This post has two questions related to a tournament I played tonight.

1. Blinds 1,000/2,000. My stack is 19,000. Average stack at table around 15,000.

Villain is a solid player who had been shoving frequently as short stack (about once per orbit). A few hands prior, he shoved on my BB from the SB with A-2 off and I called with K-Q suited and ended up losing to his Ace high. Villain now goes all in pre-flop for 13,000, this time UTG. I have been dealt A-J diamonds UTG+1.

Call? Fold? Shove? Why?

2. Later in tournament: I am UTG with 7,000. Blinds are now up to 2,000/4,000. I am dealt K-2 off. My action?

1) depends on tournament state, seems close, calling looks OK given villain has been active but he is utg and we still have an unknown number of players who may also stack off, so I'd pass and look to get the money in first later

2) if you've not just lost a big pot then you've made some serious errors getting this short in the first place, I'd fold as you have no FE. Other players stacks, situation in the tournament, number of opponents are all key information you've omitted

How have you come to this conclusion?

He does pretty well in tournaments. Seen him go deep enough times that I think he knows what he's doing.

1. I was more inclined to call because of how active he'd been, but his UTG shove did come off stronger.
2. I called in scenario 1. above and lost to villain. It pretty much crippled me. I was all in the next hand before I got blinded out. Still 7 players, average stack around 15,000. I figured a shove with a high card was better than any two random cards in the big blind the following hand, when I'd be down to less than one big blind. Is this the wrong way to think about it?

1. I shove with AJ. You're down to less than 10bb's, which is still enough to make most stacks fold that limped in. If you wait, there's no guarantee that you'll get better hands. But there is a guarantee that your stack will soon get small and that future small all-in will get called by multiple limpers, diminishing your chance of surviving. That is why villain is employing this strategy and shoving more often. Your Ace is probably stronger than villain's Ace if he's been shoving once an orbit during that level. You don't want to just call because if another player with a bigger stack than you also just calls and the board gets checked down because you both missed, and your hand was better, then you miss out on those extra chips you could have made with your shove instead.

2. I shove here too with a K. Your stack isn't even 2bb's. It got too tiny. If the reason is because you took a hit, then that hit pretty much eliminated you. If you're this small by not pulling shoving triggers at about 10bb's, then learn from it.

1. This is a snap shove. You are way ahead of his range, and dominate a big chunk of it. There is some risk that someone behind you has a bigger ace, but AJ is very strong when the average stack is 7.5 bb
2. It doesn't matter. K2 is a crappy hand to go in with and is behind everyone else's calling range...and you will get called. If you wait, you are all in on the bb no matter what. Either way, as mentioned above, you done goofed to let it get to 2 bb(unless you lost a hand to get that low). You should be shoving pretty wide as soon as you get below 10bb

Money bubble? How many handed? Pay Jumps?

Both look like call/shove to me but I would be taking into account some of these other factors as well.

When short you want to maximize the pots you're in. Shoving Kx when you 'are not' in the BB is way better than shoving Qx or Jx (or ATC) from the BB since there are more chips in the pot that weren't originally yours to start with. In either case you still need to get lucky and win a pot ... might as well win a bigger pot. I can't imagine that Kx isn't on most shove/fold charts with 2 BB.

Not sure where I read it, but there was some information about players that 'panic' near Level changes. The idea was to embrace the Level change since there would be more 'actual' chips in the middle from blinds/antes after the Level change than before. This certainly can open up a huge discussion and would have to include a peek at the structure and position of the player as well. GL

Scenerio #2 reminds me of when I am playing blackjack and someone gets 16 versus a dealer face card. They ask me what to do, and I tell them 'The best play is to hit, but you are going to lose". Shoving 2 bb with K2 is probably the optimal play, but it sucks and you are likely going to lose.

I think I read the same thing about waiting for the blinds to go up before shoving (I think maybe in Phil Gordon's Little Green Book, was years ago). If your stack is so low that the blind increase won't decrease your fold equity, than I would agree. If the blind increase will knock you down from 6 BB to 3 or 4 BB, then I would disagree.

K2o is slightly worse than a random hand, however in neither case do you have any fold equity and if you shove UTG you might get isolated which knocks out the BB that has 50% of your stack in dead money.

I think K2o is the slightest of favorites against a random hand? But other than that, I agree. If we ship it here, we have the chance to win 1BB dead money that we can't get if we have to call it off in the BB.

Actually I take that back, K2o is a pretty big underdog to a random hand with 33% equity. Thought it was more like 45% or something like that.

I don't know if 33% is enough justify the possible one BB dead money here. Could be really close.

Lol what? There's zero chance that any Kx has less than close to 50% equity against a random hand.

Even 72o has more than 33% equity against a random hand..

Oops, I had a flop selected. Seemed strange. So it's basically 50/50 which means there is no reason to pass up this hand.

Calling when you're that shallow is usually a mistake. You need to shove hands or fold them. There is no reason to look weak by making a call and inducing other calls. This is one of the most common mistakes that I see in tournaments. Players think they are doing the right thing by making calls and not risking their whole stack when the truth is that their passivity is making them a target.

You could pass up K2 if you think that you're going to get too much action by shoving so short UTG. You may get isolated which would be nice. It sort of depends on the table chemistry, as to whether shoving this or ATC from the BB is the best play. While many players would say that it is mathematically correct to shove K2o <2BB UTG, I sometimes feel like I'm just asking to get into a multiway pot with a dominated hand when I could take a risk with ATC from the BB where I'm acting last. (Although it should be added that while you are acting last from the BB, it may be obvious to the other players that you have to shove your final 3k.) You stand to win 4k more from UTG, but that isn't going to matter much if you're in a 4-way pot.

You actually can be a tiny bit protected in the BB since the button and small blind know that you have to call/raise any bets from them. Their stack sizes come into play here. You may also end up with more protection overall in the BB since shoving from UTG always seem like chumming the water.