Which strategy do you prefer?

[Pierre]

Hi!

Here's the situation :

Satellite for the 200$ NL on PokerStars;
41 players left, 31 move on;
You are one of the shortest stack with about 3300;
Blinds are 200-400 with an ante of 25;

You are the BB, so you have 2900 left after posting;

UTG reasonable player with about 10 000 chips raises to 1200;

Everyone folds to you;

Do you go all-in, Or

Do you just call the 800 with the intention of going-all in (with 2100 left) on the flop?

What's your thinking in both cases?

Thanks!

[Kurn, son of Mogh]

I think it depends on what cards you have, unless you're fairly sure he'll fold anything but AA or KK to your all-in raise, then it doesn't matter.

[punkass]

You left out some details. What's the time? The weather outside? Are you hungry? Bloated?

Also, it'd help if I knew what cards you had.

[Pierre]

[Copernicus]

since UTG is still there to raise!

I'd go all in unless UTG has a history of check-raising big pairs. There is a good chance he thinks you are on a steal and is re-stealing and will fold, and a good chance that even if he has a hand you are ahead. Get passed this one and he will think twice before calling any raises from your BB.

[Kurn, son of Mogh]

The problem with calling is what to do if an overcard flops. If you check-fold, now you're in dire straits.

Also, if he raised with medium suited connectors and you call, if he picks up a flush or str8 draw, he's getting proper odds to call your all-in and still be in decent shape if he loses.

My experience is the last 10 take a long time to go out in these things. If you fold here, you have maybe 3 orbits left to either double up or get desperate. The problem is, he has enough chips to call and not be crippled, which is good if he has TT and a tossup if he has AQ (he's getting odds to call with overcards).

So it's raise/fold with call a distant 3rd. I'd have to make the decision based on my gut about how possible it would be to limp into the money if I fold. Average stack here should be about 6,800. Knowing the distribution and how soon you'll hit the 300/600/a50 level figure into this as well.

[Pierre]

UTG first raised to 1200 and i'm in the BB...

[cferejohn]

Given that you have JJ, I'd fold to an UTG raise here.

[allenciox]

No question --- you have to go all in, you are only an underdog to three hands (AA, KK, QQ) and the odds against that occuring to at least one opponent ten-handed is about 8:1. Note that the blinds are 1/7 of your stack, and since you are short-stacked, I wouldn't be surprised to see him try to steal here with any medium pair or AK or AQ (maybe even AJ when he's getting greedy, which you dominate). Your upside is great and the odds are in your favor.

[Kurn, son of Mogh]

I would agree with this if this were a tournament situation, with the bigger payouts concentrated in the top half dozen or so places. However, since finishing 31st is no different from finishing 1st, the decision becomes much more difficult. In fact, if there were 35 people left instead of 41, I'd say this would be an automatic fold. Unfortunately, this is going to last for at least 3 more orbits, maybe deep into the next level, so specific stack sizes of the other combatants is crucial to the decision.

[Pierre]

I went all-in with JJ. Given that i had one of the shortest stack and that i definitely needed chips to make the top 30, folding didn't enter my mind.

UTG called and showed AQ offsuit (a marginal call in my opinion)

Flop : 9 8 5

Turn : Q

It is highly probable that if i had just called the raise and gone all-in on the flop my opponent would have folded.

This is the kind of situation that doesn't come up often, but i think it's important to consider the possibility that sometimes just calling a raise and waiting until the flop to go all-in might be the best strategy...

[Copernicus]

and there is the possibility that going all in with 73o is the best strategy if you are going to flop 456.

His call was marginal at best with AQo, and you got your money in as a 57/43 favorite. At least half the world would fold with AQo realizing they are underdogs to a very likely pair, so your all in should win nearly 80% of the time (50% when they fold plus 50% times 57% when they call.) I'll take that position every time.

I think calling and seeing the flop could be right when you are one of the boss stacks and the opponent is one of the smaller stacks, but big enough that you if you double him up he becomes a contender again. His raise in that situation is more likely to be QQ,KK,AA,AK,AQ and you might want to see if you are an overpair or set first.

[Gus]

Actually I dont think the big stack call is marginal, he would make a mistake not calling, as he definitely has the odds against any cards (apart from AK, AA, KK and QQ). From his point of view, if he looses no big deal... with 7000 left he can just go back into his shell and wait for 10 smaller stack to bust out. If however he wins the coin flip two very good things happen:

_ He knock an opponent out (only 9 to go then), without having a small stack doubling up
_ He increased his stack to a very comfortable size, so he can take more coin-flip against small stacks

When a reasonnable player open-raise from UTG, he probably has a hand that will give him the odds to call the re-raise of a small-stack if the guy is all-in.

From the hero point of view... he put his money in the pot when he had the best of it, and he definitely needed to double through if he thinks he's got no chance of being in the money by just waiting. So I would say both players played it fine actually... does that actualy make sense?

[Kurn, son of Mogh]

Be careful about being results oriented, here. If he had AK, you'd have won. He was a little bit better than a 6-5 dog here getting 8-5 on his call, so his call was marginal, but in light of stack sizes *and* the fact that this is a super satellite structure, not a huge mistake.

I stand by my previous statement that preflop is raise/fold. An overcard to your jacks will flop over 40% of the time. If there were no smaller stacks than yours, you made the right play.