Forward from Doug: Myself and the Upswing Poker team are wishing Texas Mike the best in his current health battle. We’re pulling for the best possible outcome and look forward to seeing him back on the felt soon.
OH…MY…GOD!
That was my honest reaction after seeing this hand play out between Hook and Texas Mike.
It took place on Hustler Casino Live’s Million Dollar Game with blinds of $500/$1,000/$2,000 ($2,000 ante) and an effective stack of around $800,000. Without any further ado, let’s jump right into it!
Note: In this hand, the preflop and flop analyses are straightforward, so I won’t be separating simple analysis and advanced analysis until the turn and river.
Hook raises to $6,000 from the Under the Gun+1 with 8c 7c. Handz cold-calls from the Cutoff with Tc 9c. Texas Mike calls from the Straddle with Th [2s].
Eight-Seven suited is a must-raise and his sizing is good. In this spot, Hook should be open-raising with a pretty wide range (around the top 20% of hands) given the large ante. His open-raise size should be between 2-4 straddles (he went with 3).
Both calling and raising are profitable plays for Handz with Ten-Nine suited. His overall strategy should include both cold-calls and 3-bets. The presence of the straddle and ante provide him with better pot odds to call than you would see in a typical (no ante) cash game.
Ten-Two offsuit should be folded by Texas Mike. Even though he should defend with a wide range given the pot odds and that he is closing the action, his play is simply not going to be profitable. Ten-Two offsuit is among the bottom 15% of hands.
The flop comes As 5h [4c]. The pot is $21,500.
Texas Mike checks. Hook bets $5,000. Handz folds. Texas Mike calls.
Texas Mike makes a standard check here. There is no advantage for him on this board, therefore no reason to lead out into the preflop aggressor.
Hook’s decision to make a small c-bet with his gutshot straight draw is okay. However, I think checking his entire range is a better strategy because Handz has a higher proportion of super strong hands than Hook.
Handz’s fold is clearly good. He doesn’t have enough equity and playability to make a profitable call, especially with a player behind.
Texas Mike’s call is also good. He has a gutshot straight draw to the effective nuts on a rainbow flop, and he’s getting a great price (better than 5-to-1).
Overall, the flop was played decently by all the players.
The turn comes the 6s, making the board As 5h 4c 6s. The pot is $31,500.
Texas Mike checks. Hook bets $16,000. Texas Mike raises to $52,000. Hook calls.
Texas Mike should always check here, which he does. This is not a good card for him to develop a leading range on.
With the turned nuts, Hook should always bet. As far as sizing goes, anything from 50% to 80% pot is appropriate.
Texas Mike should be check-folding at this point. His hand is very weak with little hope to improve to the best hand against Hook’s range — he actually has 0% chance to outdraw Hook’s actual hand.
He should check-raise bluff with some hands in this spot. However, he has higher-equity bluffs that are better suited to this play (pair plus straight draw hands like 86-suited or 75-suited, for example).
Hook needs to decide if calling or raising is better at this point. The better option depends on how Texas Mike will play the river. If Texas Mike will be overly aggressive, Hook should set the trap by just calling.
The turn 6s would normally be an action killer because the nuts have changed, and previously strong hands (like AK) have to play more passively now.
Texas Mike’s check is good as this card doesn’t improve his range disproportionately. He should check his entire range here.
Hook has the nuts, so firing a turn barrel is a must. The weakest hand he should be barreling for value with is probably Pocket Fours. That being said, we are off the optimal path of the game tree (as a range check on the flop is probably optimal). So I will focus on breaking this down street-poker style (aka old-school poker).
As far as sizing goes, anything from 50% to 80% pot is good. An overbet wouldn’t be good, as that would push Texas Mike’s range towards too many strong hands, thus losing value.
Texas Mike should be check-folding at this point. His hand is very weak and his blockers are not relevant. It would be much better for him to check-raise with hands like a pair + straight draw that block sets and straights.
The only good thing about Texas Mike’s bluff candidate here is that it isn’t blocking any of Hook’s bluffs. But as a counterpoint to that, Hook might not even have any bluffs at this point.
