RUNNER RUNNER at $250,000 Final Table (WSOP Hand Breakdown)

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With over $5,000,000 on the line this might be the sickest bad beat you’ve ever seen. Ben “Ben86” Tollerene faces off against Taylor von Kriegenbergh at the $250,000 Super High Roller final table.
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Episode transcription: upswingpoker.c...
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[@UpswingPoker]

Get 33% off Aaron Barone's exclusive training content in the Upswing Lab during the Vegas Winners Sale* at upswingpoker.com/the-poker-lab-coaching *Expires when the WSOP Main Event ends.

[@RobRochon]

Dear lord, this is why you should never get coached by nerd children living in mom and dad's basement making decisions with computer simulations and absolutely zero appreciation for money. Sure...if you have tens of millions of dollars in your bank account, AND you trust these simulations are gospel truth (I don't) then why not slow play your KK with 2nd huge stack compared to the other 4 players? But most people - including most poker players and even the "high rollers" (often staked) don't have THAT kind of money in their accounts. The correct play is to grind it out until the small stacks need to start donk shoving while you're in a great situation with huge stack and in position against the large stack and pick them off. Reraise pre-flop and let Tollerence know he's going to be playing for stacks with his crappy hands and be thrilled to take down the $1.2M preflop which will undoubtedly help you if you try to pick off a small stack later and the flip doesn't go your way. When you smooth call the set on the flop, and the turn comes and you still have the nuts, when the chip leader bets another $1.7M, making the pot $7.4M - this pot alone covering the two small stacks - the you absolutely take it down right then and there with a shove. If your chip leader decides to call your all in in that situation its because he also has a set, he's never calling the gutter, and if he does then you're 2% for him to hit his quads and you're going to win the tournament. And if he folds you win a $7.4M pot making our stack almost 50% of chip leader's stack, but more importantly more than three times the small stacks and double the larger other two smaller stacks...so vital when the small stacks are getting squeezed by the blinds and need to force their play. There are times to take risks and times you don't. This is life changing money and you turds don't get it because you've lived privileged lives. I'd never recommend buying your training based on your analysis of this hand alone.

[@jasonbatteiger2421]

oh no there are players (not good ones) that'll make fun of the K's guy for not "protecting his pot/hand" here post flop and preflop. do not educate them, let them let you off the hook every time they want on the flop when you have 3% equity vs their current nuts. hope they remember the ONE time they didn't and ran this bad and are so scared of that ever happening again they won't easily let it happen again.

[@jasonbatteiger2421]

sometimes at low stakes this actually isn't close to as bad as vs good/great opponents also, these good/great opponents DO have bluffs in their range, for all streets, at least some of the time. for say a 1-2 player, if you trap your kings even at similar stack depths to here (or low limit tourneys since we're talking tourneys here), the average 1-2 player might not say ever have triple fire bluffs worth trapping for. a lot of the equity in the way the KK's guy is playing his hand is since tollerene WILL try to leverage the ICM pressure by triple firing a good bit of the time.

[@jasonbatteiger2421]

that "do not educate them" comment was NOT meant for the upswing pros specifically educating us here, i mean us, regular poker players, do NOT stop your opponents from playing badly, is what was meant.

[@jasonbatteiger2421]

also the worse the opponents are, the higher % of those will be just stations, and if yr sitting there on flop with KK's thinking "this can't be a raise, i got the deck crippled, what hand can opp even call with" well you're not a station, they want to call with a LOT more than you'd ever think to. some might bet/call a raise with like 98 hoping for backdoor 5's and 7's etc.

[@jasonbatteiger2421]

when guys this good are smiling like that, in this spot, it's exactly that, "sometimes you just lose" and he knows it.

[@tiki4rafiki390]

good anaylsis! makes me feel better about getting sucked out on last session -_-

[@tphuynh85]

Cool analysis

[@JayMaverick]

On the river yeah you call and lose. Can't be afraid of a one outer-nuts. I think the "mistake" if you can call it a mistake, was not raising the flop and turn. But that's the chance you take, and sometimes it bites you in the arse.

[@AlbinoMutant]

I know the guys tried to explain why he was slowplaying a strong hand that was getting stronger, but if there's a mistake in this hand, imo it's that. There should have been a raise preflop and a raise on the turn. All I get from this hand is another example of why I'd rather make the mistake of betting or raising in the wrong spot than checking or calling in the wrong spot.

