Party 250k - Small Pocket Pairs Mid-Tourney

[Ulysses]

350/1500 or so left. My stack is exactly average.

Party Poker No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t300 (10 handed) converter

MP1 (t6615)
MP2 (t5898)
akshawnd (t4735)

CO (t6669)
Button (t4168)
SB (t9370)
BB (t1520)

UTG (t4445)
UTG+1 (t3642)
UTG+2 (t10392)

Preflop: akshawnd is MP3 with 4[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], 4[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img].
UTG folds, UTG+1 folds, UTG+2 folds, MP1 folds, MP2 folds, akshawnd ???

What do you do here?

[YoungPoker2]

You have a decent size stack with some nice stacks in front of you. I say you limp, and see what happens. 44 isn't exactly a monster 10 handed, so I'd wait to see if you can hit your set for cheap.

[La Brujita]

I think this is a difficult decision. I was discussing yesterday with a 2+2er how difficult it is to play in a tourney with between 11-15 times the bb (this is pretty much the same). Less than 10 and you are all in or fold mode but 10-15 one 3x bb gets you so close it seemed to us you have to be pretty selective about what hands to play.

That being said I guess it depends how aggressive the remaining players are and how likely they are to fold to a bet.

For me given standard opponents I fold. I prefer playing these guys in a volume pot where I am risking 7% or so of my stack or less. I feel like you have enough play to hope to find a better spot.

I feel a bit nervous giving the devil advice but there it is.

Edit to respond to the poster above that the problem with limping is you are not getting in very cheap because of the size of the blinds and you prefer a mulitway pot when you limp with small pairs late so your set can hit the correct implied odds. Also as blinds get big I think an open raise is almost always better than an open limp especially after a few folders.

Regards