Voslyn 5 - 2 Multi-table Tournaments (MTTs) $3 buyin each. 39 minutes long. Beginning stages of tournament play.

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I am actually four tabling during the recording, I focus mainly on two tables, but I bring in the other tables from time to time for interesting hands. The plan was to have a backup table in case I went broke in one of the two main tables, unfortunately Camtasia crashed on me after recording the early stages of the tournaments. I wasn’t able to get it going for the rest of these tournaments, but I have pulled a couple of interesting hand histories to review from the unrecorded part of the tournaments. Hand 1 is interesting because I end up calling all-in with no pair. I have to decide whether or not he is playing his hand straight-forward, or instead if he is calling me loosely and trying to get lucky or outplay me after the flop. He knows I am a button raiser and he knows that I might have a wide range of hands in that spot. So I don’t think I have to put him on a big hand.

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Ultimately I decide that I have the best hand. He would most likely check a Jack or a Big overpair on the flop. He would very likely re-raise his medium pairs pre-flop rather than take a chance on a bunch of big cards coming down on the flop. So that leaves a 5 or a bluff, and maybe a tiny pocket pair. If I can put him on cold-calling me before the flop with a 5, I can just as easily put him on a bluff. So I think a call is best here. This is a tricky spot and is very much dependent on the player, position, and your feel in the hand. Some players will play their hands very straightforward (not many players in the micro tourneys) rather than checkraising their big hands, vs. this type of player you will want to be careful in a spot like this.

Hand 2 is one of my last hands in the pokerstars 45-man tournament. I think I made a mistake in this hand and looking back I would prefer a different line of play.

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Given the stack sizes, I think a call preflop is best, and a reraise all-in is preferable to the smallish raise that I made. I have a stack that gives me room to maneuver and his min-raise gives me the opportunity to make a call and try to hit the flop. This would avoid the problem of committing all of my chips when I am not sure where I am. If he had raised 3-times the big blind, then I think shoving all-in would be the best play. However in this exact circumstance I like a call the best, and a reraise all-in second best.