OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

I know i'm just feeling pissed...but...

Party $million, and I've been red-hot and more than doubled early to 3100. Now I get KK UTG and make it 90 to go (blinds 15/30) 2 callers and now BB makes it 400. Right away I think AA. He has 1800 chips. I really hate calling because itwill probably draw at least one of the others in. But in his spot AA is the only hand I make that raise with. Maybe KK, but not even QQ.

He doesn't have enough chips to give me correct odds to try and hit my set. I finally decide that I can't fold, and if I call and undercards come, I'm going to be in the sameboat, so I push.And of course he has the aces.

I still haven't ever laid dowm KK pre-flop, but if ever there was a casefor doingit, this wouldseem to be it. I give up 90 chips and move on. No one knows what I laid down so what's the big deal. Ifhe had pushed it's an easy call, but that size raise says AA to me 90% of the time.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

This doesn't even look like AA. Push.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

If the raise said its AA 90% of the time you should have folded. For what its worth the raise doesnt say that to me! For a lot of your opponents 400 is a totally normal sized raise to make there with many hands.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

[ QUOTE ]
This doesn't even look like AA. Push.

[/ QUOTE ]

what does it look like?

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

Eh....

Many donks raise with 99+, AK

I think AA is much less than 90% and that it is always an incorrect play
(folding that is).

Puuuuuuush

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

I think it's 19.5 to 1 for someone to have AA while you have KK at a ten handed table. That's so unlucky that the universe is almost forced to correct itself by letting you hit a set at only 4 to 1.

Push!!

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

I disagree, i see the donks making the huge overraise, a push or making it 1000 or something crazy, this raise was the perfect size for someone who wants action.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

Big deal you lost KK vs. AA for 60 BB. This is just a results-oriented bad beat post.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

[ QUOTE ]
I think it's 19.5 to 1 for someone to have AA while you have KK at a ten handed table. That's so unlucky that the universe is almost forced to correct itself by letting you hit a set at only 4 to 1.

Push!!

[/ QUOTE ]

not when a player re-raises 90 to 400 early in a $600 tourney.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

I dont see why you dont think QQ/JJ/TT is possible.
Folding KK here is just silly imo, if he has AA so be it, but you are ahead here most of the time.

Folding here does not win tournaments

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

[ QUOTE ]
OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?

[/ QUOTE ] If you only call big reraises with AA...anything.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

FWIW I would never* push here, be it with AA, KK or 72o. I much prefer calling. This by no means implies I wouldn't play the hand for all my chips, just that when my opponent is *representing* AA when I have KK, I prefer to let him keep representing it.

*The times that I would push here involve specific reads or some sort of tricky payout situation, but I would not push by default early in a tournament.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

I wouldn't play any hands except AA and KK that way, so one of the reasons I posted it is to see if any decent player does. Of course there is no telling what a donk might do, but usually the donk blind raises are when a bunch of players limp in, not an UTG raise.

How would you play TT from the BB?

I think a real top notch player gets away from this hand with minimal damage. Maybe I'm wrong but I think if I want to be as good as I think I can be, i need to make big laydowns too.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

Well he has no idea what I would rall a big re-raise with, and if I folded KK he'd still never know. If I've seen someone make plays like this a few times it would be easier to discredit the raise

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

very constructive reply.

And in what possible way is KK losing to AA a bad beat??

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

Here is what I think:

1. Blind reraises for that amount can often mean 1010-KK/AK, or less or even any two
2. Discounting weak hands and a bluff play. Assume only the the best likely hands making that play AKs/KK/QQ/AA/JJ/1010

Obviously, KK is a push in most mtt settings. I don't play on Party. But, I have to assume that the range above is reasonable.

I have folded KK pre-flop twice so far. Both times, because I put the villain on AA. In both instances, there was heavy action in front of the villain's push and the villains were players that were very, very unlikely to push anything other than AA.

From your description, I would, at minimum, call and push an Ace free flop. I would probably reraise to a pot committing amount, preflop and push the flop.


Beyond that, if you had a read for AA that you were convinced was right, than go ahead and fold. The only problem is if you had this read here, I don't see it from your description.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

I think you need a very specific read on this player in order to get away from this hand...and since you don't have that read you should call here and then play for all your chips on a non ace flop.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

call.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

[ QUOTE ]
very constructive reply.

And in what possible way is KK losing to AA a bad beat??

