QQ raise - rerasied all-in by A 10 off!! Your thoughts please.

[soxfan70]

Single table Act 2 tourney at Foxwoods. 1st gets a seat at an Act 3 ($1050 value) 2nd and 3rd get seats to another Act 2. Second round, blinds are 25/50, already one player out. I have about $1100 in chips when in MP I look down and find QQ. No one in the pot yet, I raise it to $300. Player immediately to my left thinks for about 60 seconds, and folds, as does everyone else back to the BB, who I've played with before, and likes to gamble. He thinks for another minute, and then goes all-in over the top of me for the rest of his $800. Knowing that he is lose I call in a flash. He turns over A 10 off, and the gut to my left says he mucked an A. Obviously, you know what hit on the flop, or I wouldn't be posting this. At first, i was quite angry that this lose player would go over the top of someone like me, who plays fairly tight. Then I thought about it for a few minutes. What would I have done in his spot? I KNOW I wouldn't have pushed, but I might have called and saw the flop - at which point I'm beat anyway. I guess my question is should I have raised it more? Or maybe less? With a smaller raise, he may just call, hit his Ace, and then I know I'm beat, and I'm only out my smaller raise. If I raise it more, he HAS to know he's behind, but you would think he would know that with a 6XBB raise. Thoughts?

[jimotto]

You made a good read and got all your chips in the middle as a big favorite. What else can you hope for (other than better flops)?

[carpola]

Disappointing...but you played it perfectly.

[BDJ]

I feel your pain -- I played an Act II at Foxwoods this weekend also. Six players left, roughly equal stacks. I had about 2000 (started with 1000). With blinds of 100/200, I looked down in late position and (like you) found QQ. Raised to 600. A middle position player went into the tank, looking at his cards, and my chips -- I read him as weak and when he finally moved in, I beat him into the pot. He turns over A4 offsuit, and announces that he's "in trouble." Sure enough, he flops two pair to eliminate me.

Like you, I think I played the hand correctly, and just took an awful (and all too typical) bad beat. In a fast moving satellite, you just have to try to get your chips in when you are a prohibative favorite. My only other option would have been to move-in myself from the outset, but that would have really been nothing more than risking my whole stack for the blinds, which just doesn't make sense at that stage. Folding to the all-in re-raise seems like a bad option -- if you can't take a stand with QQ when you (correctly) read your opponent as weak, when can you?

I'd really like to know if anyone has other thoughts.

[donkeyradish]

This hand makes up for one of the times when you beat someones AA all-in with your QQ /images/graemlins/cool.gif

[B Dids]

QQ losing to A4 isn't a bad bead in the least. Yeah- you were ahead from the start, but it's not like he needed a miracle to beat you.

[BDJ]

Certainly, I see where you're coming from -- any ace and I'm in trouble. But the numbers don't lie -- statistically, I'm going to win that confrontation 70.4% of the time. That, to me at least, is a bad beat.

Would you have folded to the all-in reraise, B Dids?

[NotMitch]

You played it well, However 6x BB is ont he big side for an open raise, I think 3 or 4x works a little better.

[Jason Strasser]

You played this fine. I would raise less preflop, but that is because I usually go with a standard raise so I can disguise my hands. 150-200 to go sounds fine.

You got what you wanted, your hands like this need to hold up in order to win something like this. If they don't, its not a bad beat, but its just not your day. You can't fold, that is a horrible idea.

[B Dids]

I'd call.