88 from SB with 12bb — push or fold?
The answer
Push
all-in
The math: 12bb blind-vs-blind · a pocket pair is a clear jam here. 88 shoves every time.
Why
Any pocket pair at twelve big blinds is an automatic all-in. Picture what happens when someone calls: against two overcards you're a slight favorite, and against a smaller pair you're crushing them — the worst case is a coin flip. But most of the time everyone just folds and you scoop the blinds for free. Folding here would throw away a hand that's ahead of almost everything they could call with. Push.
The spot
- Your seat
- SB
- Stakes and stacks
- 1,000 / 2,000 · 12bb
- Your hand
- 8♠ 8♣
- Board
- Preflop — no board yet
- Pot
- POT · 3,000
- Action on you
- Folded to you
Every option
Foldgive it up
Why not: Folding feels safe with only twelve big blinds left, but a pocket pair is far too strong to give up. 8♠ 8♣ is ahead of every unpaired hand and only a coin flip against two overcards, so shoving prints chips while folding throws away a made hand.
Pushall-inCorrect
The idea behind it
From the blinds, a pocket pair is one of the easiest shoves in short-stacked poker. Around twelve big blinds, blind-vs-blind, you're either a favorite or a coin flip against any hand that calls, and folds come far more often than calls. So from here you jam every pair, small or large. (That's a blind-vs-blind rule, though — don't take it as license to shove 22 under the gun.)
Concept: Pairs always jam
Terms in this spot
Play it instead of reading it
The trainer deals this hand with hints, grading and spaced repetition — and randomized variations of it once you have seen it.