CALLING AK TO A RAISE PREFLOP

Just thought I would let you know how profitable calling a pre-flop raise in early or* late position would be after recording it down for a week now. Anyone in here that knows me knows im more about doing whats more mathematically (odds) correct to do in a situation, as opposed to just doing something from instinct, wether that be good or bad. Now your only goin to be able to make money with AK when your getting paid about 2:1 on your money, there for calling a all in with AK would be bad, but calling a preflop raise with someone who had atleast as much to bet as they raised post flop makes sense. SO............... Here are my records for the week...........When calling preflop raise in early position ive lost a total of $25.95. Ive won $5.00. In late position ive lost $6.00. Ive won $8.25. So im down $20.95. Now this doesnt make sense to me, maybe the records are too insuffient so far and ill keep recording them. But let me know your comments back on this. because I used to never call a preflop raise with ak, but I thought id see how it does, well im about to give up on it./

A lot of it has to do with how you played it post flop. Also, how big were the raises? Did you ever re-raise, or just call? It seems to me there's a lot to consider that you can't capture just looking at a handful of numbers.

It also helps to know the player doing the raising. If you think he's loose, I'd re-raise him pre-flop and lead out post-flop whether I connected or not. If you think he's tight, you might be better off not calling a raise from him with AK, or at least look to hit top pair before you bet into him on the flop. You may be playing the hand too passively - calling the pre-flop raise and then checking when you miss, which is death no matter what you hold.

Why is calling an allin with AK bad?

-'rilla

Bill, you have to call raises w/ AK and reraise occassionally to throw off the bad guys. Nobody sits around and waits for AA, KK and QQ. People raise preflop w/ all sorts of hands that you have dominated like AQ, AJ, KQ, KJ medium pairs etc. Mix it up a little. Take a flop and go from there.

Why is calling an all in with AK bad? Because mathematically your behind with AK to any pocket pair lower then QQ. KK and AA your way behind 4:1 underdawg, im sure you know that rilla, come on. Consider your only goin to flop a pair 40% of the time (1.5:1). You really need to be able to get paid 2:1 by your opponent to justify calling with AK. Now you could bluff a your opponent post flop when you miss, but why? You know your opponent more then likely has something in his hand, which is only goin to lead to a call. Now, if you call a all in & your getting paid 1:1, this jsut to me isnt a correct way of goin about makin money overall. However calling a raise from an opponent who had atleast as much left in his stack that raised you preflop with gives you implied odds to get paid 2:1 or better. Allowing you to see a flop and then receive great implied odds on your money. I really dont see how re-raising with an unmade hand could be more profitable. Especially at lower limits, where people dont respect Re-raises. If I have AQ and raise and get RE-raised even minumum, im goin to more then likely give up the hand ( without a good read on a TERRIBLE PLAYER) because im behind to almost any hand you think a player is goin to raise with, let alone RE-raise with. maybe thats just the passive side of my game or whatever. But thats just my style. And I think the numbers I have on record so far speak for themselves. And im still keeping track not quite giving up on calling a raise with AK yet, but im pretty close to it...Its just not profitable,simple as that.........Maybe im not seeing something right and would enjoy more comments or suggestions towards this post

It depends on the possible (Reverse) Implied Odds you're getting, and not just pre-flop odds!!!

Remember too, implied odds (and reverse) are not just a function of your opponent's stack size, but also a function of so many other things:

- how your opponent(s) plays post-flop - aggression, likelihood of slow-playing/setting traps, folding easily to 'strength', reads., etc ......

- the possible range of hands you can credit your opponent(s) for and how your hand and their hand(s) connect with the board

For example, given a range of hands you credit your opponent for, you estimate your pre-flop odds with AK are '2:1 dog', then in the long run, yes, you should ensure you that on average you are getting at least 2:1 on your money *going in* in those situations. BUT, if you are, on average, playing mostly against bad opponents (or ones with inferior post-flop skills than you) then you should be able to make extra money in enough/many situations to under-write some looser calls when you aren't getting 2:1 on your money pre-flop. i.e. your hand connects with the board better than your opponent's but they still pay you off huge even when it would be obvious that you have them beat to better player.

It's about EV right, so I don't think you can just look at the the pre-flop match-up odds to make a clear cut rule about AK in all game situations.

Of course I neglected to also mention a very important point. If you or your opponent go all-in pre-flop, there are no implied odds, so that's a different situation.

Just checked over my stats for my last 1000 hands (yes, I know that's a horribly small sample). In my .10/.25 games, AKs+o netted me $0.40 when I called a raise with a total net of $20.60 for all the times I played it. In fact, it's my most profitable hand currently, with AA coming in behind it at $17.65.

Just my .02 on what I've seen lately.

- Jeffrey

YOU MUST CALL RAISES WITH AK!

Not always- you don't call an AI every time.(obviously having a reasonable read will help you use some discretion) And you don't call AI when there are 2 AI's in front of you necessarily (but sometimes you do). However, you are a small dog to almost every PP and you are most likely ahead of the hands that these low limit piss poor players raise with anyway.

Maybe you're having a personal bad run statistically but you'll make some $$ over the long run if you stick around with the AK.

Originally Posted by SteveO

YOU MUST CALL RAISES WITH AK!

Not always- you don't call an AI every time.(obviously having a reasonable read will help you use some discretion) And you don't call AI when there are 2 AI's in front of you necessarily (but sometimes you do). However, you are a small dog to almost every PP and you are most likely ahead of the hands that these low limit piss poor players raise with anyway.

Maybe you're having a personal bad run statistically but you'll make some $$ over the long run if you stick around with the AK.

I agree 100%. I wont necessarily call an AI with AK preflop, but Im not going to start laying down AK everytime some unknown player wants to raise. Perhaps if you are very familiar with the folks you're playing with.....but Im not going to lay down AK everytime, unless Im facing large enough bets to force me to.

that sounds really stupid, folding AK to a raise? ok sure i might fold it to an all or 2 in front of me, but i won't lay it down to a 3-4 bb raise.