holding AKs... 63 left... 60 paid... what to do?

[Equal]

Playing in a $50+5 NL MTT on tourney on Party last night, and this hand comes up with 63 players left.... and 60 to be paid a minimum of $108.

My feelings regarding the money is that I dont really care about $108 - I want to maximize my chance of winning the tourney - although of course I would rather have $108 than $0. That being said making the money and $108 pays for two more of these tourneys.

Party Poker No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t600 (9 handed) converter (http://www.selachian.com/tools/bisonconverter/hhconverter.cgi)

saw flop|<font color="C00000">saw showdown</font>

<font color="C00000">Hero (t7340)</font>
Button (t5295)
SB (t7060)
<font color="C00000">BB (t580)</font>
UTG (t6100)
UTG+1 (t2125)
MP1 (t6440)
MP2 (t3740)
<font color="C00000">MP3 (t8180)</font>

Preflop: Hero is CO with K/images/graemlins/heart.gif, A/images/graemlins/heart.gif.
<font color="666666">4 folds</font>, <font color="CC3333">MP3 raises to t2200</font>, <font color="CC3333">Hero ???

An additional piece of information is that, while I just got moved to this table recently, I had seen the opponent make a first-in raise before this hand, and it was smaller then this raise. I think 1800ish.

Note: I had originally posted this as 61 players left, but that was incorrect. As you can see, the BB is all in on this hand and folding would probably move me into the money as it is probable that the BB will lose this hand. There was 63 players left in this tourney at this point.

[fnurt]

Given his position and the fact that he was first in, your opponent could have a very wide range of hands here. I cannot conceive of folding here.

[Pat Southern]

I push in this spot, he should be raising with a wide range of hands there, and this way you put the pressure on him to make a decision if he wants to be bubbled by calling. I think it would be a no-brainer if the raise came from anywhere else, but this is the one guy at the table who can bust you. Nevertheless, I think this is a good place to build your stack to make a run at the real money.

[esbesb]

Why not just call? That way you don't have to take a coin flip if he calls your all-in with a pocket pair. If you hit the flop (or even if you don't) you have position. If you miss the flop and he bets hard, you fold and still make the money.

[esbesb]

The other thing I forgot the mention in my last post (that I think weighs in favor of just calling) is the deception it adds. If the flop comes with an Ace, think of the good position you'll be in if he has AT, AJ or AQ. If the flop comes with a K you'll be in great shape if he has KQ or the like.

[PokerNeal]

Good answer. Excellent point. I am opposed to coin flips in general (unless you gotta do it and are up against the wall) and slow play in this situation might give you good dividends.

[danstjohn]

I like calling here. I guess you need to ask yourself is your hand good if you hit the flop? I love AKs against a player out of position. Depending on what type of player he is, after the flop he'll likely bet into you. If you hit the flop insta push. If you do not hit the flop and he bets into you muck and wait for a hand to go all in with after your in the money.

The only way you have a shot at winning these tournies is with taking a risk, you double up here and you are in great shape to finish well. You miss the flop you muck, simple as that just don't get cute and all in with a miss.

[familyteeth]

what did you make of the additional piece of info?
to me it says :villain was strong first raising hand and he's trying to say "i'm really strong this hand" hence weaker.
I won't call this for 30% of my stack and fold. it's allin here for my money

[GoSox]

Just a comment, why you may not care about $108, but take into account that people drop very quickly once everyone is in the money. If you have an avg stack and play tight once the money is hit you'll move up very quickly and that 108 goes up quick.

[Benal]

You cant CALL about 30% of your stack pre flop and fold. No way. Like you said, you dont care about the $108 so.. push. I would, almost every time. MP3 is the big stack, on the bubble, its folded to him.. He should be raising with 72o !

[ethan]

Push, and I don't think it's too close. You can't call and fold on a missed flop because it's 30% of your stack. The table leader will raise a lot of hands you have beaten/dominated since people are playing tight trying to get to the money. He doesn't want to bust out either, though, so put him to a decision. He's going to fold a few hands you'd rather not see (mid-pairs) and may actually call with something like AQs. Doubling up gives you 2.5x the stack of anyone at the table, and even if MP3 folds you're at 1.5x. If he happens to have AA, at least you're suited /images/graemlins/smile.gif

[kenstall]

Make a decision before you get to this spot:
A) You care about $108, so fold everything but AA and wait until your safely in the money to play your normal game.

or

B) You care about the final table in which case, you see that the table leader is going to be pressuring everyone at bubble time and you need to fire over him with top tier hands. AKs is one of those hands.

