Tyron Krost: The hand of my undoing

Well after a decent run I’m out of the WPT Paris event. It was a really good tournament; good structure, well run, good location, but alas, not a good finish for me.

I woke up after a really great night’s sleep, had a solid breakfast and took a walk around the streets here before heading to the tournament. I felt really good and was looking forward to the day ahead, but was stifled along the way.

The hand of my undoing

I might as well go through the hand of my undoing, it’s fairly interesting, fresh in my memory and perhaps I could get some opinions on it.

Some background info: Had a nice stack going into day 3, but got seated with two of the chip leaders directly on my left. My table would be breaking with 32 left (27 got paid, 39 were left), so I was planning on just playing solid until then and reassessing once the table was broken.

We had been playing for roughly an hour and I hadn’t been involved too much but was starting to get a bit more active. I 3-bet with JJ from the BB an orbit before and took the blinds as well a few hands later. In this hand, I didn’t really know much about the opponent other than that he had a big stack and was a youngish guy who seemed like a good player.

My stack ~170k, opponent covers, BB has about 80k. Blinds 1k/2k with a 300 ante.

I raised to 5k with JJ utg+1, opponent called and BB called. Flop came Jh8h6h. I bet out 14k, villain called and BB folded.

Turn was the 10d, and I led out again with another biggish bet of 33.5k. He took a bit of time then called.

River came the 5d and I bet out 36k, assuming I still had the best hand and hoping for a call. He went all in and I took some time and called. He showed the AhKh.

The ugliest spot I could be in

With about 60% of my chips in the pot, this felt like the ugliest spot I could be in. To be honest, I just didn’t think a flush was in his range until he shoved the river. Reasons being a big suited Ace I thought was probably going to 3-bet me preflop, he’d protect a lower made flush on the flop or at least on the turn and I felt like he would’ve folded a small suited Ax type hand preflop.

Going into the river I thought he had the Ah10 a fair amount of time with a AhQ also quite possible, AhJ I guess was also possible but unlikely as I had two of them and he’d probably be more active on the flop with that. I didn’t think that any of the straights were that realistic, maybe Qh9, but I eliminated the chances of him having that. Of those hands, AhQ or Ah10 might decide to run a big bluff on the end with the Ah blocker. From a lot of time playing tournament poker against young European guys, they seem to love running those big fancy bluffs with blocking cards, so that is at the back of my mind.

I really could’ve flipped a coin

Once he went all in I really could’ve flipped a coin though either way. My gut told me he had it (specifically I thought an Ahxh type of hand was most likely) and I was about ready to muck, but with so much invested and a price of around 3:1 on the call I thought there was about that price on him running a big bluff. Anyway, I couldn’t bring myself to fold. Basically all my hand was at the end of the day was a really elaborate bluff-catcher, but it was too hard for me to fold there.

In hindsight maybe I could’ve gotten away. But I really don’t know. I’ll ask some friends, and they’ll probably say it’s close or I’m a fish. Either way, can’t change the fact that I’m out of the tournament. I’d feel better about myself though if we could’ve gotten it all in on the flop.

Oh well, guess that’s what next time is for.