EP - KK First Hand - How would you play?

[KCheng]

First hand in a NL $5 Party tournament. No reads at all, first hand I get dealt KK in EP. What would you do in my situation?

NL $5 Single Table Tournament - Party Poker 15/30 (10 handed)
FIRST HAND - EVERYONE HAS 800 CHIPS
KCheng has Kh, Ks and is EP1

KCheng raises to 141, Button folds, SB folds, BB calls

Flop(19 7/15 SB): 4c, Qc, Ac

BB bets 225, KCheng folds

Thanks for your help guys!

[Lou Krieger]

[ QUOTE ]
First hand in a NL $5 Party tournament. No reads at all, first hand I get dealt KK in EP. What would you do in my situation?

[/ QUOTE ]

I'd raise about three or four times the big blind, so I can either get away from my kings if there are a load of callers and the dreaded ace flops, or else if I'm reraised before the flop, I can go all-in and hope to contest the pot heads-up against the original raiser.
_______
Lou Krieger
Raise your game with Lou Krieger, author of "Internet Poker: How to Play and Beat Online Poker Games," at Royal Vegas Poker.
http://www.royalvegaspoker/lou

[La Brujita]

Lou has mentioned the standard way to play it. This is how I usually play it. A couple of points:

1. At the lower levels of SnG's, with small blinds, people often don't respect raises of 4x bb because they see them as "only" 60 chips. By raising, one thing you are trying to achieve is to get people holding aces to fold. So you may want to consider a bit of a bigger raise due to the mindset in early rounds at PP.

2. The other choice is the go for the limp reraise, a la Super System. This is rarely my choice, but is a good play in an aggressive game. Since you had no read, you may have to go to your past experience to see the likelihood of a raiser before the flop (from what I remember in small games, very likely).

Regards

[Al_Capone_Junior]

[ QUOTE ]
At the lower levels of SnG's, with small blinds, people often don't respect raises of 4x bb because they see them as "only" 60 chips. By raising, one thing you are trying to achieve is to get people holding aces to fold. So you may want to consider a bit of a bigger raise due to the mindset in early rounds at PP.

[/ QUOTE ]

Agreed. I rarely raise less than TEN times the blind in the early levels of a small buy-in SNG. It's extremely rare that I steal the blinds doing this. It's also pretty rare that I flop an ace with KK here. So I'll take my equity pre-flop here. As the players get better, as sometimes happens in the 2+2 SNGs or zoo tourneys, I revert back to a strategy more like that suggested by Lou here.

Going for a limp-reraise is no good when it's early in a SNG where you don't know the opponents.

al

[cferejohn]

[ QUOTE ]
I rarely raise less than TEN times the blind in the early levels of a small buy-in SNG.

[/ QUOTE ]

So do you never steal in the early rounds? It seems to me that risking 200 chips to win 30 (assuming 10/20 blinds) doesn't make a lot of sense. If you are only raising with hands that you don't mind committing that number of chips to, I can't imagine you would get many calls.

You say "low buy-in". I'm not quite sure what you mean by that. I play $30-100 SNGs on Stars, by and large, and in most of those, it is not uncommon to see a 3.5-4x BB raise take down a pot uncontested preflop.

You say it is "extremely rare" for you to steal the blinds with a 10xBB raise. When I see a raise this big it screams "medium pair" to me (i.e. probably the best hand right now, doesn't want a lot of players on the flop), and I will sometimes call a raise this big early with big cards on the assumption that if either of my cards flops, I am probably ahead (unless the other player flops a set, but I flop top pair + someone else flops a set happens fairly rarely.

Just my observations. I'd be interested to hear your response.

[TheGrifter]

I actually had this same situation come up today with the blinds at only 5/10 in a SnG and I had AA UTG. I raised to 100 and everyone folded. In my experience that will happen rarely at the lower levels but I did wonder aferwards if a smaller raise or limp/try for reraise would have been better.

[NotMitch]

I hate the limp reraise early in the most $5 SnG's. Everyone wants to see flops and it is way too likely you will take the flop 7 or 8 handed for a single bet and that is not what you want at all.

[William]

I usually raise 100/120. This way you often get 1/2 callers.
I agree that raising "only" 3xBB is nothing that big trouble ahead.

About the comment "risking 200 to win 30", if you get any callers, you are going to win more than 30...that is something you say when you are bluffing or taking a chance with lesser cards, it just doesn't apply here.

Take care,
William

[Pitcher]

I know everyone plays these things differently, but if I get KK during Level 1 of a Sit N Go I will bet 200 chips or more (depending on position and action) Here is why....I really don't want to play this hand early for less than that because I prefer to survive to 7-8 players, then become very aggressive. Further, and I just love this, you will frequently be called or re-raised with that bet anyway. If re-raised, I will be happy to put all my chips in the middle. I will normally limp with medium pockets early on hoping to hit a set. In essence, I risk next to nothing in the 1st. level or 2 because I am confident I can outplay most of my opponents during the course of the tournament.

Pitcher
PS, I normally play at Party and start with 800 chips. Seems like there are lots of poor players at $30 level, which has alot to do with my strategy.

[allenciox]

Interesting... I often raise 60-75 in early position on the first round (blinds 10-15) with a top pair like AA or KK, and very often win the pot uncontested (not what I want, of course). Then I will see someone raise it 100-150 and get called (or raised all-in) two or three places. When they show their cards, it can often be a medium to small pair that they have raised on.

Based on your behavior and others, might it be better to raise to 100-200 on the first round with AA or KK --- that counter-intuitively, you might get more callers there?

Of course, some of it may have to do with buyin level. I play $50 to $200 SNGs, rather than the lower levels.

[La Brujita]

Slightly off topic, how bad is this play by my opponent at PP? Fifth hand of a SnG. I am holding KK as the fifth player to act. One limper, I raise it to one hundred. BB calls, EP limper calls.

Long story short EP limper is holding aa, and didn't reraise when the BB called my 100. I thought that was about as bad as you can play aces. I spoke of the limp reraise above, but why the heck limp in early position and flat call to a huge raiser and the bb.

Regards

[alekhine8]

I think another alternative that has not been brought up is to just go all-in. There are a lot of morons playing in the $5 Party SNGs and they will call you with real garbage.

Sure, you might lose to aces every now and then but you would probably be in the same situation after the flop and lose chips then too.

Note that this only applies to the first few hands (when you have a chance to establish yourself as a 'maniac') and in a $5 or $10 tournament.