NL 1/2
Hero is in for 250 but now at 150. It's a crazy game and the price of seeing a flop is huge. Hero topped off once but now doesn't mind being low. This stuff is nuts to a person of conservative temperament.
Villain is a 70 yo WG who isn't an OMC. He's a respected reg but no nit. He's crafty and does goofy stuff occasionally where everyone looks at him like he's on glue (happens but not often). He has $290.
Hero has AK on the button. UTG goes all in blind for the third time in a row. He's a blackjack player who ran it up to $500 and now is at $140 or so. He's given up and wants to play more blackjack. Pre-deal he moves $140 out.
Villain raises to $290. I felt like he was trying to isolate. Hero is on the button. BB and SB have below $60. Hero???????????

Range villain? Because this entire scenario is a maths problem but depends greatly on villain's range. So that's where you need to start. If you do that, you can work out if it's a call or not.

I put him on JJ or 10s here but also felt he could have AQ. AJ not really a possibility. 88 below I've never seen him do anything like that before. There was a fourth player to consider in the hand who didn't figure into my decision as he was the BB and a total station.

What position is V in?

It's probably a thin call but you can dump it if you don't want the variance. You're probably topping out at 5% ROI max on the call, some chance it's -EV. If he has nothing but AK and TT-JJ and UTG has top 40% then it's ~exactly breakeven. Add AQ into that and it's good, add AA/KK in and it's bad.

What the heck? Snap shove!

As described utg has any two or is a good chea t partnered with a good or better mechanic.

This.

Am I misreading something? We are getting almost 2-1 on AK for 70 BBs and one hand is random?

It's not that slam dunk. Like, say V only ever has { AK, TT, JJ }. Against that and a random hand you're putting in a third of the money and your equity is 0.3424. And throw QQ+ into his range as well and you're down to 0.3123, so that would be -EV. The truth is somewhere in the middle there. I tend to think the truth is closer to the first range, so I'd get it in, but it can't ever be anything but a really marginal spot. I wouldn't blame someone for just dumping it if they didn't want to flip three ways for a buyin.

The surprising thing about AK is how limited it is against even remotely strong ranges. Against { QQ-TT, AQo+, AQs+ } you'd think it'd be awesome right? Only stuff you beat or tie with! It ekes out a slight fave at 53.9%. Add AA and KK in there and AK is an underdog. The flipside is that it's hard for AK to be a huge underdog against most ranges, unlike a hand like TT which gets crushed by a lot of hands.

of course he is trying to isolate. and since you are the only player left with any kind of significant stack, he is specifically trying to iso against whatever random hand that you have, so he could be very weak right here. like QT off. or pocket sevens.

shoving pre all day.

I guess if you have AQ in his range and not the top stuff (AA/KK) it can work out to a pretty decent ROI.

He was in the hijack. Thank you for your comment. I really appreciate everyone else's feedback.

Oh yeah dog! appreciate the sentiment. That's what i did.

This is excellent analysis, Chris, and I appreciate you taking the time here. I read everything you write on this board.

Thanks, appreciate it.

easy fold

unless you feel like gamboling
you will win this less than 10% of the time

How do you figure that?

It will probably end up something like this
Q7 vs JJ vs AK....we have 39% equity

Or this
T5s vs AQs vs AK....we have 43% equity

Even if we give the blind guy and Ace and give HJ a monster
A7s vs KK vs AK....we have 28% equity even against this really bad spot

The reactions in this thread are nuts. With the straddle to 150, we're sitting on a stack of 1BB. Go look at push/fold charts for tournaments, even AQ is almost certainly a shove against a HJ open. Trivial spot.

You misread the hand. UTG went all in BLIND. His pf range is 100% of hands.

Don't understand how you can range him to 10''s and JJ.
You thinking he would flat AA-QQ?

I'm never folding. Also think he sounds like guy isoing wider than expected.

Finally the post is misleading: this isn't a min-raise, it's a shove. There's no way you can range villain on as tight a range as TT/JJ/AK. He can of course have QQ,KK,AA here, as well as a lot of weaker Ax hands, like ATs,AQo, etc.

doubt V's stepping out of line that badly which means we're a dog to his hand and then a mystery 3rd hand

ok so even at 30% we lose 7 out of 10 times
if you feel like gamboling go for it
we lose $150 7 times = $1050
we win $290 3 times = $870
looks like a losing proposition to me

It is amazing how neutral of a spot it is. If he is isoing a strong range. I expected to see more profit than I am calculating.

Well, I got you up from 10% to 30%.....but I just showed 2 scenarios that are probably the most probable....and we have 39% and 43%.

So lets call it 41% equity if this spot came up 1000 times.

So we win $290 41%
We lose $150 59%

Winning proposition. Its not a ton of +EV (about $30) so if I had a small bankroll Id fold, but Im personally never folding. You dont get into that many situations to make 15BBs of EV in one hand. OP even said he didnt top off because he knows hes going to be getting all in at some point soon and he wanted to risk less. This is that spot.


If you raised to $12 in a 1/2 game with QQ and a guy shoved on you for $150 and showed you AK would you call? This is about the same amount of +EV call.

Your math is way off!!!!

At 30% equity our EV is roughly -$16......not $180

-$180 EV isn't even possible when you start with $150.

Actually YOUR math is off. His math shows -$18 in EV not -$180. His assumptions of 30% EV is what is off.