Situation: 2004 World Series of Poker Final Table

Stacks :

Greg Raymer 7,920,000
Josh Arieh 3,890,000
Matt Dean 3,435,000
David Williams 3,250,000
Glenn Hughes 2,375,000
Dan Harrington 2,320,000
Al Kruk 2,175,000

This often discussed hand from the 2004 WSOP main event final table involved eventual winner Greg Raymer, along with professionals Josh Arieh, David Williams, and former main event winner Dan Harrington.

Pre-Flop:

Arieh started the action by raising 220,000 with K9. Raymer called with A2. Harrington raised 1,200,000 from the button with 62. After the small blind folded, David Williams folded AQ in the big blind.

The Analysis

We’ll examine this hand from the perspective of each protagonist, so you can analyze and evaluate the decisions you’d be confronted with if you were in their shoes.

You’re Josh Arieh: Your reputation is that of an aggressive player, and you haven’t disappointed anyone yet. You and chip leader Greg Raymer have been the most aggressive competitors at the final table. You have 3.89 million, which puts you in second place, though certainly not by anything resembling a commanding margin. You’re way behind Raymer who has twice as many chips as you do, and your lead over the five players behind you is not really substantial. Matt Dean, in third place trails you by less than half a million chips, while Dan Harrington, who is next to last with a 2,320,000 chip count, trails you by 1.5 million. Any one of your opponents who is fortunate enough to double up – even Al Kruk, currently in last place – would vault over you into second place.

You raise 220,000, which is typical for you. After all, you’re not going to fold that hand so you make a prudent raise of slightly more than 5 percent of your stack that’s designed to drive marginal hands, particularly any weak ace, from calling. You’d like to win the pot right there, without a flop. But even if you have to play this pot heads up, your king may be good, and you will certainly make a continuation bet if a king falls, and will probably make a continuation bet if any ace or queen hits the board too.

There’s no sense in making a large raise here. You’re out of position, and you realize that if anyone else has a really big hand, he’ll simply re-raise and you’ll be forced to toss you hand away. Your small raise sends the same message as a larger one, with far less risk to your chips.

You’re Greg Raymer: You’re the tournament leader with slightly more than twice as many chips as Josh Arieh, who’s in second place. Both of you have been aggressive at the final table and that’s resulted in some obvious animosity between the two of you. You probably read Arieh’s 220,000 raise for just what it is: an attempt to win the pot right there, or play against one opponent.

You call for slightly less than three percent of your stack. With A2 you want to see a flop on the cheap and you’re hoping to make a big hand against a large field, where you can stack off at least one of your opponents. There’s no sense raising with this hand. If Arieh has a really big hand he’ll re-raise and you’ll simply have to fold – plus a larger raise won’t attract the large field you’re hoping for. You would have liked this situation even more if Arieh just called, allowing you to call behind him in hopes of attracting other callers too, allowing you to play your implied odds type hand for all the value you could milk out of it if you were to get lucky on the flop.

“Wouldn’t it be nice,” you’re probably hoping as you call, “if I can flop a monster and bust that smack-talking Arieh!”

You’re Dan Harrington: You’re next-to-last in chip count and realize you’ve got to start gathering chips if you hope to position yourself to win this tournament. You know your nickname “Action Dan” is a tongue-in-cheek, somewhat sarcastic reference to your reputation as a guy who plays only the highest quality hands. And your manner at the table supports this. You don’t engage in trash-talking, you are quiet, taciturn, and somewhat withdrawn. You are viewed as quiet, conservative, straight-forward, and cautious.

You don’t have any personal vendettas at the table, so no one will call you out of anger or spite, and you realize that each of your opponents respects your game, your reputation, and your style of play.

You know you need to start harvesting chips, and understand that your selective play has earned you a license to steal at least one pot and maybe more. When you raise, you realize that all of your opponents will credit you for a legitimately big hand, and if you are called or re-raised, you can be certain your opponent has a huge holding.

You put Arieh on a wide range of possible hands because he has been so aggressive, and you figure Raymer for exactly the kind of hand he has – one that’s worth a call because of it’s implied odds potential, but it’s probably not a big hand at all. It’s a hand Raymer can afford to play simply because his chip lead is so large. He can afford to play this kind of hand. Others can’t.

You raise half your stack. If you’ve read your opponents correctly and understand how they perceive you, it’s clear that without a pocket pair of kings or aces, they won’t be able to call. If you are re-raised and have to surrender the hand, you’ll drop from next-to-last into last place, and although that’s not desirable, it’s not all that much of a fall.

