[dfan]

No one has recommended check-fold here. It would be hard to have the discipline to do, but I'm guessing it would be the most EV+ play.

I would estimate that in this particular situation (3bb raise called by two fairly tight players and a loose player in the second hour of a $150 buy-in MTT) one of the 3 calling hands will be holding TT -- AA 75% of the time. Low vpip players (<20) tend to play pretty tight at this point in the tournament unless they are short stacked or really big stacks.

The 14% vpip player will likely call your raise only with 99+ or AK. The 18% vpip player will see a raise and a call from a tight player in front of him, so he too is very likely to fold small pp's, AQ, etc. And while the 3rd loose caller's range would be pretty broad including AQ's, 77, etc, he just adds a bit more risk since he still may just happen to have a big hand or a T or 88 or a flush and straight draw. Put the three callers together and the prob none of them have a big pair or catch the flop is pretty low.

A stack of 1750 chips is OK at this point. If you really want to be aggressive (which I agree you should do) I say fold to a bet here, and then pick up your blind stealing as the blinds go up.