Play a Hand With the Masters #2 Pre-Flop

[MLG]

[ QUOTE ]
If there is a boring street I dont understand why we dont just skip ahead.

[/ QUOTE ]

If we're trying to appeal to the whole forum then it makes sense to include this street. Just because it might be boring and incredibly obvious to you (and me) doesn't mean there arent lots of posters who can learn from the discussion.

In this particular situation I raise to whatever my standard raise has been, around 3x BB. In this type of spot personally I often end up limping expecting a raise to push over because I am fortunate to have bad, predictable LAG's at my table that have been punishing limpers and are capable of calling with a dominated hand. I almost always DO get raised when I take this line however, and if I didn't have sufficient table read like I don't here the standard raise would be mandatory to me, as I don't want to waste AK in this spot.

[FishInAPhoneBooth]

Call or raise? I probably raise 80+% of the time, perhaps limping if the hand # ends in 1 or 0. When playing against observant opponents I like to raise AK to whatever I have been raising 99-JJ to, usually the standard table raise + 1bb. I delude myself into thinking it gives my continuation bets the best chance of taking down a raggedy flop with AK high and a flop with overs with the mid PP.

Why do I limp AK? I periodically limp AK for several reasons. During that hand it allows: weaker aces and possibly KQ to come along for the ride; several people to limp for someone in LP to punish who I can then repunish, either taking down a nice pot preflop or getting better odds in the event of a call and a flip.

The real reason I like the limp, possibly another delusion of mine, is what it does for later hands. I feel it allows me to open limp a few more hands in EP without fear of a raise. Granted I do lose some value, but being able to limp 56s and 44 utg+1 to have people worry it is AK again makes up for it IMO.

In the event of a reraise? I turn to the person sitting next to me and say "AK nice tournament" and all the $$ goes into the center.

[AJo Go All In]

are there really 92 posts about whether or not to raise with AK before the flop?

[bennies]

Cool, I've been looking for this to start again...

I limp preflop. Raising 3*BB is fine too but I think it gives our hand away, or at least, it makes AK the most obvious holding. I expect AQ, AJ, KQ to fold after this raise, and those are the hands we would like action from.

I also think minraising is fine because it gives less away, a minraise could be any top-10%-hand.

[nath]

My quick line: I raise probably to 400, sometimes less-- unlike others, I'm not looking to keep the pot small; I don't think our stack size is big enough to merit that. I call any preflop push or push over any re-raise.

I limp if I feel absolutely certain someone behind me will raise. (This happened to me today-- 6-seat tourney where the guy to my left entered 3/4 of his non-blind pots a round, and I caught him doing stuff like raising 43o UTG. He raised every single time I limped in, so I limped AK UTG or UTG+1 (50-100, I have about 4500, he has about 3200), he raised to 450, got a call, I pushed, he called with A8o. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img] But I digress.)

Here I mostly do whatever I think gets me all-in. Not really looking to fold here until/unless it becomes evident I am beaten in a bad way. (Like preflop, if it goes 400, mp2 raises to 1000, button pushes, BB calls all-in, maybe.)

[Ryendal]

I am disappointed you didn't follow the questions from the OP.
I respect your opinion, but your opinion, here is only to raise ? but What amount to begin ? etc.
The only boring thing in this thread is your answer, we hope more from you, gl

[K-mac]

[ QUOTE ]
Do you call or raise? If you raise, to what? Since most players usually raise with AK in this spot, under what scenarios would you just limp and why? If you raise and get re-raised, what's your plan (which obviously could depend on which player re-raises you)?

[/ QUOTE ]

I like 3X BB raise. I know it is the 'standard' raise but i like it best. Im not sure i limp being OOP due to the issue that if it is folded around and is raised by someone in LP, I would be facing a much bigger range of hands. At that point i think i would push and hope it is a coin flip at worst. Also i am a pretty weak player so i am not confident in being able to out play someone post flop.
(I am grunching here so i can't wait to see how far off i may be)

[Stipe_fan]

With these stack sizes, I will raise 50% of the time. I don't want to blow out the competition at this level. If the stacks:blinds ratio is larger I might just push. I like to limp for these reasons:

1. You will have the best hand if you flop an Ace or King, of course.

b. Most players at this level will not put you on AK when you flop it

iii. You have a ton of options if reraised. If 3-4 players limp behind me and either the SB or BB reraise, I would definitely push. They are probably trying to pick up the dead money. If the player in the UTG+2,3 pushes, I may decide to lay it down since they pushed with several players behind, which signals strenght and I will be out of position the rest of the hand. I would also call the shorties since they can not bust me.

D. If you do get reraised, you may get a player to laydown a hand of you go over the top. He may think you were slow playing a monster.

Stipe

[Cactus Jack]

[ QUOTE ]
I've been taking this line more recently with reasonable success.

It allows for a limp re-raise which represents AA, but if you get called you are usually not dominated, and putting in the last raise is always part of my goal in any hand.

You must be carefull when it gets limped around and you will have to fold TPTK to heavy action, but Ax <K pays you off nicely in a lot of spots.

You also can avoid tying yourself to the pot OOP when you whiff.

I know some guys like Adanthar are good enough not to *always* have to fire a a wiffed flop when they were the PFR, and therefore keep the cost of the hand down, but often AK can cost too much when you are OOP and have more than 1 to act behind you and you feel that you *have* to take a shot on the flop because you were the PFR.

Also, if you do raise PF, get called and hit an A or K you rarely get paid off. If you raise AK PF and hit TPTK and get action you are often beat at this level.

Raising here is fine, but I don't think limping is as bad as many would say. Especially if you are comfortable with your post flop play.

In fact I would go as far as saying if you can play well post flop, you can make just as much (if not more) limping AK in EP as raising, and lose much less.

Regards,
Woodguy

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not even going to bother reading the rest of the posts, as it's either this or raise.

This is my first post on the MTT forum, so pretty much few know me from the 1-table Forum, I assume. Suffice to say, in this hand at this time, I'm Trapper Jack. I limp.

It's pretty simple to me. Raising only forces me to play a drawing hand OOP for a bigger pot, too early in the tourney. None of which I enjoy doing.

Limping allows me more room to operate. Depending on what happens behind me, I can let it go without regret. I can reraise if I sense weakness, or call, again depending on what happens. I'm also completely disquised. If an A comes on the flop, no one is going to put me on TPTK. At this stage, many times I'm playing TPTK against second pair. Again, I have far more flexibility by limping than raising, and more control of the pot than I would have raising OOP.

The "standard line" is raise. The Trapper Jack cagey line is limp. (Unfortunately I know this is not going to be the line played, so the rest of the hand will be a lot harder for me to play.)

Thanks, Woodguy, for taking this line. I thought I would be the only one.

CJ