Blinds+ante too steep - push with 88 in middle position?

[r8ed]

I was on the final table of a home tourny with 9 other people. The blinds were 300/600 and the ante was 50. I started with 3500. Paid the blinds but did not get a hand to play, so I'm down to 2500 after 2 hands. I'm the 2nd shortest stack now. I'm the button holding AQo and there is one caller before me. I raise to 1500 to try and steal or get one person heads up. Small Blind calls and Big Blind goes all in since he has 1200 chips. Initial caller stays in. Flop comes out K84 offsuit. Small Blind raises for almost all my chips. Initial caller thinks a long time and folds. I figure SB has a King and can take out the short stack so I fold. He had AJo and the small stack quadrupled his chips and I am left with barely enough to pay the blinds. A couple hands pass and the blinds are 3 hands from me. I get 88 with no callers before me. So, I push knowing somebody will steal the blinds if noboby bets before them. I get 4 callers. AQo, AJo, KT, etc. A Queen comes out and I'm done.

Was it worth pushing in this position? Should I have played the AQ differently? By the way 88 was the best hand I got the whole tourny besides a couple AQ and AJ. My one other PP was 33. Tough run of cards but I wanted to hang around long enough for my luck to change

[arkana]

Im no expert but with blinds that high (relative to your stack) you should either raise all in if you decide to play a hand or try to limp in, because you ended up committing almost half your chips with the raise and then folding.

That game is for gamblers not poker players I would say.

[r8ed]

The first hand I could have pushed, but I don't play that way. Seems desperate at that time and in fact I think I made correct choice. I survived to see some more hands.

I was amazed at the way people there not only played poor starting hands but overvalued every hand. On one hand, one guy put out a huge bet with J34 and everyone folded. He flipped over J9 as if he had an unbeatable hand. You could see how proud he was. Then everyone remarked what a nice hand he had. I just couldn't get anything to take people down with.

They are going to play once a month. Can't wait

[mike4066]

Push with your AQ hand from the button, you have 6bb's left you need to make your move.

Your 1500 raise leaves you with 1k chips, You comitted 66% of your chips and don't have enough chips for a follow up bet.

If a bet is going to take more than 40-50% of your stack seriously consider pushing them all-in. If you raise 50% of your stack and get called you wo'nt have enough chips to buy the pot on the flop.


With the 88 you have to take that hand. your most likely a coinflip, against a single caller. First one in I'd push every time. With such a short stack you can expect to be called by "big cards" and pray for low cards on the flop.

[Cavalry21]

The first hand I could have pushed, but I don't play that way. Seems desperate at that time and in fact I think I made correct choice. I survived to see some more hands.

Be careful with the I don't play that way threory going into a game like this. Maybe not on a hand like this specifically, but at least in general. I play in one every week that sounds almost exatly the same, but with 15-20 people. I tried playing extremely tight aggressive for a while, but people were calling with anything and everything and thinking they are playing well when they catch. Look at the callers you did get AI.

To me its become like playing the micro limits, or $5 SNGs, you love to beat up on a few fish, but when your the only one thats not, those fish get dangerous.

[r8ed]

I don't play that way, meaning if I'm short stack but have an orbit or two before I'm blinded out, I don't push all in without the goods (usually). Plus, in my experience, if a short stack makes a large bet without going AI, I usually respect their hand more. If they just push, I think they got desperate and impatient. In this case, If I hit the flop I'm AI. If not, then it's desperation time. I even considered folding the hand. If one or two more people were in it, I would have. AQo doesn't hold up well in multipots.

I now have better knowledge of the players, so I'll post my winnings after next month's game.

[Sed]

Shortstacked you can't ask for a much better hand than AQ.... What hand are you waiting for to push all-in pre-flop? Like you said, people think you are desperate and may call you with a lesser hand to try and put you out.

In that situation, I want all my chips in there against a single person. You are likely to only get one caller if you push all-in or take the blinds with no showdown. You are 50/50 or better against any but the top 3 pocket pairs and will usually get called by another ace (which you have dominated) or a smaller pocket pair.

If you get called you have about a 50-60% chance of doublling up. If you raise 50% of your stack you run the risk of playing into a larger field which can draw out on you. If you fold the flop or to a re-raise, you now have half your stack which you need to catch a hand and double up with to get back to where you were. That is before the blinds eat you alive. Why would you ever want to put yourself into this situation? You now need to double up another time to get to a stack where you can be competitive. You have lost all folding equity. What large stack won't call a standard raise to try and put you out?

By pushing, over half the time you will double up and no longer be in trouble or take the blinds and have another circuit to wait for a quality hand. You will only hit an A or Q on the flop ~1/3 of the time so 2/3 of the time you will be out of half your stack.

- sed

[r8ed]

Good points.

One thing that bothered me was how they determined the button when we merged tables. The drew cards to see where each person sat. Then somebody suggested they draw again for the button. But somebody sitting right before the button mentioned that we had already drawn cards. So, they kept the button where it was and I was BB.

Seemed OK to me, but how is it usually done? I really got hosed having to pay the blinds being 2nd shortest stack to begin with.

[Sed]

I follow these rules...

http://homepokertourney.com/moving_players.htm

just try to get everone moving to the new table into about the same spot relative to the button.

there is also tourney software that can move people for you
Donationware: http://www.thetournamentdirector.net/

- sed