Hand 2 Hand Combat -- Matt Vengrin

Event: Absolute Poker $100,000-guaranteed tournament
Buy-in: $500
Players in the Event: 203
First Place: $31,000

Hand No. 1
Blinds: 1,000-2,000
Ante: 200
Players at the Table: 5
Stacks: Matt Vengrin – 51,335; Villain – 221,521

Vengrin raises to 4,000 from the button with the K J. The big blind calls.

Matt Vengrin: There’s a shortish stack to my left, and a big stack in the big blind; it’s a very dangerous position, but I’m not folding K-J here.

Craig Tapscott: Why the min-raise [minimum-raise]?

MV: I elected to min-raise to try to get some worse hands to come along. I know that the big blind is a defender, so I don’t mind raising and getting a call here.

Flop: K 8 6 (pot: 10,000)

MV: On the flop, I’m very happy. I flopped top pair on a straight- and flush-draw board. Now I need to figure out how to extract max value from my opponent, while also getting an idea of what he has. I will throw out a bet, which I expect him to see as weakness. I’m hoping he comes over the top of me. But if he just calls, I don’t mind, since he could be floating me and/or could be behind by a large margin.

The villain checks. Vengrin bets 5,000. The villain calls.
Turn: 3 (pot: 20,000)
The villain checks. Vengrin checks.

CT: The turn seemed like a blank. Why the check if you’re shooting for max value from this opponent?

MV: You’re right. The turn is a great card. After the villain checked, I decided to check behind, for a few reasons. First, he will expect that I missed the flop and the turn did not help me. Therefore, if he was floating me, he would more than likely have to bet on the river, because why else would he float … excuse me, reverse float. Second, if he is on a straight or flush draw, he will have to bet it, because it’s the only way to win. Also, if he has a medium pair and checks the river, he is most likely calling a bet of mine if the river does not change things drastically, or is not a big overcard, like an ace.

River: J (pot: 20,000)

CT: Not the best card for you, but pretty good.

MV: Yeah. But the only things I am really afraid of are a flush draw — but I doubt that he has that, since he probably would have overshoved the flop or reraised — and perhaps 3-3. That hand would probably call a flop bet and check if it hit a set on the turn. Those are two very small things to be worried about overall.

The villain bets 12,550. Vengrin calls. The villain reveals the J 8. Vengrin wins the pot of 45,100.

CT: If the flush was such a small part of his range, why didn’t you shove instead of call?

MV: The reason that I didn’t shove this river is because worse hands are not calling me (except J-8, duh!). He’s either bluffing here or very thinly value-betting. This means that if I raise here, I am probably not getting called, which is the reason that I elected to just call and scoop up a nice pot.

CT: So, your turn check paid off big.

MV: Exactly. The key to this hand was checking the turn; that’s what got me value on the end. Now, obviously, if I knew that he had J-8, I would have played the hand differently. I suspected that he had some sort of 8 or a straight draw, so that’s how I elected to play it. I expected him to bet most rivers if I checked the turn, and that’s what got me the most value. If I had bet the turn big, he probably would not have called.

Hand No. 2
Blinds: 1,200-2,400
Ante: 200
Players at the Table: 5
Stacks: Matt Vengrin – 33,800; Villain – 96,345

The villain shoves all in from the button. Vengrin is in the big blind with the K 3.

Craig Tapscott: Set this hand up for us, Matt.

Matt Vengrin: This hand is interesting, because we are down to 10-handed play, right on the bubble of the final table.

CT: What’s your read on the villain?

MV: He has been pretty aggressive lately, but that alone is not enough to call off here. He strikes me as being an aggressive player, so he’s going to use his chips as leverage, especially when he covers me and the small blind threefold. Also, this is a tactic that I’ve noticed in sit-and-gos, mostly when it’s four-handed on the money bubble. If the shorter stack is in the small blind rather than the big blind, the big blind will often fold if he is covered, because the small blind has fewer chips than he has, and he doesn’t want to bust out right before the money. The same concept applies here. I have slightly more chips than the small blind, and we’re 10-handed. What the villain does not know is that I don’t care if I bust out 10th, as long as I feel like I have the best hand.

CT: So, what range of hands are you putting him on if you’re considering calling this shove?

MV: I’m not a numbers guy, by any means. I’m a feel player, and I felt like his range here was basically any two cards, because even if he loses, he still has the second-biggest stack at the table, and if he wins, he adds more than 5,000 to his stack, which is a decent amount for relatively little risk (we will fold here more often than not).

CT: Are there any other considerations?

MV: The last thing that I thought of was his raise size. He basically overbet the pot by a ton. If he had a real hand, I would assume that he would raise less and call a reraise, since that would make sense against our stack sizes, or call and call if we shoved.

CT: That’s some pretty in-depth thinking with K-3 offsuit. Summarize for me, please.

MV: OK. Let’s put those three things together: (1) His range is very wide, which probably makes my hand a favorite. (2) He is a very aggressive player. (3) If he had a real hand, why would he shove here? Well, the answer is, he most likely would have raise-called. These three pieces of information make me arrive at one simple answer — to call the shove. Now, I did all of this reasoning in my head instantly; as a matter of fact, I was hoping he would shove so that I could snap-call.

Vengrin calls. The villain flips over the 10 8.

Flop: K Q 3 (pot: 69,400)
Turn: 10 (pot: 69,400)
River: A
(pot: 69,400)

Matt Vengrin wins the pot of 69,400.

CT: How would different stack sizes held by you and/or the villain change things?

MV: Different stack sizes would have made the hand play completely differently. If he had 50,000, I likely would have folded, since he would have been risking basically his stack if he was wrong. If he had more than he actually did, it would have made it an easier call.

At the tender age of 25, Matt Vengrin already has posted some impressive tournament results. He recently signed with Absolute Poker, agreeing to be the new face of the brand. Over the past few months, he has been very busy, making three final tables in the process during the World Championship of Online Poker, for a combined $138,000 in winnings.