Give us your opinion in the comments section below for your chance at winning a six-month Card Player magazine digital subscription.
Ask any group of poker players how you played your hand and they’ll come up with dozens of different opinions. That’s just the nature of the game.
Each week, Card Player will select a hand from the high-stakes, big buy-in poker world, break it down and show that there’s more than one way to get the job done.
The Scenario
You are deep in a major event and stacked with 1,838,000 in chips, good enough for 76 big blinds. The tournament is played eight-handed, but with 19 players remaining at three tables, you are current playing short-handed.
You look down at K
K
and make just over a min-raise to 50,000 from under the gun. The action folds around to the button, a solid player with 1,238,000 or 51 big blinds, and he makes the call.
The blinds fold and the two of you see a flop of 10
9 8
. You continue with a bet of 75,000 and your opponent quickly raises to 210,000.
You make the call and the turn is the 2. You check and your opponent fires in a bet of 275,000, leaving 700,000 behind. You have him covered, but would be left with just 25 big blinds if you lost an all-in confrontation.
The Questions
Do you call, raise or fold? If raising, how much? What hands in your opponent’s range are you currently beating? What hands have you drawing dead? Is it possible to get your opponent to fold a better hand? If calling, what is your plan for the river?
What Actually Happened
With just 19 players remaining at the EPT Prague main event, Mariusz Klosinski faced a bet of 275,000 on a board reading 10 9 8 2 holding K K.
After some thought, he moved all-in, putting his opponent, Mads Amot, at risk for his tournament life. Amot thought it over for a little over a minute before making the call, turning over 8 8 for a set.
Relieved to see he was ahead and not up against a straight or a flush, Amot was visibly crushed when the K hit the river, giving Klosinski the two-outer he needed.
Amot was eliminated in 19th place, earning €25,000. Klosinski went on to bubble the final table, earning €53,000 for his ninth-place finish. The eventual winner was Sweden’s Ramzi Jelassi, who took home €835,000.
What would you have done and why? Let us know in the comments section below and try not to be results oriented. The best answer will receive a six-month Card Player magazine digital subscription.
