The Big All In

I was playing in an online no-limit hold'em tournament recently in which some other Card Player writers and I had $50 bounties on our heads. I made it to the final table, where my $65,000 in chips was third behind stacks of about $80,000 and $70,000. The next two largest stacks were in the $40,000-$50,000 range.

With the blinds at $600-$1,200, I was in first position and picked up a very good hand – pocket queens. I raised to $5,000 to go before the flop. A loose player in middle position called. Then, the player with the $70,000 stack, who had been playing relatively tight, raised all in. In most situations, I would go for it with pocket queens. Here, however, I was in very good position for the big money. If I called and lost, I would end up finishing 10th, which was worth a rather small amount of money.

I wondered what the odds were of this player having pocket aces or kings. Or, if he had "big slick" (A-K), I would be a coin toss away from elimination. But if I called and won, I would be in great shape for winning the tournament. What would you do in this situation?

Since this player had been playing noticeably tight at a previous table, I decided that he was probably on a very good hand and that my chances of losing here were much greater than what I was willing to risk. So, I made the cowardly fold – or was it the "prudent" fold? Being online, I had no way of finding out what the player actually had. But, my fold was eventually justified, as I went on to win the tournament.

Afterward, I searched through my collection of poker reference material to find out how frequently pocket queens would be up against pocket aces or pocket kings in a 10-handed game. Not finding that particular statistic, I wrote a GWBasic program to obtain the odds by simulation. And while at it, I also ran the program for pocket kings and pocket jacks.

My results were as follows: If you hold pocket jacks in a 10-handed game, there will be a higher pocket pair (aces, kings, or queens) in one or more of the other nine hands about one time in eight. If you have pocket queens, there will be a higher pocket pair about one time in 11. If you have pocket kings, pocket aces will be out against you about one time in 23.

So, when you are cruising along nicely in a big no-limit hold'em tournament, what odds should you consider good enough for you to risk everything? There are some arguments for waiting for essentially a lock. And even if the odds are 100-to-1 in your favor, this could be that one time. This is one of the toughest judgment situations in high-level tournament poker.

This kind of decision should probably be based mostly on how much experience you have and how well you play in big-time no-limit hold'em situations. Also, how good are the other players with big stacks. If you are playing against one or more players who always have a good hand when they play, you should have a big advantage in short-handed play.

But, if the player making the big all-in bet is somewhat suspect, and because there will inevitably be a good deal of luck involved in the final critical hands, you might judge that you should go for it here and now. Who knows, you might just happen to have the best hand or even pick off a bluff.