I have 31,400 chips with 23 left in this event where 15 players make the money. The blinds are 600/1,200 with a 200 ante and the average stack is around 68K. I have AK of spades UTG and raise to 3100. The villain in the cutoff looks at his cards and takes a few seconds and counts out a few chips to call before changing his mind and says “heck, I'm all in” and pushes his stack of 31,000 in the middle. I have played with this older guy for about 90 minutes and I am 99% sure he has jacks. He just doubled up a few hands earlier when he shoved UTG +1 with KK and got called by 77 (“I didn't want action there” he says afterwards). He would have instashoved AA and KK and taken fewer seconds before shoving QQ and AK, when he hesitates I am certain what he has. I tell him “I'm not slow rolling you sir, I'm just deciding whether I need to gamble here” and I end up calling after about 15 seconds and indeed he has JJ and I lose the flip and go out two minutes later.

for the sake of argument, if he had actually turned his cards over and my 99% “certainty” became 100% fact should I fold? I've been doing well in tournaments recently (cashing in 6 of my last 13) and I feel running a 20bb stack into a 40bb stack without flipping or getting cards is something I've been doing pretty consistently. There were some top pros left in this tourney but a lot of soft spots as well. Mathematically it's a call I guess as I have to call 27,900 to win a pot of 37,700 but I knew I was behind and I called anyway and I'm thinking for this reason I should have folded. I would have had 23bb if I folded. I'm not going to lose a lot of sleep over this one but it's bugging the hell out of me today