WCOOP Event 9: $215 NLHE 4-Max

This was an interesting tournament format, with only four players per table. My starting table actually had only three, and the other two were of course terrible. I doubled up fairly early on when a guy called my raise with 73s, flopped trip 7’s, then shoved the river after I turned a boat with 99 and made two big bets. Of course a bit of a cooler for him but he made two terrible decisions as well.

So I was actually playing heads up for a bit against this giant calling station. It took some adaptation, since Stars didn’t made the SB the Button as is customary for a HU match. Against this particular opponent, I found it best to call most raises when I was in the BB/BTN, raise most of his limps, and limp most of my range from the SB.

As usual, I didn’t adapt as well as I should have to playing with really loose opponents. I’m accustomed to playing a very aggressive short-handed game, as that’s the winning strategy in mid- and high-stakes cash games. But it doesn’t work as well against tournament monkeys, and I was back down to my starting chips after a few failed double barrels. For a while I kept my head above water short stacking, shoving when appropriate, etc.

This brings up one point I want to address. When blinds were 100/200, I was in the BB with about 2500. There were no antes. The SB, who was a decent player I’ve seen around Stars tournaments for several years, open raised to 800 with QJo and called my shove. This may seem minor, but there’s just no reason to raise to 800 here. I do sometimes vary my pre-flop raise sizes, but this is an awful spot for it. When we are this shallow, you are only revealing information about your hand. My opponent is telling me that he has a hand he’s willing to take all in but that isn’t so strong that he wants me to shove. He raises to 800 to tell me that he’s committed to the pot. Well, if you’re going to do that, just shove yourself. Or limp-jam, or raise a smaller amount where you can fold to a shove, or do something that allows you to keep your range a little wider.

Believe it or not, this information helps me to make marginal decisions. I’m more likely to shove stuff like Kx, since I know my opponent doesn’t have too strong a hand, and less likely to shove hands worse than QJ since I know I have no fold equity.

This isn’t sour grapes- I shoved with A7 and doubled up. But it’s a point I consider worth making.

I eventually limped 87s in the SB, flopped overs, a gutshot, and a flush draw, and lost to middle pair with a better flush draw. It was a shame, because the 4-max was a good format for the WCOOP and I felt that at my best I would have a pretty big edge.