Stop n Go with AK

[centja1]

This happened yesterday in a live B&M MTT at my local casino. I had doubled up on the second hand of the tournament and was in control of my table throughout. Nobody would take a stand against my raises, but they were quite clearly getting tired of it. As a result, I had decided to only raise my hands that i would not mind getting all in with since I figured it was a matter of time before someone played back at me. BB in this hand is an older lady whose mother I had just busted with pocket nines against her A10o. Anyway.....

Blinds T200/T400; 27 players remaining (out of 80); 8 paid
Relevant stacks (before blinds): Hero T9000, BB T3200

Folded to hero in MP and raises to T1600 with A/images/graemlins/heart.gifK/images/graemlins/spade.gif. Folded to BB, who calls T1200.

Pot: T3400
Flop: Q/images/graemlins/diamond.gifJ/images/graemlins/heart.gif2/images/graemlins/spade.gif

BB moves all-in for T1700.

Hero ??????

I know I'm getting 3:1 on this call, and I WANT to call. Do you call here?

[Melchiades]

This looks like a medium PP or AQ,KQ,AJ,KJ to me. Which means you have somewhere between 7 and 10 outs. If you want to call, call.

[betgo]

Easy call. You are getting 3-1. You have 2 overcards and a gutshot.You have a 28% chance against AQ or KQ and a 37% chance against Qx. It is likely villain has a pp, a Q, or a J, but you could be ahead here.

[fnurt]

[ QUOTE ]
If you want to call, call.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is my new slogan. It seems so all-purpose.

[illegit]

Yeah, when I got a big starting hand and a blind position pulls a stop n go on me I'll treat it just like she had pushed PF and call even if I totally whiff the flop. When the stop-n-goer has relatively few chips anyway.

[betgo]

[ QUOTE ]
Yeah, when I got a big starting hand and a blind position pulls a stop n go on me I'll treat it just like she had pushed PF and call even if I totally whiff the flop. When the stop-n-goer has relatively few chips anyway.

[/ QUOTE ]

True, but here you have to call even if you know villain flopped top pair.

[schwza]

folding this would be horrible. this isn't much of your stack, so we can say $EV ~= chipEV.

to be cEV-neutral, you need to win 25%. to borrow someone else's stats, you have a 28% chance against AQ or KQ and a 37% chance against Qx. so you want to call those. the only hands you don't want to call are:

QJ, J2, Q2, 22, JJ, QQ. QQ and JJ reraise all-in pre-flop if they're not absolute morans, and Q2 and J2 usually fold. QJ and 22 are possible, but screw it, that's not likely. and anyway, you're still ~15% against those hands, which isn't far off.

and you're ~88% against a hand like A8 or K7. you can't fold.

This is a tough one. You can't assume you are up against just random hands, like any pair below JJ or A8/K7, especially considering this is an old lady (unless your read is that she's aggressive, thinking, and would pull this with any 2. Of course, if she's thinking, she's gotta realize that flop might have hit you in some way, too, either with a pair or some sort of straight draw, and getting 3:1 you probably won't fold...but then this goes to what your opponent thinks you think she thinks level, which may not be the level she's on.) You are definitely behind, tied against AK, or only ahead of T9

In addition, the chips aren't insignificant to your stack. You will have lost 1/3 of your stack and she will now have a larger stack than you if you call and lose. (M~=10 if call and lose). This could be significant if you can use your big chip lead to push people around...of course, if you fold, you lose some table image that helps push people around.

That said, I'd probably call for the following reasons. You do have a 4-outer to the nuts, you likely have at least one or 2 live cards...this all gives you close to the pot odds to call, when you cancel out the times she has a set or 2pair against the times she has AK or T9. Also, it helps with the image you are trying to project, that you are being aggressive and stealing with good hands, but you aren't going to give up with your children out there.

Call unless you have a read she flopped a set. Don't assume she didn't reraise all in with QQ or JJ. If I thought I was better than you and had a read, I might be tempted to call and determine whether the flop hit you or not and move in on the flop rather than reraise all in preflop where you are guaranteed to take a coinflip.

Dennis