10NL; AKos SB: Mucho Limpers

I am dealt AKos in the small blind. 6 limpers ahead of me + the BB. Raise or call? If we raise, to how much?

full tilt poker Game #5119743730: Table Invergordon - $0.05/$0.10 - No Limit Hold'em - 14:48:55 ET - 2008/02/04
Seat 1: Naypoo ($10.95)
Seat 2: royalburrito24 ($8.80)
Seat 3: boohoo35 ($3.60)
Seat 4: bocha12 ($3.35)
Seat 5: W111BTH ($17.75)
Seat 6: brat-farrah ($4.60)
Seat 7: b0unc0r ($1.90)
Seat 8: LilFang07 ($9.75)
Seat 9: NineLions ($1.80) Yes, NineLions is sitting at my table...
royalburrito24 posts the small blind of $0.05
boohoo35 posts the big blind of $0.10
The button is in seat #1
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to royalburrito24 [Kc Ad]
bocha12 calls $0.10
W111BTH calls $0.10
brat-farrah calls $0.10
b0unc0r folds
LilFang07 calls $0.10
NineLions calls $0.10
Naypoo calls $0.10
royalburrito24 ??

Raise BIG here. To like $.70 to $1.00.

Bentheman87 said:

Raise BIG here. To like $.70 to $1.00.

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Ok. What is your reasoning?

you need to raise, not sure if it needs to be a big raise, but you need to raise

baconn said:

you need to raise, not sure if it needs to be a big raise, but you need to raise

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Yes, but why?

You probably have the best hand, but it's not like you have AA or KK, and you're out of position so you'd rather make them fold than get callers. If you use the 3x BB + 1 BB for every limper rule then that is $.60, but at these micro stakes I have a feeling that no one would fold to a $.60 raise so I'd make the raise a little higher, like $.70+.

royalburrito24 said:

Ok. What is your reasoning?

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I agree with Ben.

We have one of the best hands in HE, the only hands we're worried about are AA and KK. With all those limpers, AA or KK would have raised, so right now we have to assume we're the best hand (even if we're flipping, getting multiple callers gives us enough equity to make up for the SLIGHT underdog we are). Our goal here is to make as many fold as possible, hopefully still getting a caller or two. If no one calls, we still don't mind because there's a lot of money in the pot. A call would be about the worst thing possible you could do because even if you flop TPTK, with 6 limpers there's no way you can assume you're ahead. I'd make it 90 cents here.

The reason to raise is a lot of the value of AK is in fold equity. You should raise 3-4xbb plus 1x per limper, so about a 1.00 in this case. The thought is to chase out speculative hands and hopefully have 1-2 opponents to get max value. Similiar to Aces, AK is a strong hand but with to many in the pot very likely to be sucked out on.

Zach and Ben beat me too it, darn it.

Bentheman87 said:

You probably have the best hand, but it's not like you have AA or KK, and you're out of position so you'd rather make them fold than get callers. If you use the 3x BB + 1 BB for every limper rule then that is $.60, but at these micro stakes I have a feeling that no one would fold to a $.60 raise so I'd make the raise a little higher, like $.70+.

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1. What would you do with AA here? Flat call? Raise only a little bit? Are you just an amazing postflop player that can lay down AA to a ragged flop or do you like giving opponents implied odds?

2. 3x + 1*6 = 9x, not sure where you got $0.60

3. You're conclusion is right, but the phrase "you'd rather make them fold than get callers" is false. The idea is that we are ahead, so if we get one or two callers they are paying all that money when you have a higher equity than they do. Obviously with implied odds and such we don't really mind a fold, but we actually do want one limper, just because we are the favorite (or so we think) and when they commit that many chips we take more than half of them. It's all about pot equity, and we want to get chips in before our pot equity decreases or before people get scared when an A or K hits.

Bentheman87 said:

You probably have the best hand, but it's not like you have AA or KK, and you're out of position so you'd rather make them fold than get callers. If you use the 3x BB + 1 BB for every limper rule then that is $.60, but at these micro stakes I have a feeling that no one would fold to a $.60 raise so I'd make the raise a little higher, like $.70+.

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3X BB + 1 BB for every limper = .90......not .60 (you calculated the 1 BB for every limper, but not the extra 3X the BB.

zachvac said:

I agree with Ben.

We have one of the best hands in HE, the only hands we're worried about are AA and KK. With all those limpers, AA or KK would have raised, so right now we have to assume we're the best hand (even if we're flipping, getting multiple callers gives us enough equity to make up for the SLIGHT underdog we are). Our goal here is to make as many fold as possible, hopefully still getting a caller or two. If no one calls, we still don't mind because there's a lot of money in the pot. A call would be about the worst thing possible you could do because even if you flop TPTK, with 6 limpers there's no way you can assume you're ahead. I'd make it 90 cents here.

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Thank you for actually explaining to me what I should do, and why. Nothing I hate more than people telling me to raise/fold/call without giving me any reasoning or explanation whatsoever.

