What did I do wrong?

Paragraphs and sentences would make this a lot easier to read. As would precise language. "Raises with about 5BB"? I assume from the action you mean he raises to about 5BB, and not with a stack of 5BB?

Anyway, facing a raise that size I'd just fold preflop unless you have some reason to think he's a wild man doing that with all sorts of ****. That size is terrible at any point, and bad players do it with a hand that's big but that they're scared to play postflop.

Postflop there's really no option but to get it in.

I agree with this. I'm not sure how many players are seated, but versus a raise from early position full ring AJo is not a great hand.

Postflop - not winning a pot is not a reason in itself to say that you played badly. We are always working with percentages in poker. If you got all in preflop with AA v 22 and he spikes a 2 on the river, would you blame yourself for playing badly? (situation dependent of course, there are times it is right to fold AA preflop).

Poker is not chess........

It's AJ suited, but even so, calling a 5BB raise off 18BB with it isn't gonna be very good. 5BB raises should basically never be a thing and they're generally a pretty strong/compressed range unless the player is a real maniac. Lacking that info it might not even be a continue with anything except QQ+/AK.

Seems like you had some trouble counting outs. Not sure how you got 20 outs. 9 clubs for the flush, then 6, not 8, outs for the straight draw. You already counted the king of clubs and 8 of clubs with the flush draw outs; you donÂ’t count them again. ThatÂ’s 15. If you count three ace outs thatÂ’s 18.

It looks like you used the rule of 4 to get 80% equity from 20 outs. Be careful with that too. ItÂ’s a good approximation but doesnÂ’t work as well with large numbers of outs. If you did have 20 outs with two cards to come, you lose if you fail to hit an out ott and otr. Probability of that is 27/47 x 26/46 =0.325 or 32.5%. Thus your equity is 67.5%, not 80.

You also donÂ’t actually have 18 outs anyway if villainÂ’s range is what you expect. If he has AA you only have your flush and straight outs, 15 total. There is also the possibility of a KJ runout giving villain a higher straight or a Qc A runout giving villain a boat, so your equity is just a bit lower than the 56.1% you would calculate. With KK you lose 2 straight outs so 16 total. Calculated equity would be 59%, but again actual equity is a bit lower due to K + 9TQK runouts giving villain the boat or quads. QQ gives you the full 18 outs but again not the full 64.5% equity. Any out plus a board pairing card is a loser.

Of course none of that changes your decision; shove postflop. Just be aware that the spot isnÂ’t as good as you thought.

First... thanks to all for the quick responses...
Won't make much difference... but let me flesh out details

200 entry bounty tourney (Bounty worth from $100 to $1,000), 5 hours in, about 10 seats from Bubble...

6,000 12,000 blinds with a 12,000 ante
Both I (on the Button) and UG have about 160,000 chips
UG opens with 60,000 and everyone folds to me with A-J suited

I hadn't played a hand in almost 2 hours since my Aces got cracked by 6-9 offsuit (naturally)..
Didn't go on tilt, stayed patient, folded everything from the obvious K-2, J-4, 7-3, (which was majority of hands I got), even folding 10-J, J-Q, and Ace-10....

I assume from the responses, I should have continued to fold everything unless I got Aces or Kings...

I thought at some point needed to take a chance or get blinded out.... which looked like a real possibility

Thanks again

Or is the better choice to either fold or shove preflop?

You and the UTG have about 13 bb's each. So his raise to 5 bb's preflop is basically pot committing meaning you have no fold equity if you shove. My inclination when people raise to 5 bb's preflop is that they mostly have JJ then some QQ/TT/AK and just don't want any callers to play a big pot OOP. But here since you have AJs it could be a bit more evenly distributed. Still you have like a 33% chance against all of UTG's range noted above. So I would fold and move on.

In general your 3-bet range shouldn't be limited to KK+. Even this close to the bubble. I will typically 3 bet jam AJs against a 2 bb open from MP onward. If it is a UTG or UTG+1 open then I might just call unless they are opening wide.

In general with 200 players in the US only 24 will cash (12%) so if there are 60 players left I don't think you are near the bubble. Which should widen your preflop jamming range (whether you are first to act or are 3-betting). In the WSOP 15% cash. When I played in the Czech republic in Prague only ~8% cashed (10% of original entries and 5% rebuys).

Thanks again to all, what I'm hearing is I should have folded, waited for better hand or opportunity (which may not happen) and get blinded out

Honestly I don’t think you did anything wrong here.

We can debate your pre flop call however once you called and you’re faced with that flop with 9bb behind its a shove/call everyday just about.

Let’s be honest; anyone who has played a ton poker has been in these spots….sometimes you get lucky, other times you don’t. This time you didn’t - that’s poker.

I think you may need to study your short stack shoving ranges if you're worried about getting blinded out. (You mentioned the hands you folded - what were the circumstances? They may or may not be folds depending on what position you're in and the action.)

Postflop there isn't really a decision, and calling a normal sized raise preflop is fine. 5x is such a huge chunk of your stack and represents such a tight range, though, that you're better off avoiding it without a premium.

Preflop is just terrible. You can't call an UTG 13xBB shove with this hand and that he made it 5xBB makes it worse.

Later you can pushbot steal so not to get blinded out. It isn't so much the hand as the situation.

Apparently you can call UTG1 shoves with AJs from 18BB, so probably the preflop was not that bad (maybe you should have rejammed here but again it is 5BB open raise scenario, GTO is long far gone).

Postflop was also alright, GTO-wise you just don't fold flush draws on the flop 99% of the time (unless you have a definitive read that your opponent is too unbalanced), especially nut flush draws, ESPECIALLY with bonus OESD, so postflop is kinda alright too (though, again, with 5BB open, even if it was right from standard GTO standpoint, it doesn't mean it was the best play in this spot, ranges of you both are already pretty messed up at this point).

And, whatever is the case, it is poker, you can play good and lose, and you can play bad and win, it's all just about long-term profitability.