Beware the Early Raise (tourney)

LAYDOWN

A raise from early position generally means a strong hand for a couple of reasons. First, the raiser is indicating that he is not worried about a re-raise with several players still remaining. Second, he will be acting first throughout the rest of the hand and is at a positional disadvantage.

In this example, I had a feeling that the raiser had a strong hand since he raised 3x the big blind in such an early position. I don't mind folding what would normally be a pretty good starting hand when someone raises up front. I felt I was weaker and I was right. Additionally, if I had just called, I could have faced a re-raise which occurred in this instance. I would then have to make another difficult decision.