|
*****PREFLOP. AcAd.
One min-raise. one caller.
It's never wrong to go all in all with Aces. You will occassionally get called and be a huge favorite (but still lose!). You will suck in KK and maybe in even QQ, and be a huge favorite in a monster pot which will make your poker session. Even if everyone folds, two good things happen. First you win the pot, a tax (rake) free pot (100% equity Yay!). Secondly, you avoid any chance of putting your money in bad, and we all know as great as AA is -- the flip side is that it is emotionally very hard to let go off. For some reason we think that if we have AA world owes us a big pot. BS!! Every poker player has stacked off with AA postflop drawing stone dead or nearly dead against two pair, a set, a straight, or a flush. Don't lie, you know you have.
Still..... most of the time you will want to play somewhat deceptively and attempt to extract extra value from your powerhouse hand. AA is such a strong hand you can afford to play in a variety of ways. You hope to be up against something like top pair and win a very nice pot with a series of solid value bets.
Extremes aside, the standard preflop play is to ReRaise 1.5-2 times the size of the pot. Which means that your ReR is *VERY* light. That's ok if your plan is to be deceptive and quasi slow play. Be aware that you are often giving your opps the right odds to hit a big hand. AND your AA will be hard to let go of. Think about letting go in advance.
You make a smallish ReR of 7 BB, on a ~5bb pot, giving our opps around 2-1, or better to call. That's ok if you are intentionally playing decptively and underrepresenting your hand. You will usually win, but losses can sometimes be very large and you will wonder why you allowed your opps to outdraw you.
One fold, one caller, good already we have some dead money. I love dead money, it gives us a math overlay for our hand.
***FLOP. 9s, 6h, 5h.
Right away we see that our opponent would need to be playing either trashy SCs or a small pair to hit this flop. While the board is coordinated it does not connect well with a tightish medium to big pair, or Ace Strong hand.
We are confident that we have the best hand on this flop.
You make a very standard size bet on the flop, which seems perfectly reasonable to me. The button makes a sizable ReR. Yuck! Gross !! Now *we* are under pressure.
So now, for the first time, we have think about the possibility that we are beat. Time for a quick version of a hand range analysis (good idea to poker stove it too as a follow up).
Hands we beat:
--Single pair: anything from a pocket pair like 88 up to KK or something like to 45s or 98s. Quite a range. Overpair and aggressive play fits the bettting so far.
--Simple Draws: Our opp could have either a flush draw, a straight draw including a gutshot.
-- Complex Combos: There are many. Pair, flush, straight draw combos are numerous. He could easily have a hand like 9h8h, giving him top pair, a flush draw, a gutshhot and five outs to two pair or better. His aggression makes this more likely than a simple draw. Agree ?
--Air: He could have complete air and be on a steal. Maybe he just watched Tom Dwan on TV. Air bluff is never less than 5%.
Hands that beat you.
---Set. The sickest and most nightmarish of hands to be up against. Unlikely but always possible, and likely to milk you for a big score if you have trouble letting go. A set nicely fits the betting of the hand so far.
--- Two pair. Even more unlikely, 65s would really have to thread the needle. I would almost entirely discount this hand.
So overall, noting the very wide range of hands, most likely we have the best hand. We absolutely hate the ReR.
I see three options.
1. Fold. Too early IMHO, only somewhat unreasonable.
2. Call. He probably has hand, likely a draw. Let's see what happens. We are acutely aware that we may need make decision that endangers our entire stack.
3. Raise. We likely have the best hand and therefore should raise. The next question is what size and what are implications ? It turns out we don't have much flexibility.
a. Smallish raise. He raised about 1/3 of his stack. Not much room for us here. If we smallish ReR, it's pretty much all or none for him. Any ReR from us makes him pot committed if he wants to continue which means any raise from us really means...
b. All in raise.
His raise was right in between, aggressive but not yet pot committed.... he could fold. But if you raise and he wants to continue you are almost certain to be playing for the rest of your stacks. Both stacks still have meat and you'll be completely busted since he has you covered. Gross.
So, as I see it you have a choice of all in or call. I hate both options. I'm moderately inclined toward going all in. Most likely your hand is best.
We could be up against KK, QQ, JJ and make a huge score. We could also be up against 99 and be drawing nearly dead. We could also be up against a wide variety of draws, including combo draws, some of which we are about even money (like 9h8h).
Looks like we are in stuck in a high variance gamble.
But I hate it.
I hope he fold or calls with the worst of it.
Did I mention I hate my hand now ?
|