Not Raising Pre Flop with KK against Calling Stations Early MTT

[Bogeysave]

Returned earlier this week from the Gulf Coast Poker Championship and played in all of the preliminary events. It became more and more clear to me as the week went on that you just are not going to get people off of hands in these live MTT's at the early stages. Then this hand comes up.

Level 2 starting chips were $2,000 and blinds are at 25/50. Average is maybe up to $2,200 at our table. I have $1,975 and am on the button.

UTG+1 raises 6X to $300 with $1,475 behind. Cutoff Calls with $975 behind. On the button i stare down at KK. Now if i raise here i am thinking i am committing not only myself to the pot but also both of the other players. I know that at least one of them has to have an ace. Its too early to determine if either of these two are true calling stations but i find at this stage of a live MTT there are lots of them. So i decided to take a look at the flop and if an Ace doesn't come on the flop push at that point.....if an Ace does come i can get out. I smooth call.

Big blind now wakes up and pops it to $1,300 - he has us all covered. Oh boy he must have aces! So now the original raiser goes in the tank and i'm pretty sure he has AK or maybe JJ, 1010, QQ in that range. He finally calls leaving $475 behind. cutoff immediately commits rest of his chips a quarter short of the raise. Now i know at least someone out there has an Ace and its possible that the BB has two of them or that the original raiser was putting on a show and has two of them but i discount that as he didn't just put the rest in.

If i make this call i have another $675 behind to play with and fight back with should an ace hit the flop. So again i decide to not re-pop with my last $675.

Flop comes 772 Rainbow. BB is first to act and bets enough to push original raiser and myself in. Original raiser tanks again and after about 3 minutes mucks. I instacalled telling BB his Aces were good. He flips QQ. Cutoff flips A5 off. original raiser says he had AK. My KK holds to take a monster pot at this stage of the tournament.

My thought in hindsite is that i think i played this hand correctly given the dynamics. The BB re-raise with QQ and the other two stations making that call add to my thought process that at this stage i am not going to get the other two off of a hand. I would rather play post flop than pre-flop especially when on the button. So i think i did well but of course my poker feedback buddies are giving me the raise with KK everytime speech. (interestingly enough one of them re-popped a short while later with KK and a gal called him with AJ - ace on flop).

What do you think of my play in this hand and the overall strategy of small pots even with big hands early in a live MTT?

Thanks in advance for the feedback.

[betgo]

Reraise with your kings both times, nit. Stop worrying about busting out with kings. Your approach sucks.

[4CardStraight]

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Reraise with your kings both times, nit. Stop worrying about busting out with kings. Your approach sucks.

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[levAA]

You have an initial big raiser and a caller and hold KK - against a single Ace like AQ you are 70:30 favorite.
So don't worry about hands that could beat you if you have such an edge like in this hand.
Push it in and pray one of the two - or best both call.

[4CardStraight]

Oh, and if I can get a call with AJo EVERY TIME I have KK and we can go all in preflop, I think I am a very happy camper.

Why is seeing a flop with KK better than being a 71/29 all in preflop.

We need to catch cards and win showdowns to win tournaments. Its simply not possible to accumulate chips all tournament long without ever showing a hand. If we can force an all in where we have a 70%+ chance to double up, we should, end of story.

Your poker buddies sound like they are not idiots. Listen to them. We raise, reraise, and 4bet our kings preflop as much as possible. Getting a call by a trashy AJ is a *GOOD* result. As for the ace flopping, whatever.. people suck out all the time in this game. It is very hard to force an all in showdown where we are better than 70% to win. To win tournaments we need to force those situations as often as possible.

Also - with respect to the Ace flopping, so.... What happens when we are called by TT,JJ,QQ and an Ace flops? We check fold the winning hand? Stellar. We bet and fold to a shove with the winning hand? Super-fantastic. We somehow gain a magical insight that they are behind and go all in anyway? Even better. Your sarcasm meter should be blazing right now. If we are forced to bet to see where we are at when an ace comes, why is it better than just pushing it preflop. If we are planning to fold on every ace high flop, arent we losing an aweful lot of value against hands that were calling us preflop but were behind like QQ/JJ/TT ?

4Card

[ZBTHorton]

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Reraise with your kings both times, nit. Stop worrying about busting out with kings. Your approach sucks.

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[Bogeysave]

Ok, ok, ok.....i realize under a microscope in isolation this one hand appears extremely nitty.

I'm not trying to say the way i played this is or should be a standard play.....it was the specifics of this situation.

Is there ever a situation where you wouldn't re-raise with KK? I hate the always play this way rule.

[ZBTHorton]

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Ok, ok, ok.....i realize under a microscope in isolation this one hand appears extremely nitty.

I'm not trying to say the way i played this is or should be a standard play.....it was the specifics of this situation.

Is there ever a situation where you wouldn't re-raise with KK? I hate the always play this way rule.

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I cold call with kings/aces all the time in position in the later stages of tournaments, especially against opponents that are sure to fire a c-bet, and the blinds are more likely to fold.

In your situation, your not getting the pot HU, which is bad. And your also inviting the blinds to call getting great odds.

[BigAlK]

[ QUOTE ]
Ok, ok, ok.....i realize under a microscope in isolation this one hand appears extremely nitty.

I'm not trying to say the way i played this is or should be a standard play.....it was the specifics of this situation.

Is there ever a situation where you wouldn't re-raise with KK? I hate the always play this way rule.

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As ZBThorton indicates the time for this move is when you're trapping someone, not now.

For the future it is generally best when posting hands not to post results. This will often color peoples responses. On this hand you should stop at the point where you're deciding what to do on the flop or possibly after your fold asking if this was correct. In this case it's unlikely your answers would have been different. But often it can be if we know what the villian(s) had.

[betgo]

You should definately reraise with KK when you exoect to be called. You are a typical live nit, too worried about busting out.