What do you do when you have KK preflop...and you know you are beat

I have had this happen many times late in tournaments when i pick up KK and get into a raising war with a really tight player, knowing he's got me beat but not being able to let it go. I always tell myself that he would make the same play with QQ but it its never the case. So my question to you guys is, Can you really fold KK preflop? or must you just call and see the bad news and curse your luck?

I can definately throw kk preflop. I usually raise like 10x big blind (I play .05/.10 nl) and if I knew it was a really tight player re-raising, definitely fold.
Not saying to fold to everyone just if you know it is a tight player.

I'd do pretty much whatever I can to getta look at the flop though.


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If a player is so tight that I am absolutely certain a raise is AA's, sure I would fold. But I will be making my money bck mercilessly stealing his blind knowing I will only get raised back when he has AA's.

NO way iam folding kk pre, only won hand beating me pre, no matter how tight they are.

if its a big enough raise and a tight enough player, yes i would fold. i wouldnt like it and i could be wrong, but i can live with it. there will be other hands in better spots i can make money.

I have that problem to. KK is a very hard hand to get away from pre flop. Post flop you always have the option to look at the board and it becomes much easier to let it go. I really am not very sure if i can fold it pre flop but if I knew for sure it was a very tight player re-raising me then I would have to just bite the bullet and let it go.

Agreed. I would still want to see a flop before folding against a tight-reraiser though. Lately my KK and been called mostly by someone overplaying a weak ace, and of course flops an ace. I lose more than win with em'.

sorry to pull you up on this, PF, but what amount of action do you get with a 10xBB raise PF? I play .05/.10 online, and hardly ever see a 10xBB PF raise, its either tops of 6xBB PreFlop, or all-in.
I have standard 4 or 5 xBB with KK, if its a reraise to me by one player I put them alin, if they have AA, so be it.
Post flop, texture of the board is so important, at the very least an Ace on the flop will make me consider my play, so many callers nowadays with A-rag..................

well if you know you're beat then why would you call? i mean if you know it then its just a stupid play.. but how can you be sure someone holds aces... you can beat anything else so i guess unless you're sure then id be a hard fold.. but then again.. how are you ever sure..

Here's that word again---DEPENDS!---What's the stacks? Final table? ITM? Onna bubble? AND it wouldn't be a 'raising war'--I'd just call--like ZZ said, do what ya gotta do to see the flop!

You say you know you are beat so lay it down. The addage goes "if you never lay down a winning hand you are playing too loose".

Please teach me how to know my opponent has Aces. This skill would be extremely useful to me. Thank you.

^ultra tight fish, bets KK and AA the same way. Odds of you and him both having KK are slim to say the least, but yet he's betting like he has KK or AA. So you eliminate KK, and figure(not 100% sure, but near enough sure) he has AA. In most situations I still call, even if it is just to see those Aces.

The question here semms very simple to me. If you KNOW you're beat....FOLD!

I call anyway and am surprised to find out that my opponent often does not have aces.

There is no way to know you are beat. You may have a strong feeling that you are beat. But there is no way to tell you are beat unless you know his hole cards or you call the bet to the end.

of course i dont know for sure that I am beat but you know that gut feeling I am talking about.

In the half-million or so hands I've played online in the past two years, I think I can count on one hand's fingers the number of opponents I've had a firm enough read on that I could put them on specifically AA preflop. And not once have I had the misfortune of holding KK at the time.

So here's my conclusion: All of you in this thread who even consider laying down KK preflop (which, if you pardon my being presumptious, I actually doubt you do - I think you call the shove and remember the times he had AA and second guess yourself) have a huge leak in that you're much too willing to fold KK preflop.

Let me rephrase that.

If never folding KK preflop is one of your more serious leaks, you'd be in the top 0.1% of poker players in the world.

In the half-million or so hands I've played online in the past two years, I think I can count on one thousand hand's fingers the number of opponents who have beaten my K's by spiking a one on the flop.


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Oh, that's hardly the same thing, now is it?

Id also like to know where there is a possibility to get deep in a tourny and be able to get in a raising war, much less have the option to fold after one.

