Stupid Hindsight

I decided to give PokerRoom another chance today, and played in a $5 MTT. 325 people played and the top 40 make the money.

I was in 25th place with about $T6900, the blinds were $T300/$T600 and I was on the button when it was folded around to me. I have [Ah 4h]. There are 51 players remaining. I don’t have any reads on anyone at the table because I’ve changed tables about every 10 hands this tournament. So what would you do in this case? I’ll give you a minute to think about it…





Well, I’ll tell you what I did, and why. I went all in. I really just wanted to just raise them, but I thought that there would be no way I could put any more money in the pot if either of them called or re-raised. And if that happened, I’d be in danger of getting blinded away. I didn’t want to fold, because I thought there was still a good chance that I was ahead and even if I wasn’t I could induce a fold based on how close we were to making the money. I felt like if I wasn’t going to play that hand then I might as well check the auto-fold option and walk away. I was pretty sure they would fold and the $T900 in the pot would have made me a lot more comfortable in regards to being able to make the money.

Now, hindsight being what it is, I realize that probably any hand that they would call with would be way ahead of me, and that if I had just raised, and been prepared to fold to any aggression on their part I might still be in the tournament.

As you have probably guessed, the big blind did call, and he had a pair of queens. My hand improved, but queens still beat fours so I went from a position where I likely would have made the money, to one where I was eliminated 11 spots away.

I should have just folded, and waited for a better hand to try to make a move. If one never came along, there still would have been a good chance for me to finish in the money. Stupid hindsight, I hate you and you’re know it all attitude. Where were you when I was making this horrible play?