the expected value of a move.Even if I set the BB to a really loose player, calling with KQ, KJ, QJ, the expected value of the move is still 2900 chips..that means that if you did the same move a 1000 times, you would end up with 2900 in average result.If you set the BB to just beeing a loose player, not a maniac, you get a expected value of 2800 chips.If you in average loose 200-300 chips every time you do this, it is really a bad move!!

[Dhall901 0]

With and M of 10 player A should be thinking about making a move, but not with A7o. The pot is 300 and altho it's five-handed I'm not pushing with this hand. Knowing that the BB is LAG and will call with most holding, I'm looking for a better hand here. Especially if only the top two get paid and one player is nursing a small stack. Why get involved with the one player that can break you with such a marginal hand?

[BeaverStyle 1]

I wouldn't push pre-flop here as UTG w/ A7o... and I certainly wouldn't call if I was the BB w/ A10o.