Simple tournament hand

[LarsVegas]

Hi all, I know this belongs in the "Multi-table Tournaments" forum, but I suspect I may have a better shot of getting some decent response here, so here goes:

PokerStars $100+9 multitable tournament, no well-known faces at the table. One player busted on the previous hand, where I got to show KK (vs another KK and JJ!), the first hand I had showed at this table (been sat perhaps one orbit). Seem standard tournament tight, perhaps even a bit tighter than usual.

75/150 blinds, 8-handed as the one player had just busted. First two fold, then it's to me with 77 and 1530 in my stack. If I play this (even if I just raise it 450 to go like normal), I play for my entire stack.

Can anyone help me with some easy calculations here? I am potentially risking my stack of 1530 and picking up 225 every time I win the blinds.

I guess AK/AQ is usually playing this against me, as well as AA-TT (of course a lot of players will play 99 and even 88 here, but I think that evens out EV wise with the times I will get stack-action from fools with 66-22).

How does that math work out?

lars

[Alix]

With 5 players left to act, and 225 blinds for a 1530 stack, your raise factor is 5*1530/225=34. Thats a little too much for 77. At best, you're slightly +ev in chips, but -ev in $$.

Call or fold depending on the likelyhood of getting raised if you limp.

[JasonP530]

Its a tough call, but it seems like you need to double up. In two hands, youll be at 1300 in chips, which is getting down there. You would probably rather try to reraise someone that is weak and hope to pick up some chips without being called. Might you be better moving all in to start? It clears up most people from making a bad choice with AT or A9 or so, but it may clear out the lower pocket pairs as well. I think that there are only so many big pairs, you need to double through. Raise, if youre reraised, hopefully you have a better hand or can suck out. Ahh, the advantages of having chips....

[LarsVegas]

The hand struck me as maybe even closer than I had thought when I posted it here. Even though I went bust with the hand, my immediate thought was that it was clearly a bad play.

Am I right in thinking that this is nowhere near close with 99, and probably a play with 88?

I don't think limping can be done here. Maybe with 2000 chips. With 1500, limp-folding is not attractive AT ALL, and even the smallest of raises is very troublesome to me (either by having to fold to pretty good odds or by limp-calling 25% or so of my stack).

lars