[Rakkad]

Its been said, but this is a great time to push and pick up some more chips before getting deeper into the money.

For those advocating calling or folding because of how fast the first couple tiers of money go by, its hardly worth considering the extra $40-60 you may make by letting 20 more people bust out. The money is in the top 3 places.

[SossMan]

If you can't push here, you shouldn't play poker, and you deserve to lose.

Well, maybe that was typically harsh, but it's really not very close.

[esbesb]

The reason we gave the answers we gave (at least the answer I gave) is because the original poster couldn't decide whether he wanted to make the $108 or go for the big money. I agree he needs to decide and play accordingly and push if he really wants to win. But, given that he couldn't decide, I was simply suggesting a move whereby he could see the flop and still make the money by doing nothing if he didn't hit the flop.

[Equal]

I am sorry if I was unclear in the original post, but I want to make the play that gives me the best chance of winning the tournament.

I ended up pushing all-in, he called with KK and won. I ended up in 61st place.

[ethan]

[ QUOTE ]
The reason we gave the answers we gave (at least the answer I gave) is because the original poster couldn't decide whether he wanted to make the $108 or go for the big money. I agree he needs to decide and play accordingly and push if he really wants to win. But, given that he couldn't decide, I was simply suggesting a move whereby he could see the flop and still make the money by doing nothing if he didn't hit the flop.

[/ QUOTE ]

Fair enough. I think it's important that people reading this thread realize that the above route is a very bad one. A big stack on the bubble who's playing weak-tight to avoid busting out could reasonably be described as not fond of money.

(I truly don't mean the above as a personal attack. If he's worried about the bubble then I suppose he can fold, but it's important that people realize that should be the farthest thing from his mind.) That said, I don't think the original poster was in this bad mindset...he seems to be aware that the most +EV move may at times end up with him being 62nd and wants to take it anyways.

[ethan]

Bummer, but it happens. One other thing...you mentioned in your first post that his raise sizes varied slightly. The 400 extra is definitely not reason to assume he has AA/KK. You played the hand fine, better luck next time.

[Kirkrrr]

When I first read the post, my knee-jerk reaction was "Push!!!" ... however, after thinking about it for a few seconds (that's just my short attention spa.. hey, a pigeon! /images/graemlins/ooo.gif) I think a call is much better.

MP3 could be doing this with any Ace or K-high hand (or 2,7o if the table is playing super-tight the way it usually goes on the bubble and he knows there's a very good chance he'll take it heads up against a random hand that's all-in already). By just calling, you have a very good chance he'll bet into you again on a flop you hit in any number of ways.

Furthermore, he's just as reluctant to go up against another big stack on the bubble as the Hero is, so if he DOESN'T hit the flop in a big way, he's going into check-fold mode 70% of the time and you take the pot down anyway.

In this particular case, I think calling has far more advantages than pushing. Which will in no way stop me from pushing the next time I'm in this exact situation.

Kirk R.

[Kirkrrr]

That really... sucks. The majority opinion was with you, though. If that makes you feel any better /images/graemlins/wink.gif

Kirk R.

[ThingDo]

While there are many reasons why calling is incorrect here, I think the biggest one being, even if you have his hand dominated if you call and an A flops, he bets and you push... he is getting incredible odds on his call, a call you would rather him not make. I would push here every single time.

[Pat Southern]

If you're already allin, you don't need deception for when you have him dominated.

[SossMan]

(that's just my short attention spa.. hey, a pigeon! )

that's pretty funny.

[adanthar]

[ QUOTE ]
While there are many reasons why calling is incorrect here, I think the biggest one being, even if you have his hand dominated if you call and an A flops, he bets and you push... he is getting incredible odds on his call, a call you would rather him not make.

[/ QUOTE ]

If you both hit your A, you're about an 80-90% favorite depending on what the rest of the flop looks like. You'd MUCH rather he make the call for the rest of his stack. (Hint: If you have 88, he has 9 /images/graemlins/club.gif 9, and the flop comes J /images/graemlins/club.gif 8 /images/graemlins/club.gif x, he has perhaps half an out per street less than AK v. AQ on Axx. I don't need to tell you that you want him to call a bet, right?) At some point, given the extra chips you pick up AFTER doubling (ie, you can steal more), the odds become irrelevant.

