Continued from Part One...
Participants:
1. Joe Roberts – Blue Belt Robert Joe is a product of the Grading and recently won a side event at UKIPT Nottingham.
2. David Docherty – An Omaha specialist from Scotland, David has cashed in both the WSOPE and Aussie Millions Main Events for a combined $56,166.
Part Two: David’s Hand
History: This hand comes from the 2009 World Series of Poker Europe Main Event, €10,000 buy-in. The blinds are 600/1,200(600) and David is in the big blind with an above average stack. David has been relatively quiet since moving upstairs to the feature table whilst Antoine – who has been at the table for 90 minutes – has been getting involved in pots and frequently raising from late position.
Seat 1: Jussi Nevanlinna - 31,100
Seat 2: Karl Mahrenholz - 29,800
Seat 3: Steve Zolotow - 192,100
Seat 4: Samuel Chartier - 22,900
Seat 5: Antoine Saout - 120,000
Seat 6: Jens Kyllönen - 143,300
Seat 7: Jason Mercier - 215,600 (btn)
Seat 8: Tobias Reinkemeier - 168,700
Seat 9: David Docherty - 147,900
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to David Docherty [ Jh 9h ]
Jussi Nevanlinna folds
Karl Mahrenholz folds
Steve Zolotow folds
Antoine Saout raises to [3,400]
Jens Kyllönen folds
Jason Mercier folds
Tobias Reinkemeier folds
David Docherty calls [2,200]
** Dealing Flop ** [ Ad, 7d, 9s ]
Pot: 9,200
David Docherty checks
Antoine Saout bets [6,100]
David Docherty calls [6,100]
** Dealing Turn ** [ Qh ]
Pot: 21,400
David Docherty checks
Antoine Saout bets 15,000
David Docherty calls [15,000]
** Dealing River ** [ Jd ]
Pot: 51,400
David Docherty bets [14,000]
Antoine Saout raises to [52,000]
David Docherty calls [38,000]
David’s Analysis:
Preflop: Although I think Antoine had only opened the hijack once, he clearly had a wide range, so I wasn’t going to fold a hand as playable post-flop as J-9s to a guy that had been raising a lot from late position. I assume he is opening several A-x, K-x, maybe even Q-x hands; any Broadway hands; any pairs, and lots of suited connectors and suited gappers. I didn’t see any reason to three-bet (and be four-bet back) given the flop connectivity potential my hand had, so I called.
Flop: Like preflop, this is played out fairly standard. Middle pair against Antoine on this board rates to be good a decent percentage of the time. There’s no reason to lead at this flop or do something silly like check-raise and inflate the pot out of position (or cause myself to be blown off what is likely the best hand at this point). With that in mind, I check-called Antoine’s continuation bet which I assume he is making with 100 percent of his opening range on this texture flop.
Turn: I think this is a very interesting street. While I thought that the Qh could hit Antoine’s hand reasonably often, I didn’t think he’d bet it if he hit. He can’t realistically expect me to check-fold an ace to another bet, so he’d always get called when he was behind. On the flipside, I thought that he might believe he could get me off a 9 if he continued to represent either an ace or a queen, but then why would he bet a queen in order to get me off a 9? That made no sense. That’s why I’m not sure I like Antoine’s bet here. It looks like he thinks I have an ace, but it also looks like he’s trying to represent an ace even though he has second pair, which still beats more than enough hands in my range to justify a check back.
In effect, he’s only supposed to have premium aces, sets and two pair combos at this stage for value. That’s a pretty tough range to believably represent when you’re a player as active as he’s been in unopened pots against a player as quiet as I’ve been. Of course, I could be completely wrong. Maybe he did put me on a 9 and was value-betting. It seems incredibly thin but I guess it’s at least possible in this tournament.
Either way, I didn’t believe his story. I thought he should check back with the vast majority of his hands that had some equity, including some flush draws, so I put him on either an already made monster or (much more likely) a complete air ball and splashed in the call, planning to reevaluate the river.
