I know this may be controversial to some of you...

[morgan180]

[ QUOTE ]

If you miss the flop then probably no more money is going into the pot. I don't think it can possibly be that hard to play AK with 800-1000 starting chips postflop as the caller.

[/ QUOTE ]

OK, what about with 1500 chips? I mean is it a major leak to be betting in to a ragged flop w/AK against 1 opponent? I can't see how it is. With 2 opponents it starts to make sense but at my level (11s) you're still looking at hands like AQ,AJ,AT,KQ,KJ that are in there with you and you're ahead a good percentage of the time on that type of flop.

[citanul]

[ QUOTE ]
But what if your opponents will call your reraise-push with ATs and worse, often? (very often)

[/ QUOTE ]

well, how good are you going to play out of position, heads up, with a large preflop pot, against this opponent when you miss the flop?

citanul

[johnnybeef]

There are more than enough players at the 11s and 22s who are willing enough to get all in with any ace to make reraising with AK profitable. I wouldn't recommend it at the 33s and above though.

[Voltron87]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
im been saying this for a while. ace king is a drawing hand, play it like one.

[/ QUOTE ]

So any non-pair is a "drawing hand" for you?

[/ QUOTE ]

im joking


seriously though, most of the time calling a raise with AK is better than reraising.

[zipppy]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
im been saying this for a while. ace king is a drawing hand, play it like one.

[/ QUOTE ]

So any non-pair is a "drawing hand" for you?

[/ QUOTE ]

I think it is in levels 1+2 of a SNG. Can someone run the odds of any player at the table being dealt a pocket pair with 8,9 and 10 people left? Usually pocket pairs (no matter how low) will call your raise in 11s-33s, making AK a drawing hand. Later on the chance of someone having a pp are much lower with less people, so often AK will dominate opponents. It'd be interesting to see the stats on someone having a pp early on.

Your opponent doesn't know what you have, so sometimes you can get people away from their low pps with continuation bets (regardless if you pair up or not). This is assuming any pp calls you preflop, but it's been my experience that they will for most reasonable raises (5xbb or less in early levels).

[Voltron87]

ok, its usually much better to call than reraise when ak when its not push/fold, and in normal cash games, but not because its a drawing hand.

[Crispy86]

Interesting, and it makes me wonder. I went and checked my stats for the first two levels, and found that AKo is one of my absolute winningest hands (top 2) but AKs is break even at the first level, albeit with only 10 hands (well below the 40+ average of the others), and 6th in the second level. I'll take a look at the hands and see what's up.

Albert

[The Don]

Definitely agree.

[bjb23]

[ QUOTE ]
Call me crazy, but I usually just limp with AK in the early levels mainly because if i raise, some donk will push with 66 and I will lose. I play AK much like 33...if i hit my hand, i will hopefully double up. If I miss, i am done with it.

[/ QUOTE ]

so you would rather have the donk with 66 limp behind you to see a cheap flop and possibly spike a set? i know you play at the 1000 chip levels so you have more room for post flop play, but say the flop comes k high, do you often worry about some random bb two pair or a set if any aggression follows your flop raise??

by limping, do you extract more value from ak by someone limping behind with a weaker ace>? does this outweigh establishing your hand preflop, or do you simply and solely limp ak for the sake of not being pot committed to an overbet by a small pp behind you?

-bj

[ilya]

[ QUOTE ]

But early in a sit and go if you are faced with a non steal raise and the blinds are low, please stop reraising with AK!! Just call and play the hand!!!! I really hate reraising with AK in some of the posts I've just read (like 3 in the last 15 minutes), so I'll just make a blanket statement.

Trust me it'll make your life much easier.

[/ QUOTE ]

I also play AK more weakly than many people here, but I still think that raising is often better than calling even against a non-steal raise. For example, if a few players have limped in EP and MP and the CO now puts in a moderate raise, an AK on the button has gotta raise or fold even if CO isn't one to make fancy moves. If he just calls, he's looking at playing a multiway pot from a bad relative position with a hand that'll rarely hit harder than 1 pair. A related situation is facing a small UTG raise with AK in UTG+1. Calling figures to encourage overcalls and create the same sort of unpleasant (for AK) situation - a multiway pot with bad relative position. If UTG is solid, I prefer folding in that spot unless I've seen that the rest of the table is quite tight. If he seems LAGgy (my basic assumption until proven otherwise), I will put in a pot re-raise on level 1 or just push on levels 2/3. Or say there are 5 or 6 limpers on level 2 and I have AKo in the big blind. If I check here, I'm basically giving up on the hand....unless I spike a miracle two pair+ flop, I'm just not gonna feel comfortable putting in lots of chips. So, I prefer to make a big raise. It's true that someone may well "know" I have AK and call me with a small pair, but that's ok. As long as they "know" I have nothing and call with me AQ and KJs often enough to make me about even money in the long run, I'm happy.

I don't understand the reluctance, common to this forum, about gambling early in the tournament. A player whose ROI would be 18% if he refused to gamble all his chips on a 50/50 on the first hand of every tournament figures to increase his hourly rate by over 20% if he chooses to accept that gamble, assuming he increases his equity by a factor of 1.9 when he doubles up.

I suppose you might argue that his normal ROI is as high as 18% largely because he tends to "wait for better spots" and get his chips in as a large favorite against the loosey-gooseys. This IMO is bull. With his fold-fold-fold strategy in the early going, he rarely has a chance to snag the looseys before they lose all their chips to someone else. Many times these loose players luck into big stacks and make all sorts of trouble for our Hero come bubble time with their wild&wacky calling standards. As long as Hero is a sufficiently winning player (gambling early isn't a good idea if your ROI is very small) and knows how to handle a big stack (i.e. he actually increases his equity by at least 1.9 when he doubles up), he does better taking a 50/50 on the first hand.