Our friend Dainius Antanaitis busted the Main Event on Day 1d a bit ago during the 100/300 (300) blind level. He shared with us the hand along with some insight into his thought process. Antanaitis is one of the sharpest poker players regardless of the poker variant. Even the best make mistakes but in this case, I am not sure if many could have found a fold or not. Check it out as it is a decent hand to analyze.
"The blinds were 100/300/300 when I limped behind an under-the-gun open limp," began Antanaitis. "The player in the hijack raises to 1,600 and I was the only player to call. This could be a mistake to play this hand in the first place but I call to see the queen-six-seven rainbow flop. Sometimes I lead out with a small donk bet on this flop but he could put me in a tough high-variance spot as I would have to shove over the top then. Check-raising was also an option depending on the sizing but I opted to check-call his bet of 1,500 into a pot of 4,200."
So far so good although I would personally be folding this hand preflop. Then again, I admit that Antanaitis is a stronger player than me so let's go back to his thoughts.
"The turn was the perfect five of diamond placing two diamonds on the board and I donk bet pretty big for 5,500 into a pot of 7,200 with just 18,200 behind," Antanaitis shared. "This sets me up a pot-sized bet on the river with my straight if he calls. He tanked for a minute or two and I definitely saw him debating whether or not to shove. So, I put him on a range of ace-queen, kings, aces, and sets. I am hoping for a brick river so I can shove and get the call probably around 90% of the time."
Antanaitis no longer had the nuts on the board by the time the river came as our Lithuanian friend explains.
"Unfortunately, a seven paired the board on the river. So, now I am debating between going for a block-bet-fold or check-bluff catch. I chose the latter and after I check he internally debates for about 30 seconds before he puts all of his chips in one piles and jams them all-in. My first instinct and idea that comes to my mind is if I can make this fold, I can definitely win this event. He is rarely doing this with aces, kings, or queens and would probably go for smaller value for like 6,000 to 8,000. I feel he definitely never has a 7x for a value shove here. So, basically 80% value full house/quads, although it is unlikely he has quads as he would have likely limped his sevens. So maybe 20% for a random bluff but I didn't have much history with this player before. As I was only getting 33% odds on this pot-sized shove and it was for my tournament life, I should have found an easy fold despite the fact I could re-enter. Instead, I took an easy no-brainer move and just donated the rest of my chips. Many people would call this a cooler when actually it is just a big mistake to pay off the river bet once you analyze the hand properly and see the big picture.
Thank you for sharing the hand and best of luck the rest of the week!
