blonde poker forum

I was an observer to this hand at the 1k NL wsope event..

Two guys have above average chips (let's say 20k+ when the av is 10k, not sure exactly but it's irrevelent to the hand pretty much).

Blinds are 100-200/25.

Player A opens in MP for 500 with KJ. Player B 3bets to 1500 using 3 of his large stack of 500 chips. Player A calls.

The flop comes KT3. A check, B bets 2 x 500 chips. Called.

Turn comes a 7. A check. B bets 3 x 500 chips. Called.

River Q. A check, B now bets 25 x 100 chips despite still having easily enough chips to bet it with 500's.

Should this affect Player A's decision?

NB. This is Player B's first ever live tournament.

He's 18 from Canada and flew over just to play this.

Yeah it would for me

I'd be finding all kinds of reasons to call with a marginal holding

would never read anything into this vs an experienced player. it's def an interesting one with a live virgin though, looks like he's trying to intimidate

doubt it affected A's decision though, he's probs making the call here with KJ whether B bets big chips, little chips or potato chips

I think Live Tells are extremely over-rated, I spot stuff all the time in live poker which obviously mean something, but if you dont know the player all you're gonna do is level yourself in my opinion.

So i wouldn't let this affect my desicion if I have little experience with this player

I may be reading to much into this and probs making a fool of myself but I think I could find a fold here.
If this is his first live tourney how many poker books has he just read which tell him that people throw big denomination chips in when they're strong and lower denomination when they're weak. I think he's hit the flop and bet confidently with the 500's by the time the river has hit he's remembered what the books say about this type of tell and then decided to under rep his hand and throw out the lower denom chips.

Ultimately all tells mean different things for different players and until you can observe these players for any length of time it's just a stab in the dark. Unless of course your name is Cal lightman.

FOLD !

He's just hit his Q which is probably his gin-card imo.

when people do stuff like this i usually jam.

[ ] iv won a big live donkament

Level ? Jamming would be horrible.

Reminds me of a Kevin Saul vs Benny Spindler hand from 2009 PCA, from Saul's blog (http://www.pokerroad.com/blog/kevin-saul/36)

With the blinds 20k-40k, I opened the button with 77 for my standard raise of 95k. Benny then re-popped me to 315k and I made the call. The flop came 10-10-2 rainbow, Benny checked and I decided to check too. Sometimes I bet this flop but I decided to check for pot control and because my hand couldn't stand a large check-raise from Benny who was capable of doing that with nothing. So the turn came a Ks, bringing a flush draw and Benny bet 450k. I took about 2 minutes before making the call. I really felt like the King was a great card for Benny to try represent a hand like QK or AK and I still wasn't sold that he had me beat. Then comes the river where things get tricky.

The river was an Ah and this time Benny bet 650k, really putting me to the test. I took like 5 minutes before finally putting all the pieces together. At this point of the tournament, the biggest chip denomination in play were 25k chips, then 10k, 5k and 1k chips. As you can imagine with the blinds so high the 25k chips were the easiest to maneuver when making bets. Both Benny's pre-flop raise and turn bet consisted of the maximum amount of 25k chips. Now on the river, Benny had about 800k in 25k chips, but when he made his bet on the river he moved the 25k chips out of the way and grabbed 3 stacks of 10k chips. As I contemplated my action on the river I sat and stared at the chips he bet and decided that he had to be bluffing and knew if I called he was going to lose the pot. This is why he didn't make the bet in 25k chips because he wanted them for future hands because they are easier to maneuver. He also appeared nervous and I eventually made the call and he threw his hand toward the muck.

My point exactly, leveled yourself into making a decision, based on factors you do not have the enough information to collaborate.
ignore it imo unless you have VERY VERY strong read/reasoning to allow you to use this info effectively.

I'm still green with live tells.

I guess his mass of chips could be an intimidation thing in which case strong=weak  ===CALL.

Could also be a rouse to say check out this attractive mass of chips you could win in this pot == FOLD.

Just from the hand alone I'd call, the interpretation of the tells do nothing to sway me away from a call.

When he uses the little chips, that'd make me less likely to call rather than more so.

I'd prolly have some idea just paying attention to previous betting patterns if any. And I doubt he is such an ubergenious that he is balancing his chip tells.

To answer the qn. should it affect the A's decision? I mean you have to take it into consideration obv. and use any bit of info. if it helps your decision making and it'd make for a cool blog post later like belowabove.

But for me, more than any chip tells, the river card makes the decision easy.  Basically, with river Q, majority of 3betting range now beats KJ, if it wasnt already. AA/KK/QQ/AK/AJ/KQ/TT all beat KJ. Only hands A beats are AQ and JJ and doubt B would take this line with it. So unless Player B has been superlaggy and is capable of turning 99s/midconnector type hands into 3barrel bluffs, A can fold this safely.

So prolly answer here is B used 25x100 chips here to get a call.

The Idea that you can look at someone you've never seen play before and instantly know the strength of their holding based on a "live tell" is a theory born entirely out of the movies IMO

You should defo look for stuff like this, the chances are it is a tell, but you need to analsye it in far greater detail than one individual hand

as a good example of this, I have this wierd thing where I hate having odd number's of £25 chips. so in my reg game if I have £175 in pony's and want to bet £60. I'll use 1x £25 chip and 7x £5 chips. is this a tell?

sometimes i do this when I am have a strong hand, but dunno for sure if I'll win (turn FD maybe, or a 1p hand im bet folding) sometimes I do this when I know I have no chance to win if called (not the end of the world, at least my stackof pony's is now even) and sometimes I forget entirely about this cos I am concentrating, some times I dont care, sometimes I just wanna bet with lots of chips cos it looks cool and sometimes I have loads of ponys (sick brag) and dont know if the stack is even or not and cant count em in the middle of the hand.

In a similar fashion I will often bet using chips that keep my stacks in neat piles. eg, if I have two stacks of 100 chips and I want to bet 200 then I'll often bet using a 500 chip. But if I had a couple of spare 100 chips I'd use them instead. Nothing to read into here.

I'm 100% certain it was a tell, he was a nice kid but terribly nervous throughout.

I mean, an 18 year old playing his first ever live tournament in THE WORLD MFKING SERIES OF POKER!

He'd have to be a pretty cool cookie not to be nervous.

The trouble with tells is that they can go either way. Are you saying it was a tell in that he was not confident?

A tell is pointless if you don't knwo what it means, its defo something worth noting, and seeing if you can turn it into a solid read at a later point

weak=strong so fold i guess

Player A agonised and called..

Player B turned over QQ for a rivered set.

Karabiner and Rupert are too good.

Ahem, I feel left out. :)

Sorry!

+1 ;)

strong could easily have = strong though!

so whats the bottom line to this tell.

Is he using the smaller chips to make the pot look more attractive inviting a call?

Fwiw weak= strong only applies when players do things consciously.

yes I think this was more of a "how much to me?" tell.  i.e. in the excitement of hitting his card, he forgot how he bet previously.