[Al_Capone_Junior]

with three limpers I would have raised it at least the pot, somewhere in the neighborhood of 60-80 or so. Most of the time weak hands will just fold and you'll pick up the pot, which is FINE. rarely you'll get called. Then you really need to know something about your opponents to make the best play. However in a tourney that's usually not going to happen. The buy-in of the tourney is a clue. The smaller, the stupid-er the average opponent is. In a $500 tourney, anyone who calls your raise PROBABLY has something quite strong. in a $5 tourney you could be looking at anything from AA to 72o, sometimes literally. Anyway, it's not OUT OF THE QUESTION that someone would call with QJ, but it's far less likely than if you didn't raise! I Sometimes raise even MORE with AK. The more limpers, the more I am tempted to make a LARGE raise, like 10x the blind or so. Narrowing the field works better as your raises get larger.

As for your hand, you bet $175 into a $60 pot. I hate to be critical of large bets, but that was perhaps overdoing it. I would have bet the pot or a little more, or perhaps even checked (given that you did not raise, if you raised, then bet away). When you get raised, you must consider WHAT DO THEY HAVE. It's more important than what they think you have in this case. They aren't making a huge raise of a huge overbet without a strong hand themselves. It's obvious he had either a set of tens or a straight, with two pair less likely, given the action you described. It's very unlikely he has a hand tho that you can beat. Given his huge raise, you should have just called and not gone all-in. I realize folding would be too tough for the average human here so we won't go into that, but it really was pretty obvious you were beat here. Folding would have been an option tho had you not made such a giant bet in the first place. Keep things in perspective. Huge overbets of the pot are not usually needed. "The pot or a bit more" is my favorite bet in average circumstances.

al