protect pocket queens?

[blakheart 3]

3 table sit n go on UB. 18 players left. Blinds are 30 60. I am in the big blind with pocket queens sitting on about $2400 in chips. The UTG goes all in for $310. It folds around to the button ($3500 in chips) who calls. Button has been fairly TAG and I expect he wouldn't have called without some sort of hand. I also figure he will call a resonable raise regardless of his holdings since he likes his hand already and he has position.Obviously I am playing the hand. The question is- Do I smooth call or raise? If raise, how much? All in?If I call and the flop comes out ragged due I push then?

[allinbluff35 0]

I raise to 900

[-=BigWorm=- 0]

i agree with Bluff i would also raise about 3 times what he had put in to let him know if hes calling with a medium hand hes gonna have to pay to get lucky.

[strategy 4]

I raise to 900

Do you fold to a re-raise? What can he fold for 600 more in this 1500 pot? He's got position and should have a decent idea of what you hold (my initial impression would be a medium pair, but maybe that's giving too much credit). Aggressive players with those two advantages are not fun to play against.I would raise more, but that makes it tougher to dump this if he re-raises. I guess I'm just not confident that we won't be outplayed too often postflop with this hand.

[Drwnded 0]

UTG could be making this move with almost any two cards obviously. If I'm the button, and my hand is good enough to call the UTG push, it's probably good enough to raise in order to isolate and play heads-up against a marginal hand. That is, unless I have a real monster like AA or KK and want to try and let one of the blinds call as well. If you're reading him as a TAG/good player, his calling w/o raising to isolate would be a little ominous to me. Still, your queens are going to be hard to get away from unless the flop is really ugly. I'd probably raise to define my hand here, perhaps to 1200, and be prepared to consider a tough laydown if the button then pushes. You'd be left w/only 1200 chips, but that's not dead with the blinds only 30/60.