Is this a bad beat or bad play on my part?

[villagenut]

I'm at work so I don't have hand history but I want to ask this question. I'm early ITM. I have 14K blinds are 800/1600. I'm in CO position and dealt AK0. UTG min raises and has 3 callers. I bet 7500 and everyone folds but a MP guy with 35K. he calls. FLOP comes 234. He checks I push. He calls and shows A5 unsuited. Turn was 2 river was K so I have 2 pair to his straight. I realized I probably should have pushed preflop but I still think dude would have called. Any other way to play this hand or any thoughts on whether or not I should have folded after the flop.

[thenonsequitur]

I'd say it's both (a bad beat and a bad play). I think a pre-flop push is a must here. The pot is already big when it gets to you, and you want it now. If you have to contest it, you want to contest it against as few others as possible. By not pushing here (and only betting 7500) you are pricing in others to call with speculative hands and not taking advantage of all the fold equity you have. Also, with a stack this short relative to the blinds, it never hurts to get all your chips in with AK. If someone calls, it could easily give you a much-needed boost.

But as played, you don't really have options post-flop; no way you can fold. You are very pot-committed at this point. The pot is what, 27k? And you have 7k left in chips. Not to mention that if you fold you now have a pitiful M of about 3.

You really need the chips in this pot. You pretty much have to get all your chips in, IMO, so the push makes sense. He's going to call with just about anything. But if he has a pocket pair (or an unlikely straight as the case might be) there's not really a way to get away from it one way or the other, so hope he has AQ or AJ and push. But you could avoid this mess by just pushing preflop.

[Sprayed]

A push would have been better but not bad. You want to be up against A5 when you have AK.