tournament question

You have 800 in chips, the rebuy period has passed and the blinds are 25/50. The blinds double every 20 minutes, and this round is about halfway finished. Someone in mid/early position opens for 300 and everyone folds to you in the SB. You have JJ. Earlier in the tournament this same player raised to 100 when the blinds were 5/10 and showed 77 after everyone mucked. Whats your play with the JJ?

Raise all-in and hope he doesn't have better than 77 this time.


Later, Greg Raymer (FossilMan)

I agree with Greg going all-in is the play. The only thing I will add is if the raiser only has 400 or 500, and there is no chance he will fold pre-flop, you can just call and bet out with all your chips. The only danger is that if you just call the BB may also just call so be aware of the BB.


Ken Poklitar

ohKanada@hotmail.com

Sorry if I forgot to mention he had the same number of chips as I did. Anyhow I called, he had AA and I sucked out with a jack on the flop. Not that him having aces makes me doubt very much that I did the correct thing.

Hmmm. That is a tough call. Maybe to play devil's advocate, I think there is a case to be made for folding. The most significant thing, I think, about your scenario is that the re-buy period has ended. I presume that he raised big with the 77 during the re-buy period. I know a lot of pretty tight tournament players who will make moves like this knowing that they have a slightly better than 50-50 chance to double up against big overcards, and can always reach into their pocket and re-buy of their gambit does not pan out.


But oce freeze out begins, these players will not play cheese like 77 early for a big raise. So I figure someone fitting that profile may raise with 99-AA, and maybe AJs+ or AQ+. You are a huge dog with 3 of the 5 hands that are pocket pairs, and you are basically a coin flip with any other hand other than AJs. It seems to me that you may want to steer clear of situations like this where you are not confident that you have the best hand going in.


Just a contrary thought.