blonde poker forum

Local casino 16 left, top 7 paid. Blinds 600/1200

I have 20k in chips and UTG makes 3k raise with  Ahrt Kh gets around to BB the dealer who has about 26k left and pushes all in. I call without too much thought and think with the speed she pushed I might be behind, she turnes over  7s 7d

Now this got me thinking did I do right calling the all in? was she correct moving what would be 80% of her chips with at best a coinflip? I mean if I am going to raise with crap it would not be UTG would it?

Ofcourse standard  Ad Ks 4d 2s  7c and I am out.

Was her play bad or was it me?

I cann't see much with your move, I think I would have done much the same thing (or possibly call-pushed but only if the cercumstances were right). The push with 7,7s is particuly agressive but not nessisarily wrong, unless you have AA you should probly have to think about calling all your chips off and with your actual holding I don't think I would have called. This would also depend on the type of player she was, had you seen here do this type of play before with ace-x? If I had seen her make this type of move with high cards then I would be more likely to call, AK is only strong when the other player has an ace also. If they have a pair at best your under 50% to win (less if they have KK or AA), you're not in a weak position as far as chips are concerned if you fold.

In answer to your questions, I think her move was a bold one and your call was a gamble, although previous play could change this opion.

I'm not sure I like the call at all here with the AK.  Any pocket pair, and you're a slight dog in the coin-flip.  Any other two cards, and you're not a huge favourite.  Of course, if she has AA or KK - you're in more trouble.

The push with the 77 is certainly aggressive, and she's probably thinking anything except for a very big pair is going to be uncomfortable calling off the rest of their stack here.

Of course, it does depend on what the play's been like, and if she's been pushing with anything or if you've been raising with atc as well.

Ahh some good points, she had pushed all in around 2-3 times in the last 30mins and only showed her cards once with kk.

I would have accepted a 50/50 before seeing her cards, I didn't mind a gamble as my coinflips had been going well recently :) with a A K flop i thought this good luck was to continue.

I guess I could have laid them down, but they were suited!

good push..not a bad calll either

Did Ironside teach you how to play AK?

That's the key sentence here.

Not saying I wouldn't have called myself but I'd at least have given it some thought

Even if she has randon carbage like T 3 os she's not that far behind AK. It's about a 65-35 shot. AK is not that good a hand to be calling an all-in with as it is behind to any pocket pair.

Offer some advice...

I push UTG with AK here every single time, i think it's difficult for her to call but it is an easy reraise for her as you have to fold pretty much anything other than JJ+
You gave her the opportunity instead of keeping it yourself, wouldn't you have folded 77 to such a large bet in her position?
This is the best stage of a tourny where stealing blinds for fun is the way to go, ok if you get called you take your chances but you shouldn't be giving up your FE.
You've lost 3k but you can easily get that back by aggressive play in the next orbit.
So basically i say fold the AK and use your chips to better advantage.

I like the call, if she is pushing over the top with 77, she is also doing this with aq/aj which gives easily enough equity in the hand to make us a favourite against her overall range.

As for the shove with 77 its kind of marginal depending on your opponent, ie what his opening range utg and how much fold equity in the hand. I think we have too many chips to shove here, though its +ev, standard raising its a more optimal play IMO, as we can c-bet a flop and still not be pot comitted.

limp-re-raise all-in at this stage.

I like the push - quite a common move when getting close to final table/bubble.

one point though - when she pushes there are two ways she can win the hand, by you folding, or by you calling and her hand holding up. After she pushes, there is only one way you can win it - by outdrawing her.

why only raise to 3K, if you were going to call any raise anyway ? stick em in, in give the decision to someone else...


to conclude - good push, slightly fishy call...

Ditto

lol @ these massive overshoves with AK, what do you all think it looks like?

Cheers for the advice, maybe if could have laid it down or increased my raise before her push. Either way I live and learn, was fun night.

LOL, you gonna tell me you don't push UTG with AK here??

600-1200 with 20k i push with exactly 0.00% of holdings.

like AK

what makes you think that's a good thing?..you are essentially saying "hey, wanna race for all my chips?"

Acid raised to 3k from UTG...a perfectly respectable raise. Her raise wassn't bad either. she could have raised to 9k and maybe get someone with a lesser holding than AK to fold but that also would have left the door open for him to move all in, which is what she wanted to avoid. Any raise higher than 9k would have meant "I'm gonna put all my chips in the middle no matter what" so she might aswell push in that case.

