Might be a very straightforward spot but I feel I need improvement in call a jam spots.

I am in BB with 8 BBs. New table, did not seem super strong. Possibly tilted but usually tight Russian guy to my left (good instincts, but not a pro or anything) jams for about 11 BBs. Unknown player in mid position shoves 2 BBs. Folds around to me.

By my calculations we need 35%. We have A8s. Call or fold? And is it close?

To your left, so UTG? How many players are at the table?

What stage of the tournament is this?

UTG, 9 handed. About 30 people left out of 150 with 13 paid. Average stack probably 22-25 BBs.

I'm likely calling here unless we are literally on (or very close to) the bubble. Edit: so I would call here...

I realize that UTG at a full table (9 handed) would likely fold hands like A6o pre-flop but if he is tilted then he might shove any Ax.

If UTG has a better Ax than us or 99+ we would have about 30% to 33% chance of winning/chopping against him. He could also be jamming with 55-77 and even 22-44 given his frame of mind.

Far from the money I would call (I have called here with KJs and lost to A4o) because I just don't trust the chances of having a really great hand with 6 bb's or less where we would have little fold equity.

Into the money at min cashing levels I also would call. I think we need to double up+ to have a shot at going deep.

Interesting spot. In my experience rec players tend to not get out of line UTG (unless they're under 10bbs then I think they become a bit loose with their jams fearing the bb ante) I'd assume the Russian has something like A9s+ ATo+ 55+ KJ+ suited broadways at worst so I'd likely call one pip tighter than all of that. Question is, how does the 2bb guy change the spot? I'm not entirely sure, but my first instinct would be that we again want to be one pip tighter, since it's harder to win 3 ways here and despite being only 2bb the Main pot is still substantial (more than half of the side pot). Granted, there may be an argument for introducing some stuff like 89s, 9Ts into your calling range since those may (?) have better equity in a 3 way all-in than A7s/A8s/A9s. Hopefully someone like Nath who is better at the math than I can help with this one. Tough spot, what did you do?

It feels like a close spot (perhaps leaning fold) in an online tourney with regular ante, but in a live tourney with BBA (i.e. 2 out of 8 bb's are already invested) and nowhere close to the bubble, I don't think fold is even an option.

Ya this makes a lot of sense, I also read it as we had 8bb after posting, if it's the other way (6bb left after posting) I 100% agree with your sentiment and we may want to even widen it significantly more? Mel, was it 6bb remaining after posting or 8bb?

This is a close spot.

My rough calculations: For the side pot, we are about 42.5%, so will get 5.1BB from that pot. For the main pot, we are about 29%, so we will get about 2.2 BB from that pot.

We need to put in 7, and will get back about 7.3, so this is a small +Cev spot under my assumptions.

Even though we are still far from the money, there is still SOME risk premium. Add in the fact that we have just paid the BB, so we will have just the SB and then a bunch of free hands...

A lot depends on how well the table will respond to my 7BB shoves in the next orbit(s). My experience is that we get more FE than we should in these spots.

Not knowing these calculations, I think I'd have folded. Seeing the numbers, I'd still fold, but it is close.

This is backwards thinking. The BB ante being gone benefits us, because we don't have to pay antes for the rest of the orbit. We didn't invest the BBA, that has been disproved many times.

Its going to be 6 bb shoves in the next orbit. We started the hand with 8 bb's we put one in as the ante and one in as the BB. So our Fold Equity will be less than what you thought it would be.

My experience is that we sometimes get folds (and the BB will show us the 72o, 83o, 62o, 32o etc) but we often won't. I shoved 98s with about 7 bb's and got called by 96s and of course lost when a 6 hit the flop)

Thanks for the responses everyone. It was 8 after posting so we started with 10 BBs.

I did fold. I was concerned UTG has too many aces as this is a really tight player who I have seen tank call a 3 bet jam with JJ on around 20 BBs.

This changes everything for me. Slightly.

We need to win 37% of the time (we are putting in 8 bb's to win a pot of 21.5 bb's)

It totally depends on my view of UTG. If they can be jamming with most Ax then I call. If they are super tight I fold. Here because the guy was tilted I might call anyway but I do think we have some FE with 7.5 bb's for the next 8 hands (well we have 8 bb's as SB the next hand). And you call him "really tight". So I guess I fold here. I'm also guessing you would have won this hand if you had called...

UTG had KJs and the short stack had KTs. I would have won with ace high.

Would have posted it regardless as I think it's an interesting spot theory wise.

Rick, my thinking was pretty similar to yours that he just has an ace a lot of the time and I would prefer to jam than call a jam with 8 cheap hands to do so. I ended up doing that with 66, getting called by AA, cracking it, and then getting my aces cracked by a combo draw when I flopped a set. Fun times!

I’ll be a little contrarian and say that A8s is probably a little too good to fold here because you will be dominating some broadways and worse Ax, and the dead money in the pot makes a call a little more enticing. To fold here, we really have to think villain won’t be open ripping stuff like A4s or KTs.

That being said, in a live lower stakes setting I could definitely get behind folding some of our more marginal call offs (like KTs, A4s or A8o) if we think this range really skews heavily towards Ax and pairs. So it’s not a slam dunk or anything.

The new math on have 8 BB behind.

Using my guess for ranges above, where we were winning 0.3BB, we are now losing 0.025BB. An easy fold given risk premium (if my ranges are correct).

If we take out the short stack who called we'd be winning chip EV of about 0.14 BB. The short stack calling costs us chip ev, even if we are ahead of his range. This is because the short stack gets the same benefit of the dead money as the other players at a much lower price.

Something to consider when we have a marginal call in these spots, and something to realize when we are playing a short stack ourselves. The short stack gets great odds in spots like these, although he'd prefer we don't contest the pot either, as we take away part of the ev of the dead money.

We have all seen someone who gets it all in and slightly covers, leaving themselves with a micro stack. They then put the last of their chips in blind the next hand out of frustration. Don't do that. Those chips have the most value, and get the most leverage of any chips you will have in a tournament.