folding AK pre flop

[T_B_H]

a hand from last night, when i told deano after wot i had folded he was quite shocked, he seen i thought long and hard about it 1st.

in my opinion tho i played it correct (in a MMT situation) after a raise and reraise, either of the 2 of them could have eisily been holding AA or KK

my thought was, i got peanuts in the pot, i'm all in to call (and was after the re-buy period) so wait for a better spot

Everleaf Gaming Game #336672236
***** Hand history for game #336672236 *****
Blinds 300/600 NL Hold'em - 2011/12/15 - 22:43:42
Table 1
Seat 10
Total number of players: 10
Seat 1: k1994 ( 10550 Chips )
Seat 2: iljamaicano ( 20012 Chips )
Seat 3: savant ( 6400 Chips )
Seat 4: nagz10 ( 4900 Chips )
Seat 5: wings ( 23250 Chips )
Seat 6: StuLucky1 ( 10150 Chips )
Seat 7: DeanReeves66 ( 20340 Chips )
Seat 8: lifesonsrv ( 20248 Chips )
Seat 9: Lauren7 ( 12645 Chips )
Seat 10: T_B_H ( 6525 Chips )
k1994: posts ante [ 75 Chips]
iljamaicano: posts ante [ 75 Chips]
savant: posts ante [ 75 Chips]
nagz10: posts ante [ 75 Chips]
wings: posts ante [ 75 Chips]
StuLucky1: posts ante [ 75 Chips]
DeanReeves66: posts ante [ 75 Chips]
lifesonsrv: posts ante [ 75 Chips]
Lauren7: posts ante [ 75 Chips]
T_B_H: posts ante [ 75 Chips]
k1994: posts 300 Chips]
iljamaicano: posts 600 Chips]
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to T_B_H ]
savant 6,325 Chips]
nagz10 folds
wings folds
StuLucky1 folds
DeanReeves66 20,265 Chips]
lifesonsrv folds
Lauren7 folds
T_B_H folds
k1994 folds
iljamaicano folds
** Dealing Flop ** ]
** Dealing Turn ** ]
** Dealing River ** ]
savant shows ] two pairs, eights and twos
DeanReeves66 shows ] two pairs, eights and twos
savant wins 7150 chips from main pot with two pairs, eights and twos ]
DeanReeves66 wins 7150 chips from main pot with two pairs, eights and twos ]

DeanReeves66: what u have m8 u was thinking lol
T_B_H: AK off
T_B_H: didnt wanna play it againt 2 hands
DeanReeves66: ooh yhought u would snap called m8 lol
T_B_H: 2 hands double chance of 1 hitting

[DukeOfDeath]

I think Dean made a correct point that the amount you gain to win by tripling up is enough to outweigh the still relatively small chance that you are really far behind.

However here's the deal with AK: Very rarely worse than a toss up, a little less rarely better than a toss up. What makes it so special? Post flop ability can make you a good profit off it deep stacked if you know when/how to play based on board and opponent. And even bigger is it's fold equity. But if you 3 bet AK and get way overbet/shove 4 bet, you aren't crazy to fold. What can you beat? Not up against AQ- often enough and even 22 is slightly ahead.

Calling with AK is only really good when you are out soon anyway without a hand, or if the opponent you're up against is way shorter stacked than you. Otherwise it's value is in betting not calling. In this situation you definitely can't make a lower pair fold so you can't get the true value out of AK. You are at desperation level with stack size though. So it might have been a call unless you think enough people are being eliminating soon to make it worthwhile to wait longer (for instance right on the bubble with other even shorter stacks still in).

[JackSpades]

I agree with Kev i too folded AK off in a hand where there were 3 raises i think sometimes its better just not to get involved by the way AK won the hand.

[reaper1569]

sum times ..its best 2 play that way..untill game calms is so crazy nowa days no 1s scared of high pockets or ak

[rad6]

I think it was a good move, I have no idea why you gits think going all in with AK is a good move anyways, certainly not on the cash side. By going in I realize that you are trying to norrrow done the field but most players with small pairs will go with you and they have the much better chance at that point.

[ultimodragon]

Originally Posted by rad6

I think it was a good move, I have no idea why you gits think going all in with AK is a good move anyways, certainly not on the cash side. By going in I realize that you are trying to norrrow done the field but most players with small pairs will go with you and they have the much better chance at that point.

Well said hun,lost quite a bit with that hand vs 66 or 99..so sharp learned a lesson.AK pre flop is a stinker

So good move Kev inmho..