The call, well not much wrong with it if you're thinking she has a lower pair..maybe even a weaker Ace or AK...essentially everything other than KK/AA and you are willing to race for all your chips at this stage (which you don't have to do but OK) but you have to atleast think about her holdings before making the call. You surely have to know you're racing. If you make the choice to do so than that's fine..if you just fling your chips in the middle actually expecting to be ahead you've made a mistake against a decent player.

If he had pushed from UTG with 18 BB's that would just have been a stupid move, nothing more nothing less. yes he might have picked up the blinds here...but he would also have scared off any weaker holdings and KK/AA is laughing at you when you do and quite rightly so and then you're cursing at yourself for not even giving yourself the option to get out of the hand. even a big stack at the table would say "well, I've got JJ but I'll take that race now, thanks".

the one thing that slightly concerns me about your original post is that you say "you flung them in there without giving it too much thought" even though the only other hand you've seen her do it with was KK. Admittedly her range is MUCH bigger here but you have to give an oppo some credit when they re-raise you for all your chips and then you have to actively decide to fling them in there. Like I said, if you thought you were in a coin flip and wanted to take it that's fair enough but it wasn't neccesary.

Was I right to call ?

This scenario came up with me a at Cincinnati's a couple of weeks ago.

£25 freezout - 4 left from 23 runners

I'm big blind in 2nd spot chip wise with pocket 88's. Blinds 3000/6000

I min raise to 12000, one caller goes all in with 21K

He turns AK off, my hand holds to knock him out.

Bad Play ?

No u were getting 3 to 1 on your money and hopefully looking at 2 overs at worst for a coinflip, no way you fold!

Honestly i never read the whole post, i just assume you fold............
The part i highlight though is probably the (i'll be polite) strangest thing i have seen in HA, the fact is you need to push, everyone does with a HUGE range of hands at times otherwise you blind out.
We don't all get aces every hand unfortunately and so we don't always have the luxury of pushing with aces. Maybe pushing UTG with this hand isn't to your taste or anyone elses, i just said that's what i would do in this spot.

I probably would have called to be honest. I have no problem with his call here. I just don't like the push with 18 BB's I much prefer a raise of the size he made.

;iagree;  A push utg for 18 bb's is out of the question.  The way it played out was fine.

Is my favourite option.

Nothing wrong with that IMHO. I personally would have called holding 77 I mean at the end of the day pushing all in with 77 to a standard size raise is asking for trouble BUT not unexpected. See you tonight if your there Matt.

Agree with every bit of that.

Good post.

Well to be honest that is utter insanity and flies in the face of any sort of basic poker thinking.

If we just go back to basics for a minute.

There are two things we want to happen when we make any raise

1) A worse hand to call
2) A better hand to fold

If the blinds are 600/1200 and I move all in for 21,000 UTG there is no way a hand worse than AK will call unless you are up against fellow maniacs.

You are only going to get action from the monster hands that have you in big trouble such as KK or AA.

So basically this move has two possible outcomes

1) you risk all your chips to pick up the blinds (bear in mind you are the Big blind next hand anyway! so a fat lot of good that has done you)
2) You race for all your chips against a better hand.

Why would any serious poker player be happy with either of those scenarios

Agree with everything that's been said about flat pushing being insanity.  I would be interested to hear at what point ur stack has to be to make this a push not a raise, do yo u play big pairs the same here (make it 3k) and which of these do you call the ladies shove with?

So you obviously MUST fold your hand every single time you get reraised?
Folks pick up on stuff like that.
The beauty of AK is that very few people can fold it, i can but in this position i use it to either have the race or to win the blinds.
I am talking about this specific situation BTW, i don't mind a race, it happens all the time.

EDIT: i may not be making this clear, if you are going to fold to a reraise then ok fine, the raise is a bit low for me but ok.
If you are looking to play this hand then a push UTG is also fine because you can still avoid a race.

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I am talking about this specific situation BTW,
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So am I.

and the situation is: Blinds 600/1200 you have 21,000 chips UTG at a full table.

You look down at AK

What do you do?

As I said I think moving all in here is madness.

