The Poker Reporter Blog
Strategy Snapshot: Click a Mouse Lose a House
Created By: Daniel Skolovy Posted in: The Poker Reporter Blog, Strategy Snapshots
The action has been hot and heavy at the nosebleed stakes on Full Tilt Poker as of late. In this version of the snapshot we check out a hand in which Phil Ivey looks very human, donating a $401,919 pot to Finnish pro Sami "LarsLuzak" Kelopuro.
It's entirely possible that Ivey's play is motivated by superhuman strategic powers, but he seems to have made a slight misstep here.
Players:
Phil Ivey - $200,960
Sami "LarsLuzak" Kelopuro - $318,625
Game: $500/$1,000 No-Limit Hold'em, GusHeaven, Full Tilt Poker
The Setup
The hand kicks off with LarsLuzak raising from the button/small blind to $3,000.
Phil Ivey then three-bets to $9,000 and LarsLuzak four-bets to $27,000.
Ivey makes the call and they take a flop heads-up of J♦ 2♥ 5♥. Ivey checks and LarsLuzak checks through.
The turn comes A♠; Ivey bets $40,000, and LarsLuzak calls.
The river comes T♠ and Ivey ships all-in for $133,960. LarsLuzak makes the call. Ivey shows 6♣ 6♠ for a pair of sixes and LarsLuzak shows A♦ K♦ for top pair, top kicker.
LarsLuzak's aces with a king kicker are good for the $401,919 pot.

The Breakdown
Lars raises off the button to $3,000 with A♦ K♦, a monster hand heads-up.
Ivey chooses to three-bet with 6♣ 6♠. He has a pocket pair against an aggressive opponent; his opponent is completely capable of raising any two cards off the button, and pocket sixes are ahead of that range.
Lars elects to four-bet with A♦ K♦. The stacks are deep, and a suited ace-king is going to be ahead of even Ivey's four-bet calling range - thus he four-bets for value.
Ivey makes the call with 6♠ 6♣ and the flop comes J♦ 2♥ 5♥. Ivey checks and Lars checks behind.
Ivey checks because his opponent four-bet preflop.
Lars chooses to check behind because he missed the flop completely and the pot is already huge. If he were to bet, Ivey is very likely not going to fold any pair or call any worse hands. A bet would accomplish nothing.
The turn hits the A♠ and Ivey bets out $40,000 as a bluff. Obviously Lars is never calling with a worse hand so Ivey's bet is designed to get a fold out of a hand like 88 or 99 or TT.
Lars decides to just flat-call with his top pair, top kicker. Once he bangs off the ace he is only a dog to sets, and chooses to flat-call in hopes that Ivey hangs himself on the river.
The river comes the T♠ and Ivey ships all-in for $133,960 - a move I can't really get behind.
Now obviously, I'm no Phil Ivey and it's entirely possible that he is on some totally different level that we mortals can't even imagine, but I really can't see any hands that call the turn and then fold the river.

The only hands you may get a fold out of are something like 88 or 99, but those hands have to be discounted because they would normally be bet on the flop as would any flushdraws.
Lars of course has the easy call to make. Because he knows Ivey is very capable of running up huge bluffs, TPTK in this scenario, in a four-bet pot preflop, is basically the nuts.
He snaps off Ivey's bluff and finds himself $401,919 richer for it.
To see more pots from Full Tilt Poker, or more of the Top 100 biggest pots online over the last day, week, month and year, jump to the MarketPulse Biggest Pots section.
To rail any of the action and take advantage of PokerListings.com's, exclusive deposit bonus hit up Full Tilt Poker here.
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Comments
4Sean Lind
2009-02-13Michael, although I hear what you're saying, I have to respectfully disagree. In a heads up match, especially one between a very high-end high stakes player, it would be a fools errand to try to make someone fold KK with an ace on the board.
In heads up play, with the hand range these players have KK is almost never folding in this situation. Second pair is a monster holding Heads Up.
Against a tight player it would be an easy fold, but since Ivey knows that Lars thinks he's a loose aggressive player, Ivey would know that there is no way Lars would fold almost any pocket pair.
Whatever read Ivey had, I don't think KK was it. To be honest, I think Ivey simply made a mistake here, a brain fart.
Michael Calabaza
2009-02-12maybe he put lars on KK/QQ? and figured ace would scare Lars and he can bully him out of the pot. He did 4 bet which means a monster.. probably really only QQ,KK,AA and the check on the flop was weird though. Maybe narrowed his range to a 1010. The ace hits and ivey trys to rep it cuz he 3 bet. But when lars calls maybe ivey thinks that he would call with tens in that spot cuz he would expect a bluff on the ace. Since lars didnt raise the turn ivey figures he had a good hand that didnt contain an ace and possibly not a JJ cuz lars would prob raise the turn in hopes to get ivey all in with a good ace. So lars check then smooth call turn shows "i dont like the ace" Ivey leaves himself a nice stack to shove in bluff the river because lars cant call unless he has an ace strong kicker/ Aces up. That board is even scary for AK against iveys range with a suited A.
Daniel Skolovy
2009-02-12Ivey can't be calling the four-bet for set value alone.
The jack high board is going to be as good a flop as any for his hand so yes, I think he does go for a check/raise on that flop.
When he whiffs the turn bet isn't bad but once he is called he absolutely has to c/f the river.
The only thing he is beating is a flushdraw which Lars would have bet on that flop 100% of the time because the pot is already huge from the fourbet.
Once lars calls the turn he is very unlikely to fold to any river bet.
But then again Ivey may have had some monster read. I mean he is Ivey
Bob Sacamano
2009-02-12Agree that the river bluff is bad but what line would you take here?
Bet/call flop? Was he looking for a check-raise on the flop? Check/fold river once he gets to that point?