Q&A #116: Taking An All-In Risk During The Late Stages Of A Tournament
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In tournament play, you make decision after decision that could result in risking all your chips. You’ll make at least one decision for all your chips in virtually every tournament you play. And in most tournaments you’ll make multiple all-in decisions.
Whenever you choose to go for it, and you lose, it’s easy to second-guess your decision. “I thought I had an edge at the time, but maybe I should have waited for a better spot…”
Tournament decisions can be complicated by the nature of the prize structure, but in many cases the second-guessing is unwarranted. Today’s questioner, slide (from the message board), is wondering about some of his all-in decisions:
Lately ive been having some bad results calling All-in bets near or at the final table.
Usually when im at or near the final table (in the real life tourneys i play) average stack is around 10 big blinds, so there isnt much happening except ALLINs and folding (alot of stealing).
Obviously this cant go on forever, so whenever i think i have a good chance of having the best hand i call. Alot of times this turns out to be a coin flip, and i was wondering if calling the allin was the correct play.
Ill give 2 recent examples:
1) I called an allin with 77, other guy had KJ and the board paired Aces and Tens leaving me empty handed. (i thought he might shove with Ax, any pp or 2 face cards) so in my mind i had a slight advantage.
2) I call an allin with AQs, other guy had TT, board came up dry and i headed back home.
(i had this guy on AT+, pp, or 2 face cards)
Now obviously i shouldnt be calling these bets if we had bigger stacks, but with the short stacks you just cant wait around for AA/KK all the time.
So my question is should i be making these calls, or should i just let them steal, and wait till its my turn to steal back?
Unless the prize structure for your tournament is exceptionally flat, I like both of your choices to get the money in.
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Tags: all-in situations, coin flips, no-limit-holdem, poker, poker-tournaments, taking a stand
Say you consider yourself to be among the best players at this tournament. In this situation, I believe tightening up a little more when it comes to calling is a better approach. Especially if your stack is above 10 BB.
The fact that the other players are weaker than you implies that they’ll make mistakes that will allow you to win some chips without the need of taking a 55-45 deal. I’d wait for 60-40 deals at least.
I would really appreciate some comments on this!