KK - Part III

[kinboshi]

OK, everyone"s favourite hand - KK.

Our hero is in an APAT National, it"s early doors, in fact it"s the first level and the blinds are still 25/50.

Our Hero looks down to see ks kh, and they"re second to act.

Hero raises to 175.



 That"s probably fairly standard?  Anyone play that differently here?



Someone in middle position calls.  Then the cut-off  re-raises to 500 to play.

Our hero then re-raises to 1,500.



 Do you like the re-raise?  If you don"t, why not?  If you do, what are you trying to achieve?



Middle position then calls.

The cut-off then re-raises to 5,000.



 What do you do now?    

[Zanshin]

 That"s probably fairly standard?  Anyone play that differently here?

Early position and this early in the tourney I may limp and see if anyone else raises. If they do I might just call rather than re-raising but I'm also more than prepared to ditch the K's if I don't like how things are proceeding after the flop.

I know this is a bad way to play K's but this early I'm not that keen on getting involved for what could end up being all my chips.

 Do you like the re-raise?  If you don"t, why not?  If you do, what are you trying to achieve?

Ok assuming I did the right thing and raised in the 1st place I would re-raise here as I want to know where I stand. 1,500 to 2,000

 What do you do now?  

Well it's all in or fold and I'm not going all in this early without A's (I'm such a chicken at times )

[hi_am_chris]

what hand could they possibly re re raise you with? Depends on your read of the player but most players would only do that with AA or possibly KK so ur either splitting or well behind. Maybe tiny chance of QQ but maybe they would have called to see the flop or raised bigger. Surely with AK they would have flat called your re re raise :S i dunno im lost now lol

[Mikeyboy9361]

As usual I tend to agree with our hero, I might have only re raised to 1000, but we"re only splitting hairs. So with that big a re re raise you have to be up against Aces or AK, or playing Buster Gonad!
So this early in the tourney it is a fold. I laid "em down in a cash game at the weekend after the flop 3 3 A, I  raised the original bet, and he moved all in for about $100, couldn"t afford to lose that! In a tourney i would have called , I think!

[lukybugur]

Yep, Fold. But then, I"m notoriously tight! And crap!

[RioRodent]

OK, everyone"s favourite hand - KK.

Our hero is in an APAT National, it"s early doors, in fact it"s the first level and the blinds are still 25/50.

Our Hero looks down to see ks kh, and they"re second to act.

Hero raises to 175.



 That"s probably fairly standard?  Anyone play that differently here?

Whilst it is 3.5 BBs, 175 doesn"t make much of a dent in 10k chips and if you get a caller or two in the next couple of seats , then you are likely to end up with late positions and blinds calling with any two pretty cards. If I"m open-raising from early with this hand I would make it 250-300 to try and chase off the Ace/rags and raggy connectors... Or I may limp/raise.

Someone in middle position calls.  Then the cut-off  re-raises to 500 to play.

Our hero then re-raises to 1,500.



 Do you like the re-raise?  If you don"t, why not?  If you do, what are you trying to achieve?

I probably just call and see a flop.

Middle position then calls.

The cut-off then re-raises to 5,000.



 What do you do now?    

Dwell up... Umm & Ahh a bit and then Fold muttering something along the lines of "F**king pocket Jacks, I hate them!!"

[kinboshi]

 Do you like the re-raise?  If you don"t, why not?  If you do, what are you trying to achieve?

I probably just call and see a flop.

I think you"re right with this here.  I call and the explanation I"ve seen from some "good" players convinces me it"s the right thing to do.  Interestingly, my reasoning for doing so wasn"t exactly the same as theirs!

[UKChamp]

I go with the call initially too. The re-raise gives you information, but with only one hand beating you do you need to raise the value of the pot so early? Also, and most importantly, what hand can you beat that can call this re-raise? Its negative EV for sure. Furthermore should it be called you are out of position for the rest of the hand.

One of the fundamentals of poker is having your bets with strength called by waeker hands. If the bet can never be called by a weaker hand then its an error to bet in the first place.

By raising you also give away the strength of your hand, not something you ideally want to do, flat calling still gives you some range to represent and hopefully get paid off with.

[dirama]

I would play it exactly the same as Hero but fold to the 5000 bet .  It is still just the Ist level and there will be other opportunities to go all in with KK in the later stages of the tourney.

[nosey-p]

I must be a rubbish live player because I would be all in

[Jon MW]

...

Hero raises to 175.



 That"s probably fairly standard?  Anyone play that differently here?

Nothing wrong with that, I might sometimes limp from early position to disguise the strength of the hand, but generally a standard raise seems right.

...

Someone in middle position calls.  Then the cut-off  re-raises to 500 to play.

Our hero then re-raises to 1,500.


...

I"d flat call.

Without any read on the player you can"t assume that the player either does or doesn"t know what he"s doing.

You hope he"s not re-raising with aces, but he could be reraising with a wide range of hands - nearly all of them you"re ahead preflop.

If the flop contains an ace and he calls or raises a continuation bet then I"d probably end up ditching the kings.

If it doesn"t, then the texture will give you an idea of where to go - a flushing board might be worrying, or his pocket pair hitting a set could be a problem. Basically I would see his response to my continuation bet on the flop and take it from there.

This way you might fold and give some chips away to a mediocre player who has played badly, but that"s better than giving away all your chips to a good player who has played well.

[GiMac]

OK lets look at the options here

1.   Call - Flop comes Q high, with so much in pot and out of position you have to push and if he has underpair and has tripped up you are fecked, if he has AA you were beat anyway, if he has underpair and missed you dont get paid, if he has AK he should call as he is priced against an underpair and you still risk him hitting A on turn or river. An A comes, you have to make a continuation bet into a 10k pot, to see where you are, so probably 2500 minimum, you have commited 3/4 of your stack and have to pass to a re-raise, so you are pretty well crippled early on.


2.   Fold - If with the limited info at hand you put him on AA might fold, although the chances of him having AA when you hold KK are 24.5:1 and you are only going to see it once every 542 hands played.

3.   Push - if you push and he has AK, QQ or below, he should be putting you on AA or KK and should pass. If he doesn"t and he has AK you are 72-28 fave, if he has an underpair you are 80-20 fave. If in the unlikely event (See above) that he has AA, then you are virtually priced in anyway.

I think on balance you have to push here. The only reason we are folding here is because it is early in the tournament. Is that really a good enough reason?

At the very worst you run into AA and either go home saying you got cold decked or you dish out a bad beat and he goes home with a bad beat story. A win-win situation if I ever heard one.  

[kinboshi]

But do you make the 1,500 re-raise in the first place?

[hi_am_chris]

would prob make it 2k to play so not much difference, when he reraises to 5k you cant flat call so u gotta decide whether its all in or fold, online when im multitabling im going all in 95 percent  + of the time, live it depends on ur read and also depends on ur reason for being in the tournament, i want to win and would find it hard to put it down, if he has aces im off to the bar to moan about my "bad luck". Change the hand to qq or jj and im foldin 95 percent of the time when he reraises to 5 k but at least you find out cheap that u were either far behind or 50 50 at best

[kinboshi]

What good does your re-raise do?  Does it not just declare your hand to your opponent (as either KK or AA)?

What are you trying to achieve with the re-raise?