I’ve been too busy to play for a few weeks, but my last SNG, I won, it was memorable for being dealt 88 three times in fairly quick succession. I’ll recount the hands that led me to the win.
First hand of the game, I got myself in trouble with JTs, sitting in the BB. I re-raised to 4BB, and got 5 calls. It’s a 6-seat table, so to get 5 callers right away I know everyone’s playing a bit too loose. I flopped middle pair, with a runner-runner straight draw, Q4J on the board, but no diamonds to help my cause. I decide to try to buy the pot, and put in a pot-sized bet, but get two calls and two folds, which is hardly good enough. The Turn card is an Ace, I check, not wanting the pot to get any bigger at this point, and ready to lay it down if someone puts in another big bet, but the player behind me just min-bets, and we both call that. I’m hoping I river a King, but I’m not that lucky. The player last to act goes all in, and holding 3rd pair, I have to lay it down: https://www.replaypoker.com/hand/replay/467921822
Down to 750 chips, I tighten up and somehow work my way back up to 1600 chips, when I got lucky on this hand. Holding JQo on the button, I raise up to 3BB, and get two callers. I flop what turned out to be top pair, Jacks, with top kicker: T8J. The SB, holding Q8, has bottom pair, and checks. The other player in the hand min bets, I raise to 300, everyone calls. SB is now pot committed. I’m hoping for a 9 to give me a straight, but I don’t get it. Instead I end up with Two Pair, JJTTQ, to knock out the SB, who had Two Pair, TT88Q, and the other player, holding Jh9h, came up one heart short of a flush, and also has Two Pair, JJTT, but with only a 9 kicker, so I take down a good pot here. So many ways I could have gotten beat here, and I managed to avoid all of them:
https://www.replaypoker.com/hand/replay/468032100
Just a couple hands later, I have K7s in the BB, pair the 7 on the flop, and the King on the Turn. My opponent, holding QTo, has 2nd pair and an inside straight draw, they’re short stacked and decide to go all-in, I call, and knock them out as they miss their straight: https://www.replaypoker.com/hand/replay/468032418
Two players eliminated by me now. I take a few small pots, then a few more hands later I’m dealt AA on the button, which I use to eliminate my 3rd opponent at the table. With just 2 opponents left at the table, I only feel a need to raise 2BB here. SB calls, BB mucks, and the SB goes all-in after hitting a pair of 7s on a 7J4 flop – they min bet here, I raised betting the pot, they re-raised me all-in. My Aces don’t improve, and my opponent comes up short, lacking a T for a straight, another 7 for trips, or a pair to their 8 for two pair, to crack the Aces: https://www.replaypoker.com/hand/replay/468034102
Now it’s heads-up, and I have a 2:1 stack advantage over my opponent.
This is quickly nullified when I play KK into him and get beat by a Q-8 straight over KK99 to bring the stack odds to just about even: https://www.replaypoker.com/hand/replay/468035028
Another poorly played hand, I play A5o into A6s, and get lucky to chop the pot when enough cards come over both of our kickers to make them irrelevant: https://www.replaypoker.com/hand/replay/468035412
I hit a straight, K-9, but didn’t get value for it when I bet the river too strongly and my opponent makes a wise fold: https://www.replaypoker.com/hand/replay/468035844
We go back and forth for a while, small pots going back and forth as neither of us gets cards that we feel like playing. But then I am dealt 88, and take a 1600 chip pot with them, making a set of 8s on the river. I bet the river, my opponent folded. This was a tough hand to stay in, as there were A, K, Q on the board, and right up to the river I felt like I was being set up for a trap, my opponent checking and then calling me when I’d bet, and even at the end holding trips I felt potentially vulnerable to a straight here: https://www.replaypoker.com/hand/replay/468036677
A few hands later, I’m holding 88 again, and this time the hand doesn’t proceed past the flop: https://www.replaypoker.com/hand/replay/468037556
Yet again I have 88, and this too ends at the flop: https://www.replaypoker.com/hand/replay/468037711
I win a 2400 chip pot on a high card, King hand where we were both drawing to a straight that we both missed. He’s holding QT, I’m holding KT, and if there had been a Jack he would have had a better straight, but if a 6 came we would have chopped: https://www.replaypoker.com/hand/replay/468037924
JQo, I pair the Queen and take the hand after the flop: https://www.replaypoker.com/hand/replay/468038295
And for the win, holding 67o, not really sure why I decided to play this hand, I guess for the connector potential, I limp, and hit the 6 with the flop, decide to bet it, and get a call. A 7 gives me two pair on the Turn, and another 7 comes to fill my house on the river. My opponent holding 72s, had been chasing a flush draw, missed, but made trips and shoved at me in response to my value bet, easy call for me to win it with a small boat: https://www.replaypoker.com/hand/replay/468038372