I just played my first MTT (a home game MTT). It was a $15 buy in for $50 worth of chips. The field started with 18 people (3 tables of 6) and unlimited rebuys for the first 1:20 (ended up being 25 buy-ins). Blinds increased every 20 minutes, everyone started 100 BB deep. The top three players got paid, third place got their money back, second place won $97.75, and first place won $262.25.

I made it to the final three as chip leader with approximately 460 in chips, the second biggest stack (Player B) had approximately 410 in chips, and the shortest stack (Player C) had about 380. Blinds and antes were 15/30/60 increasing dramatically every 20 minutes, so we were all very short stacked playing less than 10 BBs each.

Now here’s the situation which knocked me out. I just want to know if I made the correct decision and what I should learn from this hand.

I’m in the BB with As3c, Player C folds his button, Player B limps in for another 30, I check. The pot is 165.

Flop comes Jc9cAd

Player B checks to me, I bet 50. He thinks about it for a while and then shoves for another 265 (315 total). Pot is now 530, calling and losing would leave me with about 50 in chips and essentially a guarantee of third place, calling and winning would give me a commanding chip lead over Player C who I feel confident playing against heads up. It should also be noted that Player B is a known loose aggressive player who I have a history with.

I eventually make the call, he flips over Ah7h. I think that maybe there will be some chopportunities, but alas the turn is the 6h and the river is the 5d. I exited my first MTT in third place only making my money back.

So what I want to know is should I have been able to get away from this, especially in the circumstances?

With such a big discrepancy between 2nd and 3rd should I have waited for a better opportunity to get it all in?

I’m really just looking for any feedback I can get, it was my first MTT and it was a lot of fun, but pretty discouraging to go from chip leader to third place finish and not even profit. Please let me know what you guys think, thanks!