[@abarone68]

You're more likely to win the pot, but long term it'll result in less value

[@johngriller4997]

If you never play a raising strat IP OTT then OOP can destroy you with small turn sizes bc he will over realize with all his draws. Without being results oriented, IP got unlucky but he also misplayed by not raising. You always want to gii with your best hands so allowing your opponent to dictate the size of the pot by betting tiny+allowing him to realize his equity at will is a mistake. Had he bet a standard size (75%+) then flatting the KK would’ve been the standard and only play. You simply HAVE to build a raising range (value and bluffs) vs small bets in every branch of the tree or you will self exploit yourself by allowing others to easily exploit you! And this is why betting larger is better vs good players so you can realize your equity by betting big and polarizing your hand as you should OOP on a double barrel line. This tiny sizing is nonsense and something he used exploitatively either bc he’s a weaker player himself or thinks IP was a weak player that wouldn’t raise enough. The tiny sizing should’ve cost OOP his equity once he got raised and should’ve lost the pot. But it worked bc his opponent was weak. Good play vs population tho

[@johngriller4997]

OTR, vs a good opponent who should’ve raised the turn with his best hands like KK, 66, 33, K9, KQ, and some bluffs like JT, low Axhh, 22-55, that leaves IP with KJ, KT, AhQx, A9cc/dd, QJ and QT cc/hh. Most of this range isn’t raising vs a small sizing, T9s can turn itself into a bluff some amount of the time and then JT combos that didn’t raise will be the main value raise. So his tiny sizing vs a strong opponent makes no sense again. Against pop who under raises all those hands OTT, then it can work bc they will have more hands that will raise OTR for value and literally 0 bluffs or damn near it. For those reasons, I think a bigger bet from Ben makes more sense bc even vs pop who will have more strong hands by the river, a lot of them will not even raise KQ there and 33-99 even bc of ICM and monsters under bed mentality that weak players have. So Ben is really praying for KK there specifically which he lucked out ofc 🤣. A check is tricky, but makes more sense than block sizing bc you unblock the hearts region and 87s that can bluff there, but the heart region will mostly consist of Ax and people often check those back too. And KJ should be a value bet OTR but again, same mentality that weaker players are afraid to value bet bc of what I explained earlier. All in all, as played, I prefer: big sizing, check and block bet are both mediocre but if I had to choose I’d pick block bet over check vs weaker players, and check vs strong players whose range will be very check back heavy on the value region, but will also contain KJ that will correctly re open with a value bet, and will have some low Ax whiffed FDs+87s.

[@MaxwellSmart086]

Hilarious. 'Weak player' at 250k high roller final table. Your analysis is absolute dogshit brother, I don't know where to start

[@user-yu7dm9yd8j]

I remember why i stopped watching these videos

[@speaker151]

Why

[@HD-fc4ds]

Lost me on a flat turn with the nuts lol

[@Roman.Carrasco]

If you are trying to “protect your hand and take the pot” against 2-outers then you are probably not making money playing poker

[@gabrielrockman]

I definitely like the block bet sizing on the river. People really love raising block bets. I think that two pair is going to raise too often here. And block bets are also great at provoking bluffs.

[@johngriller4997]

The block bet sizing on that specific line doesn’t make sense tho. Assuming Tollerene had a plan to exploit pop under raising turns… then betting tiny OTR again with the nuts makes 0 sense bc he should know that they will also under raise rivers here as well. So blocking that spot is very nonsensical, but his button clicking worked lol.

[@gabrielrockman]

@@johngriller4997 I don't think that people will under raise rivers if you use block bet sizing. If you bet large, you won't get raised much. But block bets get raised much more often than large bets do. I think the block bet can also be interpreted as a top pair like K-J or K-10 that is going for thin value and might be scared of a raise. Top pair on the flop is a good hand, but if you don't improve and you've been called twice, it's hard to bet big on the river and get called by worse. The block bet sizing is also still a large bet relative to the blinds because the players put in money on both the flop and turn.

[@kentedwards983]

You push after the turn. The pot is over a third his stack. Take it down. BTW, you guys clearly like to hear yourselves talk. Analysis gets lost in the over speak.

[@WHEREAMI42]

I agree, for ICM you want to just take it down/get in ahead against the chip leader. However the question is do you have all-in turn bluffs?

[@mbradycf]

thanks for your input. Sorry you found us too long winded -- we get excited to talk poker.

[@jaredneilsen]

@@mbradycfdon’t apologise, it was good

[@abarone68]

@@mbradycf I'd like to take this chance apologize...to absolutely nobody

[@enooti1376]

Idk wat pay jumps were but with 2 short stacks on 6 million I think I’d flat river just bcz we never have any bluffs and are praying our opponent has 99,QQ,KQ... If we are going to raise river for value when we no longer have nuts then why not raise on turn when we have less bluffs than river... also feel like having Kh isn’t as relevant since it pairs and doesn’t change fact that chip leader will have plenty Axhh, J10hh, QJhh. I think tollerone went with excellent sizing on turn despite what the analysis said. Plenty of good river cards to bluff and we won’t even have to bet that big.

[@charleslilja4698]

I'm not a proponent of slow playing. Preflop you invite any Ace rag to catch that would have folded pre. The flop was extra dry, so yea ok. But the turn...how greedy do these "pros" expect people to be??? Take the 9mil with a 6.5 or 7mil raise. Maybe I'm the only person to get crushed slow playing

[@theminion8665]

That's not a bad beat. It's a cooler. He had the best hand when the chips went in

[@imustsaythatwasthebesttast7492]

Horrible commentary. The smooth call on the flop is good. The smooth call on the turn is a mistake. He has to jam all in on the turn to prevent the flush & straights getting there.

[@johnd5225]

This video was awful. Would rather watch with zero commentary than drawing it out for half an hour and rewinding 100 times for a single straightforward hand. Doug pls save us.