Is it time to gamble?

vinyard · #1 04-27-2005, 10:50 AM

I was planning on pushing this pre-flop (duh) but then the ubiquitous miniraiser came onto the scene. Am I just being a fool by laying this down and not overpushing?

And more to the point, now that I am back down to the 800 chip tables I am finding myself in his situation more often and short of decent sized pairs, AK and AQ have been folding to these miniraises. For the more established, experienced successful poster here I have a question:
What's your play here and why? And if its not an overpush, what is the range of hands you would overpush with?

Party Poker No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t100 (8 handed) converter

UTG+1 (t1000)
MP1 (t2780)
MP2 (t550)
Hero (t725)
Button (t1335)
SB (t375)
BB (t725)
UTG (t510)

Preflop: Hero is CO with J[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], A[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img].
<font color="#CC3333">UTG raises to t200</font>, <font color="#666666">7 folds</font>.

Final Pot: t350

Tilt · #2 04-27-2005, 11:11 AM

What level is this? How often has this guy been minraising? If its fairly often, that might widen my range to AJ. If not I fold this. My range would be AQ+, JJ+ against a raise before me at this point. I am not even sure about AQ, that might depend on how tight the table has been running.

vinyard · #3 04-27-2005, 11:18 AM

Its level 4 of a $22 (Not sure what you meant by level.)

He basically hadn't been playing any hands except his blinds and this was his first miniraise. The next hand he pushed out of the BB at a miniriaser with KJo but that didn't help me at the time.

Tilt · #4 04-27-2005, 11:30 AM

Yeah 22 is what I was asking.

Its still a fold, even knowing he pushed KJ. You are so likely to be called that you may as well consider pushing as calling a push. And I don't think you want to be calling a push here with AJ.

Very few of the hands that call you will be dominated by AJ. A few hands that call you will be 60/40 in your favor. Most will be a coinflip, and some will dominate you or worse. This kind of puts AJ at the midpoint of hands you want to be all in with. You have a better edge from stealing later than trying to resteal here with AJ.

ripped · #5 04-27-2005, 11:36 AM

This is an easy fold. I would not even think about pushing this hand with 8 left. Yo0u gotta be more selective with your hands with it 8 way. Pretend it's a full table and play it like that. Now the next round might be alittle different but with the blinds small and 8 players in you should drop the hand and wait it out.