One Drop

In this article I will share with you a hand from the 2015 $1,111 buy-in Little One Drop Event. This event drew a huge field that seemed to consist mostly of amateurs, likely because it started early in the morning at 10 a.m. I was cruising along early in day 1 with 22,000 chips from a 10,000-chip starting stack when I was fortunate enough to flop a premium hand.

At 150-300 ante 25, a tight, somewhat passive lady limped in from first position with an 18,000-chip stack. The player in third position, a loose, aggressive Brazilian guy with 7,500, and the fourth position player also called. I looked down at 9 9, which is normally a fairly strong hand. While I could certainly raise both for value and protection, I decided to limp as well. Especially against first position limpers, I much prefer limping because some amateurs love to limp with premium hands from first position, looking to reraise. Seeing how I do not want to get limp-reraised, I decided to call and see a flop. Both of the blinds came along as well. It is important that you realize that when you limp instead of raise preflop, you will frequently be conceding the pot to one bet on most flops. You must be disciplined enough to get away from a marginal post-flop holding when it becomes clear you are drawing nearly dead.

The flop came Q 10 9, giving me bottom set. The blinds checked to the lady, who bet 500 into the 2,025-chip pot. The Brazilian called. The fourth position player folded. I decided to raise to 1,500, making it 1,000 more to go. The purpose of this raise was to charge the draws and also to ensure that marginal made hands would call and see the turn. While a large raise, perhaps to 5,000, would almost certainly charge the draws the maximum, if I get any action, it will be mostly from a larger set or a straight. Since that range of hands has me crushed, a large raise would be terrible. Looking back, I think a raise to around 1,800 would be ideal, but I was fairly certain that neither of my opponents had an amazing hand, so I didn’t mind if they stuck around. The players in the blinds folded and both the lady and the Brazilian called.

The turn was the 2. My opponents checked to me, and I bet 3,200 into the 6,525-chip pot. To my surprise, both players called again. At this point, I assumed the lady had a marginal made hand, such as A-A, K-K, or A-Q, and the Brazilian had some sort of draw, either a flush draw or an open-ended straight draw. Interestingly enough, the Brazilian only had 2,500 left after calling my turn bet. I didn’t quite know what to make of his willingness to call off almost all of his chips, but this is the type of play you see in small buy-in WSOP events.

The river was the Q, giving me a marginal full house. The lady decided to bet 7,000 into the 16,125 pot, leaving 6,000 in her stack. The Brazilian instantly folded, confirming he was on a draw. I had to decide if I should raise, call, or even fold. Against the most blatantly tight and straightforward players, I think a case could be made for folding, assuming your opponent would not vastly overvalue trip queens. I was not so sure this specific player would only bet with better hands than my full house, so folding was out of the question. Next, I had to decide if she would lead for 7,000 with a queen and then be unable to fold it for 6,000 more if I raised. I was somewhat unsure about this. I also thought she would make this play with any full house, so I could be crushed.

In tournaments, I think there is a decent amount of value in not losing a significant pot with less than the nuts, even if you have the best hand more than half of the time when your river raise gets called. If this situation was from a cash game, I would have gone all-in because I believed my opponent could realistically have trip queens and never fold to my small raise. I thought about it for a second and decided that the potential upside of stacking my opponent was not worth the potential risk of losing a large chunk of my stack when I happened to be beat.

Notice that losing 13,000 on the river out of my 17,000 remaining stack would cripple me and make it quite difficult to continue playing a loose, aggressive deep-stacked strategy, whereas I could continue implementing this style if I lost 6,000 out of my 17,000-chip stack. Also notice that if I won the pot without raising that I would have 40,000, whereas if I raised and she called with the worst hand, I would have 46,000. I don’t think there is much of a difference, especially early in the tournament, between 46,000 and 40,000, but there is a huge difference between 17,000 and 4,000. There is a huge amount of value in maintaining a “playable” stack.

All of this led me to call. Much to my surprise, she said, “I’m bluffing” and turned up K 10, for middle pair and a gutshot straight draw. Notice that if I raised huge on the flop, as most amateur players would, citing value and protection, I would have missed out on winning a huge pot. Always be sure to keep your opponents in the pot when they are drawing thin. Sometimes a pile of chips will fall in your lap. ♠

Jonathan Little is a two-time WPT champion with more than $6 million in tournament winnings. Each week, he posts an educational blog and podcast at JonathanLittlePoker.com, where you can get a FREE poker training video that details five things you must master if you want to win at tournament poker.