POTD #78 Ben86 vs Jakoon85: The Most Talked about Hand in Triton Montenegro

At least the most talked about in my group chats

Since I’ve started writing this Substack, I’ve been forced to consume a lot more poker content than I am used to. I want to see what people are talking about and what my competition is posting about. One thing I find interesting is the disconnect between what hands go viral outside of the poker world, what hands go viral within the poker world, and what hands go viral in high roller circles. Hands that break containment outside the poker world are few and far between; we are talking about hands like the Robbi Jade Lew vs Garret Adelstein J4 hand.

No hands like that were played during Triton Montenegro. A hand that went viral within the poker community was Kristen Foxen’s big fold, which I covered in POTD #42. However, the hand that I spent the most time discussing among my peers was Ben Tollerene, second in chips, three-bet shoving AA on 952 rainbow over chip leader Jason Koon’s check-raise.

There are several reasons why this hand went viral in my group chats but not in the larger poker community. The obvious one is that Jason folded and the pot wasn’t that big. I know that even in 2025, there is no better way for a poker hand to go viral than for aces to get cracked. The other reason is, in the class of punts that can go viral-- hero call gone wrong, hopeless bluff, the worst fold of the century-- you will rarely see a hand where a player who has a great hand plays it too fast.¹

So why was this hand the topic of conversation for a couple of days? Well, it looked like Ben Tollerene one of the best NLHE and PLO tournament players in the world made a very costly mistake. One that would usually not cost him much, but if he was wrong, it would cost him a lot. Which brings us to the final reason this hand didn’t generate much online chatter, poker players care about hands that lose a lot of EV, the poker audience tends to care about hands that lose a lot of money. Did Ben lose a lot of EV? Read on to find out

Triton Montenegro 2025 Event #12 150k NLHE
(50k/125k/125k) (SB/BB/BBA). We are 6 handed at the FT

HH: Triton App

Ben Tollerence (5.45M) has A♦️A♣️ and raises to 250k UTG6, Matthias Eibinger (3.5M) folds, Phil Ivey (540k) folds, Eelise Parssinen (1.1M) folds, Jason Koon (9.25M) calls K♣️4♣️ from the SB, Wayne Heung (1.5M) folds in the BB.

Flop (750k) 9♣️5♥️2♠️: Jason checks, Ben bet 220k, Jason makes it 800k, Ben shoves 5.2M, Jason folds.