This hand happened at the final table. My opponent UTG is a very strange player. I had him at 15 VP$IP/0 PFR over about 100 hands. I never saw him raise, and I really didn't remember him winning any pots. Honestly, I have no idea how he was still in the tournament with this style of play.

Anyway, I know he must be limping with some hands that are actually worthy of a raise. However, I have to like 99, especially as the short stack in a five-handed game. I felt I had to raise preflop here.

It seemed like a good flop for two nines. I honestly don't really know where my opponent is. On the other hand, I'm not going to check 99 with just one overcard. With my stack, I felt I had one move. I made it.

This seems pretty standard, but with such a nitty weird opponent, I thought there might be some different schools of thought on how to play this hand.

Thoughts?

Full Tilt Poker, NL Hold'em Tournament, 1,500/3,000 Blinds, 400 Ante, 5 Players
LeggoPoker.com - Hand History Converter

BTN: 81,209
SB: 82,203
Hero (BB): 53,430
UTG: 85,052
CO: 178,106

Pre-Flop: (6,500) 9 9 dealt to Hero (BB)
UTG calls 3,000, 2 folds, SB calls 1,500, Hero raises to 14,000, UTG calls 11,000, SB folds

Flop: (33,000) Q 6 2 (2 Players)
Hero bets 39,030 and is All-In

What were you thinking when you raised? I don't mean anything bad, I'm just curious. Were you shoving any flop, non A flops, non A or K flops, etc. This is a relatively good flop for you I definitely think you have to shove here. With 11000 chips in the pot I'd be tempted to go ahead and shove pre, but I suppose a raise setting up a pot sized shove on the flop is fine too.

its fine. final table gotta gamble. if gonna raise and fold to a shove from utg thats ok too. shoving pf also ok here i think.

Good question. I was mostly thinking that I was going with any non-ace flop. Of course, I might have shut down on something like K-Q-J too. I was just thrilled not to see an ace. It was a really nervous moment when I pulled the trigger on the flop.

i do stuff like this all the time. it usually fails.
i think i'll try the 17x preflop shove next time.

STANDARD.NH

i like your line here - good preflop raise-size.
i think with an utg-limp you can also shove an ace-flop, cause utg-limps are rarely Ax imo.

In general, I would agree with you. However, in this case, the guy was just playing weird . I could easily see him limping with AQ or AJ and then calling a raise. It was really strange to see someone have over 100 hands logged in my stats with zero preflop raises.