30 minute levels started with 25,000 chips. Blinds are 1000/1500 with 1500 BB ante

Hero has 31 blinds and AKo in MP (next to LJ).

Hero opens to 3,500, folds to BTN who raises to 10,000 (~7 bb's)

BTN entered the tourney at the 500/1000 level with 25 bb's. He is good and probably is part of the pro group that looks at very late entries as the way to go. Youngish like 50. My take on him was that he could be GTO based. He has 3-bet a few times already and has made some bets that were substantial and could easily have been bluffs. He has 25 blinds. So his bet is not quite 30% of his stack.

The previous 5 times I had AK in spots like this in senior events I shoved and lost all 5 (3 flips and two AA) and was knocked out each time.

My thinking in spots like this was that I should call and fold if no A or K on the flop. And yet before I could think at all, all of my chips were in the middle. Not sure if this is +Ev or not. If I had thought about it I think I would have shoved because BTN can have a widish range even though this was a senior event. I had raised about 4 or 5 times in his presence pre-flop and the blinds mostly folded. In fairness he would have been right to think my range was very wide as I had raised with 74s, 98s, T7o on the BTN though never had to show. He did see me fold once to a 3-bet when I opened with Q4s in the CO and BTN re-raised.

My instinct right now is to call the 3-bet in position with AK and to shove OOP against a Pro who 3-bets balanced. Against most senior players I would be apt to call OOP though because at best I am flipping (they wouldn't be 3-betting with AQ).

Thoughts?

I would probably rip here if villian can be light in your opinion. A button 3bet can be much lighter than the standard 3 bet. If it’s an OMC, then year I would be fine just calling I guess to be safe.

Not a fan of flatting here with AK and playing fit/fold post flop. Opponent is prolly going to not give you much action if to they don’t connect also with say an A or k on certain board textures.


Think I like getting 31bb in against hand Vs just flatting and playing post where you get less max value.

Let’s see 5. AK out of position at this stack depth sucks postflop.

With this stack depth I think, AKo is pretty much always an easy rip preflop. Dont overthink the situation, just because you busted a few times in similar spots.

with 31BB + the positions here + your description of villain this is an easy 4-bet rip.

Hey Mr. Rick - I was in the same MTT. TBH I don't think I have ever seen the late reg'ing pro person in a Seniors event - usually they are re-buys.

you block the only 2 hands that scare you. Math is math, so rip it in. I doubt V is folding much once he leverages his stack with his 3!, but FE can't be exactly 0 here either.

I can't believe all the posters saying to 4-bet shove, when Mr. Rick has provided exhaustive history of no less than FIVE hands where he tried that, and lost each time.

But just having a little sarcastic fun with Mr. Rick..I get it; seniors are scary when they 3-bet. But those are the fears that need to be overcome. If I have 31 blinds with AK in such a spot, and I get 3-bet, I am ripping vs. seniors, vs. juniors, vs. ladies, vs. college kids, vs. online players, vs. just about anybody. The exception could be if the 3-better is so very old and tight that you can narrow their range to just a sliver. That doesn't seem the case here as you apparently were facing one of the young gun rookie hotshots of the senior poker world.

And, just for the sake of a complete record, I faced almost the exact spot with 27 BB in the Venetian Seniors, and I 4-bet shoved with AKs...and I ran into AA. But I'm still rippin.

This. However, if the villain is INCAPABLE of 3-bet bluffing in this spot, I understand why you are unsure of what to do here. If that truly is the case, I wouldn't hate trying an unorthodox line with your hand and 30bb, like limping to induce a 4x iso from LP players which you'll then limp/jam against. Definitely not a common play in our arsenal, but one that could make sense in this particular field and in a spot where the normal prescribed method (4b jamming here) doesn't feel palatable to you based on your table reads.

Have intention with your bets; meaning, if I open with AK here, I'm actively looking around the table at who I want to 3bet jam me, or who I want to 3b me so I can 4b jam with fold equity. If you have a strong value hand and you can't stand up to any aggressive reactions to your initial raise, well your initial raise might be worth reconsidering to something that can yield more positive results for you.

Outside of the box thought like this is shunned by most pretty quickly but I would recommend opening your mind to logical solutions to spots where our standard methods don't fit.

I'm not much of an MTT player, but intuitively I would think this just has to be a jam for reasons that others have said (AKo OOP short kinda sucks).

Out of curiousity, I decided to check GTOWizard.

It is indeed jamming preflop, with jamming pre having almost 2bb more EV than calling.










Here is the link to the spot if you want to check it out yourself: https://app.gtowizard.com/solutions?...-F-F&soltab=ev

You need to shove this preflop. You can't call 30% of your stack here. You are likely racing, but there is a chance you are against AQ/AJ. You are just running bad if you have run AK into AA that many times. If you were deeper, we can discuss flatting, but not at this stack depth

Attenborough did exactly this with AK on the ME FT

It's true IF that, yeah. Given how often villain has 3-bet so far according to OP, I find this highly unlikely to be the case.

haha ya exactly, I immediately messaged a few students after that one. Honestly it's a play I'd been recommending to some of my live guys (in their 50s-60s) to help them avoid awkward spots + exploit the populations' tendency to isolate their (perceived) weak limps. Just not usually as effective with tough player v tough player, altho attenborough found the perfect villain to pull it off against and nailed it. I think the play works best when its a murderers row of aggro ppl with stacks in LP and the hero is older/perceived as weak and limps in EP with 25-35bb, they're just gonna induce SO many iso's which they can jam over as opposed to their normal plan- (raise 3x, get called by LP, check/fold or bet/fold most bricked flops) Problem is it's not really easy to balance (I'm open to some suggestions if ya'll have any) with so its just a pure live exploit in very specific spots.

Agreed, I'm with you, it just has to be a jam and I think hero may be seeing monsters under the bed, however, it's not to say that there aren't a lot of spots I see population jamming right into AA/KK/QQ/AK value ranges of nits cause they "can't fold here!" or "have to jam". While i agree that's the case here, I do think this train of thought has hurt a lot of players when they are playing against villains whose bluff range is just non-existent cause they're so used to watching content of good players who jam same hand in same spot (but theyre up against a villain who is actually capable of bluffing)