You finished in 2nd place (eliminated at hand #3703840512).151 hands played and saw flop:- 8 times out of 33 while in small blind (24%)- 17 times out of 31 while in big blind (54%)- 1 times out of 87 in other positions (1%)- a total of 26 times out of 151 (17%)Pots won at showdown - 9 out of 14 (64%)Pots won without showdown - 151 time out of 87 in other positions? Wow. That's interesting. I knew I was playing tight, but ... wow. FWIW, that one hand is the only hand I played in main part of the tourney:
Third to act, I raised all-in (1170 in chips) at hand #26 (seemed like it was later than that, to me) with TsTd. XXPantherXX (6720 stack) calls, and ross_man9383 (10,029 stack & the chipleader) calls. Flop is 4c3h7c, ross_man raises all-in, and XXPanther folds. I'm sweating the club flush draw, of course, but ross_man had 9h9d and figured his overpair was good. I'm pretty sure he had me figured for some sort of Broadway (or a pocket pair) with the PF all-in from early position -- he may have had my range at AQ+ and JJ+. Turn 7d, river Ad. I had forgotten the river was an Ace; that would've really been terrible to get sucked out with a monster chipstack playing "LOL any ace." I won 3,610 in that pot.
Teh suckitudeI'll try to elaborate below, but here are the main reasons I think I did well in the tourney:
1. I played tight.
2. Other players were eliminated quickly.
3. I got good cards in decisive positions and at critical times.
4. Weak play by my opponents (relates to #3).
(1) I played tight.In addition to that amazing stat from above, I counted this: 5 hands played in 70 hands pre-final table. (Not counting checks in the BB/fold on the flop or call/folds out of the SB.) One is the major double-up hand.
I mentioned that we played with 10 still in (2 tables of 5) for "forever", it seemed — it was, in fact, 28 hands, which is 5 orbits. Weird. During this time, I raised all-in from the blinds in these situations:
— I checkraise all-in after it was folded to me in the SB, with Qh4c on a 8-A-K board (2 diamonds). He minbets the flop, and I guess I must've thought he was weak or something. (I can't imagine my motivation for this move now -- possibly a dreaded "read"?) My stack was a large fraction of his — about 2/3, and he folded.
— preflop all-in 1st to act with pocket Queens. I know some would say that I should've limped/raised a small amount to build a pot, but the worst possible thing to happen would be an A-K-x flop, y'know? (And that seems to happen a lot to me lately.)
— preflop all-in from the BB with 8d8c after the SB completed. Folds.
— all-in preflop, UTG with AhQs. This was after it went up to 200/400, so that's some serious blindage. But folded.
That's all my action before the final table.
(2) Other players eliminated quickly.I'm really not 100% sure about this, but it seemed that way. We had been playing 10-handed for awhile when the first break came (after an hour), and continued that way for awhile. Maybe 1 hour isn't an uncommon time to get down to final-table numbers; I wouldn't know, as I rarely make it an hour into a tourney.
Anyway, the advantage (for me) is obvious: the blinds go up every X minutes, so I was still able to foldbot a lot without them eating me alive. IMHO, you pretty much need to have some semblance of a stack by that point in the tourney, or else you're sunk. But I didn't really get many chips until about halfway through the final table...
(3) I got good cards in decisive position and at critical times.This is the real meat of my "success." Here's where my strategy gets dicey/I luck out some.
Instead of open pushing for chips, I was determined to fold, fold, fold. I wanted the other players to respect my all-ins for something, by getting a tight image. The problem with this, of course, is that to a 30k stack, the guy with 2000 chips is going to get called with basically any 2 cards.
I had $2910 coming into the final table. Blinds 200/400, ante 25. After about 12 hands (and 1 person eliminated -- not in the money yet), I'm down to 1760 in chips. I check out of the BB with T3, flop T-5-5 (2 clubs), I go all-in for the rest of my chips and finish up at 5420.
I check out of the big blind (1200) 15 hands later at 2770 in chips with K3, flop is 6-3-6, I go all-in, folds all around, I win a
4,125 pot. Stack up to 5620.
Those are two lucky hands.
An unconscious part of my strategy (I say unconscious since I only realized it after reading through the hand history) had been to basically never call a raise. Even at this point in the tourney, I hadn't yet called any raise. I was either the one doing the raising (all-in), or folding. (Occasionally calling or checking.) This is related to the gap concept, I guess, but I wasn't going to a) let myself get slowplayed by a minraise or anything like that; b) call off any part of my stack, with a marginal holding, to someone who is saying by his action, "I have something". I wanted to put the maximum pressure on everyone else to call me, if they thought I was risking my tournament on rags. Now is also a good time to mention: I never, ever got raised after a limp from any position, including the SB. (I did fold the BB several times, of course.)
That's luck in and of itself, because getting raised/reraised after committing a large bet with a blind call would've pretty much forced me to go all-in with a hand that I didn't feel was worthy of an open-push.
