stupid hu question
 

You're playing a decent to good player heads up at a live casino with unlimited raising.

you have KK on the button. you raise. he 3-bets. you 4-bet. he 5-bets. how many bets would you go ?

with QQ?
with JJ?
with TT?
with 99?

note there hasn't been all that much 4 betting preflop.

Re: stupid hu question
 

All In with KK[img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]
Probably all-in w/QQ
JJ-99 I'd probably just call.

Re: stupid hu question
 

With KK I would 6 bet and call a 7 bet. The problem here is you are defining your hand to a VERY narrow range which makes the hand much easier to play for your opponent. Say the flop comes rags, after a 7 bet preflop how many bets would you put in on the flop?

With QQ, JJ, TT, and 99 I would 4 bet and call a 5 bet.

Re: stupid hu question
 

Hmmm... interesting question.

It's reasonable to assume that once the pot gets big enough, both of you are taking any reasonable hand to showdown. It's also reasonable to assume that your opponent does have one of these reasonable hands, as with each raise a showdown is more likely and a bluff is less. Once this hits about 4-5 BB's, bluffing and deception have virtually no value since the pot odds of calling down HU will be lucrative enough to guarantee that there will be a showdown. Once that threshold is reached, the benefit of continued raising is really going to level off since both of you will assumedly have the goods as you're both going to showdown, and it's just a matter of who came out on top this time.

Once it gets 4 bet preflop, there's 4.5BB's in the pot, and the opponent will bet getting at worst 4.5/2.5 effective odds to call down. So I don't think going much past 4 bets is advisable with pretty much anything because the reverse implied odds will kick in.

Not sure if I explained what I'm thinking well enough but there it is...

EDIT: Here's another thing to chew on. A kind of postulation i'm not sure is correct:

The more bets you put in preflop, the less you can safely put in postflop. Do you see why?

Re: stupid hu question
 

I vote 1 more with KK, and I'm done with all the others. Wouldn't like playing QQ or worse for 7 bets against any sane player...will likely see the river through anyway. My 2C.

pal

Re: stupid hu question
 

I often stop early preflop, but KK really doesn't want to lose action from QQ/JJ on Axx, so I'd go a 6th bet. If he goes 7 though, I reckon his range is probably down to AA-QQ, which means that's enough.

Re: stupid hu question
 

To answer this question, you need to compare three probabilities: (1) the likelihood that you are dominating a smaller pair, (2) the likelihood he is drawing live with a lone ace, and (3) the likelihood you are dominated by AA.

Possibility #3 happens, but oh well. So mostly I think it is #1 vs. #2. Your answer here in evaluating this probability is going to depend a lot on your read of the opponent.

The important thing to mention here is that against a lone ace, you are only a 70:30 favorite. So your hand becomes a lot stronger on the flop. Because my hand value is significantly defined by the flop, Im probably not willing to go more than 5 bets preflop. Absent a good read on my opponent, I'll give up the preflop advantage in exchange for postflop clarity.

Re: stupid hu question
 

[ QUOTE ]
To answer this question, you need to compare three probabilities: (1) the likelihood that you are dominating a smaller pair, (2) the likelihood he is drawing live with a lone ace, and (3) the likelihood you are dominated by AA.

Possibility #3 happens, but oh well. So mostly I think it is #1 vs. #2. Your answer here in evaluating this probability is going to depend a lot on your read of the opponent.

The important thing to mention here is that against a lone ace, you are only a 70:30 favorite. So your hand becomes a lot stronger on the flop. Because my hand value is significantly defined by the flop, Im probably not willing to go more than 5 bets preflop. Absent a good read on my opponent, I'll give up the preflop advantage in exchange for postflop clarity.

[/ QUOTE ]

With all due respect I think you're making this way too complicated. If the only choice was between possibility 1 and 2 you would happily put it all in pre-flop. The threat of possibility 3 is the only reason to stop raising.

Apart from the cards themselves, what you'd really like to know here is what is opponent's answer to the OP's question?

/mc

Re: stupid hu question
 

[ QUOTE ]
If the only choice was between possibility 1 and 2 you would happily put it all in pre-flop. The threat of possibility 3 is the only reason to stop raising.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes of course this is true. Even getting 2.5:1 on your money is a huge edge. So I guess you're right that the AA possibility is limiting the preflop raising. But I also do think that the possibility of an ace on the flop is tremendously important. To put it in a NL context, how many people would ship it with KK preflop, assuming reasonably deep stacks?

Re: stupid hu question
 

i'm assuming you're the small blind.

i raise a lot of my hands, probably 70+% headsup. "good" aggressive players will 3bet you with up to 40% of their hands in defense. i dont mind 4 betting with 88+ AJ+, but i think you should just call the 5bet if it comes.

if this was the only hand you were playing against this guy, or the last hand, then 6 betting is fine. but i think its important that you dont 6 bet with AA, KK QQ AK or the range of possible hands he can put you on when you 4 bet but only call the 5 bet is pretty thin.