Strategy Snapshot: Markets Fall, Ivey Continues to Soar

Phil Ivey battles it out with everyone's favorite poker hunk, Patrik Antonius, in another nosebleed session from the RailHeaven table.

In today's turbulent times, Ivey's stock might be the only one still on the rise.

Today's snapshot shows exactly why when he looks up a deep-stacked semi-bluff and is awarded a $355,146 pot for his troubles.

Players:

Sami "LarsLuzak" Kelopuro: $177,486

Patrik Antonius: $367,469

Phil Ivey: $158,074

Tom "durrrr" Dwan: $213,694

Game: $500/$1,000, No-Limit Hold'em, "RailHeaven," Full Tilt Poker

The Setup

durrrr raises from under the gun to $3,000 and Lars folds on the button. Patrik Antonius makes the call from the small blind and then Phil Ivey reraises from the big blind to $12,000. durrrr and Patrik both make the call.

Three-way to a T 4 6 flop. Patrik checks and Ivey bets $27,000; durrrr makes the call and Patrik ships all-in for $355,469. Ivey calls all in for his smaller stack, and durrrr's cards hit the e-muck.

Patrik shows 7 5 for the open-ended straight draw and Ivey flips up J J for the overpair.

The turn comes K and the river bricks out T. Ivey's J J hold for the $355,146 pot.

That's just Patrik's natural aura.

The Breakdown

durrrr starts the hand out with a raise from under the gun with an unknown hand. Even UTG, durrrr's range is still very wide, and at this point we have no clues as to what his hand is other than that he didn't fold.

Patrik then cold-calls in the small blind with 5 7. Usually a weak hand to play from out of position against a tricky opponent, but the stacks are 200BB deep between the two, and Patrik knows durrrr is capable of raising any two. Thus he feels he can probably get him to fold post-flop a lot of the time.

Phil Ivey than makes an obvious reraise for value with his J J. Pocket jacks are miles ahead of both durrrr's UTG open and Patrik's call from the small blind, and he knows both opponents love to see flops and will likely call with worse.

durrrr calls the three-bet with his unknown hand, though now we can at least narrow his range down a little more. He will be in position for the entire hand and can be calling in this spot with suited connectors or pocket pairs, as well as other random hands, planning to float.

Patrik also makes the call because his call will close the action and he can see a multiway pot with a decent multiway hand and is at least 150BB deep.

When the flop comes T 4 6 Patrik checks his open-ender. Ivey then bets $27,000 for value with his overpair. He is looking to get value from draws, a pair of tens and random underpairs like 99-55 etc.

durrrr flat-calls the flop bet. This narrows his range further. His range now looks mostly like pocket pairs 99-55, hands like 5 6 or 6 7, tens, and some pure floats.

Not Phil's first big pot.

Obviously, though, some of those in that range are more likely than others … 99 might have been four-bet pre-flop against a possible squeeze, and tens could be raised on the flop for value.

Patrik now sees all the money in the pot and decides to semi-bluff at it and shoves all-in with his open-ended straight draw - a move that I cannot find fault with.

There is already $90,000 in the pot and there is a small chance he can win it with his check-raise of the field. However, if he doesn't, he still has eight straight cards and a back-door flush to bail him out.

Ivey makes the call with his overpair. Knowing the tendencies of both his opponents, he still has no reason to believe his hand is anything but the best right now, so he makes the call and durrrr folds.

Luckily for him the board bricks out and his jacks hold for a $355,146 pot.

Another interesting hand involving some of the game's greats. In this one Ivey gets lucky - his hand holds - and Patrik is reminded why playing suited connectors from out of position can be a frustrating thing.

To see more pots from RailHeaven, 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 PL.com's exclusive $10k new-depositor freeroll, hit up Full Tilt Poker here.

More Strategy Snapshots:

• Strategy Snapshot: A Questionable Value Bet?
• Strategy Snapshot: Dwan durrrrrowned by River
• Strategy Snapshot: Dwan durrrrains Kelopuro
• Strategy Snapshot: Ivey Kills Kelopuro