Hellmuth folding QQ.

BTW

People can have there different opinions on if it was a bad play or not in Phil's shoes, I respect different opinions. I just thought it was funny that brandonnj was trying to defend the fold even if the cards were turned face up. lol

rileyl said:

It was a skilled fold? Am I missing something here Lol. How is it a skilled fold to fold QQ when your the short stack in a winner take all event. As for calling Hellmuth the best NLHE player, that is the biggest joke ever.

Hellmuth is good at beating fish and amateurs, see WSOP events. You put him in a game with top pros, or even just average ones and he will get owned.

Phil has done a great job marketing himself and he deserves credit for that. He's a genius at selling products and his brand and he's made a TON of money because of it. The folding QQ's probably was done to try to help market himself, because people would think how awesome it would be that Phil folded QQ's or whatever. But calling Phil the best NLHE player is way off base as he really isn't even close. I honestly beleive that most online mid-stakes regulars would have an edge over Phil in a cash game.

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mid-stakes online players better than phil? WHAT? You do know he not only holds the most bracelets, but the most cashes and is (or at least was don't know if he still is) #1 on the all-time wsop money list. I can see why a lot of ppl don't like him but come on man, mid-stakes online players? You can knock him all you want but the numbers don't lie. PHIL HELLMUTH IS THE MOST SUCCESSFUL NO-LIMIT TEXAS HOLDEM TOURNAMENT PLAYER IN THE WORLD. BAR NONE. I believe that the ability to fold QQ preflop is a beautiful thing. He happened to be wrong in that particular situation but I like the fold.

I think this is a great laydown in cash games its an easy all in but in what is a SNG its a great laydown,Its easy with hindsight for us to say that it is a "donk" play. Phil doesnt know what Featherstone has and hes played extremely tight so even if phil puts him on hand range like QQ+,AQs+,AQo+ it is basically a coin flip although phil is still slightly behind(46-54) but i think phil thought he had QQ+,AKs,AKo which means he is roughly 60-40% behind why would you put yourself in postion to go out of the tournament with nothing and if you double up your still not even in a postion to win the tournament.

This is the real reason why phil is a great player because he knows when to pick his spots yea sure if he knew had AQs he would have called but he doesnt have access to other players hole cards. This is why a lot of people are not good at SNG they treat it like cash games but is a whole different game Phil knows how to adjust. How many times have you see in a SNG some bust out because they go all in a spot like that against a player with such a low rate of preflop agression and discover they are way behind or a coin flip away from getting nothing.

jrmonty said:

I think this is a great laydown in cash games its an easy all in but in what is a SNG its a great laydown,Its easy with hindsight for us to say that it is a "donk" play. Phil doesnt know what Featherstone has and hes played extremely tight so even if phil puts him on hand range like QQ+,AQs+,AQo+ it is basically a coin flip although phil is still slightly behind(46-54) but i think phil thought he had QQ+,AKs,AKo which means he is roughly 60-40% behind why would you put yourself in postion to go out of the tournament with nothing and if you double up your still not even in a postion to win the tournament.

This is the real reason why phil is a great player because he knows when to pick his spots yea sure if he knew had AQs he would have called but he doesnt have access to other players hole cards. This is why a lot of people are not good at SNG they treat it like cash games but is a whole different game Phil knows how to adjust. How many times have you see in a SNG some bust out because they go all in a spot like that against a player with such a low rate of preflop agression and discover they are way behind or a coin flip away from getting nothing.

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Let me get this straight...you think QQ vs AQ is basically a coin flip and you think AK is 60% ahead of QQ? wrong and wrong

QQ against AQ is huge favorite and QQ against AK is still slight favorite. And remember..he only raised it 3 times the BB and Phil could have just called and outplayed the youngster after the flop or got away from it if the miracle 3 outer ace hits. That guy was playing so nervous he would have probably folded if Phil pushed even the ace did hit...thinking Phil has AK. I'm not saying it was an insta shove preflop, but the fact that Phil didn't at least call and see what the kid does on the flop boggles my mind.

jrmonty said:

I think this is a great laydown in cash games its an easy all in but in what is a SNG its a great laydown

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This sentence put my on life tilt.

anyone who says automatically pushing with the QQ is the only play are idiots. These people have probably only played online where it's easy to push cause know one knows who you are.

