180 Man Ballers: General Theoretical Question

[VespaRally]

I can’t remember the exact stack sizes, but I had been playing somewhat aggressively and really active the last few hands. The table had been playing really passive since we were close to the bubble. There were ~ 22 left.

I was UTG with like 25-30 BBs or something and opened to 3x with A[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]J[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]. It folded around to the BB who I had no reads on and no stats. He moved in for his whole stack, giving me 8-to-5 for my money. If I called and lost, I would be crippled.

My initial read was that he probably had something like 88 or better and that he wouldn’t be moving over the top with many worse unpaired hands than mine, if at all. I gave him the benefit of the doubt and mucked, realizing that it was pretty close if that was a good estimate of his range. Also, as I said, I had been stealing blinds pretty easily so I didn’t really want to take a close gamble just yet.

After doing some analysis though, I feel that this should be called and that it isn’t close. The reason is that if he does have this range 100% of the time it is only a small mistake. But let’s say instead of 7% of all hands, he is much looser and will move with like any pair, A8s or better, ATo+ and some suited Broadway cards (14% of all hands). If he moves with this range only 5% of the time, my call becomes +EV, worth a few chips.

If he moves in with that range a quarter of the time, a call is worth 40 chips.

Later on, he open-shoved w/ 25o UTG for like 12BBs 7-handed and I realized after the fact how huge AJs was against this guy. Granted, it’s a lot different than him moving over the top of my UTG raise, but it still has to lead to some doubt about how often I can be confident that he is moving in with a range that makes my call a mistake with AJs.

Sometimes I’m in the zone and I have a good read on all the players and will insta-call with AJs getting 8-to-5, but this time, readless, I definitely made a mistake by mucking. Against the general 180-man players, is this ever not a mistake?