Did I play this wrong?

I played in the biggest tournament I have ever played in (not too big reall). I was down to around 4300, the blinds are at 300/600. I was 2 off the button and looked down at pocket kings. I raised to 1800. Table chip leader was in BB with about 12K. He raises me all in. I call. He hits a J on the flop for a set of jacks. I'm out in 64th place when the top 54 paid.

My friend says I should not have put all my chips in when I was so close to the money. My thinking is that I had to win one more hand to blind into the money, and I just could not lay down those pocket Kings pre-flop. Although the money would have been my biggest win ever, I had no problem with my play and would do it again, but my buddy has put a little doubt into my head. So what do you guys and gals think?

your buddy is a moron.. Mr. after the fact... what would the pay have been if you were "in the money"? I'm sure it wasnt much, unless you hit the final table... if you won that hand, your buddy would have told ya "it was a no brainer" to risk your chips w/ KK...

I probably would have played it the same. The reraise would have me thinking pocket pair, (which was the case obviously) but with Kings, you made the right play. Just goes down as a bad beat story..

Id do what you did anytime!!! Because u hit your in good position . I play to win though not to finish in the money.. first off, you finish 1 place out of money or 90 still the same.. you finish in the money all good right? unless I have like no shot at winning and im really close to the money them maybe but not with Cowboys

If you aren't willing to get all your money in when you have the second best hand in poker then you shouldn't be playing. Bad beats happen and I'll take KK vs JJ anytime.

[deekay140]

Dont just play to get into the payouts. play to win. 2nd just means you were the first loser.

There's no logical reason to fold this here. You should have probably moved all in without even bothering to raise to 1800 ... however, once you raised to 1800, this is a no brainer call. You had only 7x the BB left at the beginning of this hand as it is, so there is little guarantee that you'd be able to fold your way into the money. If there are 64 players, you're playing 8 or 9 handed, so at two off the button, you've only got a few more hands till the blinds erode another 900 of your stack. Even if you did play tight to guarantee 54th place, you'd have so few chips that you couldn't possibly be competitive for the win, and you'd wind up 51st or close to it. You had the best hand here, got in with a big edge ... a big stack sucked out on you, it's part of poker. Your buddy's analysis is garbage.

[brofriend]

You did not say what 50th place paid and if that would be a change in your life. If I was playing a event like the WSOP and 560th paid 12750 it might be worthwhile laying it down but in a normal tournament to make 50-100 bucks you definately did the correct move

[AdamWolf]

Being a relatively tight player (and thus maybe providing a slightly different POV), the only thing I might've done differently is to not have pushed the 1800 in. Let the flop coem cheaply, and then ocne you've got overpair, roll the big bet, maybe all in off the top wiht the overpair

...you would've ended up in the same place, however, proving that your buddy maybe needs to leanr how to play the game instead of backseat betting.