And to the people that say Phil is not good or worse? Well that is insane. The man can sit with the best of them and he has proven that by winning millions of dollars. Has anyone here won even a fraction of that?

is this about when folded QQ to the amature on poker after dark preflop when it wasnt even that big of a raise. he suprised everyone at the table even

helmuth is a player thats not realy good i think, just got lucky a few times and now is playing 'pro poker'. Dont like his attitude

ynot

he had a feeling so no lose plus we'll never know
will we if it was the right move

ok fair enough maybe he is able to lay down qq and that makes him a world champ and what not

but does he REALLY need the additional air time?

all that whining and moaning and groaning, come on man, play your cards and stfu

I only watch PAD to see him go on tilt and blow up

riverboatrat said:

ok fair enough maybe he is able to lay down qq and that makes him a world champ and what not

but does he REALLY need the additional air time?

all that whining and moaning and groaning, come on man, play your cards and stfu

I only watch PAD to see him go on tilt and blow up

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Then I hope you taped this week as Ziedman tears him up

Brilliant laydown imo.
Am I the only one who noticed that AQ was sooted?

PooffyFooffy said:

Brilliant laydown imo.
Am I the only one who noticed that AQ was sooted?

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Ok that makes Helmuth a 65% favorite instead of to a 69% favorite lol.

Your point?

As said above, im sure he admits he played that poorly. Alot of people hate Phil so he gets attacked when he makes 1 mistake. Truth is most people who hate him do so because A. they cant lay down a monster hand and B. they are jealous

Anyone who follows poker knows most of the pros like and respect him, and even more know that while his personality is a little like you see on TV most of it is over dramatized. No different then an athlete giving pc answers to hard questions, so they can make some side endorsement cash. If you were in his shoes and didnt make some of those scenes and were dull/boring ex Allen Cunningham you lose out on other oppurtunities. Love him or hate him we all like to watch, so he keeps his demand high. Nice to be offered extra cash for a little acting on the side of the game. Most players are mentally strong enough to not let it bother them, since they pretty much know why hes doing it. Just look at PAD they invite him like evry other week. Plenty of good players out there but nobody wants to watch paint dry (ex Jen Harman,Forrest, Cunningham) all great players, but all boring to watch.

phea1dave said:

The man can sit with the best of them and he has proven that by winning millions of dollars. Has anyone here won even a fraction of that?

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yep.

The 5 bucks I won last night is a fraction of his millions.

Looking at the situation omnisciently, the other guy had several outs to win (2 A since Matsuow had A2o, 3 spades), so it would have been coin-flip pretty much, so nice fold.
Looking at the situation in Phil's eyes (the real deal), it was either shove or fold and QQ is somewhat vulnerable in the face of a tight villain. Shoving makes sense to double up, but if you have a bad gut feeling, it is better safe and still in the tournament then sorry and out. I'll take the word of someone who has written an entire book on tells that his gut told him to fold that one.

About Phil as a player, he certainly has his style, and it certainly helps him win and be rich. Whatever works for him, I say.

are u kiddin? how is that a flip? AQ vs QQ.

what helmuth likes to do is stall for tv time with his big 'laydowns'. on the occasions when he's right, he'll pound the table, 'i knew u had that hand. what a great laydown. i can DODGE BULLETS BABY'.
and when he's wrong, he'll say the other player overplays his hands.. overvalue... blah blah.

what a jackass.

TrapStar said:

Let me get this straight...you think QQ vs AQ is basically a coin flip and you think AK is 60% ahead of QQ? wrong and wrong

QQ against AQ is huge favorite and QQ against AK is still slight favorite. And remember..he only raised it 3 times the BB and Phil could have just called and outplayed the youngster after the flop or got away from it if the miracle 3 outer ace hits. That guy was playing so nervous he would have probably folded if Phil pushed even the ace did hit...thinking Phil has AK. I'm not saying it was an insta shove preflop, but the fact that Phil didn't at least call and see what the kid does on the flop boggles my mind.

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you dont understand what hand ranges are,there is a difference between QQvAQ+,QQ+ thats AQo AKo AKs AQs QQ KK AA and QQvAQ which you are right you are right the qq are ahead maybe should look at things closely before you make comments about people being wrong.So if you dont believe me about this go and check something like pokerstove. really whats the point of posting here if people tell you are wrong if they dont even understand the post.

