About 80 of 135 players remaining.
Small blind, 500, Big blind 1000, Big Blind Ante 1000

9 Handed, Hero is UTG+2. Hero has 31k total chips and opens for 3000 with As-3s.

Folds around to SB and small blind calls (80k total chips, TAG player), big blind calls (60k total chips, LAG player). Total Pot 10k.

Flop is Kc-10s-8s, SB bets 5k, BB calls 5k, now 20k in pot.

Hero has 28k remaining. What do you do????

Are you near the money bubble?

Leaving aside any ICM, I think call and jam are equally viable, though I lean towards call.

You are obviously behind and will almost certainly get a call as you heavily block the most likely draws and while one V might be on a straight draw, you are very likely looking at least one V with a K. (Although in a live game, you might get a K to fold here, as you should have all the AA, AK, and KK). But jamming gets max value if you get there, as you might not get stacks if a spade hits on the turn.

On the flip side, if you call you still have a playable stack with 28 bbs if the turn is a blank. And who knows, you might get to see a river if you call, and your A may even be a live card. That's why I lean call.

But if you think you have any FE vs both Vs, jam is better.

Idk I see calling ok and ripping if villians can find folds. Hmm I prefer lower variance route and call and fold turns where sizing is chunky. Not anti ripping flop but against 2, you are going to get called by tpgk a lot. Think the lower variance route is better. If you bink a flush on turn, we can bet if x to to set up a pot size bet or maybe tad under pot size river shove. In spot like stated, I would just bet turn if we flush out really small as an exploit and rip river. Prolly folding most turns to proper turn sizing bets when we don’t bink spade.

Open to less than 3k. On 31bb, opening to 3bb should not be a thing. I would just min open to 2k and have more maneuverability post flop. I love going min open when stacks under 40bb effective. Just think it works out better and makes post spots a little easier per se. If pot is say 7k here by making it 2k, villians cbet size may be smaller so our decision is slightly easier. Our spr is higher when we min open- just makes things easier and less murky.

Nah, middle stage of the tournament. This did go through my thought process when making my decision. If we are on the bubble or at a very early stage, I am never ripping this and always calling.

I guess that is the side analysis that I am trying to figure out. Really two questions:
- What stage(s) of the MTT, if ever, is it appropriate to make this move?
- Is it ever appropriate to make this move, raising 23k above a 20k pot, when villains have ~80k/60k.

Spoiler:

This is a ship everyday of the week don't ever think of folding here. I'd like to see you preflop raise be slightly smaller. No need to 3x.

Nut flush draws are gold just his this and ship the tourney.

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So you're thinking, if I opened w/ 2k. A shove would be the right move or a call?

I do totally understand your viewpoint about the open amount. My argument against it is...
- With a big blind ante, I feel like you're never going to steal blinds with this 2x sizing. BB just has way too much pot odds to not call.
- A lot of pots were going multi-way and I just don't mind sizing up a little to try and avoid that. (obviously didn't work in this instance). - This is something I try and do especially in live tournaments, size for what I think will get 1 caller, based on the previous action, but also never putting in more than about 10% of my stack...

I will think about this open sizing some more and try to refine my strategy.

You don't necessarily want to steal the blinds. Likely if the blinds are calling it's with a weaker hand and you have position.

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Yeah, I think from a perspective of equity, fold equity, and pot odds... It makes total sense to ship it and I'd do it all day, every day, in any cash game.

The reason I'm so torn about it, is that calling is not that much worse of an option and risking your tournament life is always a big deal. Maybe I conserve chips and find a better spot to double up?

Really tough, but yeah I am thinking ship it is still optimal at this stage of the tournament.

You have a tonne of fold equity though so when you factor that in with even if you are called you have lots of outs to make the nuts it's a no brainer. You are showing a tonne of strength and likely getting folds.

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You absolutely want fold equity with your open raises. If you have no fold equity with a certain open size, that size does not make sense. You'd be better off opening bigger or limping. Your logic is way too simplistic because worse hands calling can still cost you EV. If that weren't the case then why would the BB ever defend wider than an RFI range at equilibrium?

At equilibrium 2.0-2.5x is the optimal open size UTG-BTN at most stack sizes, but at equilibrium you always have fold equity against every position. If players left to act are VPIPing much wider than they should then you need to adjust.

This far from the money, ICM is such a tiny factor that you can completely ignore it. You don't need to take it into consideration until you're much closer to the bubble.

With that said, when you have a weak player donkbet with a big size in a multiway pot AND a caller, you probably have very little fold equity when shoving. If your fold equity is low then shoving is a punt. With the nut flush draw your equity against both players combined is likely going to be similar to your equity against each individual player, so shoving and getting called by one of them while folding out the other is a disaster, and that's the most likely result when you shove. Calling seems like a clearly superior option IMO.

Agree with this. People defend so wide today- walks are more rare than the past. I still get walks with min opens also but at a lower rate per se. Trust me you will still get walks when folks have trashy hands behind. Also you need all the chips to win a tourny. Stealing the blinds is awesome bc we don’t go to show down but gotta realize we need to win pots against bb and sb defends to win bigger pots.

My experience is that they never give you a free card in spots like this if we flat. The board is too wet/dynamic and you will only get one chance to hit your flush. Ripping realizes equity, and while it isn't great when you get a call and a fold, it isn't terrible. Your Ace is usually live here, and your opponents might be sharing outs for their redraw against your flush (ie one has a set, the other a pair or 2P). You do sometimes get 2 calls, which is obviously fine as well.

Well played OP. I do agree with the criticisms of the open size. The problem if you size it this way is that you lose so much more when you get 3! and fold (or call from behind). If you insist on using this opening size, you need to tighten your range to mostly hands that can continue to a 3! Get rid of the weak suited Ax, and the bottom of your range offsuit broadway stuff; they just don't do that well as a 3x opening.

I think in a spot where the SB should almost never be leading multi-way in theory and the BB also calls, that I generally prefer calling here. Part of the value in jamming, as Wumpy suggested, is getting some better hands to fold and I'd wager that SB's range in particular is almost exclusively value especially when they can't have the nut flush draw themselves.

I mean, running this spot with 35-40% equity against a single player isn't bad but I'd wager it's probably break-evenish. Probably optimistic to think you're going to run this spot three ways as unless the BB is bad there's very little they call off with if SB calls.

Ya this seems like a spot where unless SB is like a spazz whale, they’re not bet folding. Call and hope we bink a spade