WSOP Hand Scenario Involving Jacks

While watching the Arizona Cardinals get humiliated on Monday Night Football last night, my wife and I had reruns of this year’s World Series of Poker set as our flip channel. I haven’t watched poker on television in several years as the play in tournaments like the WSOP isn’t conducive to a learning environment regarding improving poker play at cash games. That’s not to say it can’t be entertaining, but I just don’t find enjoyment watching others play poker like I used to.

However, last night we spent a few minutes during football’s commercial breaks to watch some hands unfold and we came across one that my wife and I differed on a play that was made. I wanted to discuss it here and see what others thought of the play.

At this point in the tournament, the players were in the money and cashing out at about $125,000 and increasing with each player being knocked out. I don’t recall specific chip counts for each of the players involved, but it really doesn’t matter too much as all the money went in the pot pre-flop. I will do the best I can to reconstruct the hand as close to accurate as possible so a fair decision can be given on what you would have done.

Player A was dealt pocket jacks. Being in early position (not exactly sure where but he acted before the other two players involved), Player A led out with a raise of about 2.5 times the big blind.

Moving to Player B, who is holding Q-10 of spades, this guy re-raises all-in for an amount more than the initial raise but not so much that it puts everybody at the table all-in. This player was likely short stacked and saw an opportunity to get heads up or maybe even steal what was in the pot and not get called by the original raiser, hoping to build his stack a little and last a bit longer so the payout grew larger should he go out an hour later or so.

Player C then looks at A-Q offsuit. He re-raises the all-in from Player B. The re-raise is so much that it would put Player A all-in should he call. It folds back around to Player A.

So let’s recap. Player A raises with pocket jacks. Player B re-raises all of his chips with Q-10 suited. Player C re-raises with A-Q offsuit. It is back to Player A with his jacks and a call means he is all-in.

I do not know whether Player A had more than Player B, because their chip stacks would determine whether Player A finished higher than Player B should he have more at the start of the hand and they both be knocked out by Player C. This data might affect your decision on whether you call or not, however, without that information I still would like to know whether you call or fold with the jacks.

Player A agonized over the hand for a bit and finally folded. My wife was surprised to see him fold what she considered a really good hand. I told her I agreed that jacks were a good hand, but not in this scenario and I too would have folded. In a best-case scenario you are up against two overcards between the two players, which is exactly what was the case here. You figure you have to either be up against one player who is holding a smaller pocket pair and the other player has A-K or A-Q or both players have high cards that would beat you should an ace, king, or queen come out. Again, this is all best-case scenario. Worst-case scenario would involve being beat already by one of them who is holding queens, kings, or aces.

Playing against one person for all your money is fine when holding jacks, but once a second opponent enters into the mix your jacks aren’t quite as dominant. It would take queens or higher for me to make that call, and even queens I would be nervous.

I told my wife another reason for the fold is because the players were in the money. By folding, you assure yourself some more time to stick around and climb up the money ladder. Should Player B get beat by Player C then you automatically move up one spot in the money. I could see the argument for calling and tripling up should your jacks win, which would put you in a great spot to make it even deeper in the money, but I don’t like the odds of going up against two unknown hands that apparently are pretty strong with all the raising and re-raising going on with just jacks. I mean, do these people look like men who are beaten by jacks?

Player C ended up winning the hand, knocking Player B out of the tournament, with ace-high when nothing hit. So Player A would have won with his jacks, which hurt even more when he saw a jack come on the river giving him what would have been a set, not that he needed it.

Not sure if you agree with my assessment of how to play this hand, but I would have folded the jacks.