[CaptainSandy]

I've been trying to put myself in your position, but I just can't decide what I would do.
Knowing how close you were to payout would ultimately be my deciding factor.
By folding you live to play another hand.
Playing against a raise and an all in reraise is certainly high risk.
Even with hindsight if you'd played it was a 3 way split pot.

[phattP]

good fold.

[T_B_H]

i would have called on a cash table, or if could have done a rebuy, then i think the risk would have been worth it

[DukeOfDeath]

So I just used some new poker software to go over past hands. With AK I won just over 67% of my hands. But with the win small lose big, I actually have come out losing $12.50 on my 132 times of having it in cash games (an average of nearly 3 BB lost per time I'm dealt the hand). I guess I need to really rethink how I play this...

[T_B_H]

well spose not called Anna Kournikova for nothing, looks pretty but seldom wins lol

i'm happy to raise 3/4 times BB with or call same raises to see flop, alot of time ur prob up against a small pocket pair, if u miss the flop then easy to bin it, howerer at times u will hit a pair but ur opponent flops his set, u just have to say unlucky

on the hand in question i knew deano was strong JJ QQ KK AA or AK

so no need to get involved in my opinion

[DeanReeves66]

i remember this hand m8, u said any of them could of easily been holding AA KK thats true but the player all in could of had anything, he has 10BBS left which puts him in the danger zone and could be shoving with anything there, u saw how loose and crazy are table was playing, we was laughing at most of the play through the tourney lol thats y i was suprised u folded there u also only had 10bbs left and i could of easily just been trying to isolate play there and could of been holding weaker that AK.
dont think i could folded there but if it was a 4 bet shove and not a 3 bet i would easily lay AK down.
anyways every1 plays different and it wouldnt of matterd anyways coz we got rivered and ended up being a split pot lol

[T_B_H]

if was someone else who 3 bet it i'd have instant called

i knew you were on a hand, and was at best a coin flip ( ie) you had a big pair or AK, so decided best to lay it down

would not have hesitated tho to play it against 1 other hand, but against 2 others thought best to run,

ok if had won it i would have trippled up, but decided to wear a tournament head and bow out

and yeah was loads of crazy play, was fun tho

[sexynomore]

Great threads to read hear and I believe I have learned a lot from it. Nice going!

[DukeOfDeath]

Originally Posted by T_B_H

if was someone else who 3 bet it i'd have instant called

i knew you were on a hand, and was at best a coin flip ( ie) you had a big pair or AK, so decided best to lay it down

would not have hesitated tho to play it against 1 other hand, but against 2 others thought best to run,

ok if had won it i would have trippled up, but decided to wear a tournament head and bow out

and yeah was loads of crazy play, was fun tho

I think the power of being tight aggressive is you either grind down other players or force them to only play back with really good hands. This also let's a TAG know when they should give up and allows them to showdown a lot of good hands and also take a lot uncontested. It's easy to assume a good player just always has a good hand when this isn't always the case.

Now this is all speculation. Haven't seen Dean play just a whole ton, but I've watched him a couple times in tourneys. So this is speculation off just a few hands and what I consider to be standard play from a good player: I'm sure Dean's range in this spot is somewhat tighter because of the whole "you never bluff a fish" rule. However he makes a good point about isolation. His 3 bet range may be small enough to only include AK+ and QQ+ (maybe JJ). However some of this tightness can easily be expecting the most likely 4 better to be the original bettor (if this makes sense). Since the original bettor is already all in his range can be wider. I mean if an absolute donk pushes all in and you're sitting with 88 or AJo or A9s or maybe even KQs you're gonna feel pretty good, but not if someone else jumps in too. The fact he 3 bet shouldn't make you think his hand is stronger (if anything weaker since he might even flat with AA KK here). Instead the 3 bet is just a better way to play because it isolates, so as far as putting him on a range you could consider it almost the same as flat calling. So I'd say his range is at least as wide as JJ+, AJo+, ATs+ (and honestly probably wider). Against this range you are a slight favorite and are definitely a favorite against the UTG shove. So best expected value is to go all in here. Again it depends on bubbles and payout jumps, but assuming you aren't 1 above bubble or there isn't another super donk walking around that you can wait out, it's a slightly borderline but still correct call in my opinion.

Plus if Dean tells you that you have to call you just HAVE to right?

But a fold is far from outrageous and I think a perfectly good play (you always have that added fold equity if you wait for a different spot where you can shove all in instead of calling all in)