Back to whether calling is better than pushing: I think pushing is better (and I'm weak tight in multis), but I think it's probably closer than people think. Given the other guy raised 1/4 of his stack, your folding equity cannot be that large here- but you will be all in on almost any flop you hit unless he check/folds (if he bets 1/2 the pot half his stack will be there, and when you all in he'll be getting around 8:1 to call it.) You're basically getting gigantic implied odds.

Here's a question: What do you do here if you have JJ or TT?

[fnurt]

You are neglecting the chance that he will already have hit his kicker on the flop (i.e., flopped two pair).

Regardless, the fact is that if he has a dominated hand, you are in great shape no matter what you do. About the only way you can screw it up would be to call preflop with the intention of folding on the flop if you don't make a pair, which, unbelievably, I actually see some people recommending. How awful is it when your opponent has AQ, the flop is rags, and you fold to his auto-bet on the flop?

Some people seem to be afraid that your opponent MIGHT have a pocket pair and MIGHT call and MIGHT win the coinflip. I personally think you have a premium hand and need to play it strongly.

[ron dogg]

I don't like the call idea at all, the chips just are not deep enough for that. Move the chips in. A player knows that the best time to accumalate chips is right before the money. Since calling is out. I don't have enough chips to fold AKs here the only option then is to all-in.

[Bigwig]

Push all-in.

The only hands you are really afraid of are KK &amp; AA. And those both have a 50% less chance of being his hand because you hold an A and a K.

You cannot play NL Hold Em tournaments when the blinds are this size and be afraid of KK or AA. You'll never win a pot and lose.

[ethan]

How could you have enough chips to fold AKs? More chips in both the relevant stacks make a push not quite so good and a call not quite so bad (as you imply), but a fold?

/images/graemlins/confused.gif

On a side note, as the stacks get deeper and a call becomes more plausible, a non-all-in raise gets better too. (This isn't to contradict anything you said...such a raise just hasn't been mentioned in this thread and it would be with larger stacks.)

[EnderW27]

What do you do when the SB pushes all-in?

[45Player]

I don’t agree that an all-in is obvious here.
Firstly you have no idea what kind of player MP3 is. If you reckoned that he was trying to bully the table with his big stack, then I agree that an all in is correct given the range of hands he may have.
However you have no reason to assume that he is a bully. He has put in a substantial raise, into two large stacks, so that usually indicates a strong hand. He may be the type of player who will call any reraise with AK , TT, JJ, QQ. At this point you don’t know his tendencies so if you reraise there is a reasonable possibility that you will be called, in which case you are either a big dog or a slight underdog. Don’t forget that MP3 has already committed 25% of his stack so he may feel unable to fold to a reraise.
Your chip position is good in relation to the other players and I presume to the field (although we don’t know that).
Why would you risk that position on a possible coin toss or worse ?
I do realise that you only have 12 BBs left but others are in a far more critical position, and you may be able to gain an advantage there.

I initially thought about calling but risking 30% of your stack in the hope that an A or K will hit the flop is not a good idea.

So, I reckon folding is the best option here. I may not like it but sometimes what appears to be a good situation can suddenly turn unpleasant, and you just have to grit your teeth and let it go.

My comments as always are open to criticism.

[Pubknight]

I'm curious for those saying to push in, would your answer change if Hero was holding QQ?

I had almost the identical situation to Hero, just with the different starting hand.

Extra info if it makes a difference:
- I was button, and both the SB and BB were sitting out, so there was no chance of a call being reraised

I've been wondering for a few days now if I played the hand right.

[Big Jon]

I too, think that all-in is the best move, but how good of a move it is depends largely on what you know of the player. If he or she is aware of Gap Theory, and uses it, then you are likely to hold a superior hand at this point. If they are aware that players typically tighten up on the bubble, then you likely have a superior hand. If he or she is aggressive or LAGish, you are likely have a superior hand. You can see how many different variables work in your favor at this point.

Of course, if they are a very tight player that only plays premium hands, then you might be in trouble. Of course, many of the hands that a tight player would raise with you also have dominated. And if they are tight enough, they just might lay down a small or mediocre pair, to which you are a slight dog.

Even though they have you stacked, your count is very close to theirs. If they were to loose the pot against you, they would only have enough for one big blind. These kinds of thoughts will definitely be racing through their head when you push all your chips into the center. That's why being so aggressive is so advantageous. You're always putting the other guy to the test.

Barring a read that the player is very tight, I think this is an obvious push. As stated before, if the stacks were much deeper, you could justify just a call, but here, you just have the be aggressive.