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#266 – BBoC Bust-Outs – Down the Toilet with Kings and Queens
The Bad Beat on Cancer tournament on Tuesday evening was a big success. 295 players entered a $5 tournament with a $5 rake. That’s almost $1,500 for cancer research, education, and prevention, and several players who lasted to the end were asking about how to donate part of their winnings. (www.preventcancer.org is the foundation Furst and Gordon have allied their charitable efforts with, and they take credit card donations online.)
Apparently, Rafe, Phil, and I have taken some heat for all busting on the first hand. I guess the implication is that we “lured” everyone into the tournament with the promise they’d get to play with us – granted, Phil and Rafe are slightly bigger draws than me, plus I play about 13 hours a day – and then we purposely got ourselves eliminated right away.
False. Here are our three sad stories, the saddest being mine.
Phil – This is from an e-mail Phil wrote to Rafe and Rafe forwarded to me:
“I raised with KQ, got 2 callers, the flop came AJ9 and I bet 220. Someone check-raised me all-in and when I looked down, I realized that I accidentally had bet 2220. It was 400 more to call, I had a 16% chance to win, and with 5600 in the pot, there wasn’t much chance of me folding.”
That’s a pretty big goof by Phil Gordon, but it was a goof, not an attempt to put himself out of the tournament. I don’t think Phil would do something like that but even if he did, he wouldn’t be foolish about it. He has way too much pride.
Rafe – An e-mail from Furst:
“Arggh. I had QQ first hand, raised pot, someone behind me reraised, a third person flat called. I pushed trying to squeeze the middle guy, and assuming the third guy had to be weak. Middle guy folded, third guy calls and flips over KK. He played it wacky and I got wacked.”
My story, which led to my busting 295th out of 295, starts with KK, second to act. I raised the 30 big blind to 90 and everyone folds to the big blind, who calls. The flop is
4h-5d-Qd
The big blind, quigs79 checked to me and I bet 150. He raised it to 695. I moved all-in and he insta-called. He had 4c-5c for two pair, and they held up.
If this was a World Series event, I probably wouldn’t have gone broke with an overpair on the first hand, but I’m not unhappy with the play in an online tournament. The number of hands where he was drawing or beaten, especially considering the way people generally play online. (It was the first hand so I had no knowledge of how quigs79 plays.)
Here’s what beats me: 5-4, 4-4, 5-5, Q-4, Q-5, Q-Q, A-A. There are 72 combinations out of the 1,326 where he has those, about 6% of his hands, though Q-4 and Q-5 are pretty unlikely and 5-4 is a more likely fold unless he’s suited (and he was suited). So it’s really 4% of the time he’s going to play this way with a hand that beats me.
Here’s what he could have that doesn’t beat me: 2-3, 2-6, 2-2, 3-3, 6-6, 7-7, 8-8, 9-9, T-T, J-J, A-K, K-K [for the split], 6-7, 7-8, any two diamonds, and Q-X. I’m racing through the math so I could be in error about some of these but it’s not even close. Some of these are pretty unlikely – I’m not sure if he’d call a raise with 2-3 or 2-6, even if they were suited, and two diamonds like 9d-3d are probably folding hands in the BB. But out of 110 combinations of the 11 remaining suited cards, 30-40 would be presumed callable. I get people pushing all the time on me with a pocket-second pair or two overs. Likewise, maybe he won’t go crazy or necessarily even call preflop with Q-3 or Q-6, but he’s pretty likely to be all the way in with A-Q, K-Q, and maybe Q-J or Q-T.
Even if my math’s not perfect, that’s a lot more hands than aces, a set, or two pair. I had a guy in a tournament a couple weeks ago bluff a flop like that with J-3 and call all-in. So I’m not throwing away K-K online on the first hand.
Even though quigs79 played it just right, he apologized for taking me out with 4-5. He also insisted on donated the cash equivalent of the pizza-bounty and the $50 Rafe put up for busting me to PreventCancer.org. He made the final table and I think donated a portion of his winnings as well. I almost feel GOOD about busting to 4-5.
