The famous "all-in" strategy

[Chuckster]

Very general question, but one that I feel is important.

In bubble stages, many times you get a decend hand ....say AJs, AQs, 10-10, 9-9...etc...By no means are these monsters, but they still are likely to be ahead of most hands.

Say you have a semi-average stack. For this case, lets say the blinds are 400-800, you have T7200, and the average stack is T11,000. When you get hands like this is it best to just go all-in??? I know position is key, importance of payout money, etc...

We are of course assuming that no one has raised, and you are in mid-late position (opinions on early position are appreciated as well).

I face this dilemma many times in the MTT's (as we all do). I sometimes pick up a nice AJs and I don't wanna limp, but I feel like raising, say 2-3 X's the BB might be wrong because if you miss the flop, you almost have commited a large chuck of your chips, and are kind of forced to take an all-in stab anyways, and if the caller has a pair you are likely done for.

I feel like folding is not proper either because if people have limped behind me, or folded to me, there is a good chance that I might have the best hand.

I used to always prefer just pushing and putting the pressure on other players, and hoping that they understand the gap concept, but is it a good idea to put your stack at risk with these "trouble hands"?? If you get called you are likely dominated.

I am confused as to these situations as to what might work best...maybe a minimum raise, maybe limping...I don't know

All comments will be greatly appreciated.

[joeboe2001]

I used to always prefer just pushing and putting the pressure on other players, and hoping that they understand the gap concept, but is it a good idea to put your stack at risk with these "trouble hands"?? If you get called you are likely dominated.

Errrrr...I guess I misunderstand the gap concept. I thought it meant that your hand requirements increased when someone opened before you. Clearly that is not your strategy here??? I.e., you propose calling an all in with less than powerful hands???

[Chuckster]

Basically what I mean is that if I push with AJs, I would hope that a someone with an understanding of the Gap Concept would fold hands like.....AQ, and small to mid pairs...hands that you might consider raising or even pushing if no one has raised before you.

[theghost]

[ QUOTE ]
your hand requirements increased when someone opened before you

[/ QUOTE ]

...and if they understand the gap concept, they need a big hand to call your all-in.

[danng721]

You've considered pretty much everything you need to make a good decision except for the size of the stacks behind you (you probably just forgot to write it in your analysis).

In EP, you'd want a more premium hand selection, but you'd want to push simply because playing semi-good hands out of position is a pain in the ass. If my stack is still manageable, I may muck AJ in UTG and UTG+1 at a full table if there are alot of huge stacks left to play behind me.

In mid-to-late position... I'd push as well! /images/graemlins/tongue.gif However, if it was folded to me AND there was no stack still to play that completely dwarfed mine, I'd have a much wider hand selection (Axs, 44+, any two broadways). Assuming the semi-average stack you talked about, you need to do this because the amount of chips in the middle will signficantly increase your stack by 20-30% each time you steal. This is key SnG play that applies here.

With the blinds so large relative to your stack, you should never consider limping or min raising.