Thomas Whalroos vs. Rafi Amit at the WSOP Omaha Final Table
This hand starts at about the seven minute mark of the video, and it involves reigning champion Rafi Amit against online full tilt poker pro Thomas Whalroos where he was short stacked at this final table facing an early position raise from Amit.
Even though Amit is among the chip leaders at this table, he is known as a solid, tight-aggressive player so while Whalroos would've had to have known he was behind going into their hand. But just as you could imagine being short stacked in a no limit hold’em game, you really have to know the true value of your hand. And I believe Whalroos was certainly taking that into account.
If you look and compare using a backhander poker calculator, you can see that while Whalroos’ hand being double suited is still behind Amit’s AcQhTd9d he stands a good chance of stealing the spot with a marginal situation, given his hand of KdTc8d4c.
So even though while Thomas pretty much configure he is shoving it in behind, given his remaining stack is only just over about 60,000 in chips, this is a reasonable move to try and double up and earn a higher payout. If not, he is likely going to be blinded to the point where he will get multiple callers, in another situation.
This is one of those moves where a player in late position is actually hoping for somebody to raise and isolate the pot assuring that his small stack is going to be facing off against only one opponent. This is a good strategy to consider for any type of game, when you're short stacked in a tournament.