Hook has a tough decision to make between calling and re-raising (both choices have merit). His opponent is representing the nuts or a bluff. The expected value (EV) between these options hangs on the answer to the following question:
Is Texas Mike going to be overly aggressive on the river after Hook calls?
If the answer to the question is “No”, then raising would be more profitable. That would deny Texas Mike’s equity, capturing the most amount possible from the pot. Why is that? If Texas Mike would never bluff on the river, for example, then trapping has no upside for Hook.
If Texas Mike is going to be overly aggressive on the river, then Hook should want to call. Trapping gives Texas Mike the chance to put substantially more money into the pot, as his bluffs have little equity.
As a general rule, the less equity the bluffs have, the more incentivized you are to slow-play a strong hand. The downside to slow-playing (letting them catch up) is reduced in these cases.
A note that is going to be important for the river: Texas Mike’s is representing exactly a straight in this situation. No one should ever raise with two pair or a set in this spot (granted, that doesn’t mean they won’t).
The river comes the Ah, making the final board As 5h 4c 6s Ah. The pot is $136,500.
Texas Mike checks. Hook bets $160,000. Texas Mike shoves for a total of $734,000.
On this Ah river, Hook is much more likely to have a full house than Texas Mike. Hook would have bet with all sets and maybe some two pairs on the turn, then he would have called the raise. Meanwhile, Texas Mike will rarely, if ever have a full house considering the turn action.
For this reason, Texas Mike’s decision to check is good.
Faced with this check, Hook’s overbet is a mistake. His opponent’s range is a straight or a missed bluff. If he wants to get called by worse, he should bet smaller.
Texas Mike’s check-raise all-in is incredibly bold. This is not the right spot or hand with which to bluff from a theoretical perspective. Hook can have so many full houses and might hero call with a straight.
Despite facing a massive all-in of $734,000, Hook should call. Texas Mike is representing a full house that he basically can’t have given how the action has played out.
Given how the hand played out, the Ah river is normally an action-killer. Texas Mike’s best hands, the straights, have been devalued. Meanwhile, Hook can have a lot of full houses.
This range versus range dynamic should lead Texas Mike to check his entire range at this point. Smart check from him to start the river action.
Hook now has an interesting decision to make. On one hand, his opponent is either holding a weak hand or the same hand as him. This means that there is no value to be had against a solid player (because they would check-fold all the weaker hands).
On the other hand, if he thinks there is a non-zero chance that his opponent is going to do something aggressive with those airball hands, then betting to induce does make sense.
Having said that, overbetting here without a full house doesn’t make sense. Why? Because the likelihood of inducing a bluff-raise drops the larger he bets. It’s true from both a practical (psychological) and theoretical (mathematical) standpoint.
Without knowing this information about Texas Mike, it’s best to check-back and scoop the pot very often.
Now onto Texas Mike’s decision, who should fold at this point. As I said in the turn section, his hand doesn’t have the right blocker properties to be a good bluffing candidate.
Also, his check-shove is way too big. His required fold equity is very high, and he would have to have Hook folding some full houses to be profitable. This is even more true when faced with an overbet, as that range is going to be stronger than when faced with a smaller bet.
Folding would be a mistake by Hook. If you’ve followed the thought process so far, you will have understood that Texas Mike should rarely, if ever have a full house. The only logical conclusion here is that he is bluffing.
Hook folds. Texas Mike drags in the nearly $300K pot with one of the boldest bluffs I’ve ever seen!
What about Texas Mike’s bluff? Let me know in the comments below.
Texas Mike is a legend for this one. I don’t care how much money you have in the bank. Betting $800,000 while holding nothing is a lot of risk for anyone.
You cannot fault Hook for folding here. By calling, he would also be risking the same enormous amount of money with a pure bluff-catcher. This would cloud anyone’s judgment.
Huge respect for both players for putting it all on the line like that!
If you want more high stakes hand analysis, check out Doug Polk Tries to Bluff a Guy Who’s Up $2.5 Million (Hustler Casino Live Analysis).
Till’ next time, good luck, grinders!
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