River: It’s always an action river card on TV! I have to admit that I was very fortunate to catch the Jd. I was very confident that I had the best hand on the turn, so if the river had bricked out, we’d have probably both checked and I’d have lost the hand. As it happened, I made two pair with a card that completed both flush and straight draws, which meant I had to have a real good think before I decided what to do.
There were 51,400 chips in the pot and although I had no intention of playing for stacks, I wanted to extract some extra value. I still thought I was ahead more often than not. My dilemma was that if my read had been wrong on the turn and Antoine had an ace, two pair or a set, he would probably check back if I checked the river again since he’d rarely get a value bet paid off by worse.
Similarly, he might not barrel his air ball hands again since my check-call of two streets and a check again on the river looks like I really just want to get to showdown, meaning I would probably check-call a fair percentage of bets. In essence, I thought he would probably only bet flushes and straights if I checked for a third time, so I deduced that checking was not an option.
But how much should I bet? I thought anything close to a normal value-bet size would be silly, since it would now look like I’d improved and wanted to get paid. It’s impossible for me to not have at least two pair if I bet 26 to 32,000 on this river, given how the hand played out. Just like checking, if I made a normal-sized bet, I figured I’d still only get action from better hands. I’d actually found an option worse than checking.
Then I considered making a nonstandard underbet of around 14,000 to 15,000. This would keep the action open, but now I’d be laying Antoine over 5/1 on a call and would put him in a really irritating spot with his air ball hands. Who would want to two barrel air and then just give up on the river to a 14,000 bet into 51,400? It had so many plus points. It looked like it could be an ace scared of the flush (which would fit my image as a random internet qualifier); it would prevent him from raising sets, better two pair hands and maybe even straights; and it would get some small value out of his A-x one pair hands.
But, best of all, I felt like it would polarise his entire raising range to bluffs and flushes, with it being heavily weighted towards bluffs in my opinion – 1. because I thought he should check back most of his flush draws on the turn and 2. because the Jd had taken many of the suited connector and suited gappers preflop raising hands which were in his range on the turn, out of his range on the river.
Joe’s Analysis:
Preflop: All three options are available to us here and all have their merits:
Call
We are faced with calling 2,200 into a pot of 7,000, so our immediate pot odds are slightly better than 3/1, which is certainly an attractive price. However, if we do elect to defend, it is important that we do so with a plan on how to play post-flop. Antoine is capable of opening here with a wide range, and if we flop a pair we can reasonably expect to be well ahead of that range. We can also expect Antoine to continuation bet most boards when checked to in position. If we call, I think it is nearly always with the intention of continuing only if we flop a pair or a decent draw, and check/folding if we miss.
Fold
There is nothing wrong with folding here. Although Antoine is an aggressive player and can be opening a wide range in late position, and we are getting a decent price on a call, we should also consider our positional disadvantage in the hand. At 100 big blinds deep, we can expect to be put in some tough spots post-flop even if we do flop a pair. If we are not going to be prepared to call down a decent amount of the time when we do flop a pair, then folding will be our best option.
Three-bet
We would need a very good read to three-bet here. Although Antoine opens from late position and can be relatively light here, we can expect him to defend fairly wide in position to a three-bet 100 big blinds deep. J-9 suited is definitely not a good hand to be three-betting with in this situation as we often end up playing an inflated pot out of position with an, at best, marginal holding.
Flop: Out of position we can either lead or check the flop. Leading is not the best option here. We have improved to one pair, and can expect Antoine to c-bet nearly 100 percent of his opening range on this board. Leading allows him the chance to fold some of his air, to raise bigger than he would have c-bet for value with better hands, and to make bigger bets as bluffs against us in position, as a lead will often be perceived as weak.
If we check, we expect Antoine to bet a significant percentage of the time, whether he has hit the flop or not. Checking and folding to a bet is a very weak line. If we check-fold this flop after flopping a pair, we should definitely be saving chips and folding preflop to the open raise. Check-raising effectively turns our hand into a bluff, allowing Antoine to fold any worse hands and continue with better ones.
Checking and calling his c-bet is our best option for a very important reason: if we raise and Antoine calls, there are little to no value hands that he will continue to bet with that we beat, and he will fold all of his air. However, if we flat call, we get to play against Antoine’s value range and his bluffing/air range; this will allow us to be more confident in calling bets on later streets, as we have kept in all the trash hands in Antoine’s range by just calling the flop.