[/ QUOTE ]

I think what he means is that if you hit your 20% shot and spike a King and double-up, you don't make this post or even give the hand another thought for the rest of your life, reasoning that of COURSE it was correct to call/push with KK.
Hence, results-oriented.

And it was a bad beat in the same way that losing top boat to bottom quads is a bad beat. Doesn't necessarily mean that opponent played incorrectly at any point in the hand...just that there was only a tiny fraction of hands that you could have been behind, and that's exactly what villain held.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

It's more a "cold deck" than a "bad beat" if we're talking semantics.
But yes, it's hard to narrow down the second raise as strictly AA, even that big, unless your opponent is the esteemed Tighty McNuts.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

If you are hell bent on putting him on such a tight range, then why in the world do you push? Let's say you put him on QQ-AA. Why wouldn't you call and use position to extract the most out of QQ, or save chips when an ace flops.

If I put him on a very tight range like that and I (for whatever reason) think that he's capable of laying down QQ preflop if I push, then I call here every time. Letting others in the hand is only better since it increase the chance that you get a set paid off. You should get at least one of the callers here to call the 400, so now you should have your set odds.
I think that this is a pretty straightforward call for you preflop.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

[ QUOTE ]
I think a real top notch player gets away from this hand with minimal damage.

[/ QUOTE ]

Here's a quote from Harrington on Hold'em Volume I which comes immediately after Harrington says he's not savvy enough to throw away Kings preflop:

"...here's a little secret from the world of top-class poker. Nobody else is that savvy either, no matter what they tell you (page 240)."

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

Ok,

I didn't get away from it, so I decided that I could add QQ and AK to hands he might have. But that's exactly why I pushed. Why let him see the flop before committing with hands I beat, and why give medium pairs a shot behind me? By waiting for a non-ace flop I still lose the max to AA, and let anything worse a chance to get away. unless I'm willing to fold on the flop if I don't spike a set I think pushing right here is better.

The main reason for making this post was to see if anyone would be willing to trust a read, and clearly there isn't anyone saying get away so I'll retreat into the night.

But I still think that a good enough player could give up the 90 invested and run. I wish I was there.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

[ QUOTE ]
Ok,

I didn't get away from it, so I decided that I could add QQ and AK to hands he might have. But that's exactly why I pushed. Why let him see the flop before committing with hands I beat, and why give medium pairs a shot behind me? By waiting for a non-ace flop I still lose the max to AA, and let anything worse a chance to get away. unless I'm willing to fold on the flop if I don't spike a set I think pushing right here is better.

The main reason for making this post was to see if anyone would be willing to trust a read, and clearly there isn't anyone saying get away so I'll retreat into the night.

But I still think that a good enough player could give up the 90 invested and run. I wish I was there.

[/ QUOTE ]

David,

Not online. Not with those stacks. Live, maybe. With a super read, maybe.

As stated, not a chance.

Generally, people are saying that you are giving him too tight a range, but let's give him your range of AA-AA (plus aa). If you call, you are fairly likely to get at least one of the other callers to follow suit.

That means you are paying 310 to win 1200 right away. Add in just one continuation bet from AA on a K high board and you have your implied odds. Get anything else at all from the caller and you are solidly in +ev territory. Playing it this way (i'm not saying that this is the best way to play it) is better than zipping up preflop here.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

[ QUOTE ]
I wouldn't play any hands except AA and KK that way, so one of the reasons I posted it is to see if any decent player does.

[/ QUOTE ]

I barely even feel qualified to be reading this thread but one piece of advice I've attempted applying, gleaned from this wonderful place is not to read into other players plays and I would've played the hand. The higher buy-in may take away some of that factor as you'd expect to have better players on average but they all can't be superstars [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

Soss has this right.

If you can't fold this here, you need to do something other than push. If you push here, assuming he folds all but aces, you win 400 when you're ahead, and lose 1800 when behind. You can extract a lot more the times your ahead by calling. And even if he has aces, if the flop is scary theres a very small chance you can scare him off the best hand.

Basically if you're intent on going to the felt here, play it so you get the most chips the few times you are ahead of something like AK or QQ.

Re: OK seriously, what besides AA could he have?
 

Can't get in the habit of folding KK pre-flop. The number of times he has 1010-QQ or AK more than make up for the few times he has aces. Automatic push here. Ran into some bad luck. Honestly I could see the same play from QQ or JJ to try to isolate.