[Guruman]

the thinking is this:

with AA or KK you are not only ahead, but way ahead of the bunches of limpers that are in on the action. Mediocre or bad players may limp in any position with a suited face card, a looooow pocket pair, or any ace or king. In order to get ahead of you, they need to use both cards and hit either a set or two pair - both of which are far less likely than a total whiff on the flop.

Other reasons aces and kings are good postflop against many players:

1)win unimproved - again, the opponents will have to use both of their cards to beat you, as pairing up just one will do them no good.

2)set value - top set is a great moneymaking tool against weak players, and this is a spot where you can go for overcalls if you get bet into.

3)domination - your pair of aces immediately ruins the hand of anyone holding Ax - which is the most played hand in hold-em. Kings will do the same to Kx, but are still vulnerable to Ax here. Note that your opponent is drawing to around three outs in this situation though.

4)more domination - you're way ahead of any smaller pocket pair pre-flop here as you both have the same odds to hit or miss a set on the flop (or any subsequent street)

5)conterfeiting - you hold KK and your opponent holds J5. The flop comes 85J, giving your opponent two pair. the turn is an 6. You have 8 outs to win here as any 6, or 8, counterfeits his pair of 5's and the Ks will give you a winning set.

6)redraws - you hold A[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]A[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img], and your opponent holds 89[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]. The flop comes 2T3[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] giving your opponent a flopped flush. You've now got two streets and 8 outs with which to re-draw on his flush. If the turn pairs the board here you've picked up another 4 outs on the river as well, since you can re-draw to the full house as well. [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img]

lesser hands have to make up a lot of ground to get in front of aces or kings. It does happen, but it happens more when you face multiple opponents, so protect this hand by raising and check-raising the early streets to knock out the drawing hands.