should A/Ks be raised pre-flop ?

[Herb N.]

I believe most who have played against me would consiter me a strong LIMIT player at most forms of poker,But i'm the first to admit that because of lack of experance I have a lot to learn in pot,or no limit.heres a hand that knocked me out of a no-limit touryment...I'm delt A/Ks in the B.B.[$15.] four players call including the S.B.I decide not to raise but to see what the flop brings ..the flop is A/K/10 rainbow.I leed off with a $175.the U.T.G.player raises it $250.everyone folds to me.My thinking was since he didnt raise preflop he proubly floped 2 pair rather than a set or possibly the straight,so i went all in with a $525.re-raise.Well he did flop the straight,and I realize that all my chips were going to go into the pot at some time during that hand,but I ask myself mayby I should have made a preflop raise of say $250.to get rid of a hand like J/Q ?see at limit play it dont work once the get in they will simply call the raise [10/20 15/30 games].Looking back I tend to think that a preflop raise is the best play at No-limit.Im looking for critisim so if you think I played this hand poorly Please give me your thoughts Thanks in advance ..Herb Novitsky : [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[tewall]

There's a saying about not losing all your money in an unraised pot. The flop was not good for you. Just check/folding would have been fine IMO. I doubt if getting involved there is +EV.

Whether to raise or not can be tricky. On the one hand, you're out of position, so the hand will be difficult to play. On the other hand, there's a good chance it's the best hand at present, and raising with the best hand isn't bad. If the blinds were smaller, I would tend toward not raising. If the blinds were larger, I would tend towards raising. In the situation you were in, I think there's arguments both ways. I'll be interested to see what others say. I'll bet the sentiment is in favor of raising.

With AK you'd like to get all-in pre-flop as it is either a clear favorite or just a slight dog against all but 2 hands. When you combine the equity of people folding to your all-in bet and the AK winning the race, it makes getting all-in a nice play. If you'll go all-in with AK, it also improves the probability you'll get called when you go in with AA and KK, which you'd really like.

Although AK is a fine hand pre-flop, after the flop it's not so great. As you found out, a lot of the times it gets action it's behind. So it would like to get money in when it's a favorite.

If the blinds are small, then it's hard to do that. As the blinds are smaller, it plays more like a drawing hand, trying to hit a nut flush or straight, than a top pair/top kicker hand. As the blinds increase, the TPTK value of the hand increases, and raising becomes more and more favoreable.

[tpir90036]

i can see not raising with AKs and playing it as a drawing hand in this situation, although playing it from the BB is not ideal if you do flop a draw. but like tewall said, you are trying to build a lot more than TPTK. especailly against 4 players.

however, if you were the first one in (especailly in the later stages of a tournament) i think you must, must, must always raise AK just becasue the chance of stealing the blinds is so good.

tewall raises another good point of not losing a lot of money fighting for an un-raised pot. that aside, i don't think you played the hand poorly as you did flop top two pair and it looks more like a steal on his part than anything. you would think the nuts would try to milk the remaining players a little bit with no two-flush on the board.

i would have folded QJo in EP to a big raise. but that's just me.

[1800GAMBLER]

[ QUOTE ]
There's a saying about not losing all your money in an unraised pot. The flop was not good for you. Just check/folding would have been fine IMO. I doubt if getting involved there is +EV.



[/ QUOTE ]

Getting involved here is EV! Due to the amount of possible hands he could hold that will fold when you bet or call when you have them beat! Check folding here is awful!

You understand your maths well and your theory, you can run both see it's an _easy bet_ If he has the combinations of beating hands more power to him, but it's an easy bet here.

AQ AJ AT A9. QQ JJ. KJ KT JT.

AA KK JQ TT.

Sidenote, Raise AKs preflop. Unless you play worse than the other players postflop.

Don't look for preflop raises to lose hands like JQ. TT will stay after a raise and then you have another post to make, raise it preflop for other reasons. It's impossible to always win even playing perfect.

edit: most games i can add gutshot draws too.

[Guy McSucker]

The flop was not good for you. Just check/folding would have been fine IMO

I disagree.

He's flopped top two pair. Sure there's a possible straight, and of course gutshot draws, but they'll be reasonably obvious if they hit. I doubt AA or KK is out there, so we only fear QJ or TT, or a Q or J falling.

There are lots of hands that will give action here which are very far behind AK. Without a read on an opponent as a nut player, I think getting all-in won't be much of mistake, if any, in the long term, whereas check-folding would be suicide.

Guy.

[Al_Capone_Junior]

with three limpers I would have raised it at least the pot, somewhere in the neighborhood of 60-80 or so. Most of the time weak hands will just fold and you'll pick up the pot, which is FINE. rarely you'll get called. Then you really need to know something about your opponents to make the best play. However in a tourney that's usually not going to happen. The buy-in of the tourney is a clue. The smaller, the stupid-er the average opponent is. In a $500 tourney, anyone who calls your raise PROBABLY has something quite strong. in a $5 tourney you could be looking at anything from AA to 72o, sometimes literally. Anyway, it's not OUT OF THE QUESTION that someone would call with QJ, but it's far less likely than if you didn't raise! I Sometimes raise even MORE with AK. The more limpers, the more I am tempted to make a LARGE raise, like 10x the blind or so. Narrowing the field works better as your raises get larger.

As for your hand, you bet $175 into a $60 pot. I hate to be critical of large bets, but that was perhaps overdoing it. I would have bet the pot or a little more, or perhaps even checked (given that you did not raise, if you raised, then bet away). When you get raised, you must consider WHAT DO THEY HAVE. It's more important than what they think you have in this case. They aren't making a huge raise of a huge overbet without a strong hand themselves. It's obvious he had either a set of tens or a straight, with two pair less likely, given the action you described. It's very unlikely he has a hand tho that you can beat. Given his huge raise, you should have just called and not gone all-in. I realize folding would be too tough for the average human here so we won't go into that, but it really was pretty obvious you were beat here. Folding would have been an option tho had you not made such a giant bet in the first place. Keep things in perspective. Huge overbets of the pot are not usually needed. "The pot or a bit more" is my favorite bet in average circumstances.

al

[Al_Capone_Junior]

Boy, I didn't even address the theme of check-folding! It was too suicidal to even contemplate. Check-raising maybe, but then if he had raised in the first place, there would be no need to check-raise, as it would be appropriate to lead with a bet. He got in trouble by A) not raising pre-flop to drive out the riff-raff, and B) WAY overbetting the small, unraised pot. It was pretty likely he'd lose all his chips on this hand either way tho (once he failed to raise pre-flop). Had he made a decent raise preflop tho, he MIGHT not have been up against QJ at all. I know most times I have AK and raise in a tourney I don't want QJ to call me. AK is ahead, but not really by that much. [Someone can simulate or check twodimes if they really want to know the subtle nuances of AK vs. QJ.]

al

[Mark Heide]

The most common reason for not raising is that the money is deep and you want to trap someone with a weaker flush draw. I've done it plenty of times in the first hour of a tournament and quite a few players will get married to their hands and you can win a very big pot especially if there is a straight draw too. But, when you miss the flush draw you have to be very careful not to lose all your money in a multiway pot with someone that has flopped the nuts.

When the blinds are high in relation to your stack you should always raise and hope you don't more than one caller, so if they miss you can take the pot with the first bet.

In this situation, where you are in the blinds, and if they are high already, you should move in preflop.

Good Luck

Mark