[vanman]

Why are you so afraid of playing the flop?

Kind of an accusatory question, but here's why I ask- Your M is about 12, which is pretty good for that level of that tournament. Your hand is worth a call, but reraising with it (all-in or not) is making a move. If it works, you take down the pot (about 2 M total). If it doesn't, you're either racing for all your chips (not great), or trying to suck out for all your chips (really bad). With an M of 12, you have the luxury of picking a better spot to win 2500 chips without putting your whole stack on the line (as it turns out, calling is one of them).

What this move will do is take away any need to play the flop. Once you re-raise, the decision making of the hand is usually over. Either he mucks, or he feels good enough about his hand to push all in, and you have to call. If he does just call, the only way you're getting away from the hand is if you completely miss the flop and he pushes in front of you. Any other situation and your chips are going in the middle. There just aren't enough chips to really keep playing once the pot has gotten that big.

What I'm getting at is that I see calling as a much better play- You're dominating a good number of hands players will raise with in early position in these tournaments (AQ, AJ, KQ, even KJ and AT), and there's a high chance of these hands paying you off when you both hit. You're 2 to 1 against hitting a flop that will crush QQ-99, and a lone king on the flop just begs for a c-bet. Most importantly, you've got position on you're opponent. So invest a small portion of your stack to call with a good hand in position, and play your cards on the flop. Save your AK reraises for bigger tournaments where you've got more chips to manuever with (or for playing on the internet I guess).