A♥K♠ in the Big Blind facing a Raise, what do you do here?

AK in the Big Blind facing a raise-optimizd.gif


DECISION POINT: In a Tournament where blinds are 1250/2500, a Middle Position player raises to 6200 and it folds around to you in the Big Blind with A♥K♠. Action is on you, what do you do here?

PRO ANSWER: As part of a robust Big Blind defense strategy, we should have an overbet reshoving range against various open raises on our Blind. We can define the overbet as reshoving against a standard open raise when the effective stack is over 30BBs deep.

Overbet reshoving ranges will generally be comprised of hands that have lots of equity, but realize equity poorly when giving opponents cheap or free flops. The most common hands to see in these ranges are small and medium pocket pairs, along with a number of big Aces to provide balance.

Continued below…

EP239-BB-Overbet-Reshoving.png

A hand like AKo does very well in an overbet reshoving range. When facing a late position raiser with a very wide range, we could often overbet reshove a range that includes 22-TT, ATo+, A5s, and some hands like 87s, K7s, Q8s as well.

Given that Villain raised in Middle Position, our reshoving range will be much tighter than that, but will still include AQo+, 99-TT, JTs, A5s, and occasionally KTs.

We will also reraise a smaller amount (not all-in) with various strong hands such as JJ+, AQs+. However, with the offsuit AK, shoving is the best default.

Moving all-in is the best play.

How would you play it?
Share your answer in the comments below!


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