Well, I thoroughly failed both of these on the bubble tonight.
I was short stacked on the SB with about 1300 in chips against 100/200 blinds. The big stack, who was playing very loose (over 50% VPIP), limps from the button. I push with QTo. The BB folds and the button calls. He turns over A2 and his ace holds up. I am knocked out on the bubble. Bad decision--bad result.
I have NO IDEA why I pushed here. There is NO valid reason for a push. However, there are a number of reasons not to push. I will outline them, more for a reminder for myself the next time I am in this situation.
First, the math. In order for this to be a positive EV push, the BB would have had to limp with over 50% of starting hands and then only called my push with about 8%. Well, 8% puts you in the range of any pocket pairs 66 or above, AJ and ATs or higher. That is a pretty tight range. Don't you think he would have raised preflop if he had one of these hands? These are MONSTER hands for someone playing + 50% VPIP.Second, the situation. I had witnessed the big stack gambling all throughout the tournament. He was calling with much lower hands than A2. But he was catching cards and knocking people out. I should have been thinking about this. He is on a rush. He is feeling invincible. Why wouldn't he call my push. He has been winning his races and sucking out when he is behind. Why should he think any differently in this scenario?
Third, in case I didn't mention it... he is the big stack. With close to 7000 in chips, do you think he cares of he looses a hand against my 1300 stack. Nope. No reason for him to lock down at this point. I am not going to scare him into hiding.
Forth, my chip count was still high enough to fold. As a general rule, if you have more than 5 BB's, you can still fold without loosing your folding equity. QT is not a very strong hand. I should have just let it go.
Finally, due to my initial profiling and categorizing this player, I knew he was a major fish. Major fish do not typically fold in this situation. That's what makes them fish. If this were a strong winning player, I could probably get him to lay down his limp. But that just isn't going to happen very often against a fish, especially when he is the dominant chip leader.
So why did I push here? I have no idea. I know this hand will bother me for a while. It is mistakes like this that I am trying to eliminate. It would have been one thing if I had some type of read on this player that suggested he would fold. Or maybe some fancy ICM calculation that supported this action. But instead, everything about this situation screamed FOLD, FOLD, FOLD. But I still pushed.
I am banning myself from playing until I can explain my action (or at least until I cool down!).
