How Would You Play This?

[brianmarc]

Im an experienced Limit HE player starting to play NL online tournies. Game was $100 buy-in. 7 of us left. Blinds 30/60. I'm chip leader with 2200 chips. I'm UTG and get Ac Th. I bet 120. All fold except button who has about 2000. Flop is Ah and two small hearts. I bet 500; he goes all-in. I call. I lose to 2 small hearts and get knocked out of game next hand. I figure that call was necessary, since he could have had A-little or a single heart. But maybe preservation would have been better. Thoughts?

[MrFeelNothin]

muck it preflop. this is a very tough hand to play out of position, even when you hit your A you ended up being forced into a situation where the other player pushes you out of the pot.

So you decided to raise, on to the flop: check/fold or feeler bet/fold. You have top pair no kicker with 3 of a suit on board which you dont have and you are willing to put all your chips in the middle? NL single table tourneys are about survival and doing whatever you can to avoid showdowns. You can't call that allin.

[RobGW]

You have to make an adjustment when switching to NL. You can go broke with a marginal hand instead of just losing a few bets which is exactly what happened. I am all for being aggressive but when you get played back at like this you have to decide if its worth it, and it is usually a tough decision. If you fold, you still have 1500 chips which is enough to still make a run at winning. If you call and are wrong, then you are out. I find when I don't respect my opponents I go on losing streaks. But when I respect them, I give myself a chance to outplay them.

[ChrisV]

No offence, but every action here was wrong. You should fold AT here with those blinds/stack depth. I would limp or fold AJ and limp AQ. If you are going to raise, make it 180 to avoid pricing your opponents in. On the flop, that bet is far too large. Bet the size of the pot. Finally, you are nowhere near calling that allin. There simply aren't any hands you can beat.