Busting out of freerolls with AA

MTT's are very swingy, you can go hundreds of hundreds games w/o cashing.
Only advice to give you is: get used to it.

Originally posted by Backcushion
MTT's are very swingy, you can go hundreds of hundreds games w/o cashing.

+1

Specially in some megafield freeroll tournaments on Stars.

This happens to me all the time(@ stars)too.Also not just at freerolls and many times b4 final table...Makes me wanna vomit

This happened to me last night. So risky on the bubble, but it was still a sick suckout.

PokerStars - Hold'em Tournament - $500/1000 Blinds - 8 Players
Hand Converter by Pokerhand.org

KOCKAPOKER (CO): $2,840
bambolin1 (BTN): $1,810
Mr.Tsuba (SB): $7,688
lenghel (BB): $26,121
laz1961 (UTG): $3,603
tigerlove54 (UTG+1): $10,786
superjaimie (MP1): $26,329
cepo-yo (MP2): $7,186

Pre-flop: Dealt to laz1961 A♠ A♣
laz1961 raises to $3,503 and is all-in, tigerlove54 calls $3,503, (6 folds)

Flop: ($9,306) K♦ Q♥ 4♣ (2 Players)

Turn: ($9,306) T♣ (2 Players)

River: ($9,306) 2♣ (2 Players)

laz1961 Showed A♠ A♣
tigerlove54 Showed Q♣ 7♣
tigerlove54 wins $9,306

84.17% preflop
77.98% after flop
70.45% after turn

I find this hand to be typical of PokerStars' incredible bubble suckouts. Dominating hands are less dominating and I estimate in this situation my AA drops from 85% to around 60% with KK and KA dropping to under 50%.
This is not a one off. This has been happening for the 2 years I've been playing on Stars, sometimes almost a daily occurence.

I don't know what advice to give, apart from just playing live poker (where the cards don't know you're on the bubble as opposed to software that does).

To me it was idiotic that someone would call off a third of their stack to call a shove with Q7 suited particularly on the bubble.

It was a 360 man .10c SnG with 48 players left with 36 to get paid.

So it doesn't just happen in freerolls.

you got AA in the early stages of a freeroll just go all in pre you will get called plenty of times with trash hands.

People tend to call very loosely at the start of an MTT especially if it's a freeroll. They're usually in "i have 3000 chips fck 120 i'll call maybe i hit something" mindset, and when 1 calls usually more will follow and all of a sudden your aces are not that good.

Shoving aces in that phase is not a bad idea cause there will be people who'll try their luck with Ax KJ+ QJ or a PP, and most of the time you'll have only 1 caller and a great chance to double up.

Originally posted by boboistina
People tend to call very loosely at the start of an MTT especially if it's a freeroll. They're usually in "i have 3000 chips fck 120 i'll call maybe i hit something" mindset, and when 1 calls usually more will follow and all of a sudden your aces are not that good.

Shoving aces in that phase is not a bad idea cause there will be people who'll try their luck with Ax KJ+ QJ or a PP, and most of the time you'll have only 1 caller and a great chance to double up.

Agree totally. Early in MTTs you have to be prepared to drop your premium hands if you can't get heads up.

Once it becomes three handed you are only flipping.

So should I have gone all in earlier to knock out more of the limpers pre? Or was going all in after the flop a bad move? I did think about just calling the bet on the flop and seeing out the rest hand as cheaply as possible, but I figured anyone who had KQh would risk half their stack to see out the monster draw.

Originally posted by AFFROPANDA
but I figured anyone who had KQh would risk half their stack to see out the monster draw.

board: th jh 4s
Hand Equity Wins Ties
kh qh 49.39% 489 0
ad ac 50.61% 501 0

[propokertools.com]

if u put your opponent on this hand you have to ask yourself do you really want to flip for ur stack at this point?

Erf, yeah. I'm still clueless when it comes to hand equity etc - makes me a pretty poor postflop player!

