Friday, May 6, 2016

How to not play Aces

I can't really complain about the session I had last night.  I had a lot of suckouts against me, but also got good value for the hands I was dealt and generally played well up until the very last hand of the night.

In my ~8 hour session, I got my AA cracked by KTss when I opened to $16 from the SB against a single limper.  Flop comes K 4 2 - 2 spades.  I bet, he raises / I shove he calls off for $126 total and spikes a King on the turn.  A bit later, I'm dealt QQ, raise to $25 in the SB, get a loose player to limp / shove $65 from the CO and I snap him off.  I'm up against AT - Ace on the turn and I'm now 0 fer 2 with my premiums.

Finally, the last hand of the night.  I'll set the stage.  I'm in the UTG sitting on $625 and all I want to do is go home.  I'm tired at this point, and am done playing around.  I open to $25 from UTG.  UTG+1, a very tight, unimaginative, ABC player who overalues overpairs 3bets to $65.  He has me covered.  Folds around to same player from above that spiked the Ace - he shoves for less - ~$52.  Action to me.  I think for a good while - I distinctly put my opponent on KK and absolutely nothing else.  What to do?  The normal play is to raise to $160 or so...  I think this may have been the second best option, but I have to choose this option if I want to get full stacks in.  The good play here is to just call his raise and mask my hand strength - and check / raise or check / call a non-King (or non-Queen but I'm 99.99% sure it's KK here) flop.  The worst option is to open shove the $600.  Well, as you can probably guess, I open shoved.  I didn't want to deal with a flop / turn / river decision and I was tired.  I know... no excuse for the play, but still, this was my thinking coupled with being sick of the suckouts (which is an even poorer excuse since I know my opponent's cards and I should be folding to a K board).  Well, he thought for what seemed like 5 minutes before finally folding KK and I scooped against my suckout buddy's KTo who couldn't spike 2 of his 5 outs or so.  My honest thinking was that my opponent could never fold KK and would likely happily get KK in PF...  Oh well...  still a good session, though coulda shoulda woulda...

9 comments:

  1. if your true thinking was that he would never fold KK, then it's a good play. Bet the maximum you think they'll call. The fact that your read was off doesn't mean you made a poker mistake. Nice hand.

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    1. While I agree with that statement if he has $200-300 to go, it's possible even the most ABC player can't make a call like that for $600+. I got greedy and paid a reverse price for it... He definitely tanked it for a while...

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    2. I'm glad you decided your ship pre flop was not optimal. So what line would you take instead if you had to do it over?

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    3. I think the optimal line is to just raise to $160-175. Bet flop / turn / river. If I get fancy and just call, I'm going to have to check / raise at some point which will be a dead giveaway for a supposed set or stronger, plus there are a lot of flop / turn / river runouts that my opponent will not feel comfortable with. $160 raise and $200 flop bet works for stacks in on the turn.

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  2. I did same thing once w/ AA, opponent KK. Pushed allin for about $1000 over his reraise about $100. He flopped K and stacked me. Everyone at the table blame my play but the opponent himself complemented my play was correct.

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  3. Always that tough decision of whether to value bet (and how much) vs shoving, although, of course, u always SHOVE with AK, u see. The fact that he tanked means you were at least in the ballpark of making the right decision. You can never be sure.

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    1. Did someone just say you always shove with AK in this spot? But don't you want the short stack to bust out before you so you can finish in a higher place?

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  4. Misleading title! Nice session. Now, let's look at it this way. He has QQ or KK (we're not sure). Pot is about $180 preflop. Flop is Q,x,x. You bet $120, he calls, pot $420. Turn blank, you bet $200, he makes it $240 more. You have to call, right?

    Or...flop is Q,x,x and you bet $120, he makes it $420 total. What do you do? He can make this move with pocket QQ or KK.

    Let's forget what cards came out on the board. Instead, let's say he called your shove preflop and sucked out on you. I imagine most of us here, including you, would say, "You got it in as an overwhelming favorite and that's all you can do."

    Take what I say with a grain of salt since my latest post explains how bad I'm at poker.

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    1. At some point, suckouts matter. But the reality is, from hand to hand, I don't really care about suckouts. They're part of the game - whether they happen against 2 buy ins or 1, they still make up equity that I have coming back to me at some point in the future - whether I get it back through a hand holding up or me doing the sucking out myself. The key factor that's most important to me is whether I got it in good.

      FWIW, I think I 3bet to $160 not $120 making the pot $370 going to the flop. SPR is still above 1, but much closer.

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