The 2012 Main Event Final Table featured some pretty stellar play and the best champion we've ever seen in Greg Merson, but everyone's #pokerisdead overreaction was turned upside-down after the play at the Final Table of this year's WSOP ME. I thought there were some gems (used sarcastically) at the entire Final Table, but since I missed most of it I'll comment only on the HU hands while it's fresh in my mind.
Bear with me on stack sizes and bet sizes, they'll be as accurate as I can remember and largely irrelevant to the points I'm driving home.
1. [1m BB, ~40 BB effective] Farber minraises, Megatron 3-bets to 5BB, Farber 4-bets to ~9BB, Megatron 5-bets to 17.5BB, Farber folds. Farber: 55, Megatron: AJ.
On more than one occasion Farber made heinous mistakes with small pocket pairs. He *somehow* made JC Tran make a FTOP mistake by min 5-betting 66 BVB when they were ~7 handed, but wasn't so lucky when the tables were turned on him by Megatron 5-betting the AJo.
This hand got off to such a promising start, a minraise on the button with a pocket pair, a studly hand heads up! A 3-bet from a top 10% hand is a rousing second action, and both players should be gently but firmly patted on the back for their strong accomplishments. And that's the end of the good play for this one. Jay then decides to 4-bet 55 to a not all in amount, an error more grievous than General Vasquez himself.
What should he do instead? He has two swell options in fact, thanks for asking. He could: 1. Go all in. If Megatron is 3-bet calling AJ+ 88+ for value, we have just under 30% against a calling range, we win 7 BBs when he folds, we lose ~15 when he calls, so he has to be 3-bet folding just over twice as often as 3-bet calling (I'm not a math expert... no guarantees here)-- given his 3-bets of 82s, JXo, etc. I'd say this is definitely +EV 2. The safer play is to call. We have position and if we're up against a hand that wants to see five cards (face cards, basically), we can make it so that he can't. We can call and rip over a c-bet (which he'll probably do too often) on low boards, we can slowplay sets, we can just call the flop if he c-bets small enough (seems likely), sometimes we'll be able to bluff a hand like 99 with the right runout/action, etc.
Megatron's 5-bet to not all in is silly and unnecessary, he would be giving immediate pot odds for Farber to call with some suited crap.
2. [1m BB, ~90 BB effective] Megatron makes it 2.5 BB, Farber make its 4.5 BB (Megatron calls any two!), Megatron calls. KQ8r. Farber c-bets (some size that was too small) and Megatron raises (some size that was too small) and Farber folds. Farber: A8, Megatron: KT.
Megatron's open on the button is the only remotely reasonable play in the entire hand (okay, okay, he defended the 3-bet correctly as well). Farber chooses a terrible hand to 3-bet deep, A8o, and a terrible size to do it to, literally so small that Megatron can't possibly fold if he wants to respect himself in the morning (judging by his play, we can't guarantee that he does). Farber chooses a poor hand to c-bet on this flop, a dry flop where he can check call a bet from Megatron that'll probably lay an attractive price on the pot in a spot which isn't quite WA/WB, but is close enough that I want to have a polarized c-betting range against this guy and this hand would fall into the "check" category.
But I think the worst play in the entire hand is Megatron's flop raise. He's in position (something that generally looks favorably on seeing more cards come off) with a hand that is generally way ahead of Farber (needs no protection-- who wants to protection against 3 or 5 outs?!) but isn't so far ahead that he wants to stick in all of the bets (Farber actually has a sick hand to 3-bet bluff with here imo and Megatron's combos of something *awesome* are pretty low) and to top that all off he narrows his range (something else that people in position don't wanna do). I mean I can think of a worse hand to raise on the flop-- just kidding, I can't.
3. [1.2m BB, ~30 BB effective] Megatron makes it 2.5m, Farber calls. AA8r. Farber checks, Megatron bets 3m, Farber makes it 7.5m, Megatron calls. Turn 8. Farber checks, Megatron bets 10m, Farber folds. Farber: 53s, Megatron: T5o.
Do you know how often Farber has a value hand on AA8r if he's defending ~middle 50% of hands to the ~minraise? The short answer is basically never, and that's not even to mention the fact he probably shouldn't CR AX on the flop (although I guess he should given results!). Megatron's line is fine, good on him for sniffing out an obvious bluff. I think Farber was pretty over it at this point, frustrated from not making any hands and running terrible.
OK I only got to 3, so I'm only going to write about 3. Too tired to write anymore.
And I'm not changing the title of the blog either.
Honorable mention: Megatron 4-bet QTo (!), Megatron called QJ on K3293ccc-- a bluff catcher that can lose to some bluffs (!!!), Farber folded 98o and Q8o to 3-bets (!), Megatron minraise/folded Q4o with ~11 bigs (!), Farber folded J5s and Q5o on the button with ~11 bigs (!).
edit: Another honorable mention hand that deserves it's own paragraph (and would've made the top 5): Farber defends 43o to a minraise (which is too loose imo, and I never thought I'd say that), then check calls turn and river on J949A. Real bad. Low in his range and Megatron is virtually never bluffing that runout/has a 9 (or an ace) always. I'd probably bet the turn and fold to further action if I somehow got there preflop.
The truth is that Farber actually played pretty good at times and had moments of genius (c'mon, dude CR bluffed turn and followed through on the river at the ME Final Table, boss for sure) but ran incredibly badly (and thus was frustrated and followed that up with some poor play) and his fundamentals definitely weren't there. At least he had a lot of heart.
Megatron with a pretty forgettable performance because of how hard he was smacked by the deck, but I'll give him enough props to say that he took advantage of some of the spots Farber offered up. Poor kid will never get to live down how many walks he gave the French Canadian guy 5+ handed... embarrassing, raise your button bro. Also, how can anyone else have hoped to win? Dude had God on his side!
