ME Final 9

[Kurn]

There's a bit of a discussion going on over at that other board about Craig Marquis 4-bet shove with AQo that crippled the ultimate 10th place finisher. The conventional-wisdom posters are criticizing the play because, as one said "with a raise and a reraise in front of him, Marquis should understand that his AQo is a dog to the 3-bet range."

What unmitigated crap. Players do not make the final 27 or so of a 8,000+ player tourney by playing Sklansky-tight (OK, Joe Hachem may be an exception). You have to be LAGgy to get this far. I have no problem standing firm that with 10 left in the ME, AQo is a CLEAR FAVORITE vs the 3-bet range of ANY player left.

Sure, the loser of the hand showed QQ and got beat by running hearts for a flush, but that's results-oriented thinking. Besides, the 4-bet got the original raiser to fold AK which cleaned up 3 outs for Marquis.

As an aside, I think the logic behind my argument also points out how very hard it will continue to be for Phil Hellmuth to win the ME again. he simply plays too tight post-flop for this size event. WPT events with < 1,000 runners are different.