You’re David Williams: You’ve got AQ. That’s a pretty good hand, but you’re currently in the middle of a tightly-bunched pack of players who are all hovering around the 3 million mark. The last thing you want to do is go up against Action Dan Harrington, a guy who invariably has the goods when he raises, without the best of hands. And AQ is not the best of hands – not now, not here, not against Harrington’s presumed range of re-raising hands. Although you have Harrington out-chipped, he has enough left to put you in a world of hurt if you were to call and find yourself trapped by a subsequent all-in bet. If that scenario played out and you lost, you’d be down below the one million chip mark – firmly ensconced in last place.

If you’re Williams, you’re saying to yourself: “I hate to let AQ go. If it was just Raymer or just Arieh, I’d reraise without a moment’s hesitation. But it’s Harrington … Action Dan Harrington, and when he raises the range of hands he’s likely to play is pretty small. I’m guessing he has AA, KK, maybe QQ or AK, and all of them are way ahead of me. I’ll save my chips for a better situation.”

You flip your cards to the center of the table with a nearly imperceptible sigh.

You’re Josh Arieh (again): “Caught speeding,” you’re thinking. “I don’t know what Harrington has, but given the range of hands he raises with, there’s no chance my hand is good. Not only do I have to worry about Harrington, but Raymer called when I raised. He just limped in. He could have anything, from a drawing hand that he was hoping to play inexpensively, to a pocket pair of aces that he called with in order to lure me into a trap.”

You’re Greg Raymer (again): You’re thinking, “It’s down to Harrington and me. I have an ace, but knowing Dan, he’s probably ahead of me at this point. If he has an ace in his hand, I’m dominated to three outs. My chances of making a flush don’t justify the payoff when it’s heads-up. If Harrington has pocket kings, my only chance is to flop an ace and that’s a bad bargain too. Well, I limped in just to see if I could get a look at the flop inexpensively – and that’s not happening.

“I’ll just sit here, stare him down and talk to him, but I know Dan won’t give anything away. I can’t read him for anything other than a hand I can’t beat.

“Give him the money,” you say as you push your cards toward the dealer.

Summary:

The drama and the lessons of this hand are not in what happened. Actually, nothing much really happened. Arieh raised, Raymer called, Harrington re-raised, and everyone folded. Everything of importance took place between each player’s ears. All of the drama was mental, perceptual, and psychological.

Harrington needed chips. He realized it and so did everyone else. But Harrington had a license to steal. And his opponents probably realized that too. Nevertheless, even if you know Harrington will bluff at some point, you don’t know when he’ll pull the trigger. And with his reputation for tight and cautious play, Harrington used his license to steal to stealthily snatch those chips out from under the noses of everyone who was actively sniffing around this pot.

Everyone involved in this hand made correct decisions under the circumstances, but Action Dan was the most audacious and came away the winner by forcing a decision on his opponents that none of them could call. Harrington played completely against type to win a pot by re-raising with 62! I’m sure none of Harrington’s opponents realized until they watched replays of the final table on TV what well-executed larceny that was.

Related posts:

1. Dan Harrington Profile
2. Trust Your Reads

Situation: Head’s up at the Monte Carlo millions vs. Paul Jackson
Blinds: 12K/24K + 4K ante
Stacks: Phil has about a 4-1 chip lead.  Jackson has roughly $1 million in chips.

In this hand, we will play as if we are Phil Ivey. The big disclaimer here is that a hand like this does not come around very often. Analyzing it after the fact really doesn’t do it justice since it is based very heavily on Phil’s read on his opponent. But it is still a great example of putting your opponent on a hand, sensing weakness and trusting your instincts. It should also be noted that prior to this hand, Phil overheard Paul telling a friend that he was not going to let Phil push him around.

Pre-Flop:

Jackson limps in with 56, Ivey raises $60K more with Q8 and Jackson calls.

Analysis: Since this is head’s up play it’s a little harder to put each opponent on a hand without having been there to see the history between the players.  However, we can make some generalizations based on optimum head’s up strategy and what we know about our reads so far. As Ivey, we are raising about 3.5x the big blind.  Based on our 4-1 chip lead, we want to continue to put pressure on our opponent and since our opponent just limped in we could do this with a wide range of hands. Jackson calls after a brief pause so now we can assign his range to hands that weren’t strong enough to raise, but those he wanted to see a flop with. It is certainly possible that Jackson could be varying his betting pattenrs by limping with an Ace or some other big hand, but based on the chip counts it is more likely that he wanted to see the flop for cheap. Let’s put Jackson’s range as low-to-mid suited and unsuited connectors, one and two gapers 56-JT, Q2-Q8s, K2-K8 suited and off-suit (though he more than likely raises with a King). Based on hand strength and the need to build his stack, he probably raises all pairs Q9-QJ, K9-KQ and Ax.

