Did I Make the right play with 66

In a MTT I'm in middle position with 66. The blinds are 15-30 there is one caller before me and I limp. Two people call after me and both blinds take the flop. The flop comes down 6 8 J rainbow and I check hoping to check raise. It checks around and the turn is a 3. the blinds check and the early position caller bets 30. I raise to 200 about the size of the pot. Everyone folds except the early caller. The river is an A and he bets 100. Because it is so early in the tournament I have not seen him play many hands and I don't have much of a read on him. He seemed to be playing pretty tight but then again it s early. Anyway, I was thinking he had a pair of jacks on the flop with a medium kicker and was hoping for two pair. then with his bet on the river I was thinking / hoping he hit two pair j's and A's. I go all in for 700 chips. he calls and show 88. Was I too agressive on the last bet or was there no way around it.

There are two schools of thought conflicting here. The attempt to get chips while you can (important to tourny success) but also an attempt to survive by leaving yourself an out. Now, you're not going to flat call the 100 bet on the river becuase that's not getting value out of your set on a relatively drawless (? didnt check) board. So obviosuly he's setting you up for a raise, if you made it a callable raise to 400, he's just going to push allin and I don't think you can let go of your hand with 300 chips into that pot, with that board and that hand. You're destined to lose reguardless of your aim be it survival or accumulation.

Footnotes: Yer screwed!

-'rilla

You may consider just calling the 100 since it is early....but gorilla is correct. In this case you are pretty much screwed - he played it like I would have leading out weak on the river hoping to get someone to come over the top.
Incidentally you played it just like I would have as well - I would have lost all my chip in that deal too. I would have liked to say that the 200 call would have tipped me off, but he could be slow playing KK or AA or just calling with top 2 pair and was afraid to bet everyone out of the pot. No easy way to get away from this one.

No way you should just call unless there's a straight or flush possibility he could've likely had. Assuming that not is the case, you made the right play and will win like 99% of these types of hands. Bet whatever you think they'll call on the river.

And personally, it being early is more of a reason for me to be willing to go all in here. Maybe if its a satelliete and the top 5 win and there's 6 left or something you should just call on the river, but even then you'd be hard pressed to. Early on with little time invested and an absolute monster of a hand, you have to push and take your chances (which are great really).

I would have thought he had caught two pair and pushed him all-in. With that board, you have to assume your set is the best hand..

I don't know of a way to avoid losing the max set vs set.

If it makes you feel any better, which it probably won't, you made the right play.

I wouldn't have played the 66 to begin with. Your only hope is another 6, and virtually all overcards (which is most of the deck) put you to a tough decision. Just because you flopped a 2:50 card, doesn't mean playing them in the first place was the right choice.

So you'll never play 66 even though you're beating AK almost 2/3rds of the time on the flop? Weak...

-'rilla

lol... who doesn't play low pocket pairs? I am almost always willing to call pre flop (low bets) with pp. Isn't everyone?

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Originally Posted by Ragingg

lol... who doesn't play low pocket pairs? I am almost always willing to call pre flop (low bets) with pp. Isn't everyone?

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Would you call off $3.5 of a $25 stack with 22?

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Originally Posted by a500lbgorilla

So you'll never play 66 even though you're beating AK almost 2/3rds of the time on the flop? Weak...

-'rilla

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Although statistically this is true, but this only works if you're headsup and you can ABSOLUTELY POSITIVELY put your opponent on AK. So if the flop is QJ9 you'd call them down to the river as long as it wasn't a T, A or K? I think that's way risky, and AK has a bluff advantage over 66 especially with overcards. As already stated, unless you have a perfect read on them, which I doubt you'll be able to do, 66 is a folding hand on the flop even though statistically you're an advantage. Hope that made some sense.

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Originally Posted by Fnord

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Originally Posted by Ragingg

lol... who doesn't play low pocket pairs? I am almost always willing to call pre flop (low bets) with pp. Isn't everyone?

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Would you call off $3.5 of a $25 stack with 22?

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He said *low* bets. 7BBs isn't a low bet. But yes, I would call off upto 3BB with 22, 4 if I had a nice read on the guy. But I wouldn't even call 7 if he was a freaking maniac raising 7-15BB every hand.

-'rilla

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Originally Posted by allLiving

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Originally Posted by a500lbgorilla

So you'll never play 66 even though you're beating AK almost 2/3rds of the time on the flop? Weak...

-'rilla

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Although statistically this is true, but this only works if you're headsup and you can ABSOLUTELY POSITIVELY put your opponent on AK. So if the flop is QJ9 you'd call them down to the river as long as it wasn't a T, A or K? I think that's way risky, and AK has a bluff advantage over 66 especially with overcards. As already stated, unless you have a perfect read on them, which I doubt you'll be able to do, 66 is a folding hand on the flop even though statistically you're an advantage. Hope that made some sense.

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I see where you're comming from. But I'm still playing 66 into a limp pot every time (unless blinds are huge). Into a raised pot, I won't be able to win with a flop of QJ9, I will be able to sniff them out if the flop was Q 7 5 or something else in that neighborhood. It covers more than half the flops so its not a losing move to play 66. Plus the huge value of a flop like AA6 or AK6.

-'rilla

Yeah, when the blinds are cheap, not at least limping in with any PP is extremely weak, in my opinion. You're pissing away a ton of implied odds.