Hi everyone. I am a 2+2 newbie, so forgive me if my question has been asked before. I had a question about tournament strategy from a hand I played earlier tonight in a tournament. The tournament was a freeroll.

I had accumulated about 8,000 chips. The blind were still low and my M was about 40, good enough for about 30 among a field of about 500 at the time.

I was at my initial table. The player to my left, who had not been there since the beginning, suddenly showed up and made a series of all-ins. (I know this is not likely to happen in a real money entry fee tournament, but the situation could easily arise when switching tables in a regular tournament.) In those all-in situations, he showed down J6 and A9 twice. Both all ins were or about 1/3 of his stack, which was about 4000, if I remember correctly.

The hand in question: I get 99, and raise 4x the BB. The player on my left goes all in, leaving me with 4.8-3.2 pot odds to call, which risks about half my stack.

From a pot odds perspective, this is a clear call, even if I thought there was a significant change of an overpair or two overcards. But here is my question: Regardless of the odds, is it worth risking half my stack at an early point in the tournament, when I know that I could very likely end up in a coin flip situation?

He turned over Q10, a Q hit, and I lost. I managed to cash in the freeroll anyway, but wonder if avoiding the big loss might have allowed me to finish higher, in a situation in which I might have been able to exploit a greater advantage. On the one hand, it seems these are some of the gambles you need to take to build a big chip stack. On the other hand, potentially putting the tournament on the line for a potential coin flip doesn't sit right with me, either.

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.