22+R Stars Tournament - Call With AK Here?

[Mad Genius]

Stars $22+R Tournament. Blinds are 100/200, avg stack about 11K. I have 10200, villian has 9200 to start the hand. On the button, I get AKs. Folded to MP who opens for 600. I re-raise to 2000. Folded back to villian who pushes. 7200 more to call, 11500 in the pot. If I call and lose, I'm down to 1000. If I win, I'm in great shape to get ITM.

Read on villian: I've been at the table for less than two orbits, but I've already seen him raise 2-3 times and call a raise as well. He definately seemed on the laggy side.

a. Do you re-raise with AK?
b. What range of hands do you put him on?
c. Do you call the allin?

Results to come later.

[Kalle]

a. I sometimes reraise with AK. When I do it, it's because I want to get all my chips in preflop. I dont want a call because I miss the flop to often. If he calls, flop is something like Q84 - 4300 in the pot and you both have 7-8K left. I dont like it.
In this hand I think a call is the best - you are button, you have 50BB's left and you are probably one of the better players at the table: you don't want to be all in preflop against a PP. You should wait and get your chips in when you "know" you are a favourite.
b. AK-AT, KQ-KJ, AA-22.
c. After I reraised - yes.

[briachek]

I agree with Kalle on all points. with position, I would like to just call here and see a good flop. Once you raise and get reraised, I put him on a pocket pair like TT which means you should call the all in.

[Smokin'Al]

[devilmollusk]

I agree medium PP, but depending on the player you might have him dominated. What is your table image? I.e. what does he think you have? Very important question when dealing with an agressive player. He made a big move for a reason. If he thought you were strong and he made that move, beware.

I would almost always re-raise with suited AK there. So many people raise with inferior aces, and that is really a dream situation for you to be in. I like to push HARD pre-flop with AK. I hate calling with it though. Playing AK from a weak position can only cost you money. You want to be the agressor or not play it.

However, once he pushes in you are really in a bind. If you can put him on AA or KK, you have to fold... but I really don't think you can put this guy on those hands. Anything else and it is correct to call. He is laying you something like 3:1, and you are likely 50% at worst, unless he shows you either of the two biggies.

You have to win some of these to win an MTT, so I say take your shot. If you lose to a pp, such is life. If he shows you AA or KK, remember his screenname and his play. If you hit your hand, see you in the money.

[Mad Genius]

Thanks for the replies, here is what went through my head while I was contemplating my decision.

When action got around to me, I could do one of three things: call, re-raise, or push. Each option has its merits. If I call, it allows me to get away without losing much if I miss the flop. If I reraise, he not only may fold but would most likely check most of the time to me when we take a flop. And finally, the advantage of pushing is that I won't have to play a flop and I have great folding equity. I opted to go for the re-raise because that is what I would do with AA-KK, and that's what I wanted villian to think I had. I sensed that he could open-raise in LMP with a large range of hands and thus wasn't too worried about being beat at this point.

When he pushed, I still didn't put him on AA or KK. More often than not I see people getting cute with those two hands at this stage of the tourney, and a standard raise followed by a overbet push definately didn't seem like AA-KK. I was pretty sure that he either had AK or QQ-TT. Knowing it was a gamble, I figured I had to call since I was getting better than 1.5-1 odds. He had 99 and flopped a set for good measure.

His push is absolutely terrible, but aside from that, it's easy to see why I busted out earlier than I should have here. My re-raise preflop isn't necessarily bad - but a good percentage of the time it's gonna lead to me going all-in preflop. If you want to cut down on the variance it's probably a good idea to play even monsters like AKs safe when you have a decent stack to work with.