So it might have been prudent to fold the aces in the face of a large postflop bet with a draw heavy board?

Originally posted by AFFROPANDA
Erf, yeah. I'm still clueless when it comes to hand equity etc - makes me a pretty poor postflop player!

So it might have been prudent to fold the aces in the face of a large postflop bet with a draw heavy board?

i dnt rly know tbh, im far from an expert... buuuuut its a freeroll and u have aces imagine all the crap you will get called by lol! including all kinds of draws and pairs with the occasional 2 pair or set. my spider senses are telling me its a value shove. id say you played the hand well.

maybe someone more knowledgable will weigh in.

i do think that you are over analysing a bit... freerolls are just about waiting for strong starting hands and taking people to value town (which is pretty much what u did). then the inevitable sigh, another crazy call sucks out on you, then you move on because fuck it its a freeroll and crazy shit happens all the time.

Originally posted by badgerer
i do think that you are over analysing a bit... freerolls are just about waiting for strong starting hands and taking people to value town (which is pretty much what u did). then the inevitable sigh, another crazy call sucks out on you, then you move on because fuck it its a freeroll and crazy shit happens all the time.

Best advice so far

First of all:
Hi Affropanda and welcome to the forums. Hope you like what you see and will come back from time to time. If you have any questions feel free to ask!

Talking about your questions:

Originally posted by badgerer

Originally posted by AFFROPANDA
but I figured anyone who had KQh would risk half their stack to see out the monster draw.

board: th jh 4s
Hand Equity Wins Ties
kh qh 49.39% 489 0
ad ac 50.61% 501 0

[propokertools.com]

if u put your opponent on this hand you have to ask yourself do you really want to flip for ur stack at this point?

Even if this is the only reasonable hand your opponent could ever have (and it's not) you would have to call. Sure - it is a flip - but you already invested some chips and the pot is quite big. Therefore you don't even need 50% to make a profitable call. You get the odds to call with way less equity.

If you want to know how to evaluate your hands better you should try out the pokerstrategy.com Equilab. It is a software tool that helps you to analyse your hand against an opponents' range. You may find it if you follow this link:
Pokerstrategy.com Equilab

The software is for free and easy to use. I really recommend an extensive practise with this tool since knowledge about your equity is absolutely crucial in every part of a tournament.

If you need further information on how to evaluate your equity and how to know how much equity you need you may find good articles in our strategy-column. A very basic article about odds and outs can be found in the Bigstack-Strategy-section:
Mathematics of Poker: Odds and Outs

If you are not sure if you played a hand right you can use our hand evaluation forums. Our professional hand judges will have a look at every hand that is posted and will provide you with good feedback on your play. The mtt hand evaluation forums can be found here:
Hand evaluations up to 12$

If you need further information just post your questions

Regards,
Asaban

AFRO, you're not alone. I used to play the freerolls everyday, 888, PartyPoker.... and I was always looking to get as far as possible playing good hands and paying attention on my position and what my opponents were doing....

Then I started to follow since the begining of the tournament (by opening their tables from the lobby) those players that had since the start a triple up or a quadruple up within 3 minutes. Well.... donk donk donk, there's no other word for that. And they keep acting like that.

A good number of times I've done well enough to be at the first 50th places (out of sometimes 4k people) and 2 times I've been in the final table of these tournaments, my best result was the 4th place.

Here I have to tell you, in these 2 times in the final table, both times I lost for the chip leader in a ridiculous way:

1st : I had JJ, I raise and got re-raised all in to what??? Q 5 OFF SUIT!!! Busted by runner runner runner runner flush draw!

2nd: I had AA, I raise and got re-raised all in to what??? K 5 clubs... I don't even have to say what happended!!

These guys are what I call "PROFESSIONAL DONKS". It's unbealiveable! They seem to have some freak psy power or something.... Why? Because they do act like that consistently since the begining.

So, since then, to me, Freerolls are like that: it's a donk field.