Final Table Takedown: Seth Davies Shares Heads-Up Strategy For a World Poker Tour Title

Seth Davies started playing poker during college in 2009. At the time, he was playing junior college baseball, but had to endure elbow surgery in consecutive seasons. With long recovery periods for the elbow, he was left with a bunch of free time to spend on poker. Davies started to have some success with poker and, in 2010, it became apparent that baseball wasn’t going to work out long term.

He decided to give poker a go as a full-time professional and never looked back. He has played online almost exclusively up until about a year ago. After Black Friday, he relocated first to Canada, then to Panama, and finally to Playa del Carmen, Mexico where Davies has been living since 2013. In 2014 , he won a PokerStars SCOOP $1,000 event for $264,000. Davies has more than $5.5 million in combined live and online career cashes.

Event: 2016 WPT Canadian Spring Poker Championship

Players: 417 • Entry: $2,706 • First Prize: $226,893 • Finish: 1st

Key Concepts: Hand frequencies; Risk vs. Reward

Craig Tapscott: Can you share any information to set up this hand in the heads-up match?
Seth Davies: Well a hand from the previous day that I watched Perceval play is relevant here. I can’t remember the exact stack sizes, but it was a board of A-10-3-7-3 where he check-called the turn out of position and led the river. He ended up being called and flipped over a bluff. I can’t remember exactly what it was, but this is relevant in a couple of ways. First, it just means that he’s conscious of the fact that a low board-pairing card is much better for the check-caller than it is for the bettor; so he’s likely to have at least some kind of leading range on these cards. Second, he knows that I saw him lead a good card for his range as a bluff, so it seems likely that he’ll take the same line for value at least some of the time. 

CT: A little foreshadowing. I like it.

Davies limps the button holding Q 2.

SD: I limp the button. He’s sitting on about 20 big blinds, so he’s going to be shoving a lot over my opens, so I will have a variety of hands that I will decide to limp. Mostly hands that aren’t strong enough to raise and too strong to fold. I’ll also have some traps in there for protection. 

Perceval checks.

Flop: J 6 3 (pot: 280,000)

Perceval checks.

SD: On the flop, this is a board that should connect with his preflop range pretty well. He’s going to have a lot of low cards that either pair the 6 or 3 or make some straight draws with them. And he almost never has the strong overcard hands that whiff this board. So, my hand still has good showdown value and I don’t get a ton of folds by betting the flop so I…

Davies checks.

Turn: Q (pot: 280,000)

Perceval checks.

CT: Easy value bet now.

SD: Yes. I have a very clear value bet.

Davies bets 230,000. Perceval calls.

CT: What kind of range do you place him on after the turn call?

SD: He’s going to have a lot of J-x, 6-x, and 3-x hands. He’ll likely have a few weak Ace-high hands that didn’t want to shove so much preflop, along with some King-high hands like K-10, K-9. I’d also seen him play draws passively, so he might have some hands like 10-9, 5-4, or flush draws.

River: 6 (pot: 740,000)

Perceval checks.

SD: As I mentioned above, I felt that he would be leading his 6-x hands vs. me at some frequency at least. When he checks to me, I’m feeling good about having the best hand most of the time. I fire out a value bet looking to get called by J-x, 3-x, Ace-high, and King-high. All of these hands are pretty decent bluff catchers. I should have bluffs as weak as 10-9, 10-8, and 9-8 here.

Davies bets 460,000. Perceval moves all-in.

CT: Whoa! Is this an easy call?

SD: Well, when he decides to shove, I think I just need to call, given his potential bluffs. He can certainly be turning his Ace-high and King-high hands into bluffs, potentially even a hand as strong as 3-x. 

Davies calls. Perceval reveals 8 6. Perceval wins the pot of 5,000,000.

CT: Any final thoughts on the hand?

SD: There was also some meta-game to consider. You see, if he folds he’s going to be chipped down even further and his situation starts to get pretty desperate. He’ll be down to below 2 million chips and I’ll be over 10.5 million. My thoughts about him showing up with plenty of potential bluffs and reduced value, as well as the stack situation, made me decide I was going to force him to show me a 6.

CT: Can you share some basic concepts about how a player can improve their awareness of meta-game?

SD: These types of things are hard to put in a few words; they’re things learned through tons and tons of experience. But I’d say that in heads-up play, or elsewhere short-handed at a final table, if the shorter stack(s) are starting to lose chips and distance themselves more from the bigger stack(s), they’ll often get desperate and take a bigger risk for the chance to catch up a little.

Key Concepts: Hand reading; Card removal

SD: This is a huge hand and ended up being a tough river call.

Davies raises to 275,000 holding K 10. Perceval calls.

Flop: 10 9 4 (pot: 590,000)

Perceval checks. Davies bets 375,000. Perceval raises to 1,075,000.

CT: What were your first thoughts when he puts in the raise? And can you begin to define a range for him?

SD: I’m feeling pretty good when he raises. I have a very strong hand for heads-up play. I’d say his range probably contains most hands top pair or better and a bunch of straight draws and flush draws, anything from K-J to 7-6, and then the various heart hands.
Davies calls.

Turn: 7 (pot: 2,740,000)

Perceval bets 800,000. Davies calls.

River: 5 (pot: 4,340,000)

Perceval moves all-in.

CT: Can you actually call this shove? Do you have any reads to rely on from watching his play up to now?

SD: He hadn’t been one to really apply maximum pressure over multiple streets like this before. He was an active player, but mostly so preflop and on earlier streets.

CT: Could he just be a bit frustrated?

SD: I didn’t think there was a ton of desperation on his end in terms of how the match was going. He had just doubled up and we’re close to even in stacks. That made this call that much harder. I didn’t think he’d be really going out of his way to play some big pots to “get back in the game.” He already was back in the game with his recent double up. 

CT: So you’re considering calling then? Why?

SD: The biggest factor leading me to a call was simply my king of hearts blocker. Perceval hadn’t been applying big pressure in big spots like this (like I said earlier), but he also hadn’t been going for big thin value either. He was more about taking some trappy and pot-control lines in big pots.

CT: So what is he trying to represent with the shove?

SD: That lead me to think he was basically repping flushes and some J-8 or 8-6 straights containing a heart. Since I was holding the king of hearts, it’s just very tough for him to have a flush. Most, if not all, of his strong heart-heart hands are going to three-bet preflop. With those being out of his range and me blocking the region of K-8, K-6, K-5, K-3, and K-2 flushes, I end up facing very few flushes from him. Basically just A-6, A-5, A-3, A-2, Q-8, Q-6, Q-5, Q-3, Q-2, 8-6, 8-5, 6-5, 6-3, and 5-3. Whenever you can list off almost all of his value hands in one line, you’re facing a pretty slim range. 

CT: So you have him on a total bluff?

SD: I don’t have to think of too many bluffs from him to make this a winning call, as the clear ones that come to mind are K-J offsuit and Q-J offsuit. It’s very reasonable for him to take a hand like bottom pair and turn it into a bluff as well. If he’s sitting there with a hand like A 4, he’s in a great spot to apply big pressure on my range that never has the nuts and almost never has 4-4 or A-A. 

CT: What are some of the other factors that make this a call for you?

SD: Well, another thing to keep in mind in this spot is that if I fold the best hand, he’s going to take a nice big pot from me along with all the momentum. And if I call and win, the tourney is over. So that’s a pretty massive payoff for calling and being right, and a pretty big downside for folding the best hand. In the end, I decided that my King of hearts was too good as a blocker and flicked in the call and that was it.

Davies calls. Perceval reveals 8 7. Davies wins the pot of 12,500,000. ♠