34K Party Tourny hand

[Turk]

Just moved to this table and have no reads at all. I vary the size of my AK bets mini-raise-3-4x BB usually. Couldn't see putting the whole tourny on this hand.
I shouldn't have have even thought about calling this right?




Party Poker No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t150 (10 handed) converter

BB (t5005)
UTG (t1675)
UTG+1 (t185)
Hero (t5110)
MP1 (t4250)
MP2 (t3765)
MP3 (t1125)
CO (t1530)
Button (t3720)
SB (t945)

Preflop: Hero is UTG+2 with K[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], A[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img].
<font color="#666666">2 folds</font>, <font color="#CC3333">Hero raises to t300</font>, <font color="#666666">6 folds</font>, <font color="#CC3333">BB raises to t5005 (All-In)</font>, Hero folds.

Final Pot: t5380

[Turk]

Bump

[arcticfox]

Its an easy fold, thats why you are getting no responses!

[Turk]

lol, thanks.

[ethan]

I'm not too fond of the min-raise preflop - varying your raises is all fine and good but UTG+2 with AKo isn't a spot where I want to encourage a multiway pot.

The fold's fine. You're probably facing another AK or a medium pair, maybe something as good as JJ. This will very rarely be AA/KK, but I guess it does happen. You should still be able to pick on the shorter stacks at the table, and folding here won't be too bad for your image. (You don't want to encourage the short-medium stacks to your left to play back at you, but folding here won't look weak-tight.)
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I just looked up the buyin for this tournament, and it's a 20+2. That makes me less worried about your image at the table, and adds a little more weight to the possibility that you're ahead of AQs/AJs here. You're 44% against {KK-77, AKs, AKo}, 45% against {JJ-77, AKs, AKo}, and 52% against {JJ-77, AKs-AJs, AKo-AQo}. I think the middle range is most likely, and adding QQ or removing 77/88 still leaves you around 45%. The likely worst-case scenario for you here is {AA-99, AKs, AKo}, which is 41% or so.

If my estimated range for your opponent is correct, then calling and folding are just about equal as far as your chipEV goes. Calling has more variance, but calling and winning will leave you with more than twice as many chips as the next stack at your table. It's worth considering, but the fold's fine.

edit - the early big stacks in these tournaments often got them by playing LAGgy and gambling. There's a decent chance your opponent here fits this profile, which should push you closer to a call. (I didn't consider this in my estimates of his range - I don't think it changes the odds of him pushing back with the medium pairs, but it makes worse aces more likely.)

[arcticfox]

I disagree, a pre-flop push to me is nearly always AK or a pocket pair early in an MTT. The guy either could be solid and have AA and assume this early in an MTT some idiot is going to call him (I've made this play with decent results), or is a poor player himself with a pocket pair and you can likely pick up his chips in a better situation than a coinflip later. You should not be calling off over 30xBBs with AK unless you have a very specific read that the pusher is a maniac.