What do you think about my play shoving AKo on the turn after a missed flop? No specific reads about the button but pretty tight. I checked their stats they often fold post-flop and have a low went to showdown percentage. This is pretty far from the money but I had a lot of chips (one of the top ten stacks), it's a small tournament, no bounties.

888Poker, $5 + $0.50 - Hold'em No Limit - 500/1,000 (125 ante) - 9 players
Replay this hand on Upswing Poker

UTG: 8,675 (9 bb)
UTG+1: 12,119 (12 bb)
MP: 13,470 (13 bb)
MP+1: 19,080 (19 bb)
LP: 25,727 (26 bb)
CO: 45,501 (46 bb)
BU: 24,167 (24 bb)
SB: 14,804 (15 bb)
BB (Hero): 32,185 (32 bb)

Pre-Flop: (2,625) Hero is BB with A♥ K♣
6 players fold, BTN raises to 2,000, 1 fold, Hero 3-bets to 3,000, BTN 4-bets to 7,500, Hero calls 4,500

Flop: (16,625) 8♥ 9♣ T♥ (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN bets 4,655, Hero calls 4,655

Turn: (25,935) 7♦ (2 players)
Hero bets 19,905 (all-in), BTN calls 11,887 (all-in)

River: (49,709) 3♦ (2 players, 2 all-in)

Total pot: 49,709

Showdown:
BB (Hero) shows A♥ K♣ (high card, Ace)
(Equity - Pre-Flop: 43%, Flop: 23%, Turn: 2%, River: 0%)

BU shows J♥ J♠ (a straight, Seven to Jack)
(Equity - Pre-Flop: 57%, Flop: 77%, Turn: 98%, River: 100%)

BU wins 49,709


If you want to know my thinking:

Shove pre
Only 24bb effective and we block AA KK and BTN v BB ranges are super wide.

Your thinking around Ah seems a little backward btw. If you shove turn you want him to have hands like AXhh in range which we have good equity against if he calls.

I dislike the flop call with Ah blocking some hands we might beat, and dislike the turn shove with close to zero fold equity into a strong range that is almost never folding.

Thanks, fantastic analysis!!

My most important question is about your first two words "shove pre": when you say shove pre, do you mean I should have immediately reraised all-in after button's open pf bet of 2 bb? Or did you mean I should 3bet (as I did, or maybe with slightly higher sizing) and then if/when they 4-bet I should have 5-bet all-in?

My thinking for why I would three-bet rather than go all-in immediately is that many worse hands can call the three-bet, then I can get even more money from them than just the 2 bb the button raised with - i.e. if I immediately shove the twenty-two bb effective stack, then I lose out on a chance to get my threebet called by lots of hands that I can get more value from if I hit a king or ace (examples: AT, AJ, AQ, KQ, KJ, KT, K9, and if I hit an ace or king all pocket pairs might still pay me off a bit if I play my cards right. That's why I didn't think about shoving immediately. i.e. since button raises super wide versus the big blind, I should get value from more of that range than I could if I immediately reraise all-in... Like, why get only 2 bb of value when I could get 3 in the cases where I have them crushed but they would fold to my all-in but could still call a smaller 3bet pf?


and you're right I could have my analysis backwards. Fundamentally I didn't realize that I have "close to zero fold equity into a strong range that is almost never folding" versus the range that would four-bet. I thought that QQ, KK, AQ, AK can all four-bet preflop as they did but still lay it down to my turn shove. Are you saying people are never laying down hands like QQ to a shove on 89T7 in that situation as played? (i.e. zero fold equity versus that range)


But anyway it sounds like you are advocating that in a bb versus the button raise I should just go ai with AKo. I'm curious what else I should shove with in that situation: AQs? AQo? TT? QKs? AJs?

I understand that my thinking about the Ah might have been backwards. I guess what I was thinking of is that sometimes it is easy to bluff as though we had a nut flush if there are three or four to a flush on the board, so holding the Ah might potentially let me make that play if more hearts come, even if I don't actually have a flush since I only have one heart not two. Like, I was thinking that if another heart comes villain won't believe I am shoving with a flush if villain holds the ace of hearts, so villain will call instead of folding as I would want them to in that situation, so that is why it is better if I'm the one holding it, under the specific scenario that I am bluffing a flush due to three hearts on the board. I see now that it is actually better if villain has that card than me, since it means villain is chasing nut flush to chase and if villain doesn't have the right price to hit it I can get a fold more easily. (I hope I got that right). So thanks, I really had that backwards.

3-bet to 5-bet all-in is fine. 3-bet all-in is fine. Both are better than 3bet to peel 4bet at this SPR generally. There may be some specific instances where you believe villain is overbluffing and you would continue to trap postflop with ace king high. High variance but may extract more EV.

You can shove pretty darn wide here. 22, T9s, JTo seem reasonable against certain villains. You can compute a profitable shoving range by giving button an opening range and a call vs shove range. For a given hand: Fold equity = villainfold%*potsizewhenfolded. All-in equity = villaincall%*handsequityvscallingrange*potsizewhen called. Total equity = Fold equity + All-in equity.

Yes, immediately shove pre over the button raise. It's 24BB effective which is a fine size to do it. AKo doesn't play great postflop, especially out of position, but is a great hand to run it out with, and given that it's button vs. big blind you stand to get called by a fair number of hands you dominate.

Don't ever make a min-3-bet like this. You accomplish nothing except inflating a pot out of position. You don't narrow your opponent's range, you don't get folds, you don't get much more money in with a good hand. You've ended up getting yourself in a position (by flatting the 4-bet, also a mistake) where you're OOP with effectively a pot-sized bet left with a hand that doesn't have a whole lot of value in a 4-bet pot unless you hit a pair+. (I imagine a small 4-bet is either going to be a big pair or a bluff, which means the way you played it preflop you don't get to see five cards to beat the pair and you've left the possibility for something like A5s to bluff you off the hand later.)

A standard 3-bet size OOP is something like 4.5x when you're deeper and 3.5x when you're shallower but not shoving all-in. (That would be 9000 or 7000 in this hand respectively, but given villain's stack and your specific holding, a shove is easily the best play.)

Postflop, I think oldsilver is pretty much right, but I'll also add:

it doesn't really make sense to take the betting lead and shove the nuts into the 4-better on the turn-- you can let them barrel off again on the turn or you can shove the river if they check-- so you might not get the folds you're looking for even if your opponent doesn't have the jack themselves. Your betting line doesn't make sense with the hand you're trying to represent, and that hand is also a very narrow part of your range. (I don't know what villain thinks of your range, but according to you you're trying to represent exactly AJs, and it's such an odd line to take that I don't know if you're getting folds even from an overpair.)

That should read "a standard 3-bet size."

I also agree you can 3-bet shove pretty wide here. Most aces, broadways, and pairs you can shove at least some of the time; small-to-medium pairs, suited broadways, and big offsuit aces you should be shoving almost all of the time.