You could limp for 1200 and hope that a short stack will push with Ace rag.
You could limp and then come right over the top of anyone who raises.
You could make a standard opening raise (which is just as likely to win the blinds as the all-in anyway IMHO)

In fact apart from folding I think moving all-in is probably the worst play possible in this situation

I am talking about this specific situation BTW,
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So am I.

and the situation is: Blinds 600/1200 you have 21,000 chips UTG at a full table.
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I meant 16 left, 7 paid.


I understand what you are saying and it makes perfect sense but i don't play that way.
A standard raise (which is 3,600) is nearly a fifth of your stack (20k btw), you have to fold to the reraise (by everyones reckoning) so you could be just wasting chips.
If you are prepared to call an allin you may aswell just push first, this way you can discourage the 77 allin race or you can take on the race.
If you don't want to play this hand for all your chips (in this specific situation) then raise, limp fold as you wish.

So am I.

and the situation is: Blinds 600/1200 you have 21,000 chips UTG at a full table.
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I meant 16 left, 7 paid.


I understand what you are saying and it makes perfect sense but i don't play that way.
A standard raise (which is 3,600) is nearly a fifth of your stack (20k btw), you have to fold to the reraise (by everyones reckoning) so you could be just wasting chips.
If you are prepared to call an allin you may aswell just push first, this way you can discourage the 77 allin race or you can take on the race.
If you don't want to play this hand for all your chips (in this specific situation) then raise, limp fold as you wish.
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But once someone pushed in or raises it up it becomes a completely independant &  seperate situation which now has to be looked at on it's own merits. You are making your all in move with no information as to what cards all the other players may have.

So if I limp for 1200

and a short stack pushes all in for 10,000 and it gets folded around to me I now have a new scenario to deal with.

13,000 in the pot and 8,800 to call (that would leave me with 11,000)

Wether or not you call here is down to what range of hands you put the guy on, pot odds etc... BUT it is a totally seperate decision from the decision you faced at the very start of the hand.

To me this is what playing poker is about and I enjoy making these decisions and thinking about these scenarios and I would rather have this decision on my plate than to simply chuck all my chips in pre-flop and hope for the best.

I meant 16 left, 7 paid.


I understand what you are saying and it makes perfect sense but i don't play that way.
A standard raise (which is 3,600) is nearly a fifth of your stack (20k btw), you have to fold to the reraise (by everyones reckoning) so you could be just wasting chips.
If you are prepared to call an allin you may aswell just push first, this way you can discourage the 77 allin race or you can take on the race.
If you don't want to play this hand for all your chips (in this specific situation) then raise, limp fold as you wish.
[/quote]

But once someone pushed in or raises it up it becomes a completely independant &  seperate situation which now has to be looked at on it's own merits. You are making your all in move with no information as to what cards all the other players may have.

So if I limp for 1200

and a short stack pushes all in for 10,000 and it gets folded around to me I now have a new scenario to deal with.

13,000 in the pot and 8,800 to call (that would leave me with 11,000)

Wether or not you call here is down to what range of hands you put the guy on, pot odds etc... BUT it is a totally seperate decision from the decision you faced at the very start of the hand.

To me this is what playing poker is about and I enjoy making these decisions and thinking about these scenarios and I would rather have this decision on my plate than to simply chuck all my chips in pre-flop and hope for the best.






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good post..this was my point exactly...I just didn't word it as clearly me thinks

Good push, weak call. But id have done the same, does the make sense?

6-7 BBs i would shove. 8-10 or so, I'd often raise just under half my stack and probably shove any flop.

18 BBs is a bit much to push utg i feel. You obviously generate loads of folding equity but make it hard for other players to make a mistake as you telegraph your hand somewhat.

The limp reraise is a good move, especially if there is a limper's tax sheriff lurking around. If  someone pushes allin after you've limped, I would call or fold depending on who did the pushing and how much overlay is in the pot from any other limpers etc.

Madness, raising less the chances that you get action go up massively.

Limp re-raising is an avenue but i would need some reason to do this, a very active player or a knowledgeable player with a short stack in the blinds.

The idea with raising less as opposed to pushing is to get inferior hands involved. This will happen one of 2 ways, they call your raise and you play a flop with the initiative this is clearly a nice situation, however the best result is when you get an inferior hand to re-raise, then you really start making money!

I am not raising AK to pass here, that would be stupid.