Got knocked out of a tournament this weekend by set over set, it always stings thinking you're way ahead and trapping the other guy (gal in this case)... never see it coming. Although this time I felt like I may have run into set over set... TRN has pocket deuces... the villain raised preflop, I was the only caller. Flop is J32... sweeeeeet. No one sees bottom set coming at them. I hope she has an over pair or something like AJ here. She bets, I call. Turn is a Q... She bets, I raise, she 3-bet shoves, and I just start to wonder if it's possible she's got JJ or QQ. I had a hunch but I guess I am not good enough to lay down the set in this case. No straights or flushes possible on the board here... I call her, she has QQ. River blanks for both of us... tournament over. Would you be able to lay down bottom set? I think I could in something like WSOP main. I dont think I could bring myself to do it in something at my local card room.
First the classic answer applies here: it depends. The most significant factor is what your read on the opponent is, of course. If you've sat enough rounds with them to see they're ultra tight preflop not been too out of line postflop, then *maybe* you can start to seriously think about being up against QQ or JJ and find a fold there. But in an average daily tournament situation, where you probably have only been sitting across from the player for less than an hour, I think you are up against hands like AQ AJ KQ KJ enough of the time that folding is wrong there. Don't start imagining monsters under the bed just because you got unlucky. Play poker enough, and this will happen a fair number of times. You can't agonize over it. The only cure is to be on the winning end of a set over set over set situation and get a triple up. That will make you forget those underset losses.
Hindsight is .....but I would think there was a very good chance that she had a pocket pair and a set at the flop since you already had the twos there is only one out for you on the river. I would have folded after her three bet. But I mostly play at home games and have 20/20 hindsight and very conservative poker play
Obviously it depends where you are in the tournament and where she is. But I think I usually go broke there. With only one pre flop raise, the 3 bet shove could be a bunch of hands, and is the first sign of anything better than top pair strength you've gotten from her.
Even if you have a read that the person is "super conservative" players.. what if the person had AA/KK and was trying to protect that. It is a tough fold for sure.. especially with only set possiblities beating you.. no flush/straight.. that would be xray vision fold
Whaddup I could never lay it down. I think you played it right. you called a raise with a small pair to hit a set - you hit your set, the flop is favorable your 90% favorite on the flop vs an overpair (I think) just go with the hand, I would always raise flop (it doesn't matter in this situation) the money is going in. full disclosure - I am tournament donk, so you may want to ignore my advice. I would just cook myself up a steak, and get them next time.
remmerde has already covered the answer "it depends" relating to reads and ranges. My answer is also "it depends", but I'm going for the other angle. How many Big Blinds did she shove for? How many Big Blinds is the average stack? How far are you from the money? My immediate reaction to how you played it is that I would find it very hard to lay down a set there, but if we are already deep into the tourney and I can see the money bubble creeping up, I MIGHT be able to let it go. Sometimes, you have to play the tournament and not the opponent or the hand.
Eh, like people have said above, I think you have to go with this hand. Something else important would be that given you just called pre, you are very close to if not at the very top of your range when you flop 222 on that board - how often do we have a hand that strong when we only flat pre and again on the J32 rainbow? Generally theory wise, in close spots its better to lean towards a fold when you are at the bottom of your range / perceived range when there are better hands you can show up with in that given spot to fight back with. If we are folding 222 in that spot, then we also are folding literally everything else we can show up with there besides exactly 333 (and maybe JJJ the small portion of the time you slow played pre / just flat called pre). I also think if we are folding the top of our range on a dry board like that, a good opponent that is paying attention could exploit that line by lead / 3-bet shoving a lot of different banana hands in this spot knowing that we need 333 or JJJ to continue (if 222 is a fold), bluffing us off of everything else. I don't think folding a set there vs all of the hands your opponent could have or rep (AA, KK, QJss, pair plus turned flush draw, str8 + fl draw combo, or even weaker AQ etc) is better. Your opponent could be raising worse hands for value too, that you beat. Don't think anybody could have really played it any better without a sick read / unless maybe villain was a super tight player and 200 bb deep, just a super cooler imo
You did not really include a lot of information about the hand. How deep were you in BB's? Were you near the money? In a low limit tournament in Vegas folding a set is almost never something you even want to consider, even when it seems like you are beat some people will show up with all sorts of hands...Don't sweat it !
Yeah I purposely left out some of the finer details on purpose just to see what people would say. It's a local $75 tournament run very turbo style... this was level 6 which is a few levels after antes are introduced and everyone starts shoving anyway. Her and I were near even in chips, we had probably each doubled up once by that point. You start the tourney with 60 BB's and by level 6 with one double up I had about 15 BB's. The villain probably had me just covered, 16-17 BB's. 100 entries give or take, about 70-80 left, and money at 12.
You started the hand with 15 big blinds and were 5 bets in before someone shoved? That short, I'd probably have shoved on the flop. But you probably would have been called by the overpair and lost to the suckout anyway.
Okay, given that, I am absolutely going to get my chips in here and not regret the bad outcome one bit. You are describing a "high movement" point of a tournament. It would be absolutely wrong to fold a set here in this case. I think you played it right.
There's no way in hell you lay the hand down in that particular situation, as you know sometimes you ship the chips and go on to the next tourney
