AK UTG Late Stage of Tourney

Given his checkraise

Villain's range: 77-TT, QQ, AK-AQ, air

You're ahead very, very often here. I just call w/ the intention of calling any bet by villain on the turn. I probably check turn if villain checks (I don't want to scare out smaller Aces, and I want to give villain another chance to bluff if he has air). Call any river bet by villain, bet if villain checks river.

[Roman]

Nothing you could do except call down, hope u won.

A reraise has no purpose, and the way you played it, it would be impossible to fold AK here.

i disagree slightly that a re-raise has no purpose. Let's suppose villain has AJ or JJ for the boat. We obviously don't know that and villain is definitely going to bet every street, whereby we end up putting all of our chips in anyway. so in the case where we are WB and opponent has boat, we are allin by the hands conclusion anyway (according to your calling down line). Now in the case we are WA, the push makes the villain have to call 35k into a pot that is 90k. He'll be getting the proper odds to call with almost anything and you will be getting all the money in while you are ahead (very slim, say 10% possibility he'll fold). This is why i say it is a push or fold to the reraise on the flop. I don't really think there is any other choice IMO.

Thanks for all the feedback.

Where i ended up was as follows: I interptreted his call on the flop as mid/low pair, AK/AQ, maybe AJs, maybe cute big pair, maybe frisky suited connector. When he checked the flop I figured I was good, bet and expected a fold - so the min check raise surprised me and didn't know what to put him on as there were no hands that I'd have played that way. I decided he didn't have a J as the only J hand I had preflop was AJs but there's only one of those left (my A matched the board so 3 suits were covered) and I wouldn't have raised w/ it there. Given that I thought the best line was to call w/ the intent of calling any turn bet, checking behind if he did on the turn and value betting on the river if he checked again - I figured this gave me my best value if I was ahead. Implication of course was that I was committing my stack (unless a Q came on the turn which would cause me to regroup). Sounds like most of you guys were on a similar page.

The turn bricked, he pushed, I called and he turned over JTo - no miracle on the river. I either misread him or he picked a great time to loosen up ;-)

Would you guys have played his hand that way on the flop? I think I would have just smooth called and hope that I'd let my opponent hang himself on the turn and not run the risk that I scare off AQ, KK, or QQ (which were certainly in my range)

Thanks again.

HC

[eleventy]

I wouldn't play it this way. But it might be a good play against good thinking opponents. Min-raises usually mean monsters and it might be a good cheap way to bluff.

[mindyoureyes]

he was getting 2-1 pot odds to call your preflop raise so maybe calling with J10o is not such a loose call.

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he was getting 2-1 pot odds to call your preflop raise so maybe calling with J10o is not such a loose call.

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This is a terrible terrible preflop call. Pot odds are only part of the story.

It was his standard raise, and he was playing tight so he shoulda known he was up against a legit hand. Playing JTo out of position against an UTG raise is awful. Too bad you didn't have AA there hockey

[mindyoureyes]

Any statistics to back up why this is an awful play? I'm just learning my poker statistics but if I'm using poker stove correctly here's what I get:
AA thru 99 plus AKs, AKo, AQs, AQo this whole group of likely UTG holdings in their naturally ocuring distribution versus JTo has an equity of 69.9% and 30.1 for JTo. So 29% is 2.3 to 1 odds against JTo. He was getting 2 to 1 on his call so I'm not sure if I would characterize his call as "awfull". It was just a little loose. If I'm wrong on the statistics please correct me.
Thanks

[ QUOTE ]
Any statistics to back up why this is an awful play? I'm just learning my poker statistics but if I'm using poker stove correctly here's what I get:
AA thru 99 plus AKs, AKo, AQs, AQo this whole group of likely UTG holdings in their naturally ocuring distribution versus JTo has an equity of 69.9% and 30.1 for JTo. So 29% is 2.3 to 1 odds against JTo. He was getting 2 to 1 on his call so I'm not sure if I would characterize his call as "awfull". It was just a little loose. If I'm wrong on the statistics please correct me.
Thanks

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Your stats are correct but the point is that we have to play after the flop. If you call with J10o here, you're out of position with a hand that could easily be dominated. What do you do if a jack or a ten flops? You're usually going to lose a lot of chips to a big pair or not win much if raiser has AK or AQ.