The Flop:

The pot is now $176K. Phil makes a continuation bet of $80K and after contemplating for a while, Jackson raises to $170K. Ivey now re-raises to $320K and Jackson comes back over the top for $150K more. Ivey goes all-in and leaves Jackson no other choice but to fold.

Analysis: After Ivey’s continuation bet, Jackson is making a little over the minimum raise. On other flops this might be the sign of a strong hand because it’s deceiving, but in this case the board is showing a pair of Jacks making trips non-concealed. If he did have a Jack, he wouldn’t want Ivey to know it so he could maximize his winnings. He would he have more likely just called since he knows Ivey is capable of firing a second bullet on the turn. It’s certainly possible Jackson could have a Jack and is protecting against the flush draw, but if that was the case he would raise more so that Ivey didn’t have the odds to call. Also, there are only a couple of hands that would have not raised pre-flop and also called the raise pre-flop (J8, J9 and JT).

So what hands can we put him on? He could have a 7 and he’s trying to see where he’s at. Maybe he limped with a big pair like QQ-AA and he’s afraid of the Jack? He could also be on a pure bluff. But, you can’t completely discount the possibility of some 4th level thinking going on and him actually having a Jack and raising to make Ivey think he didn’t have one.

So after Jackson’s first raise to $170K, Ivey re-raises to $320K for two purposes: One is because he doesn’t believe Jackson and he wants him to fold and the other is to gain more information about the strength of Jackson’s hand.

Jackson now raises the minimum again, only $150K more. While the concept of Jackson raising back here is scary, the size of his raise actually makes it less believable that he has a Jack. Also, his raise size is curious. If he really had a Jack here, why is he raising the minimum now that Ivey is showing strength? He only has $530K behind before the raise. If he had a Jack, wouldn’t he just call the raise and hope Ivey puts him all in on the turn? OR, he should think at this point that Ivey has a hand that can call an all-in with and could shove all-in. So basically, he’s raising an amount that leaves him chips if Ivey should come back over the top. 

Let’s also look at physical tells. Ivey asks Jackson how much he has left. While he answers, he swallows big and keeps his hand over his mouth. He’s definitely nervous here. We’ve gotta remember also, Phil overheard Paul Jackson on the break say he wasn’t going to let Phil push him around. Not that this is a cut & dry hand, but once you factor everything together, Ivey makes a great read and comes to the logical conclusion that Jackson can’t call off his remaining chips without a Jack in his hand.

Related posts:

1. Phil Hellmuth – I Can Dodge Bullets Baby
2. WSOP November Nine 2009: Ivey vs Moon
3. Trust Your Reads

Situation: 3 handed at the WSOP Tournament of Champions final table
Blinds: 10k/20k + 3k antes
Stacks: Unknown, but no one seems too short

Let’s play this hand as if we are Mike Sexton. What reads do you have on the action for each street? What hand ranges do you start with for your opponents and how do those narrow down as the hand plays on?

Pre-Flop:

Matusow limps in on the button with K2, Negreanu completes the SB with 87 and Sexton checks his option with 73.

Hand Ranges: Since Matusow didn’t raise pre-flop, he is likely limping in with a hand that he wants to see a flop with but is too weak to raise with. While it’s possible he’s looking to trap with a monster, he also knows that Negreanu will complete the SB with a wide range of hands and he probably doesn’t want to play a big hand against 3 people. Based on this, we can most likely put Matusow on suited connectors, one/two gappers from 56+ and unsuited connectors 78+, as well as low suited Kx and possibly very small pairs (although he is still more likely to raise these).

Negreanu is likely to complete the small blind with almost any two cards, so if he had a big hand, he would have most likely raised here so as not to be three handed.

The Flop:

Everyone checks.

Hand Ranges: With both a straight and flush draw on the board, Matusow would have bet a pair on the flop 3 handed in position in order to not give a free card. Because of that, we can most likely eliminate Qx. Connectors with a 9 are possible, but since he has position and would likely have the best hand, he probably would have bet here to end the hand. Negreanu’s hand range is still wide open since he was first to act and may have checked to see what the others did before acting.

The Turn:

Negreanu checks, Sexton checks and Matusow bets 20K into a 42K pot. Negreanu folds and Sexton makes the call.

Hand Range: Matusow would have likely raised an Ace pre-flop. In addition, his bet is less than ½ the pot, so if he had an Ace he would probably bet more with all of the draws present. Also, Matusow is likely to position bet with any two cards here based on the weakness shown on the flop and turn thus far by the other two players. At this point, we can narrow his range to suited and unsuited connectors that missed, a heart draw and possibly a pair of 9s. A pair of 9s are still unlikely because he would be turning his hand into a bluff by betting here, although he could be betting for information to determine the strength of everyone’s hand.