You idea about calling is wrong as I said before he is puting him AK+KK+ so he calls it comes rags what do you do? he thought he had possibly KK or AA . or If an Ace or king comes up you are gonna have to fold. and the chance of a queen coming up is nowhere near what it needs to be to justify a call. If Phil thought he was ahead preflop he would have shoved. Your idea if he hits his miracle ace is wrong aswell when you think of this hand you have to forget what hand the kid has or you will never make the right choice, because what if a king comes up on the flop phil was putting him on AK+KK+ so now he will think he has trips an over pair or top pair which beats phil's hand.

Hellmuth folding QQ before the flop??? That doesn't fit in his "Million Dollar Poker System". Anybody here who has tried Phil Hellmuth million dollar poker system (only playing AA,KK,QQ,JJ,TT,99,88,77,AK,AQ)??

It wasnt about poker,it was entertainment,ratings,money.that laydown was worth more than anything he was going to make playing poker

Can I please just put an end to this thread? I'm sick of constantly getting emails pertaining to this. I try to ignore them, but when I read most of them I can't help but comment.

Phil Helmuth made a really bad fold and if you watch the entire episode you will see that everyone at the table, including Phil Helmuth, agreed that is was a horrible lay down.

If you think you are smarter when it comes to poker than Gavin Smith, Mike Matusow, Jennifer Harmon, and Mike Sexton......not to mention Phil Helmuth (who admitted it he was dumb for not pulling the trigger) and Paul Featherstone (smart enough to know he was crushed) than keep on talking.

The bottom line is that it is over and it was a bad fold. This is not up for debate. It is a fact that it was a bad lay down. odds don't lie.

Whatever crazy motives you think Phil had for doing it are ridiculous. He's not laying QQ down against AQ for anyone. Not for TV time, not endorsements, not so everyone talks about it, not for any reason other then that he had a bad feeling that the kid had aces or kings and was wrong. He wanted to look like the man by actually being able to fold without even seeing a flop for only $1800 when he had $7000. He was right when he said 99% of people wouldn't even have thought about folding at that point without even seeing flop. If he was wrong about Featherstone's hand he looks dumb and unfortunately for him it turned out that way and he admits it. To quote what Mike Matusow said about that hand..."Even if he turns over aces it was bad fold in a stupid winner take all sit and go with that stack with Queens." There were also good quotes from Sexton and Gavin about it.

Mike Sexton probably understands the game better than anyone at that table and people should respect his opinion. Nobody in this forum can say anything to make me think different..

My advice to everyone before posting anything more is to at least watch the entire episode. Everyone at the table, including Phil, says it was horrible fold, but yet people think they have something to say.



I'm done.

Over and out.

I think he did it because he wanted to control his environment. The POSITION and the numbers were telling him to shove or at least play. But he doesn't want to shove on a super tight player who has him *Out Chipped*. Cause if he loses then it's over. If Phil has the bigger stack he's probably shoving all day. I think he folded because if he re-raised the kid would probably put him all-in before the flop anyway and at that point he would HAVE to call b/c he was so committed. So there was no fold equity really. All-in and the kid calls and he's either beat or racing, which is another situation Phil can't control. If he just smooth calls there's still another player in the hand who could raise making his queens seem even less valuable. Or if the flop comes and there's just ONE over card then he would have to fold anyway, or try to outplay someone with a bigger stack, who would probably raise any bet or bet any check. I'm sure he thought about every situation before deciding to fold. It was an informed decision.

glemly said:

QQ was a good fold, hes a good poker player....but that doesn't stop me from hating his guts.....gah he's so annoying. every time he loses it seems like he finds something to complain about, like "honey, that idiot called with Q 10 !!, what an idiot player!" he said that in the main event so many times

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QQ vs AQ was a good fold?
Do you have any concept of poker?

Yeah why would you want to be a 70% favorite when you're short stacked. You're right, he should have waited for a better spot. lmao

I suppose folding AK against AQ would be a good fold too in your world. That is the same odds. AK is as big of a favorite over AQ as QQ is a favorite over AQ.

So, basically you are saying if Phil had AK instead of QQ, that he also made a good fold. You know what that tells me? You aren't a very good poker player. Let's say the cards were turned face up....are you waiting for a better spot than QQ against AQ to get your chips in? lol

Actually, that's a bad example because if Featherstone saw Phil had QQ he's instafolding AQ. This I know because I would assume Featherstone has a little trait I like to call common sense and basic poker knowledge.

I agree with one thing you said in your post though.
"He is a good player and he is so annoying."