Hello,

there were 154 Players left. 150 were payed.

Do i have to fold AKo in this spot??


PokerStars - 400/800 Ante 100 NL (8 max) - Holdem - 8 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

UTG+1: 14.66 BB (VPIP: 25.00, PFR: 18.18, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, Hands: 36)
Hero (MP): 27.35 BB
MP+1: 30.74 BB (VPIP: 13.33, PFR: 3.45, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, Hands: 30)
CO: 101.32 BB (VPIP: 41.18, PFR: 41.18, 3Bet Preflop: 50.00, Hands: 17)
BTN: 54.31 BB (VPIP: 17.65, PFR: 0.00, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, Hands: 17)
SB: 12.39 BB (VPIP: 21.05, PFR: 14.67, 3Bet Preflop: 7.02, Hands: 152)
BB: 50.56 BB (VPIP: 24.86, PFR: 18.34, 3Bet Preflop: 10.77, Hands: 175)
UTG: 50.12 BB (VPIP: 29.63, PFR: 23.08, 3Bet Preflop: 10.00, Hands: 27)

8 players post ante of 0.13 BB, SB posts SB 0.5 BB, BB posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 2.5 BB) Hero has K A

fold, fold, Hero raises to 2.3 BB, fold, CO raises to 101.2 BB and is all-in, fold, fold, fold, Hero calls 24.92 BB and is all-in

Flop: (56.94 BB, 2 players) 3 Q J

Turn: (56.94 BB, 2 players) J

River: (56.94 BB, 2 players) T

Hero shows K A (Straight, Ace High)
(Pre 43%, Flop 30%, Turn 20%)
CO shows T T (Full House, Tens full of Jacks)
(Pre 57%, Flop 70%, Turn 80%)
CO wins 56.94 BB

Hi,

I think that in this spot you took the right decision to call shove.

CO seems to be LAG, and he's the biggest stack of the table and he probably wants to put pressure at the bubble with medium/good hands.

With AKo you have a decent equity compared to pot odds.

Your call seems to be EV+ here.

What do you guys think about it ?

I mean, he's never showing up w QQ+, most of the time you'll be flipping or chopping, but guys like that can also wake up w AQ or random broadways. So yeah, call and flip better

Yeah, i think it was the right decission...but it is really hard to get out of the Tournament here.
I was in 80th place or so...

I agree with you it's not easy but in this game you compete with players and variance. Both must not have an edge on you.
Quite easy to say lol. I struggle with these sets to.
But if your decision making is based on long term run, breaking down vilain's profiles, ranges and calculating odds you'll be a winning player at low buy-ins.

Yeah, you are right.

Counterthought: you should only play ak all in preflop with someone that does not have you covered when at the money bubble, which is only one player at table. If you want to play for stacks preflop, you should have shoved it given everyone at the table but one has you covered and at least hand some fold equity. (27bbs is too big of a stack to do this imo but you are second low stack at table). I assume with 150 player bubble a few guys snuck into the money with 2-4 bbs stacks.

You easily could have waited five hands and made the money.

Thats right too...its a really tough decission.
Maybe in this case it woul have been better to fold it...

I doubt there is truly a "right" answer because the hand is at the intersection of proper hand strategy and ICM considerations; so I wouldn't beat yourself up because you called and lost.

I look at is as follows:

1. Can I chip up significantly against medium stacks with aggressive bubble play? I would say no because your table has a ton of chips compared to the others. As you were in 80th place, you were pretty close to average stack.

2. How long will it take for bubble to break? You need to know how many shorties and where they are in relationship to the blinds.

3. Do I have to play the hand given the guy shoved?

Good points, thanks.

Don't open that large off that stack size.

It is a closeish spot due to the bubble. He doesn't have KK+, but usually has a pp or AK.

If he 3! normally, then he should have bluffs, so very easy shove.


Oh, please. Not that much difference between 2.3 and 2.0 and reasons to go larger as well as smaller.

Someone playing that active, even over a 17 hand sample, is getting a call from me whatever I decided to raise with.

That doesn't sound very ICM-aware. Or you rising way to tight in this spot.

I think this exact spot is very dependant on what we believe about villains range.

If villain had been in one of the blinds I think this is a no brainer call. Even though 17 hands is a small sample I think the chance of villain not being LAG given his VPIP and big stack is very low. In the blinds I expect such a player to raise all-in with a lot of Ax-hands that we dominate, and also perhaps KQ and KJ. And probably just making a small raise with AA/KK. We will do well against such a range, and doubling up here will give us a much better chance to reach the final table. If we fold we will obv. cash almost 100% of the time. But on average we won't see a better hand than AK for a couple of orbits, so our stack will often dwindle down and the most likely outcome will be a min cash. So had villain been in one of the blinds I would have called, well aware that I would probably bust and miss the cash around 35-40% of the time. (And sometimes split the pot with another AK)

But now villain's in the CO and has two stacks of about 50bb behind him. Some players doesn't seem to care much about that, but on average I think we have to give even a LAG-player credit for a stronger range here. If it's say QQ-88,AQs+,AKo, we are 47-53%. ChipEV-wise we need 43,8% to call. So pretty easy hadn't we been so close to the bubble. But is he really that tight? I think a range like 77-QQ, AJs+, AQo+, KQs is much more likely. Against that we are almost 53-47%, which must be a call even considering ICM.

Of course we don't know that he doesn't shove AA/KK too. Some players undoubtedly will, but I'm quite sure most will do a small(er) raise instead, because they want you to call. Or even better having one of the two 50bb-stacks coming over the top.

Regarding my own play I believe I have been to tight in this type of spots earlier. As I view it right now I would call here.

Not much you can do other than stick it in - he'll usually eliminate the top of his range (KK+) jamming like this. There's a lot of leverage in tournaments doubling up here as well - the +ev you can create with 60 bb is much greater than your current stack which is not documented with ICM programs or any other software.

Not just an ICM issue. When he shoves like that, his range is heavily weighted towards AK/99-JJ. So you should definitely be raising 99/AQ, but it would be a serious mistake to call this huge shove with them. Need at least TT/AK to consider calling. JJ+ is an easy call. He is not just shoving at you, but at the whole table for like 100xBB. The shove itself is a pretty bad play.