Interesting Live Tourney Hand - Exposed Hand

[TomCollins]

130 player $130 tournament, NLHE.
Starting chips are $2000, blinds 25/50 and double roughly every 20 minutes. Players are mostly decent, 1 or 2 terrible players.

I have 2700 in chips, with the blinds 100/200. I am UTG+3. UTG+1 folds, but exposes K9c. UTG+2 makes it 600 to go. I look down and see AQc. Normally this is an easy push. But my clubs have been exposed. Plus I really hate AQ. I decide to test him and raise to 1200. I figure there is absolutely no way he is going to fold now, but I figure he is pushing any hand that dominates me. Everyone folds UTG+2 pushes very quickly (although he always had acted fast). I...

1) Should have pushed instead of raised small.
2) Should have folded.
3) Call the all in.
4) Fold and think the mini raise was ok to force him to define his hand.

[Lloyd]

I doubt if I'm raising here let alone pushing. AQ is too easily dominated by a UTG raiser and with two less clubs it's even worth less. And you still have several people to act behind you. I think I'm folding.

[TomCollins]

Remember you have 13BB's and the blinds are going up pretty fast. Raising standards are much less. Plus a king is missing, so the chances he has AK go down a bit.

The other player was recently were in a raise pot, the raiser had TT, and the player who was in with me called with QQ.

[MyssGuy]

I have to agree that you should be playing this hand. In a live tourney with blinds increasing quickly, you have to lower your raising standards slightly. (I may be biased, but the live/home tourneys I play in with similar structure, you do not see many hands. Its approximately 1 orbit per blind level, so you need to take advantage of the hands you do get.) The only issue to think about is that if your going call a raise with this hand, you might as well push now. You're putting nearly half your stack in and if your going to call a raise anyway, you should be putting all your chips in now.

[TomCollins]

I felt very uncomfortable about the K9c exposed since it killed my backup outs in case I was dominated. I decided to fold to the push leaving me with 1500 in chips. He showed TT. Made me think if I push he folds, or even if he calls, im not in terrible shape.

I'm sure I would be thinking I was a genius if he shows KK.

[SossMan]

5) flat call

You are at that funny spot where pushing will only rarely get a better hand to fold, and folding is so weak with your stack size. You have position and your call should scare people behind you from making a big move with something that you can beat. I would flat call here and play a flop. I think the way you played it was the worst of all the options.

As far as the K9c exposed...it makes virtually no difference, other than the fact that he's less likely to have KK/AK.

Let's say that he would make this raise with the following range of hands:
AK-AJ
KQ
AA-99

Combos:
AA - 3
KK - 3
QQ - 3
JJ - 6
TT - 6
99 - 3
AK - 9
AQ - 9
AJ - 12
KQ - 9

That's a total of 63 possible hand combos.
Only 18 of them are dominating you (70% or better)
You are dominating 21 of them.
You are on the bad side of a coin flip 15 times.
You are slightly ahead of his range of AQ.

Given that you are getting 2.8:1 on your call, this is a pretty horrible miniraise/fold.
Try putting him on a range of hands that makes it correct for you to fold getting 2.8:1. You darn near have to call if he shows you KK!

[Scooterdoo]

Tom, I just don't see the logic in your play. The raise you made seems to commit you to the pot (although I guess not given your fold), so the only reason for it in my opinion is to draw him into reraising you and then calling the re-raise. I don't like that strategy, because now there is no chance of getting a better hand to fold (not that there is much of a chance anyway), but what it really does it force you into a coin flip scenario when you wouldn't have needed to be in one if you pushed and got a hand like 77-TT to fold. Your raise and then fold makes no sense to me with the strength of your hand against likely hands you could be facing and the structure of the tournament.

I definitely would not fold in this circumstance, but given your position I think a call would be just fine. Even a push would be okay, but not a raise of half of your stack.

[Lloyd]

I don't know why I didn't consider the exposed king in my thinking. So yes, a flat call is what I'd do.

[TomCollins]

My initial thoughts are to push. Again, I hate AQ and I hate seeing 2 clubs gone. I hate reraising with AQo, and could treat this hand as such. I also hate that tons of players are yet to act. In fact, in a previous hand, there was a raise and reraise by the two players in front of me, I lay down AQ, and its QQ vs TT. I think I didn't realize I only had 1500 left when I raised 1200. I had a huge stack of green chips on one side, and a yellow and two blacks sitting on the other, so thought I had enough to play if I was wrong.

I think the obvious choice was to push. I am all-in-phobic in tourneys. Perhaps its good sometimes, but I am afraid to make the push now. When he pushes, I figured at best I'm on the wrong side of a coin flip, and at worst, drawing really thin. I hate calling as a dog, even though I should

[Scooterdoo]

I hear ya. A push is good because it tells your opponents that they better be willing to risk all/most of their stacks. The only hands you really don't want to see are AA, KK and AK and given that the K was out and you have one of the A's the chances are better than normal that you won't be facing one of these. If someone with any other hand does call you could dominate them (AJ or lower) or at least you're in a race.

I also don't love AQ, but it's too good to just fold. Calling isn't bad here if you feel good about your post flop play and reads on the other players. One real danger here is that another A with a worse kicker made the raise and he now pushes if an A flops because you could be easily folding the best hand -- unless you're resigned to call or push if an A flops which is probably the right move anyway. However, what's nice about calling with your hand is if any high cards come on the board, the BB is likely to slow down if he has a medium poket pair and you can then pounce. I will often call in your situation and then be very aggressive with any flop where I sense weakness in my opponent -- remember you didn't need an A to hit to win this hand.

[srblan]

Did the guy who exposed cards get penalized at least? At this stage of the tournament, the penalty wouldn't have been terrible for him, but he definitely affected play by doing what he did.

[zaxx19]

Wow im glad sossman made that layout i like to do the same thing when discussing hands but is KQ an equally possible possibilty as TT OR JJ OR AK here?? thats a joke...Given the postion and that he said these guys could play why would you expect to see a KQ??? Im really taken aback by that analysis...
I might muck here i dont like to reraise with AQ when i know that all the chips are gonna go in the middle(seems like thats gonna happen here)

[TomCollins]

He threw his cards towards the muck and they hit someones hand or some chips or something and they flipped over. No penalty. In fact, I had to fold 67s when someone folded two spades and it was a smallish raise on my BB.

The player in question is very terrible and probably very new to poker. He was routinely betting $100 into a $2000 pot. One time he bet $500 on the river on a $4k pot, and folded when someone moved in for $500 more. Careless mistake.