Quote Originally Posted by michael1123
Just a note, I do understand being more worried about them calling your all in in a tourney, and especially rather deep into a MTT (and extremely especially if you're nearing a big pay increase, or just about to enter the money).
If I am late in a tournament (right before the payouts) and delt TT, and the flop comes up T63 with 2 to a suit. I'm pushing all-in. I don't care about my stack size, my opponents stack size or position. The only thing I want is to take the pot down right there. It's a lot less likely that you are going to run into a flush draw at this time because there is a lot of folding going on. However, I don't want to play with any risk and I am not looking for a caller. I have the nuts and I am looking to take it down. Safely getting to the money is more important than giving someone their pot odds or maximizing my profits. If fact, if I am raised pre-flop, I may be tempted to lay down TT when I'm at this point in the game.

Quote Originally Posted by Manomanman
I don't mean to rain on everyone's parade, but doesn't position play a HUGE role in this decision (and practically every decision we make as poker players?)
Position matters when you are gaining your information. But position does not matter when you are going all-in. After you have made the decision to push all-in or call all-in, the position doesn't matter, the stack size only slightly matters, the only thing that matters are the cards.

In general, I like the strategy of giving a chaser his odds while playing the same odds he will not catch and potentially taking down a bigger pot. But I would put this in ring game strategy rather than tournament strategy.

Sklansky talked about EV in his tournament book and it made so much sense. It will always be profitable to make a +EV decision in a ring game. But it will not always be profitable in a tournament. If you run into a 6 to 1 shot with a +EV, it will be profitable in the long run. But what are your chances of having this pop up in the same tournament 5 other times? Because you earn money on each tournament and cannot make up what you lost in one tournament by making extra in another, you should consider laying down hands where the odds are strongly against you, even if it has +EV.

With this situation we are talking about, you have about a 70% chance to win. However, the losses you will sustain when you lose this (the other 30% of the time) I think we be harsh and hurt your tournament a lot. It is safer to take away his pot odds and play the hand very strong.

I would play this hand safe in a tournament. But I think I would make that gamble in a ring game.