KA from first position

[mab_nyc69]

online tourn....down to 1200 from 6200 (pokerstar sunday million).
- blinds 800 / 1600
- i have 50,000 chips (400 out of 1200)

I raise to 6000 UTG with KA unsuited

- fold around...two away from button makes it 20k (he has about 50k in chips as well)

- i call.....miss my flop....shove anyway...never hit
- he shows KK

I know i could have just shoved pre-flop even though same outcome

- at that point...do i fold to the reraise or play cointoss?

- with 29k left in chips....should i have just check folded after the flop once i didnt hit?

- I was thinking maybe i get lucky and get him off of a low pair, KA, QA, etc.

- was this a donk play?

[AlwaysAir]

if someone is 3betting your amazingly strong raise PF ( huge btw ) he's obviously got you beat. Toss it PF AK sux and move on with your good chipstack.

[thesilkworm]

I usually don't mind coinflipping as long as I am the aggressor, but I would fold this pre-flop for the following reasons:

1 - You are 400/1200 with 975 paid and have no need to mess with presumably one of the few stacks who can bust (or dent) you.

2 - Your opening raise was huge - anyone coming over the top of this is showing serious strength (QQ+, AK sound about right?) - you are coinflipping at best. I rarely say this about AK, but fold preflop and wait for a better spot.

[BT2]

raise less pre

[Cornell Fiji]

AA,
Every single word in your reply is incorrect.
-No one was 3 bet here
-The OPs raise was not <u>amazingly</u> strong. (while a lot of people like a 3bb raise preflop a 3.75bb raise is by no means remarkable, especially considering antes.)
-Just because the OP got raised preflop by the CO+1 does not mean that he is against aces or kings. I would probably be raising him with 99+,AQs+ in this spot, and even more hands if I had a read that the UTG raiser was risk adverse. If I was in the CO+1 with a hand like 88 here I certaintly do not want it to be a multiway pot, and therefore it would be a perfectly standard play to raise to isolate the UTG player.

--------------

Now, to the OP...

You actually made a very nice play but I do not think that you realize it. Given the dead money in the pot all of your chips should be going in here, the question is simply what is the best way to get your money in.

If you were to push preflop the villain would be getting 2.1:1 on his call meaning that he is pot committed to call you with anything that he has.

You are probably slightly behind his range preflop and therefore your best chance to get him to make a mistake that will cost him the pot is by pulling a stop and go (just calling his raise pf and then pushing any flop.) If the pf raiser has a hand like 99/TT and the flop comes down QJ2 he is going to be making a huge mistake by folding to your flop push. The flip side of the coin however is that if he has KK and the flop comes down A72 then he might be able to get away from the hand cheeply after the flop.

You seem to be someone who dislikes variance. The lower variance play here is to pull the stop and go because if you push preflop you will have to win a race. Yes, you might loose some value when an A or K flops but thats the risk you are taking by making this play (and I am pretty sure that it is a +cEV play to do so).

PS - don't post results in your OP

[Hattifnatt]

When he reraises you:

Fold &lt; all-in &lt;&lt;&lt; call

[BT2]

this hand is so read based. i dont think folding here is too bad if the reads are there. a push and a stop N go are both fine. w/out reads i think fold.

[mab_nyc69]

kornell...thank you for the thoughtful post. I dont mind variance or gambling here...and i did think about the stop and go. However, the flop came 4,4,8 and i shoved anyway at this point UTG. I think the play should have been reraise all in preflop or call and get away from the hand post flop when no big cards fell.

Then again....his raise was so big I could have waited for another battle. I am a reasonably thoughtful player but this situation comes up often and its hard to make the right decision after playing good poker for 3+ hours and being 350 out of 1200 remaining.