Mind Over Poker: The Cards Play Themselves

In a tournament, it is often said that when you get to the very end with the blinds very high, the cards play themselves. That is, your choices are going to be fairly obvious based on your cards, chip stack, and position. While I believe that to be a fatalist attitude, there is a lot of truth to it. I will use a recent hand experience of mine to illustrate, and then will discuss the one thing that we can do to lessen the impact of “the cards playing themselves.”

We had just eliminated the fourth remaining player, and the following hand was the first in three-handed play. The blinds were 2,000-4,000 with a 500 ante. I was in the small blind with 25,000 behind after posting. The button had about 43,000, and he open-raised to 18,000. I looked down at pocket sevens. Figuring the range of hands that the button could play here, I was ahead against the majority of them. Yet, I considered folding. Once I eliminated that possibility, I had to decide whether to reraise all in or just call. I decided to call, and will explain why. If I reraise, the button is all but guaranteed to call me. At this point, I’m not too worried about the big blind. Whether I call or reraise, he’s entering the pot only if he has a strong hand, and reraising should have a negligible effect on him. If I just call, the big blind knows that I’m pot-committed.

So, why just call? My thought process is that I have no fold equity versus the button preflop. However, if I push on the flop, I may have some fold equity. For instance, if he has a hand like A-10 and the flop comes with three babies, he may fold. If he has a hand like K-J and the flop comes with an ace, he may fold. Since I know that I will act first after the flop, I feel that I will get more leverage out of my remaining chips if I save them for the flop.

Well, the point was moot, because after I called, the big blind immediately went all in for a total of 40,000. The button did not like either my call or the reraise, and he folded after some deliberation. At this point, I knew that I was up against a bigger pair or possibly A-K, but I had no choice but to call. The blinds were going up to 3,000-6,000 on the next hand. If I folded, I’d be left with 9,000. If I called and lost, I’d be out. If I called and won, I’d be the overwhelming chip leader with almost 74,000. I had to call, so I did. The big blind turned over pocket queens, and the button showed his mucked A-10. The board didn’t help anyone, and I was eliminated.
My initial reaction was that if I had folded to the button’s open-raise, the button and big blind may have gotten it all in and I would have moved up a spot. Upon further reflection, though, I was happy with my decision. I played it correctly in regard to the button, and knew that there was a small risk that the big blind could wake up with a big hand, and he did. So, this is one hand in which the cards played themselves for all three players. Is there anything that you can do to prevent this? Just one thing: Be more aggressive in accumulating chips, so that when you get down to the wire, you have the most chips and can afford to withstand a few hands in which you end up on the losing end of the cards playing themselves. ♠

David Apostolico is the author of several poker-strategy books, including Tournament Poker and The Art of War, and Compete, Play, Win: Finding Your Best Competitive Self. You can contact him at [email protected].