Big Pockets on the flop (NL)

[Foldarama_City]

Assume I have KK or AA and raised or reraised preflop - I have 1 or 2 callers. The flop looks pretty innocuous with only 1 picture card. A player in earlier position goes all-in before you have a chance to bet. Is this a clear call situation (and hope for the best)? I have lost to a couple of sets this way in the last day and was wondering if I have to call.

[Jon Matthews]

It depends on where you play and how big the other guy's stack is relative to yours. If it's on Party, call every time.

If it's elsewhere, and for higher stakes than 0.25/0.50NL, then call if it's a shortstack every time but with deep money if you can be broken by calling you'll need to consider the preflop action carefully i.e. how much you raised, how quickly they called (do you think they considered reraising?), that sort of thing.

People will routinely push with AJ on a J high board and with open ended or flush draws, you have to call more often than not to bust these.

The odd but tricky player will do this with a monster to make you think you're clicking "call bluff" when you hit the call button but you shouldn't fear this unless you know the player.

Jon