And that's the reason I say I was lucky. Those are two hands I probably wouldn't have played had I been raised; maybe the K3, but definitely not the T3. It would have been far too easy for me to simply blind away; instead, I was allowed to see flops at the right times and hit hands. And if you think that K3 hand was lucky ...
I'm in trouble b/c I have ~4,700 in chips (we're down to 5 players by now, and I'm in the money) and the level has just been raised to 1k/2k blinds and $100 ante (M= 1.3) with me in the BB. Miracle of miracles, I check 82 and see a beautiful 9-2-8 flop. I wind up winning 10k in the hand.
I wouldn't say I had a real stack until this point, but suddenly I'm 2nd in chips and determined to bully the short stacks. And on my next hand, feeling saucy or something, I semi-bluff the BB after it's been folded to me with J9. Fold, I pick up a bunch in blinds/antes. I have 13k, which is at least an M of over 3.
I lose about a fifth of my chips trying to take out a short stack; in retrospect, 54 wasn't the hand to do this with, considering it has no high-card value. It was suited, but if I'm going to play connectors, suited or no, it's gotta be at least above the halfway point of the deck. (Of course, with blinds 1k/2k, I'm concerned about giving the tiny stack 4000 free chips too.)
I blindsteal with A3 at this point, which brings me to another thing about never calling raises: If it's folded around to me in the SB, I feel pretty freakin' confident. If I have any kind of hand, it's worth trying to steal because the BB has 2 random cards, in my mind. So any ace seems good.
My next luckbox moment comes with a check in the BB with 37 (great f'ing hand, eh?). Flop is 7-5-3. Fortunately, I get J3 to call me and take a monster pot.
Though I like stealing from the SB, raising all-in from UTG is also good. You run a bigger risk here of someone waking up with a big hand here (with 3 to act behind you vs. 1), but with my fold-a-lot image, I'm saying "I have a big hand." So I get the antes/blinds with A7 here, a fairly good, though not stellar, hand 4-handed.
The disadvantage of folding a lot and only trying shit when there's a lack of aggression is that you don't play many hands. I find myself back down to 10k after losing a huge chunk to 2 rounds of blinds with 1500/3k blinds and 150 antes. I was able to check and see one flop, but it was AA4 (I had Tx) and I couldn't pull the all-in trigger, even though I felt like there was a decent change he was just C-betting the scary flop.
But at the moment I'm on life support -- stack at 6k and I have to post a 3k blind -- I get A9, wind up calling a raise (would've gone all-in anyway), and beat 96. Immediate buoy back to 13k. My KQ gets counterfeited by 2 pair on the board vs. KT in the next hand, a definite missed opportunity to knock someone out.
On the next blind, I raise all-in with J7, another move I have a hard time explaining. I guess it's because the huge chip leader was basically raising every pot, trying to steal/bust people. I must not have given him much credit to reraise all-in with Jack-high, 7 kicker. He had 89 and I wound up with a FH on the hand. This double-up actually makes me the chip leader; crazy. I then lose a pretty big pot with A4 to K8 when 2 Kings come on the flop.
Back down to 13k, I'm all in with QT (any 2 Broadway is a good hand now with 3 left), and I spike a T on the river. Again, I'm playing vs. the chipleader who called me with 43 (???).
I bust out #3 with AK vs. Q2, down to heads-up.
Not much to say about heads-up. I know there are optimum strategies, based on strategic aggression + hand selection. I know some SnG experts complain often of too many 2nd and 3rd place finishes instead of wins, so they endeavor to improve their short-handed play. While I'm sure this is a valuable edge to push, I don't see it being very pratical for me since I have trouble getting there in the first place.
Anyway, I take a somewhat bad beat to get crippled -- I'm chipleader all-in with JJ vs. 22; he catches his 2-outer on the turn to make a set, and I'm down to 6k in chips vs. 60k. Next hand I get a decent deal -- A7 -- push it in, he catches running hearts to make a flush with his 53 of hearts, and that's all she wrote.
The bottom line is this: In at least 4 critical situations, in the blind -- with T3, K3, 82 and 73 --
I saw a flop and hit it, with various degrees of harditude. In any one of those situations, being check/folding would've essentially taken me out of the tourney; and in most, a pre-flop raise very well might have folded me.
I got very lucky.
(4) Weak play by my opponents.This is related to the last point, so I won't say much about it other than to say there was a marked lack of aggression around the bubble (which is common). Sure, some hands were raised preflop, but the majority weren't, and for the most part, people seemed to be playing tight / playing their cards.
By playing their cards, I mean not really taking position into account or blind-stealing. Hell, even the big stacks weren't taking "risks" for a fraction of their stack. (How do you fold to an all-in of 500 chips when you're at 40k ... ?)
This was also true when we were shorthanded, which was helpful. Blinds folded to the BB. Minraises taking down pots preflop. Nobody really bullying with their stack. It was ideal conditions for a weak player like me, and allowed me to move up with some selective aggression.
[This is only a week or so late. I hope it's informative. More coming soon.]
[Edit: Wow, this keeps the original date. I actually finished/posted this on Jan. 31, 10:40 a.m.]
