Out near the bubble in 3 hands

[JustPlayingSmart]

This is my first post asking for advice. Before I start off I just want to say that lurking on this board for a month now has made me a much better tournament player, though these results may not show it. I was bored at 2 a.m. so I decided to play in a 100 pt tournament on UB for a prize pool of $200. The top 20 get paid, though as usual the real money is in the top few. I have been playing extremely well in that I have built my stack to 5000 without getting a chance to double. I am raising to 3.5x the BB about 1.5 times per loop, and rarely am I called. Unfortunately though, I have not had any chances to double my chips, so I am only an average stack with 24 left.

In the first hand I am wondering about, the blinds are 150-300, and I am dealt A /images/graemlins/diamond.gif7 /images/graemlins/diamond.gif on the button...it's folded to the cutoff (T5645) who min raises to 600. I read this as a steal attempt, so I reraise to1 1900, thinking that I should get him to lay down the hand. He calls, so I know that I am probably in trouble. The flop comes 8 /images/graemlins/spade.gif4 /images/graemlins/diamond.gifT /images/graemlins/club.gif and he moves in. I think its obvious that I fold here. My question is...was my raise okay? It seems like this was a fold or raise situation, but after the hand I thought that since I have position, a flat call may be best. This would keep the pot small, so that I may be able to bluff him out or easily allow me to get away from the hand.

2 hands later (I have T3555), I am dealt K /images/graemlins/heart.gifQ /images/graemlins/diamond.gif in MP and open raise to 1050. It was just under 1/3 of my stack, so I felt that I could get away if someone came over top, and that I would still have chips to fight with if someone called and I couldn't continue with the hand. The button (T3475, so I have him covered by 80 chips) then raised all-in. This player had made several preflop all-in moves, typically when there were several limpers in front of him. I had never seen a hand he moved in with, so I had difficulty knowing whether I could have been against a total bluff or something like a medium pair. After some thought, I folded. I think this was my mistake. In order to have any chance at a big (relative to my bankroll) prize, I think I should have called. If I lose, I lose, but it seemed likely I was only slightly behind Ax with x < Q or JJ or lower. Did I blow it here?

Next hand (now down to T2505) I get A /images/graemlins/club.gifK /images/graemlins/spade.gif and make the same raise to 1050 (I assume I should just be moving in here since the raise is to 40% of my stack, but I was actually hoping someone would come over the top of me and I would get a chance to double or bust out). Sure enough, I am reraised and put all-in and I call, and lose to AA. Obviously the result would have been the same had I moved in, but I would like to know how I should play it in the future. I'm not really concerned about this hand, since I probably would not get a much better hand anytime soon, and though my stack probably would have allowed me to sneak into the money, I was playing for $60, not $2.

I have one other general question. Like I said, I was playing very aggressively at the table. Twice during the tournament, I stole with a trash hand, and the next hand was dealt AA. The first time I was UTG. I made the same raise as the hand before, hoping someone would play back, but everyone folded. I think I should have limped here, hoping someone else would raise and I could come over the top. The other time I stole and then was dealt AA in MP. I again open raised the same amount and all folded. Is there more of a case for raising here, or should I still consider limping. Since UB does not have antes, I feel like I didn't get enough out of my aces.

Once again, thanks for helping me out so much. There were only 2 times in this tournament where i moved all in against a bigger stack than me. The first I had ATo open raised from the button, and moved in on the rag flop. My opponent folded. The other time was when I busted out of the tournament. I feel like other than my "blunders" with AA, I really maximized my cards. I made a couple good laydowns (AK off in sb against a UTG limp reraiser who had KK and the big blind who had JJ) and made some good steals.

Jason

[Eric P]

The hand with Ad7d i think is bad. The re-raise is the 2nd best way to play it behind folding, which is far far ahead. However calling is a close thrid behind re-raising. The only reason raising is better is because you have a decent chance of winning, and if called you know you are basically toast minus a huge flop. Basically you were going to steal with a very above average hand, however when the guy to your right did it, just give it up to him and wait for another hand, you are looking double up, and you're not going to do it with Ad7d (which might as well be offsuit when it's heads up pre-flop). So you lost an chips without a great reason there. Although i'm not going to tell you when to bluff and not to bluff, but if you think this guy is smart enough to steal, you think he's not smart enough to suspect a re-steal?

Anyway moving on: Again you are probably hoping to double up with ~3200 chips and blinds being 150-300 you can play for a long time. There is no reason to move too fast, KQ is a pretty good hand if you are good at reading and have a big stack, but when medium and it's online i think you are probably better off mucking and unsuited KQ here. You can always pick up the blinds but i think when you are this low you should be waiting for good hands, the problem with KQ is that it is just so crushed by any hand with an ace, and is usually dominated, let alone beat if you get any action at all. You 100% should not have called the raise, not for a second.

The AK you should just go all-in. Picking up the blinds doesn't hurt you, and people could call with weaker aces, or baby pairs if they are a big stack, which you don't mind so much. With that low a stack all-in is the play, you were bust on that hand either way so not much to debate.

KQ is much worse in no-limit than it is in limit, especially tournaments. early tourny i think it's fine to play it but when you are going to get pot commited you at least want to have a good shot of getting TPTK to go all-in on.

-eric

[Kurn, son of Mogh]

who min raises to 600. I read this as a steal

Why would you think a raise that is easy to call is a steal?

was my raise okay?

Here's the problem. You reraised almost 40% of your chips? I would either fold or reraise all-in in that case. As a general rule of thumb, I won't commit more than about a third of my chips if I have any intention of folding.

In the KQo hand, don't second-guess yourself. You made the raise knowing you could get away from the hand if reraised and that's exactly what you did. Going to war with KQ when you're not desperate is not a good idea.

In the AK hand, you're now in all-in or fold territory

I was playing very aggressively at the table.

That's the way to win. This time, the cards and the opponents didn't cooperate.