Bad strategy or good?

Last night playing on a single table tourney on PP.

Blinds: 50-100
small blind had approx 3500
big blind had 240
UTG had approx 2000
UTG+1 had about 850
Button - me had about 1500

UTG limps in, UTG+1 folds. I raise to 250 with A,J suited. Before anyone comments on me playing that hand, It was a semi tight table and figured it was 50-50 that everyone would fold, and if not, I had position.

Small blind folds, Big blind calls (going all in) and UTG calls.

Flop: 10, K, rag (maybe an 8) with one spade. UTG checks. I checked not liking that flop. Turn was another K. UTG checks. I raise 200. UTG folds.

Cards flip and big blind has 10, Q. River is a rag and Big blind wins the pot of 790 chips.

Immediately, UTG starts screaming and complaining that i pushed him off and he would have won. His point was that there would have been one less player.

My reasoning. the big blind said he was drunk and was playing like it. UTG was playing well. I decided if I was not going to win the hand I would rather the big blind did than UTG. I would rather only have one large stack and two small withtwo of us in the midddle than two large stacks one small and me in the middle.

I figured the first scenario would be better for me strategically in the long run?

What do you all think?

sounds like i can't convince you to not raise AJs, but well, i can try: don't raise AJs.

you want people eliminated, their equity suddenly becomes 0 and is proportionally distributed to the remaining players (including you). this is a good thing.

I normally dont raise with AJs, but based on the way the others were playing thought it was 50-50 that they would just fold to me and if i did get a call it would be from the BB who would call with any face card (which he did). I though the limper would fold and leave it to me to knock him out.

After the turn, I knew I did not have both of them beat and figured if I could knock off UTG I would be better off over all. one less person to pick on me and one more who would have to worry about the blinds soon.

Incidentally, it worked, UTG tilted and went out in three hands. UTG+1 went out two hands later and BB didnt win another hand, giving me second.

Wasn't counting on a tilt and dont know if it was just coincidence that it worked.

Do you think its ever better to weaken a strong player when you could have eliminated a very weak player?

I'm fairly certain that I have read in one of the articles in the magazine, that concentrating chips in fewer larger stacks increases your equity, rather than having it dispersed across more, evenly-matched stacks. Here, though, that may be negated by your read on the villain as a stronger player.

forget the AJ, the thing here is you have a 20 buck sidepot, basically a dry sidepot...

You DO NOT bluff into a dry sidepot, would you rather the UTG gets the chips or the guy about to be elimiated gets the chips... you want people out.

NEVER bet a dry sidepot unless you have pretty damn close to the nuts

[ QUOTE ]
forget the AJ, the thing here is you have a 20 buck sidepot, basically a dry sidepot...

You DO NOT bluff into a dry sidepot, would you rather the UTG gets the chips or the guy about to be elimiated gets the chips... you want people out.

NEVER bet a dry sidepot unless you have pretty damn close to the nuts

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, listen to this person... dry sidepot is terrible

[tewall]

No. You'd rather have the weak guy eliminated. Just because a guy is weak doesn't mean you want him around. For example, may his weakness is he calls too much, while the strong guy is tight. You'd rather have the "strong" guy around than the weak guy, especially if the strong guy doesn't adjust enough short-handed.

This is just one example, but the point is you can't know enough about the players characteristics to justify throwing equity away.

[Uppercut]

[ QUOTE ]
I normally dont raise with AJs, but based on the way the others were playing thought it was 50-50 that they would just fold to me...

[/ QUOTE ]

Then you might just want to raise more than 2.5 blinds after a limp, dude.

[Bigwig]

Why do you people keep saying he shouldn't raise AJs from the button? Especially at the 50/100 blind level. Because of the limper? I'd probably open push here.