I feel your pain and have also asked myself "what else can be done". We all feel that we cannot start folding AA, or else what is the point of playing if we are going to fold the best 2 card poker hand. Of course, we are playing a 7 card game, so risking ones entire stack when we only know 28.5% of our final hand (2/7 = 28.5) may be a part of the problem.
Well, after some thought and analysis, I have discovered that the optimum stack risk to take if you are an 83% favorite (83%
equity) on the river, is actually risking 66% of your stack during the whole hand. Run the numbers and assume that you play any number of
hands you like, and you win 83% of them, and lose 17% of them, and see how much of your stack should be risked to come out with the highest number at the end. This means that I ALWAYS have 34% of my stack left and I can ALWAYS build it back up if I am only risking 66% of my stack. The point is to never get to 0.0, which is what an all-in can do to you.
I have been chastised for saying this before. My point IS NOT that you should not go all-in, and my point isn't that we can always control the pot to this degree. My point is only to describe what is the optimum number. We have to make decisions in every hand and on every street. If we know what would yield the best possible answer, then when we make any decision that is different than this, we at least are doing it with eyes wide open.
Personally, i have convinced myself that all-in without the nuts is a bad play in tournament poker. I get that it is a powerful move and it gets people to fold. But if i have the best hand, i don't really want people folding now do I. If i am
bluffing for all my chips, then i have another problem with risking my tournament life - i better be pretty darn sure my opponent will fold and isn't trapping me.
So there you go. Raise me allin every time we play, and i will fold. It will work every time. Until it doesn't.
