Some hands from my recent HPT deep run

[Brad Jensen]

By request, here are some of the more interesting hands that came about during my deep run this past weekend. For those that didn’t see the FB posts, I finished 12th in the HPT Main Event in Reno this past weekend in a field of 155 players.

Key Hand #1:

I am in the BB with 37K at 75/150. Villian is in MP with about 45K. Villian has been fairly solid but has a couple of betting tells. He also showed up with a surprising 85s from EP in a hand where he won a very big pot so I know his range can be wide. It folds to him and makes it 400. It folds to me in the BB and I have 33. I call. The flop is K37 rainbow. With 875 in the pot I check and he bets a curious 200. This signals to me that he has a made hand, like KK, AA, AK, and doesn’t want to shake me loose. Against some opponents I’d check / raise here but I elect to call and hide my hand strength. The turn is another 3. It puts two diamonds on board as well. I check and now with 1275 in the pot he again makes it 200. I am now certain he loves his hand and think its very likely only one of four hands: AA, KK, AK diamonds, or 77. I’ve obviously hit the jack pot against half that range. I elect to just call again. Normally this would always be some kind of raise to build the pot but I actually think I can get all the chips in, even this deep, with this line against this opponent and likely range. 4 of diamonds on the river. Great card. I can represent a flush now (truth be told I completely missed 56 diamonds as a possibility for him and might have driven off a cliff if he turned that over). with 1675 in the pot I now elect to lead for 1475. I figure his entire likely range has to at least call this amount and if he is as strong as I think, this is where I set the stage for a 500BB pot. He immediately makes it 3000. I have him and I know it. I now have to make it large enough that he will feel I have to call shove. I make it 9575. He immediately shoves and I snap. He has KK. To his credit both as a player and person, he takes it in stride. I did double him up later but he eventually busted. He even came over late in day 2 to check on me and wished me luck. This hand was by far the most important I played in the tournament. I can’t ever recall having 500 BB before in front of me in a tournament. Pretty cool.

The rest of the hands I would label more interesting than key.

The first occurred at 200/400 against Amir Lohavat (sp?). I’ve played with Amir for years and have quite a bit of history and a good read on him. A woman who I played with in Colossus and is pretty decent opens for 1025 in the CO. Amir makes 5075 in the SB. I am in the BB. Amir is the effective stack with 27000. I have 93000. The woman has about 80000. I have QQ. I have two real options here: Call or three bet with the intention of calling his 4 bet shove. I decide to call and evaluate. I have history with both players and therefore I am okay playing OOP. I also think a four bet polarizes me and if she picks up on that and shoves I know have to make a huge vomit-inducing decision. She folds. Flop is KK4. I check with the intention of calling. He checks back. I would fully expect him to continue with his entire 3 bet range here but I now realize once he checks that he is ranging me pretty strong and fears I have a K. I now plan to check / call so long as the turn and river are broadway free. 8 on the turn. I check and he again checks. He now never has a K and I heavily discount AA. I range him now to AQ, AJ, AT, JJ, TT, 99, QJ. Initially I think his. River is a Q. I actually don’t like this card. I think it likely kills my action as it now takes away his AJ / AT bluffs as it hits my range pretty hard. I lead for 6075 and he tanks (not uncommon for him. He’s very methodical and takes a lot of time on most decisions) and he eventually calls and mucks. On the next break he was ahead of me in line for food and I deduced that he make a call with either TT or JJ and was pretty upset with himself.

Most of day 1 was just run-of-the-mill stuff. I was dealt a lot of big hands and I think played them rather well and got some good value. Getting so many quality hands really allowed me to get paid with value bets. I literally ran no bluffs on day 1 outside of the standard bet and take the pot that no one wants for one bet type of thing. I did have one table move which coincided with a tougher situation and I was card dead. Not through much more than attrition my stack eroded quite a bit.

Because the field was so small and there were three flights, we played a ton 5 and 6 handed. As a result stacks eroded much quicker than you would expect. If this was normal and nine handed I feel that I would have had more than the 23BB I ended up with.

Day 2 started out really well. On hand three I got dealt QQ UTG. It folded to an older woman on the button. She was at my starting table but got knocked out early and made her way through the second flight after getting in to a satellite. She re-raised my 2.5x open to 8 BB. With 23BB I only have one move and jam. He hems and haws and finally folds. Very clear she had TT or JJ. I think she calls with AK and not sure she three bets less than TT. Next hand in the BB I have AA. She raises CO 4BB and I over jam 32BB. This was a direct result of the previous hand and I want to establish a wild image as we play from 32 down. I thought I might get a loose call but she does fold and starts to complain about me. Love it. I get dealt several good hands and I have maybe the best seat of the remaining 32. I win a couple of good medium pots and I have another spot where I overshove after raising AK in EP and getting called by the BB. The flop is K74. He donks around pot. I see this a lot and its almost always a hand like a weakish K or a 7. I jam like 45BB. I felt I could get a lot of kings to call. He does fold and said he had KT and felt that he was ahead. Again working for me.

I make what I feel was the one true blunder I made during the tournament a little later. I had gotten up to 303K from 93K in about 2 levels. I went pretty dead for a while and drifted back down to about 40 BB. Old guy UTG raises. Three calls, including the older lady. I have J7s. and complete. I have no qualms here as against this lot I have no problem playing OOP or multiway. J99 flop. check to the lady who shoves for about 1.5 pot. She had been making over pot bets a lot with weak hands and draws. I thought she had maybe QT so I called. She actually had QJ and she doubled through me and left me with 10BB.

Beyond that I got short and was all in pre flop the rest of the time. No real hands of note. I won AK vs KJ blind vs blind and eventually shoved KTs with 10BB with the blinds waking up with JJ and KK and destroying me.

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