As Harrington says, for everytime you fold KK and make a champion laydown when villian holds AA, you folded the best hand 4 times. Something along those lines I forget exactly. In tourny there is no question with stacks so low. KK vs AA is terrible and there is always the "i knew it" factor but its the right play, just didnt work out.

With kk I standard on .05/.10 put up $1. I believe that is 10x the blind.
so now if any of you are at my table and i raise a buck you know what I have, lol
Oh to the question I get no action, maybe if there is a loose maniac.

LMAO, do what ya gotta do to see the flop really??? I mean ok look if the dude got AA, and the flop is all lows, now what you going to do? Are you really going to put them on AA, really? It's, how did Agent Smith put, "Inevitable", I hope I spelt it right, but regardless there's no way out, unless you hit a set

don't you think if one is putting in the 4th raise pre-flop, s/he probably has aces? that's one situation, at least, where i wouldn't feel as bad folding K,K

KD i have lowered my raises since you got me thinking. I have now decided I want no action, I lowered to 5x someone always calls and an A always falls on board and I loose. No more action for me with kk. lol

If you KNOW your beat, you must fold, simple as that. You have a tight player, and he is reraising you all the way. He could also have Queens or Ace King, but Aces is definitly an option and you should really think about what your gonna do next cause he sure isn't bluffing you preflop. If you really believe he has it, then you gotta fold but if ur not sure its said that Kings should always be called due to the fact that most of the time the person doesnt have it, and if he does you can always get lucky. Good luck at the tables!

If you KNOW you're beat then fold

Saying you get no action with KK is you pretty much admitting you're playing poorly. The object in poker is to extract as much value as you can with your winners, and not to rush in to take down the blinds with a 10xBB bet. If you get raised after you make a 10xBB bet you might worry understandably that they could have aces since you made a huge donkey bet and only someone with a premium pair is likely to want to give you action. The problem here is that you're playing your KK horribly so it seems the only time you get action is when you're dominated. It's your fault that happens because you're playing like a donk.

You should win more than you lose with KK even if you're only getting called by premium hands. The odds of having a pair preflop is about 1/17, the odds of that pair being kings is 1 in 221. The odds of someone having AA at the same time is about 1 in 23 for a table with 10 players. It goes down if there's less than 9 other players. Bottom line your kings are beat less than 5% of the time at a large table and less and .05% if you're heads up. There are a lot of donks out there that overplay AK, AQ, KQ, or even pair of J's.

You obviously should be collecting info on other players but how many people fold QQ preflop? If you feel someone is ultratight, don't get in a raising war with them, try and see the flop. There's always some gamble involved but folding KK's preflop is not a very good play in general no matter what your gut tells you.

Yes if you read my other post you will see I do not want any action and cannot deal with it. there is always an ace on the board which matches with someones ace rag in their hand. It may work for alot of ppl but I tried it for the past week and a half and been dominated it does not work for me. I am raise the house or fold.

Being superstitious in poker is really never going to be strong play. If you play enough hands the math always works out. You factor in your reads and position but the math is the math and saying you always get beat with KK by Ace rags is really just nonsense. You always REMEMBER the bad beats because people get emotional about bad beats. 10% is 10% and that means 1 time in 10, 10% happens. Raise 3-4BB, call most reraises and consider coming back over the top on loose players reraising and you'll win a lot of money. Bet 10xBB and you can expect to see more big beats because you put 330% in the pot and only a maniac or AA is going to call. You're blaming chance for what really amounts to poor play preflop.

we all want action with KK, that's why you raise PF, but if there's an Ace on the flop, then you have to play with caution, but dont be afraid, they might have called with QQ or JJ, but if they then bet like they have Aces, then be careful, because they probably have it.

Alright I will give kk another chance but I do really hate that hand. I actually have more faith in ak. I will play it one more week and see what happens, lol


Azbo I have not lost with it when I raise it preflop through the roof, I get no action everyone folds. Its when I put up a 3-4x blind raise I get called by an ace rag and an ace hits.

10crow10, I think you know the answer. Simply said "knowing he's got me beat....." It sounds like you are a smart enough player so trust your instincts and FOLD!

My advice shown above is pre-flop. I agree with the posts above, if Ax calls your raise and an Ace hits the flop then it's wise to fold (providing you put your opponent on an Ace). If you don't put him/her on an Ace, then betting is the best course of action.