Copyright 2006 Full
Tilt Poker
November 06, 2006
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Poker Lessons)
Poker Lesson: Cash Equity at the
Final Table
Author: Rafe Furst
While playing the final table of the $1,500 Pot-Limit
Hold 'em event, I found myself in a difficult spot when we
were down to four-handed play. I was in the big blind and Rizen,
a tough, respected online tournament pro, was in the small blind.
It was folded to Rizen who announced that he would raise the pot.
With blinds of 15K/30K, his raise made it 90K to me.
At the time, I had about 400K in chips; Rizen had
750k and the other two players had about 250K each.
I looked at my cards and found As-8s, a pretty solid
holding in short-handed play. I decided to raise the size of the
pot. My total bet was 180. Rizen immediately re-raised, forcing
me all-in.
The pot contained 580,000 (400,000 from Rizen, 180,000
from me) and I had 220,000 remaining. I was getting nearly 3 to
1 on my money, so this looked like an automatic call. I needed
to win the pot only about 27 percent of the time to justify a
call.
Against a big pocket pair (other than aces), my
A-8 suited would win about 32 percent of the time. Against a bigger
ace (A-K, A-Q, etc), my A-8 suited would win about 30 percent
of the time. There was also a non-zero (though small) chance I
was up against a small pocket pair and would win about 50 percent
of the time.
So this was almost a zero-equity chip decision.
That is, folding and calling would have pretty much same result
over the long term. To find the correct action, I had to look
beyond pot
odds and consider (a) how this hand would affect my cash equity
for the tournament (i.e., which action would maximize my expected
cash payout) and (b) how this hand would affect my chances of
winning the tournament.
There were two factors I looked at when considering
my cash equity:
1 - Each chip in a short stack is more valuable
in terms of cash-equity than each chip in a large stack. By calling
in this situation I would have been risking chips of great value
to pick up chips of lesser value.
2 - Folding removes any chance of busting. By folding,
I would give my opponents a chance to bust on subsequent hands,
which would move me up to a bigger payday.
After looking at these factors, it seemed that folding
was the clear choice. But still, I had to think about how folding
would effect my ability to win the bracelet - which was my primary
concern. Would I be putting myself out of the running by giving
up on so many chips? Not really.
When there are more than two players remaining,
each additional chip you accumulate has a lesser impact on your
ability to win the tournament. So when the chip-equity decision
is a wash, you are better off folding than you are trying to accumulate
more chips.
If you ever find yourself in a similar situation,
you should also keep in mind that there's a big difference between
moving all-in and calling all-in. When you move in, you can win
the pot by forcing a fold. When you call, this obviously isn't
possible.
I decided to fold and wait for a better spot, and
I'm very glad that I did.
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