David,


I do agree with your concept that KK does not "lose value" against many opponents. KK will always be KK, the second best starting hand in hold em... preflop.


I do not disagree with the fact that the math and statistics show that KK will win a 9 handed pot a little more than 30% of the time against random hands good and bad. The mathematical data for this is irrefutable. I do understand that in the "long run" you are technically making $$$ every time you put in that extra bet with KK.


Part of my point is echoed by Ripdog... why attach a big neon sign to your hand saying "Bigguns here" when you are out of position? Furthermore, these guys are coming regardless of whether its 2 bets, 3 bets, or 4 bets. Why not just flat call for deception purposes later?


Most of my point goes along the lines of why possibly trap yourself preflop to going all the way? Since the flop largely defines your hand, and with 9 players, somebody is going to hit the flop good. It's a mathematical certainty. That somebody might not be you with KK.


With everybody in for 2 bets, a bet on the flop is getting 16-1 odds. If preflop is capped then people are getting 24-1 odds. In this situation, you know as well as I do that people could be in there chasing with any gutshot or backdoor drawing opportunity because the odds are there. With KK, I'm getting odds to call bets all the way.


The math doesn't lie and I'm not disputing that. However, I do believe that some caution is necessary in these huge pots to prevent yourself from falling into pot commitment trap #1 in my original post. There have to be more considerations to the play other than "the math says I make $$$ in the long run... therefore I must 3 bet to be correct." It just doesn't work that way in real life. The closest analogy I can draw to that is a college professor using a 10 year old paradigm to try to explain a "real world" situation that is much more complicated than the model structure.


As for the considerations how about these for example:


1) How am I doing in the current session? At that time I had played about 3 hours and was up $25. This hand could have easily gone the other way with any other flop and I end up down $30-$40. Now instead of cruising along... I have to work another 5-6 hours average to make up for that. How about if I'm down a rack at the time? No way I 3-bet. If I'm up a rack or so, then I probably 3-bet with 95% certainty. I'd see this as an opportunity to really make a big score.


2) Deception. People know I raise and/or 3 bet with KK so why announce it multiway?


3) Playing skills. With the exception of the button (BG), I can say that I could outplay everyone else postflop with regularity.


Hope this gives you a little more insight into what I was thinking during the hand. Look forward to your response as usual, David.


Mike