Poker Hand Matchup: David Peters vs. Mikita Badziakouski

Outcome

Preflop, four players remained, with blinds of 50,000-100,000 and a big-blind ante of 100,000. David Peters raised to 225,000 from the button. Mikita Badziakouski called from the big blind. On the flop Badziakouski checked. Peters bet 150,000. Badziakouski called. On the turn Badziakouski checked. Peters bet 450,000. Badziakouski called. On the river Badziakouski checked. Peters moved all-in. Badziakouski called.

Analysis

The pay jump from fourth place to third place in this massive $250,000 buy-in super high roller event amounted to $720,000, with fourth place taking $700,000 and third earning $1,420,000. While that number does not even amount to three full buy-ins in this event, the bottom line is that there were hundreds of thousands of reasons for the shortest stacks to try to survive to the top three. This hand began with David Peters sitting in second-chip position behind run away leader Steffen Sontheimer, with Sean Winter as the next largest stack and Mikita Badziakouski having just 27 big blinds. Peters took an extremely aggressive approach to this hand, likely trying to take advantage of the fact that Badziakouski is heavily incentivized to be careful with his tournament life. Peters raised from the button, which he could do with a wide range of hands. The 8-6-6 rainbow flop could very well have hit either Peters or Badziakouski, who should be defending his big blind with a lot of hands as well. Badziakouski check-called the flop and the turn brought the 6®. Having three of a kind on the board makes for an interesting dynamic, as there are just far fewer hands that qualify as very strong. Peters seemingly decided to leverage that fact, firing another bet despite having J-10 high and no draws to speak of outside of rivering jack or ten to make a full house. Badziakouski made the call and rivered a full house, although it shouldn’t really have changed too much as his ace-high was likely either already ahead or way behind. Peters pulled the trigger on the third barrel, putting Badziakouski to the test for all of his chips. Badziakouski decided to make the call, knowing that a player as talented and experienced as Peters was definitely capable of running a multi-street bluff in this situation. Badziakouski earned the double up to close the gap with the rest of the pack somewhat, but he still ultimately finished in fourth place ($700,000). Peters followed him to the rail in third place ($1,420,000). Steffen Sontheimer went on to defeat Sean Winter heads-up to secure the title and the $3,685,000 top prize.