Blinds 3k-6k with 300 antie
Table dynamic
Villain is bigstack on button with 460k. He's a very solid known live tournament player. He's been very active especially in CO and BTN, raising approx 80% of his hands. Part of the reason for this is the player to his left has been "sitting out" or afk for the last hour of the tournament and he's been relentlessly attacking his blinds. I in turn have been successfully pounding those one my left pre flop with lots of aggression. The tournament is paying 4 places

AFK SB 130k
Hero BB 260k
UTG 64k
CO 220k
BTN 460k

All fold to villain on BTN who opens to his standard 12k raise.
Pot 22,500
Hero Ad7s ??????

I gave serious consideration to 3b to around 28k here but decided I didn't want to be OOP in a bloated pot vs chip leader with a weak ace. Hero calls.

Pot 28,500
Flop 2d 2s Ah
Hero????

Hero correctly assumes Villain range includes a couple of magic the gathering cards, checking seems weak as villain can cbet large and force pot commitment. I'd like to win the pot right there and Villain knows I am not donking light here.

Hero donks 13k
Villain raises to 37k
Hero ????

This is either A10+ or air. Shoving seems terrible considering there is one short stack to my left and one afk blinding his tournament away. I block AA and a duece doesn't raise here I don't think. Hero calls 24k.

Pot 102,500
Turn 3c
Hero???

Turn changes nothing. Betting commits me here IMO. I don't think he's likely to 2barrel air here as if I call he loses chip lead.

Hero checks
Villian bets 40,000
Hero???

Aaaaaand I am where I didn't want to be. He still has air here occassionally but I think I'm looking at A10 here a lot. I'm still over 30bb on the bubble with a shortie and an afk. Hero folds.

Comments on any street appreciated

Don’t lead flop. A BTN open range is going to be wide, so when you hold Ax on a paired board, equity is very unlikely to shift. Checking should
Be standard with the intention of check calling.

Pre is fairly standard. I think we can have some raises in the BB but I'd pick some suited wheel Ax instead of A8o because those hands have more playability if we get called.

Leading flop is pretty terrible to be honest. We should be very happy taking a check/call line, looking to decide turn and river. I'm not sure I have any leads here. Against most aggro villains we can easily go two and sometimes three streets with a check/call line.

As played on the turn, ugh. I think we're going to have some one-pair Ax here with additional equity, like A5 and A4, plus Ax with a better kicker, like AT or AJ, that we can consider continuing with. So I don't mind folding A8 as we shouldn't have to call with all of our Ax.

I'm more open to donk betting than many here. You will find it is often an unpopular choice as it tends to polarize your range and usually finishes the hand for you whether it takes down the pot or garners a call or a raise. Either way your hand is pretty face up after donking.

In this hand I think the donk is a mistake. Against a paired bord there is too much of his range smashing you, and he's very unlikely to have any kind of draw here to push him off of. He knows you probably don't have a big Ace since you didn't raise pre and he knows you'd probably check if by chance you had a two. So it's open season on raising you with air.

In this hand I think the better play is to check/call and see how thing develop. Say he puts out a standard c-bet and you call and check the turn. You will likely be looking at a much more manageable price on the turn if you want to see the river.

I rarely donk with any intention other than winning the pot right now with this bet. As such I advise betting at least half the pot or somewhat more when you choose to lead at it.

Does not compute. Donking flop is bad. You said you didn't want to play a bloated pot OOP with a weak ace yet you donk lead flop?

he reraises u bec he wanna ask u if u wanna continue and can stand heat...he is chipleader he puts pressure on u ur chips are more valueable than his.....bec u got less.


donkin is out of question with this hand u can donk with 2x that was it.

but u shoulnd donk this flop in 1m years.....not this texture way too polarizing and easy to play against....

3bet pre rather hand like A5s then A7o with this stack dept but not on the close bubble if 3bet u need to bet at least 40k the thing is u will take it down most of the time bec he got so so much napkins holdings which he cant continue if he isnt drunk...if u 3bet 28k he can call with 72s......

Some weaker regs auto-raise when donked into and then auto-bet the next street - neither of which you really want with TPWK.

As played you have to call turn as many players basically have any two they opened (except for weak aces) - but I would never donk flop with this hand.