Booth vs Ivey

High Stakes Poker, Season 3, 2007 · A Deep-Stacked Cash Game

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A low flop, a deep stack and a big decision

The Hand

4♠2♠BoothCoversD
K♦K♥Iveyabout 290K
Blinds 200 / 400
7♠6♦3♦

Brad Booth and Phil Ivey. Blinds 200 / 400.

Before the Flop

  • Blinds 200 and 400. Booth has the button.
  • Williams raises to 1.8K.
  • Booth raises to 5.8K.
  • Another player folds.
  • Ivey raises to 14K.
  • Williams folds.
  • Booth calls. Why

    Booth. With stacks this deep, a cheap call lets Booth try to outplay Ivey after the flop on a board that misses big pairs. A shove before the flop would only get called by better hands.

The Flop

  • Ivey bets 23K.
  • Booth raises to 300K and is all in. The famous decision
  • Ivey folds. Why

    Ivey. A player who calls a re-raise and then shoves several times the pot on seven-six-three most often has a set or two pair. Kings beat only bluffs and draws.

    Ivey folded the best hand, and the fold lost to a bluff this time.

Play Booth vs Ivey, decision by decision

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The flop

The Famous Decision

Booth. A low, connected board rarely helps a player who re-raised twice before the flop. Booth’s call could be a pair that just made a set. The enormous overbet asks Ivey whether kings are worth $300,000.

The Result

Booth wins the pot.

Why It Is Famous

Brad Booth moved in $300,000 with four-high and a gutshot, and Phil Ivey folded a pair of kings. A giant bet on a scary board is a story, and the question is which hands tell it.

What to Take from It

Ask which hands tell it.

Sources

What the sources do not say. The blinds are $200/$400 in one report, and the pot after the three-bet, $31,100, fits them. The exact pot is not documented, so it is not shown and prices are given in words. Ivey had about $294,000 (PokerNews: about $280,000 left after his three-bet of $14,000). Booth’s stack is only known to cover it: he put in $314,000. Williams’s is not given. Ivey’s seat is disputed: PokerNews says small blind and CardPlayer big blind. What Williams did over Ivey’s re-raise is not documented. He is shown folding, because the hand goes on without him. The second source has no link.

Make all three decisions, then see what really happened

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