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1.Against All Odds
2.World Series Of Poker Hands | Amir’s Big Call I have a lot respect for the way Amir Vahedi play poker card games. In fact, for a while there, I was taking a piece of his tournament play, and ended up winning poker money while I backed him. Although Amir occasionally gets a little testy while playing in tournaments (not nearly as testy as I do!), he showed a lot of grace and class in defeat on many of the occasions I witnessed in 2003. As at the Bellagio in July 2003, when he was leading both tournaments he was playing in (this is really remarkable in itself), and was busted out of both within minutes of each other, but left with a very positive attitude and, believe it or not, a big smile on his face party poker. In Bellagio’s Five Diamond World Poker Classic $10,000 buy-in Championship event in December 2003, the following unbelievable hand came up late during day two. I have seldom seen a hand like this one in all the years I’ve been playing poker. With $1,000-$2,000 blinds, the first raise was $3,500 to go by player X, and then Amit made it $10,000 to go with pocket tens. Juha Helppi ( the WPT UltimateBet.com champion) studied the scene for three minutes before going all-in from the big blind for $35,500 total. The first-position raiser, X, then moved all-in, and now it would cost $25,500 more for him to call-and he only had $30,000 left. Amir studied and studied, and finally pushed in the money to call.
What the heck was going on there? Juha flipped up A-A, X had Q-Q, and Y had A-K off suit. The flop came down 10-J-2, then a nine followed by a seven card stud, and Amir had won the monstrous pot with three tens. How did Amir play this hand? I like his reraise before the flop, making it $10,000 to go. This is pretty standard, although I sometimes just call here. I hate his call of $25,500 more, but he was getting laid 4 to 1 on the call. You’re arguing with me. You’re saying that he was only a 4.5-to-1 underdog here, and that he had potodds for the call. Not exactly. Amir had to know that at lest one player had an overpair in this spot, but more than likely two players had an overpair, the way the high limit action came down. Did anyone doubt that Juha had A-A or K-K? Of course not. Juha had slid in his last $35,500 with only a $1,000 big blind invested after a raise, reraise, and an all-in. In my mind, he had to have A-A, although K-K would be believable. And how about poker the hands that players X and y held? Y moved all-in after a raise and a reraise; and X moved all-in after a reraise, an all-in, and another all-in. Why should Amir cripple himself (Amir would have had only about $5,000 left) with 10-10 in this spot? The way Amir plays poker, he had enough money to fold and still easily get to the $140,000 in chips mark that he ended up with at the end of this spectacular hand. Amir had a clear fold.
How about player X’s play with his pocket Q-Q? With only $3,500 in the pot limit hold'em, it would seem like an easy fold for X after a reraise, an all-in, and another all-in from Juha (again, Juha was likely to have A-A or K-K). Unless X had only $10,000 or less left after his initial $3,500 raise, it was a bad call. (Of course, if X was inexperienced, then perhaps he should have put the money in and tried to get lucky for the pot odds.) How about player Y’s play with his A-K? Because Amir reraises a fair number of pots, it would seem OK to move all-in over the top of him with A-K here. (Of course, I wouldn’t want to make the same move against a tight player who had reraised before the flop!) I will add that folding A-K here in this spot against Amir would be OK, too. How about Juha’s play with A-A? Of course, he had to move all-in with A-A to protect his hand-there was a lot of money in the pot already. But I don’t like the stall with A-A against one opponent (although the top players will see right through it anyway), but entirely another thing to stall around against three other active raisers, trying to lure them in when the pot is already monstrous. Juha will learn soon enough that aces don’t always hold up. I would have moved all-in instantly, thus sending a message to everyone that I had A-A. Why stall around trying to pick up extra gaming money when the pot was already so big? By the way, Juha got what he wanted: he lured Amir into the pot, only to have Amir outdraw him. Be careful what you ask for.
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6.From The Other Side Of Table 7.Poker Hollywood Style |
