Hello,
First allow me to introduce myself. I am a 24 y/o. Been playing poker for about a year and a half. im no pro but not exactly complete fish hehe. Its a pleasure to meet you all and have so far really enjoyed this site.

Ok now for the question I have. Last night I was playing on Party poker 5 +1 dollar SnG. First time in a while anyways was playing pretty tight aggressive. When I had a hand I would bet and usually catch it. So it gets down to 5 people left and I get pocket KK (am the chip leader by 900 more to the second guy in chips I got 2700 or so) in big blind everyone folds to second in chips who is small blind(he has 1800 or so). Now he raises 3xBB. My question here is this I had just wanted to call cause even though he could of just been making a play for chips I was pretty sure he had Ax. Instead my wife tells me to go all-in and against my better judgement I do. HE shows AJo and sure enough an ace came down on the flop.

I would of saved more money had I just called to see what the flop would of been and definantly would of placed in the money instead of in 4th. Just want to know what you all would of done.

I would have reraised him, but not all in. Like you said if he has Ax he's still 30% to catch and beat you I think. Maybe triple his bet (not sure what the blinds are that might pot commit him anyways, in that case just call). Now the only problem with that idea is that now if an A comes you have to be willing to fold. I've seen too many people see an A come when they have pocket KK and think "no way he has that A I'm going all in."

sorry blinds where 50/100

I left that part out I actually did raise though not enough in my opinion. I only raised it to 600 after he did 300. Weak bet I know. Anyways he moved all in after my raise. Felt like I had to call at that point I probably should of raised alot more though especially with my table image. I dont know though

This was written before I read that Kal didnt make the 1st all in move......


Kal,

You have no reason to go all in here.....

1) Its already down to heads up.....which is your goal with a high pocket pair. I might consider re-raising just to see how interested he really is, but I am not pushing.

2) With K's I am extremely scared of an ace. Many 2-3BB raises are coming with Ax (where x can be any card). By playing the hand and seeing the flop I have less volatility and can get away cheaply if an Ace hits the board.

3) You are a pre-flop favorite and do not want to scare away your opponent. I think the only reason he called your all-in is because a blind steal looked likely.....I probably would have folded (I am a bit tighter than most) and you would have only picked up my 3XBB raise.

4) You are praying for anything below an Ace and you are going to make a ton of money on this hand.....He is playing AJ (we now know that). A flop of J 7 2 is going to make him cream and you are going to have well masked K's.

In short....you may get all of his chips anyway with this hand.....why risk all of yours when you don't have to?

I seldom put my entire tournament at stake based on a coin flip.......which most all in situations are.

Beav..................I am horrible at remembering the odds in diff situations..but isn't a PP vs. One over an one under somewhere around 2 to 1 fav or so? thats not a bet i want to make if i am the chip leader going against another big stack.

Not necessarily a bad play pushing here. There's no way he should have called with AJo he has to know he's racing if he calls, and it wasn't even a race he only had 1 over so he really only had 3 A's and a str8 possibility. With KK and the chip lead you want to take down the pot right there, but the only problem is that you are the chip leader and I don't know if you where pushing people around with your chip lead or not. He may have just thought you were abusing your chip lead and made a spite call, otherwise he's the one that made a bad call.

Thank you all for responding so fast. I appreciate it.

I had actually played a total of 3 other hands this entire game. So I had a very tight image. Definantly was not pushing around everyone.

LoL hindsight is always 20/20 right. I wish I had saved the hand so I could post it the way you guys do here.

now since he went all in 1st.....you have no choice but to call......It doesn't mean I like the situation, but (I havent done the math) you are probably getting the right odds and K's are just too big of a favorite here.

Thanks so from the sounds of it.I guess I did play it right. Minus the weak raise that is. Sorry about some of the details being left out on first post. To dang early for me lol.

You played it right IMO. The only problem for you was that a lot of people treat Ax as a monster hand no matter what the situation and will not fold it preflop. And the sad thing is since they have an A they have a decent shot (as I said i think 30% correct me if I'm wrong) of catching that A and sucking out on you.

I built my backroll on these things.

Just push, he made a big mistake by calling.

If you just call, and an A hit, you run the risk of folding to a lower pair. You can't win them all.