Thinking About the Game
Throw Away a Winning Hand?
Writer and Poker champion don’t see eye to eye on strategy
by Basil Nestor

Apparently, I am bold. I have been gambling all my life, and have done pretty well at it. But still, it takes a certain level of brazenness to argue about gambling strategy with a winner of the World Series of Poker. Greg Raymer won the WSOP main-event in 2004; his prize was a cool $5 million. Not bad. Greg is a talented poker player. He’s a nice guy, too. Nevertheless, he and I don’t see eye to eye on a particular question. I am right and he is wrong. But of course, Greg says I am wrong.

Our disagreement comes from a conversation we had two years ago. I was interviewing Greg for a story about the WSOP, and we were discussing tournament tactics. I politely disagreed with something he said. Greg politely pressed his point. The result is that two gambling minds collided with no resolution. I told Greg at the time that I would put both of our arguments from that interview into a column and let the readers decide.

Frankly, it took me 24 months to write this because (for Greg’s sake) I pondered and researched the question from every conceivable angle just to be sure that my strategy is correct. I believe it is. We’ll see.

By the way, this problem relates to poker, but it can be applied to any gambling game, particularly blackjack and video poker. If you are unfamiliar with poker, no worries, the basic choice is quite easy to understand.

The Premise
Imagine you are a contestant in the main event of the World Series of Poker. You have invested $10,000 as an entry fee. This means you have $10,000 in tournament chips sitting in front of you. You are the big blind, and you have put $50 in the pot. On the very first hand the player under the gun (first to act) goes all in for $10,000. Never mind that this is an unlikely play. There are many real-world scenarios that are somewhat more complex, yet they still would produce a similar situation to the one I am describing. So let’s just say it happens. The guy under the gun goes all in.

Everyone folds to you. You look down at your hand and you have a pair of deuces.

Now let’s say that you have a perfect read on your opponent, and you absolutely know without a doubt that he would go all in only with an unsuited ace-king. Or as Greg says, “You’re the only person left and I whisper into your ear, ‘This is God. You are 52 percent likely to win.’”

Clearly, you have an advantage. If you call, you will win the hand about 52 times out of 100 and you will lose about 48 times. If you win, you’ll have $20,000 in chips, and you’ll be ahead of the field. If you lose, you are out of the tournament.

Should you call the bet? Greg says you should always call in this situation. I say that it is not an automatic call, and that other factors will often dictate that you should fold.

Greg Raymer’s argument
According to Greg, “The only question in my mind is of all the possibilities and the percentage likelihood of each of them happening. Does the sum total of all those weighted possibilities leave me in a better position or a worse position?”

Note that Greg’s strategy is quite correct in a standard cash game when one hand inevitably follows another. However, this particular situation involves sudden death. The loser is out of the tournament. There is no “next hand.” Greg says this shouldn’t matter.

He tells me, “That’s one tournament. There are a million tournaments. If you don’t play every tournament the absolutely best way possible, then what is the point? To say, ‘Oh, I might die.’ So what? This is not your actual life. Even if it’s the World Series main event and you have to wait a year, there is another one. And even if this is the only one there will ever be, in my mind, what is the point of playing it if you’re not going to play in the optimal way?”

My argument
I agree with Greg that calling with 52 percent chance of winning is mathematically correct over the long run. But in this case, there is no long run. The WSOP is a special event. Indeed, for some players it is a once-in-a-lifetime event. Considering the investment of $10,000, I say that a player should wait for better odds than 52-48. Keep in mind that this is not because calling with pocket deuces is a bad bet. But rather, the odds and the payoff are not good enough to risk sudden death.

Or to put it another way, if you’re planning to spend $200,000 over the next 20 years playing the WSOP main event, then it’s not such a big gamble to go all in with pocket deuces against AK on the first hand. There is always next year. But if you want to increase your chances of surviving to the next hand (from 52 percent to 100 percent), then you should fold and wait for a situation that is less lethal. And of course, calling is certainly a good bet if it is only for a portion of your stack. For example, let’s say it is later in the tournament and AK goes all-in for $1,000 while you are sitting on $25,000. Then by all means, call the bet.

Greg’s rebuttal
Raymer retorts, “Should you play differently because you don’t know if there is a tournament tomorrow? I don’t think you should. I think you should be playing the same game, the same decisions. The only reason you would adjust is because your opponents are playing differently. If that information influences their decisions, you would adjust to their change, but you should not adjust to this fact that this is the last tournament that will ever happen in the history of the world. You still should play in a way that maximizes your equity, and if that means taking a higher risk of getting busted early, then that is what it means.”

Greg graciously admits, “There are many great tournament players like Phil Hellmuth who would agree completely with what you are saying.” Then he adds, “And they’re wrong.”

By the way, Greg and I agree that a fold of this type could be correct if a player is in or near the money. Here’s an example (again somewhat unlikely but effective for the sake of illustration). Let’s say you have pocket aces and there are three people left in the tournament. You are the big blind, and you have the short stack. The first player goes all in, and the second one calls him. It could be correct to throw away your aces because doing so will guarantee that you will move from third place to second place in the prize pool.

And we also agree that playing too tight (folding too much in these situations) inevitably brings death by a thousand cuts as the more aggressive players steal pots. It pays to be unpredictable.

So even though I make an argument for folding, and I am absolutely right, don’t be surprised if I call your AK with pocket deuces in some future tournament.

Enjoy the game!

Basil Nestor is author of The Smarter Bet Guide to Poker, The Smarter Bet Guide to Blackjack, and other comprehensive gambling guides. Got a question? Visit SmarterBet.com and drop him a line.