Edit: Fixed title. This is SCOOP, not FTOPS. Was tired and tilted last night when posting this.
I was really looking forward to this event, as I’ve been working on my heads up game of late. I played both the $1500 and the $150 and had reasonable tough first round opponents in both. On the $150, I just a lot of small- and medium-pots to “mild cooler” spots where I had like the slightly worse hand or bluffed into the top of the guy’s range and what not. I ultimately lost the match, don’t even remember how.
Match 1
The $1500 was a really hard-fought match. I got off to an early lead, then lost a few big pots, the biggest with top pair vs a set and flopped top pair vs rivered higher pair. Villain was grinding me down pre-flop, raising, c-betting, and 3-betting well. Eventually I 4-bet shoved AJ on him pre-flop. He had AK, but I sucked out, and we were back to even.
We battled back and forth for a while, and eventually I made a big call to get into the lead. First, I’ll give you a prior hand that made me suspicious:
PokerStars No-Limit Hold’em, $1500+$75 Tournament, 25/50 Blinds (2 handed) – Poker-Stars Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com
Hero (Button) (t4600)
SB (t5400)
Hero’s M: 61.33
Preflop: Hero is Button with 6
, K
Hero bets t150, SB calls t100
Flop: (t300) 5, 8, J
(2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets t175, SB calls t175
Turn: (t650) 9 (2 players)
SB checks, Hero checks
River: (t650) K (2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets t425, SB raises to t1450, Hero folds
Total pot: t1500
Results:
SB didn’t show
Outcome: SB won t1500
In this spot, my hand is almost always either a bluff or a thin value bet, so it’s a good spot for a check-raise bluff. There are two problems with that: 1) It’s also a good spot to check-raise for value; and 2) many players just don’t check-raise bluff rivers very often, particularly not in tournaments where play tends toward the conservative. I folded, but I made a mental note, and eventually I made this call:
PokerStars No-Limit Hold’em, $1500+$75 Tournament, 30/60 Blinds (2 handed) – Poker-Stars Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com
Hero (Button) (t3770)
SB (t6230)
Hero’s M: 41.89
Preflop: Hero is Button with 10
, 9
Hero bets t155, SB calls t95
Flop: (t310) 6, 6, 8 (2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets t177, SB calls t177
Turn: (t664) 10 (2 players)
SB checks, Hero checks
River: (t664) Q (2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets t388, SB raises to t1425, Hero calls t1037
Total pot: t3514
Results:
Hero had 10, 9 (two pair, tens and sixes).
SB had 5, 5 (two pair, sixes and fives).
Outcome: Hero won t3514
He fought back up to about even, then we got it in with TT vs. AK. My TT held, and that was the match!
Match 2
This opponent was easier than my first but still somewhat competent. It helped that he seemed to be catching a lot of cards. He did make one or two questionable calls against me, but then he made up for it by slowplaying what I’m pretty sure was a flush and getting me to go for three streets of value with top pair only to get check-raised on the river. This one also ended in a coin flip in my favor.
Match 3
This guy was one of the worst heads up players I’ve ever seen. I have no idea how he won his first two matches, nor what he was doing in this tournament at all for that matter. He was just ridiculously tight and passive, letting me steal oodles of pots with min-bets and min-raises and never playing back at me. He did bluff occasionally, but always in obvious spots and never for more than one barrel. He used his position so poorly that I was calling a lot of raises out of position, which is obviously a bad plan in most any heads up match. There was never any doubt in mind that I would win this one, and after grinding him down to just 20% of his starting stack, I won a coin flip to eliminate him.
Match 4
I was lucky enough to draw another very weak opponent. He tried to make some moves, but tended to do so in a very predictable way, making it easy to catch him. Prior to this hand, for instance, he’d re-raise me pre-flop several times. Since he didn’t play back at me pre-flop, I was pretty sure he’d be itching to do so on such a dry flop:
PokerStars No-Limit Hold’em, $1500+$75 Tournament, 25/50 Blinds (2 handed) – Poker-Stars Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com
Hero (Button) (t6423)
SB (t3577)
Hero’s M: 85.64
Preflop: Hero is Button with 9, 5
Hero bets t100, SB calls t50
Flop: (t200) 4, 2, 2 (2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets t123, SB raises to t350, Hero calls t227
Turn: (t900) 4 (2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets t333, 1 fold
Total pot: t900
Results:
Hero didn’t show 9, 5 (nothing).
Outcome: Hero won t900
Unfortunately, before I could turn this guy’s aggression against him, he managed to cooler me twice, once with a set vs. my two pair to get himself back in the match, then with bottom two vs. my top pair and gut shot. In the latter case, I actually had nearly 50% equity, but I suppose I was due to lose a coin flip.
FTOPS? I thought it was SCOOP.
Dagger on not being able hold up against the last guy…the variance of heads up is ridiculous, as evidenced by that idiot you played in the third round being able to get past two other opponents.
In that first hand, do you think you’re missing a ton of value by checking down the river? Like enough to compensate for teh fact that you’re guaranteed to see his hand and gain a lot of information about him? You can probably use this information better than he can use information that he gets from seeing you check down a K on the end.
-bruechips