By no means are these guys actively colluding, or even soft-playing each other, but the fact that they know each other so well must have an effect on the decisions they’re making.
Poker’s so full of marginal decisions, spots where you’d sometimes open, sometimes fold, there’s a lot of room for subconscious tendencies to present themselves.
This whole concept is of particular interest to us since we want to see all three of these players go deep. We’re hoping that since they will have a greater-than-normal tendency to stay out of each other’s way, they might all make it through this table with stacks.
The truth is, these guys have plenty of reason not to get into it with each other. After all, why would you play pots against the best players in the world when there are five other guys to pick on?
But sometimes there’s just no avoiding confrontation. When big hands clash the money’s going in, as we saw just one hour ago.
Howard Lederer and Phil Ivey were in a hand together and both turned a flush. Howard had the nuts and Ivey the second nuts. The chips ended up in the middle and Lederer got a huge double.
We’re reporting all the action from this tournament. Follow along right here with our live updates of the 2011 Aussie Millions main event.
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