What would you do?

[jacaranda]

Just a simple what would you do question.

Relatively early in a live tournament. Blinds are 50/100. I have a lower than average chip stack (about 2000 which was the starting stack) and feel like I would like to get something going in this tournament.

I have pocket 88 on the Big Blind. It folds around to the button who happens to be table chip leader and has been using his chips to bully a bit. In fact, he has only been at the table for about 10 hands and has already been all-in twice and has bet people off pots about 4 times. He only showed down once and he did have AA and took the pot.

So on the button, he raises to 300 and I call.

The flop comes all rags: 2 5 7 rainbow. I bet out 250. He raises to 700.

What do you do?

[metsandfinsfan]

bet more than 250 on the flop or checkraise
it's early enough in the tournamant that i would probably fold. you cannot call - it is either push or reraise
if you reraised allin for your remaining 1450, it would cost him 1000 into a pot of 3050 so he is getting odds to call almost anything

even if your 88 is good right now, if he has overcards he has a good chance of outdrawing you

so i would say it is a fold

[jacaranda]

Yea... that's what I figured. In the heat of the moment, feeling like I wasn't going to let myself get pushed around by this bully, I reraised all-in and he instacalled with pocket 22. :-(

Live and learn.

[jasonfish11]

Also what are the blind structures? How long are the blind levels? If the blind levels are short (10-15min) I check raise AI here. If he has me beat so be it with short blind levels I need to get a move on. If they are 20+min blind levels then I can wait for a better spot.

[jacaranda]

The blind levels were 30 minutes long, so - yes - I had time to wait for a better spot.