Turn: The turn comes an overcard to our pair, which is obviously far from ideal. The only real value in betting is in extracting value from draws. However, these hands are not making a mistake against us if they do call in position, so there is little reason to lead this turn. We’d also rather keep the pot small with our marginal hand.
We check and Antoine bets. Check raising turns our hand into a bluff, which doesn’t seem like a fantastic option given that we’re out of position and do still have some showdown value. If we check-raise, we represent a very polarized range, but will still struggle to fold out many hands that beat us. We cannot chec- raise for value here, as we will not be called by worse.
Given that we’re getting better than 2/1 against an aggressive player, a call is reasonable. Our line thus far does not look particularly strong, and an aggressive player will often continue to barrel us here with total air to make us fold. However, we must also expect to be put in some tough spots on the river if we do make the call.
River: The river is obviously a great card for us, as we now beat all the one pair hands in Antoine’s turn calling range (aside from A-J and Q-J). If we had not improved on this river, we would be in a tough spot playing out of position with third pair, and would likely be check-calling or check-folding to a bet depending on reads. In this scenario, however, we are now ahead of a significant amount of Antoine’s range, and our thoughts focus instead on how to extract the greatest amount of value from worse hands.
The standard line here is probably to bet about half the size of the pot and hope Antoine calls with an ace or maybe a queen. The drawback of this line is that Antoine also has a lot of air in his range, which he will correctly fold if we lead for half of the pot.
David elects to lead for a third of the pot on the river, which is certainly a creative line. Antoine will still at least call with a lot of his one pair hands. However, this bet also gives Antoine the opportunity to make a much cheaper bluff raise with his air hands than if we make a larger value bet. If we bet 25,000 on the river, he might feel he has to raise the whole of his stack to make an effective bluff. However, facing a 14k bet, he can bluff while still keeping a decent amount of chips in his stack that he will not be practically down to the felt if it goes wrong.
The 14,000 bet will also often be perceived (incorrectly) as being much weaker than a half pot bet, which will lead Antoine to bluff with a far greater frequency than if we bet a larger amount. In a live game, where egos are often drawn into the game, many aggressive players would feel embarrassed to fold to such a small bet on the river. As Antoine cannot flat-call with hands with no showdown value, he will now feel compelled to raise if he allows his ego to influence his play. For these reasons, a small bet like this is called an ‘inducer’, as it causes our opponent to raise with a wide variety of holdings. We sacrifice a small amount of value we lose from hands with showdown value that will just flat our river bet in order to gain value from total trash hands which, having no showdown value, are forced subsequently to raise the river as a bluff.
The Reveal:
The hand is available to watch on YouTube by clicking here and forward winding to 3:22.
** Dealing River ** [ Jd ]
Pot: 51,400
David Docherty bets [14,000]
Antoine Saout raises to [52,000]
David Docherty calls [38,000]
Antoine Saout mucks [ Qd 8h ]
David Docherty wins the pot [151,800]
David: I made the 14,000 bet and Antoine reached for a chunk of 5,000 chips and splashed them into the pot. I really wish I’d snap-called because that had been my intention when I made my bet, but he’d raised slightly more than I expected him to and I knew, at this stage, that the hand was highly likely to make the highlights cut, so I wanted to be 100 percent sure on my decision and took a little extra time before making the call to ensure that I didn’t look like an idiot in my first televised hand of poker. Antoine mucked immediately, which made me even more shocked when I saw he had a queen after the episode aired
Joe: Having made this inducer bet, we are, of course compelled to call Antoine’s raise. I don’t blame David for making the most of his TV time, though!
The fact that Antoine has turned a hand with showdown value (second pair) into a bluff shows how effective inducer bets can be when employed correctly.
Also see previous 'Hand Exchanges':
Neil Blatchly & Steve Holden
Richard Hawes & David Bland
Sida Yuen & Jon Lundy
Mike Shaw & Joe Roberts
Gavin Hall & Richard Hinds
Robert Jarrett-Smith & Simon Mairs