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Strategic vs. Tactical/GTO Thinking
Note: you can also see a discussion of this hand in the Venues and Tours channel of the Rec Poker Discord server, starting on December 12, 2021. Some parts of this post are copied from that Discord conversation.
We are in the money but far from the final table bubble of a $1,100 buy-in multi-day tournament. 61 players remain. The blinds are 6K/12K/12K and the average stack is about 380K. Our stack is at 540K.
A player has just been seated to our immediate left and is still unracking his chips from his two or three chip racks.
We don’t have an exact count, but it’s about 123gobbazillion. Still, our stack is big enough to hurt him pretty badly. We don’t know who he is, but he fits the profile of a grinder in every way. Surely, he didn’t build this huge stack with passive play.
The action folds to us on the BTN. We look to our left to see if Mr. 123Gobbazillion (Villain) has cards and see that he does. We look down at KK and make the standard raise to 27K. Villain 3-bets us to 75K.
My plan at this point was to get stacks in. I knew he would be 3-betting light and bullying the table. I figured this would be the best chance I’ll ever get to see the final table. Not only would doubling up give me a stack that would likely send me deep, but it would also hurt him enough to tame this threat on my left. A 4-bet to 200K seemed like the best way to get stacks in. If he folds I make 100K. If he jams, mission accomplished. If he calls getting this good price, I’ll get the rest of my stack into the middle on any non-ace flop. If an ace flops, I’ll try to get to a cheap showdown. If I lose 200k, I’ll have a below average stack but still be in okay shape. So I was thinking strategically. I was willing to risk getting outflopped in a bloated pot to accomplish the two goals of getting a stack that could take me deep, and taming the threat on my left.
The flop came paired with X66. If memory serves, X was a ten. Also if memory serves, the flop was 2-tone. It didn’t matter at the time, because the plan was to get stacks in on any non-ace flop. Villian checked to the preflop aggressor as expected. We jam, per the plan and Villain calls and tables the 65clubs. The streets were no help and we went to the TD table to collect our 61st place prize money.
One option preflop would be to 4-bet jam. This might fold him out of alot of holdings he could call a smaller bet with. But it would help us avoid being outflopped by hands that would otherwise fold. In Michael Acevedo’s book, “Modern Poker Theory” it says that stacks 40bb or less don’t 4-bet anything but a jam. The effective stack in this spot was 45bb, so it was in the gray area of whether to 4-bet or jam. In a gray area we can tilt our decision on way or another based upon exploitative play and also strategic tournament considerations. Our decision to 4-bet to 200K was intended to exploit Villain’s presumably wide 3-betting range and also to take the calculated risk of being outflopped in hopes of greatly improving our chances of going deep in the tournament.
Range Trainer Pro shows that the unexploitable play was to call the preflop 3-bet with AA and KK. Presumably this is to balance our calling range and also because our holding wants action, not folds.
I have to confess I missed the calling option entirely in-game. Time for more study of my ranges vs. 3-bets. But again calling was the furthest thing from my mind. My thinking was that I needed to get stacks in with this KK holding. Even though I wasn’t aware of it at the time, this deviation from GTO strategy served the purpose if successful of greatly improving my chances of going deep into this tournament. I would be near or at the top of the leaderboard with 61 players left, and it would tame the threat on my immediate left. Also, this deviation from GTO strategy exploited what I felt would be an overly aggressive 3-betting range.
@misclickdonkey made a great point in the Discord discussion. He said that on the paired flop we’re hardly ever going to have our jam get called by any hand worse than our pocket kings.
One could say I was targeting QQ, JJ, and maybe ATs, but all those holdings might fold too. This was a flop, not a river. So it would actually be folding out Villain’s equity, and with this bloated pot that’s not terrible. KK is a huge equity favorite on just about any non-ace flop against a presumably wide range.
Did I take too much risk here? Does slow and steady win the race even in a spot like this one? The only thing that turned out as expected was that my read on Mr. 123Gobbazillion was confirmed by his tabling 65s in a 4-bet pot.
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4 Replies
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I would like to add that when you 4b here that qq and jj should just jam. JJ might just fold to a 4b not quite sure on that but qq im pretty sure is still just a jam. ATs should fold to the 4b.
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Also want to add that i think this would be a great one for review on the forums podcast
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I very much like a 4bet jam here. I’m doing this with some AK as well, so having KK in my range protects me when V starts to call with hands like TT. I know the charts will sometimes advocate for calls in these spots, but we have to remember those charts are designed for when we’re playing against a computer, or at least a computer-like player.
In this case, we’ve already identified this player as someone who “would be 3-betting light and bullying the table.” So we already know we’re outside of a GTO situation. But we’ve also identified this player as “a grinder in every way.” So while we think they’re 3-betting light, we also don’t think they’re just button clicking aggression. They have a reasonable 3bet light candidate. What are those types hands? They’re predominantly weaker Ax holdings (often suited), but also some suited connectors and smaller pocket pairs.
So if we’re correct in our assessment of this player, I really prefer a shove versus a small 4! Our focus seems to be on getting all the money in here, but why? I know we have a strong holding, but let’s capture a lot of value right now. We can be called by worse, especially with a player like this that reads this kind of shove as AK a lot and is in the mood to take a flip with TT or JJ. We ALSO fold out a lot of those weaker Ax holdings that still have 35% equity against us.
If I’m playing Stephen Chidwick or Michael Addamo here, I like the flat with KK, but against a standard aggro reg who is “bullying the table”, I very much like the shove. They can’t get cute with 5c6c or with Ac5c etc. now. Plus, we’re really only scared of one hand calling us. We’ve already captured a decent amount of value, and can maybe capture a lot more. Let’s take it down, and if we don’t, when we’re called we’re mostly in really good shape to double up.
I do understand the idea of 4! smaller, especially since we have position. And this is likely the more standard play. But this SPR here is really awkward. As you mentioned, you can’t really consider folding unless an A comes on the flop. I like a bigger 4! shove here. I may get cute with AA, but KK is too vulnerable against V’s presumed holdings and shoving here with KK protects me when I do the same thing with AK. I’d be curious to hear other thoughts though. It’s possible I’m looking at this wrong and losing value with such a strong holding.
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