Hi all!

I do feel I made a huge mistake, but wanna know your opinion.

It was a 55$ phase MTT to 2Million one. I was chepleading and out of 16 levels 6 remained. I had 35K my opp (BB) 26K blinds were 300/600. Middle position raised to 1260, everyone folded. I was SB having AKo. I reraised to 5440. Bigblind went all-in. I was thinking about that I maybe blocking the ace and the king in the best case, and faced up with some pocket. I called. He had 99, and even J,K,A could show but didn't. After that middle pos 14BB went all-in and I called with KQo 13BB, he had 88. I was busted.

My question is how should I played AKo in that situation. I think that raise was all-right, as my opp had 18K and I went for the blinds pretty aggressive, but am I right that I could have folded when BB went all-in?
I just want to add that if I could hold the AK, I would made it into the phase2 by a mile, maybe that voice told me to go for it, but was a bad beat.

With 6 levels left in the first phase, I definitely wouldn't look to just coast into phase 2. You're getting great odds to flip; block KK and AA; and will sometimes be a big favorite against a hand like AJs or AQo.

So it sounds like you played the hand correctly by 3bet/calling.

What would have changed if you call instead 3-bet? Hmm. Villain from BB with 99 3-bet more likely. You had to make a decision and play without position.
What would have changed if you all in instead 3-bet? Really? With 60BB?

You play good. This is coin flip, successful for villain and not for you.

Originally Posted by dallam

Hi all!

I do feel I made a huge mistake, but wanna know your opinion.

It was a 55$ phase MTT to 2Million one. I was chepleading and out of 16 levels 6 remained. I had 35K my opp (BB) 26K blinds were 300/600. Middle position raised to 1260, everyone folded. I was SB having AKo. I reraised to 5440. Bigblind went all-in. I was thinking about that I maybe blocking the ace and the king in the best case, and faced up with some pocket. I called. He had 99, and even J,K,A could show but didn't. After that middle pos 14BB went all-in and I called with KQo 13BB, he had 88. I was busted.

My question is how should I played AKo in that situation. I think that raise was all-right, as my opp had 18K and I went for the blinds pretty aggressive, but am I right that I could have folded when BB went all-in?
I just want to add that if I could hold the AK, I would made it into the phase2 by a mile, maybe that voice told me to go for it, but was a bad beat.

Thank U 4 Posting

The AK hand is standard as Colin said.

The KQ hand deserves more attention than the AK hand. While you did end up flipping you may want to spend some time researching on how KQ-off as a call does against an MP shove range at that stack depth.

There is an older rule of thumb that still works in tournaments today- which is- you need a tighter range to call off your stack than versus open shoving ranges.

As most V are not shoving GTO ranges from MP we cannot call GTO ranges either. So if you can equilab the KQ hand remember to tighten the possible range that a standard MP might shove.

At 13bb our skill advantage is still applicable in the tournie -so knowing we are flipping with this call eliminates that skill advantage.

Hope this helps

The other replies I read make sense and so does your play considering the blockers and that you won’t be busted if you loose. But here is question I often have to ask myself in these types of situations where I’m highly likely to be flipping. Am I outplaying the opposition? If so do I really want to gamble for most of my stack? Honestly regardless I’m probably calling here 80% of the time depending on all kinds of other variants. But you don’t have to call here. You can lay down AKo. Tight is right and even though this is a very tight option it may have been the option that got you through the satellite.

For 40BB effective you can rarely go to wrong by stacking off AK, even though a cold 4-bet is always a bit scary. But you are getting somewhat of a price having already invested the 3-bet, and you do block AA and KK, as you say yourself. So unless there was significant ICM-pressure, which apparently was not the case, I cant see myself getting away from AK in this spot. It just is, what it is. As others have said, calling KQo for 13BB is more questionable.

you have nothing to regret. you lost a coin flip with ak against 99. ak is too strong of a hand to fold all in preflop against only one player and unless he is a very tight player then i dont see myself folding this hand in this situation.