POTD #75 FT Friday Bet-Raise-Reraise-Reraise
Pictured: The Man who invented the term Click it Back
Triton Cyprus 2023 was the final stop of Season 2, and I was in the hunt for Player of the Year. Stephen Chidwick entered the stop with a commanding lead, but I and some others had an outside chance to catch him. I was one of the chipleaders with 5 left in the opening tournament, the GGMillion$, but I could not close it out and came in fifth place. In the meantime, Jason Koon did close out some tournaments, winning a $20k NLHE and coming second in a $25k PLO; like Stephen and myself, he had final tabled the NLHE Main Event, also putting him within striking distance of first place. I entered the final table as a big stack, and Jason and Stephen were two of the short stacks; with a fortunate FT, I could overtake the lead if I won and if Stevie and Jason exited early. I doubled up early when Viacheslav Bulydgin bluffed into my full house, then Stevie was knocked out by Jason, but my POY dreams were dashed, as Jason proceeded to steamroll through the final table before beating me heads up in one hand.
The final table is likely best remembered for this spat, which for better or worse was one of the most unforgettable hands played in the history of Triton Poker, but there’s another hand from this FT that loosely reminds me of another legendary poker hand: the click back war between Phil Ivey and Paul Jackson1. In POTD #70, I tried to play the role of Phil Ivey to Henrik Hecklen’s Paul Jackson, but unfortunately, Hecklen had the goods. Was this the right move at the wrong time, or the wrong move at the wrong time? Let’s look at a final table click-back war and you can judge for yourself.
Triton Poker Series Cyprus 2023 - Event #11 $100,000 NLH - Main Event - Final Table
8 Handed FT (75k/150k/150k) (SB/BB/BBA)
It folds to me in the HJ and I raise J♠️8♠️ t325k it folds to Henrik Hecklen (2.5m) who defends the BB
Flop (875k) T♠️T♥️2♣️: Hecklen checks, I bet 200k, he raises 525k, I make it 875k, he makes it 1.2M, I fold.
What I Was Thinking
I knew for chips, TT2 rainbow was a pure c-bet from me, and the BB played raise or fold with all their continues. The board is so dry, and OOP has very few hands that would want to check/call, especially under ICM pressure, where the BB will fold a lot of 2x preflop and will be even more aggressive with ace high preflop. So while I was not sure if Henrik would play any check/calls on the flop, I knew his continuing range would be very aggressive. Once I got check-raised, I knew I needed to continue a lot and could not fold any hand with backdoor flush and straight draws. I also thought that for cEV, Hecklen is supposed to fight back quite a bit vs my flop three-bets, but I was not sure if he’d have the same fight as a short stack at a final table.
I rolled an aggressive number. and I thought that if Hecklen was indeed playing raise or fold versus my c-bet, he would still need to make some pretty light floats vs. my flop three-bet to prevent my bluffs from winning a lot. I thought at a final table, he might just fold some pure continues with hands like A9 with a backdoor flush draw, so I went for a reraise. Once he four-bet, I figured at such a high stakes FT, it was unlikely he was running a four-bet bluff on the flop, soI pitched it.
What I Got Wrong
I do pure c-bet on the flop, and Hecklen pure raises all his continues. My hand mixes a tiny amount of flop three-bet, but I got a theoretical concept wrong in the construction of my flop three-betting range. If Hecklen is not playing calls on the flop, that means his flop check-raising range is linear. I am not facing a split range of the top and bottom of his continuing range when he raises; I am facing his entire continuing range. When you are facing a linear range, your response is usually be more linear with your aggression, which means a lot more of my three-bets are hands like AKo or KQ with a backdoor, hands which are ahead of hands like A9 with a backdoor or QJo which the BB will check-raise and call a small three-bet with. If I don’t think Hecklen is playing this node as loosely as the computer, it probably makes sense to be more polar in my three-bet bluffing range, but I should still have some stronger unpaired hands in my three-betting range. If I can three bet J8s and fold out QJo, it becomes a much more appealing class of hand to three-bet– yes, the board is TT2r and I am talking about QJo as if not putting 7bbs in the pot on the flop is a crazy deviation. Paired-board computer poker can get bonkers.
The other thing I got wrong is, once Hecklen clicks it back, I continue 76% of my range, including J8 with a backdoor pure. My primary three-bet/folds are A7o and worse, Q9o, K7/K6, and Q6-Q4 with a backdoor. I am not sure if Hecklen is bluffing often enough that I’d want to continue 76% vs. his flop four-bet, and it’s likely that folding most of my marginal continues is the way to go. However, it’s unclear if J8s is a marginal continue. I am likely missing the flop aggression with my most common three-bet/folds … I really doubt I’m three-betting Q6s on the flop here. However, all things considered, J8s is quite a high-EV continue for me. It’s not as good a float as the hands that can have eight outs to turn an open ender, like 98s with a backdoor flush draw, but it’s much better than random high-card hands like KQo. Given Hecklen did have KT, I’m fine with my fold and with concluding he’s not playing as wild as the computer; however, that I didn’t even think about floating or playing back reflects a problem in my thought process
Grade
My flop three-bet range construction was off; I should have picked hands that had a little more high-card equity to fight back against getting refloated, and I should have given a lot more thought to peeling against his four-bet. They’re two very minor mistakes; however, if I’m going to be results-oriented and reward myself for folding to a four-bet from trips, I can also be results-oriented and give myself a little demerit for bluffing into trips in the first place.
B-
Love this daily posts🤩 replaced reading news for breakfast, which is very good for my mindset and also poker knowledge🤝🤝