Sunday, August 5, 2007

Tournament decision with the San Francisco treat in the BB

$5 buy-in mini-tourney. Blinds are 150/300 with starting stacks of 500. Six handed to start. Top three pay 15/10/5. Royal, (Krazy) Karl, and I are all in the money. Royal is short stacked and can't even call the BB with 250 in chips. Karl is chip leader with approximately half the chips. Royal is on the button and moves all in. Karl in SB moves all in over the top. I am in the BB and pick up 49os. Blinds elevate each orbit and are about to move to 200/400 where they cap.

What do you do...what DO you DO?

I assume I have live cards. I assume Royal has a random hand. I assume Karl has any Ace, any pair, any two cards Ten or better.

There are six possible hand strength orders:
R, K, M - I am out in third place since Karl has me covered, Royal triples up
R, M, K - Royal triples up, Karl is crippled and I am in good shape
K, R, M - Karl wins tourney, I take second, Royal takes third
K, M, R - Karl wins tourney, I take second, Royal takes third
M, K, R - I eliminate Royal and Karl is severely short stacked
M, R, K - I eliminate Royal and Karl is severely short stacked

I have roughly 25% of my stack invested already in the BB.

In the end, my head hurts, I get lazy and don't calculate the entire equation through and fold. Royal makes a K high Spade flush and I would have rivered a Nine to take the side pot from Karl who pushed with a random Ace.

Not that we are worried about results but I ended winning the tourney.

Let the discussion begin!

5 comments:

Austin said...

I've tried reading this post several times now and I still have no idea what's going on.

jsola said...

Do you remember what the stack sizes were at the start of the hand?

Your hand sucks sucks sucks but your M is like -5 here so I think you have to push and hope you knock Royal out.

Then again my tournament skills are rusty so don't quote me on that.

Ryan said...

I think "Ship it!" is going to be my response to most tournament questions...

Sushi Cowboy said...

Well, six handed T500 starting stacks, so 3000 in play. Royal has 250. Karl has approx 1500. That would mean I have 1250 with 300 of it in the blinds.

I didn't even calculate my M. Plus I was already in the money so the maximum delta of payouts would be two buy-ins ($10). If randomness reigned and each of the six outcomes are evenly likely (for the sake of calculations) then I have a one in six chance of going out in third place. I have a two in six chance of coming in second. The other three in six scenarios leave me as chip leader. If Karl has a monster hand then it is likely that I at least get second. In retrospect, I guess calling would have been the right thing to do. I did take some time to try to crunch the numbers but as I said, I got lazy and just folded.

Austin, if this is at all unclear to you, please stop by the next time we are having a tournament.

Marshall said...

To make the decision easier, put the stack sizes in the OP.

My advice: SHIBBIT.