The River:

Sexton checks, Matusow fires 60K into the pot and Sexton makes the call with bottom pair.

Hand Range: With 82K in the pot, Matusow bets about 75% of the pot on the river. What does this say about his hand? The Jack on the river should be a possible scare card, so Matusow probably thinks that Sexton will fold to a river bet. However, Sexton knows this and also knows that Matusow probably would have raised KT pre-flop. In addition, if this was a value bet he would bet less since Sexton hasn’t shown that he has a strong hand.

What about a pair of Jacks or pair of 9s? Matusow could hold a hand like JT, but with the Ace on board and Sexton’s turn call, he would have more than likely checked it down since his hand would have showdown value vs. other hands Sexton might call with.

Matusow knows the only way he can win the pot is to bluff and doesn’t think that Sexton can call a pot-sized bet with the hand range he puts him on. Sexton also knows this and is willing to take a shot that his read is right. The other benefit of calling here is the meta-game implications that send a message not to bluff him. This can prevent bluffs on future hands (since much of three handed play will be without made hands).

In conclusion, this was a great read and a great example of how sometimes you have to make a gutsy call on the river in order to win a big pot. This hand was also a pivotal moment that catapulted Sexton onto victory.

Related posts:

1. Mike Caro Profile

Situation: WSOP Main Event
Blinds: Unknown, but around 250/500
Stacks: Unknown, but no one seems too short

For this hand, we will play as if we are Phil Hellmuth. We don’t have the luxury of the reads that Phil has picked up at the table. However, in poker we can start with generalizations and stereotypes and then confirm or deny those as we observe players. In this hand, Phil is playing against an older gentleman. In general, older men tend to play very tight and sometimes tricky. When they enter a pot, especially raising or re-raising, they often have a very strong hand.

Pre-Flop:

Hellmuth makes it 1,500 from the 5th seat in middle position with AK and Frank Pasintino, who is in the cut-off position says in his best mafia tone “You make it 1,500? Make it 3,000”.

Hand Range: This hand is as much about reading betting patterns as it is physical tells. When a player is jovial and conversational, it is a usually sign of strength. When someone is bluffing, they often do not talk because they don’t want to sound nervous. In this case, Pasintino is calm and almost joking with Hellmuth. As far as betting patterns go, he is re-raising only the minimum. This can sometimes be the sign of an inexperienced player who is afraid to raise too much or a sign of a monster such as QQ, KK or AA (leaning mostly toward KK and AA). In this case we have an older gentleman who is a tight player re-raising a middle position player from the cut-off. It’s not likely Hellmuth is on a pure steal, so it this combined with his relaxed table talk is the sign of a big hand. However, Hellmuth is getting a great price on his money and can easily afford to make the call and decide what to do based on the flop.

The Flop:

Hellmuth checks in the dark before the flop. By doing this, he is controlling the size of the pot but also can disguise his hand and make a read purely of the actions of the other player. Pasintino now says “you check to me? I check too.”

Hand Range: Pasintio checking behind unfortunately doesn’t necessarily narrow his hand range too much. He may check behind with QQ and KK fearing that Hellmuth has an Ace and he may also check AA with the full house in hopes to trap Hellmuth. The fact that Hellmuth holds an Ace does mean that the Ace on the flop would be the case Ace and does make it less likely that Pasintino has the other two. The only other clue we have at this point it Pasintino’s continued relaxed and conversational tone.

The Turn:

Hellmuth checks. The pot contains approximately $7,000 and Pasintino casually throws out $10,000.

Hand Range: This is a bad card for Hellmuth. Two of the three hands he can put Pasintino on now have made a full house. On top of that, he now overbets the pot. If he had KK, would he really bet $10K here with the Ace on the board? Simply by process of elimination, he has to put Pasintino on either AA or QQ. What about a bluff? I guess anything is possible, but he would have to be bluffing a large percentage of the time to make a call profitable. Based on the factors previously mentioned, a bluff simply isn’t likely. In addition to the bet sizing, Pasintino continues to casually joke around. Betting this much into the pot would make almost anyone clam up with nerves if they were worried about their hand.

The Result:

Hellmuth proudly folds his AK face up and gets Pasintino to show his AA. While you certainly don’t want to play fearing monsters under the bed, sometimes you have to trust your instincts and make big laydowns to win tournaments. This is a great example of such a laydown.

Related posts:

1. Phil Ivey Reads Souls