Can't understand the flak

Last night in a tournament, in the first round, a player went all in, with a pair of 10’s. I called with AK off, and managed to snag a straight. He proceeded to round on me, calling me a straight-chaser. I got the impression that he thought I had no right to call with that hand. Thoughts?

Anything goes in poker. In my opinion you had every right to call. I have seen players call with a 7,2 o and win the hand…anything goes. He was a sore loser. You had a nh.

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10-10 guy clearly has no idea about odds, you were only slight underdog. You can hit an Ace or a King to beat him or indeed the (fortunate) straight so take no notice of his ill informed rudeness. If you think risking your tournament life is worth the chance to double up on what was effectively a coin toss then go for it.
In the first round I would say he is the idiot for going all in with 10s when he is dominated by so many hands. Fair enough if its towards the endgame and there are short stacks and its fold or shove .
Unless I`m facing a super nit who will probably have rockets, most of the time I will call an all in with big slick

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Very rude and unsportsmanlike behaviour. Personally I consider both moves - pre-flop all-in with tens and calling with AK off - to be unwise, but I appreciate that others (most players, come to think of it) have a higher risk appetite than me. In either case, there’s no justification for commenting on the plays in question as they both seem normal poker moves. Shoving with rubbish and calling with rubbish, of course, is a different matter. But even then, I wouldn’t make a silly comment. I have made silly comments myself in the past, I must admit, but not for something like this and never after a bad defeat.

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Would agree. In the early rounds of a tournament the blinds are low and there is no point in shoving to win a small pot. With TT any hand that calls you is either going to be a pocket pair or two overcards. If you are lucky you may get called by AT. But not worth risking all your chips.

With AK off suit I would probably fold in that situation, because, again, why risk all your chips at the start of a tournament in what is probably about 45% in your favor unless your opponent has AQ. I prefer to build a stack in the early rounds by putting in meaty raises against limpers when I have a hand that has potential to make the nuts, or if I have a very high pair. Usually all the limpers will call, and then when the flop hits you, you win a nice-sized pot worth several times your initial speculative investment.

Even in the highest buy-in tournaments people who should know better get a bit overexcited. Just tonight in the 1-million buy-in a small stack had an amazing series of lucky breaks in all-ins and went from a microstack to a medium stack, but then was whining when his AJ got nailed by A7 on the river and he was eliminated. (No I would not have risked half my stack by unnecessarily calling a preflop shove with A7, but there you go.)

No it is not good etiquette to complain, but people get overexcited sometimes.

Hi, sadly this is a standard reaction. Without looking up the hand, due to the ‘chase’ comment I expect they were upset because you apparently caught the river card, as though the final card was the only way to win.

When two players are all-in pre flop, the 5 board cards are the SAME event.

If you have AK vs 10,10 and AK goes ahead after the first 3 cards and a 10 appears on the last card shown, it was still a race between two hands which started close to 50/50.

Rob

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Broadly I agree with what you say, except that the odds for Ace King unsuited versus pocket tens are about 42.5% which is significantly less than 50%.

I know that a lot of people think this is nitpicking about small numbers, but I think it becomes a relevant factor in tournaments, because your chances of winning two or three 42.5%ers in a row is not that great, so it is something that you should reserve for situations where you are getting blinded out and need to double to stay competitive, or perhaps in situations on the final table when you are trying to knock out a small stack to move up in the money, but can survive a loss.

Having said that, the situation where a pair makes trips on the river, only for the river card to give the opponent a straight or a flush is not uncommon.

Far too many players do not count the outs correctly, particularly if there is a potential flush draw on the board when an open-ended straight may only have 6 outs instead of eight. In any situation where you have outs to make sure that all of the outs are real outs.

A pair of tens has good odds against AK, because since any straight must contain a 5 or a 10, the pair of tens reduces the chances of AK making Broadway, however the arrival of the third 10 opens doors onto Broadway.

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Kind of classic bad form, complaining about someone else’s “bad play” because there was one point in the hand where you were ahead, but at the same time this is essential poker. I think a lot of people like poker because they get emotionally involved, and the swing from thinking they were going to win to losing generates a rage reaction. If it is a tournament, sadly they can’t stick around to lose more chips.

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He is a fool. If you think you have a good hand, you should follow through until you win or not.

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