Here is how the rest of the hand played out if you wanted to know.

royalburrito24 raises to $0.90
boohoo35 calls $0.80 Complete donk...does this type of thing all the time.
bocha12 folds
W111BTH folds
brat-farrah folds
LilFang07 has 15 seconds left to act
LilFang07 folds
NineLions folds
Naypoo calls $0.80
*** FLOP *** [2c 7s As]
royalburrito24 checks
boohoo35 checks
Naypoo checks
*** TURN *** [2c 7s As] [Kh]
royalburrito24 bets $0.75
boohoo35 calls $0.75
Naypoo folds
*** RIVER *** [2c 7s As Kh] [5h]
royalburrito24 bets $2
boohoo35 calls $1.95, and is all in
Uncalled bet of $0.05 returned to royalburrito24
*** SHOW DOWN ***
royalburrito24 shows [Kc Ad] two pair, Aces and Kings
boohoo35 mucks
royalburrito24 wins the pot ($7.75) with two pair, Aces and Kings
boohoo35 is sitting out
boohoo35 adds $4


Weeeeee. I am happy with my post-flop play, however, do you have any suggestions/problems?

My mistake you're right I forgot to add the 3 BBs to the 1+ for limpers. So that means you should raise to at least $.90, but I'd raise to maybe $1.10 to $1.30. With AA or KK I meant the hand is a lot stronger than AA so with this hand a raise to $.90 exactly seems better.

royalburrito24 said:

Full Tilt Poker Game #5119743730: Table Invergordon - $0.05/$0.10 - No Limit Hold'em - 14:48:55 ET - 2008/02/04
Seat 1: Naypoo ($10.95)
Seat 2: royalburrito24 ($8.80)
Seat 3: boohoo35 ($3.60)
Seat 4: bocha12 ($3.35)
Seat 5: W111BTH ($17.75)
Seat 6: brat-farrah ($4.60)
Seat 7: b0unc0r ($1.90)
Seat 8: LilFang07 ($9.75)
Seat 9: NineLions ($1.80) Yes, NineLions is sitting at my table...

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Yeah, what a bozo, playing with 18 BBs.


But I figured it's the easist way to try to collect some of the FT bonus. And even easier to buy in minimum making the decisions simpler 4 tabling while most of my attention is on looking for a new job on my day off. (fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, shove, repeat ...)


zack pretty much summed it up strategy-wise.

RB, you don't mind if I call you RB do you? Read Professional No Limit. It explains WHY you raise here (not just because that's what everyone does with AK) and will help with your bet sizing depending on how many caller we expect we will get with different size raises.

WVHillbilly said:

RB, you don't mind if I call you RB do you? Read Professional No Limit. It explains WHY you raise here (not just because that's what everyone does with AK) and will help with your bet sizing depending on how many caller we expect we will get with different size raises.

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I know why I raise AK in that spot now. I was just frustrated that people were not giving me very good feedback on my situation.
I would much rather see "Raise to .90 because...."
than
"You should raise here."

Here is a great older thread that I found in regard to AK

[https://www.cardschat.com/forum/cash-games-11/value-ak-suited-97972/]

royalburrito24 said:

I would much rather see "Raise to .90 because...."
than
"You should raise here."

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Yep. Getting extremely sick of those answers myself.

PF was fine, but I usually raise a little more out of position to negate that disadvantage. I bet the flop too; you'll get plenty of action from any ace, and there are a few draws out there too that you need to charge.

Poker is a game of questions and answers. You should always be asking yourself why. Why do i call pre-flop ? Why do I raise ? Why do I fold ?

In this example we have AK in the small blind.

We decide to raise, and raise relatively large. Why ?

1 ) We have a big hand, we want to get money in the pot, we want to get weaker hands to call.
2) We need to isolate, we know our hand whilst plays ok multiway it plays better against 1 or two players, we need to isolate these players.
3) We are out of position on future betting rounds, this makes our future decisions more difficult, because we dont know what our opponents will do. But we know we have the best hand at the moment.
4) We want to force our opponents to make mistakes, we dont want to let the button play his 85offsuit correctly because he has pot odds to see a flop.
5) Our opponents are relatively weak and we will likely win a large pot if we hit the flop.

We can go further and further with this but you get the idea.

ChuckTs said:

PF was fine, but I usually raise a little more out of position to negate that disadvantage. I bet the flop too; you'll get plenty of action from any ace, and there are a few draws out there too that you need to charge.

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I checked because the person to my immediate left bet out at every single flop they saw while I was at the table. The check surprised me a bit, but I lucked out with a non-scary turn card. Opponent ended up having Q7 (noting the donkiness).

Q7? Wow...

Another reason for the raise pre-flop with this specific hand is that you want to try to clear out any ace-rag hands. If the flop comes ace-rag-rag (as it did) and you haven't raised... what then? You've got TPTK, but you're out of position and there's every chance someone's spiked two-pair on you. Ugly.

I think the "out of position" argument is really crucial. You have a player's advantage now, but will have a player's disadvantage in the ensuing rounds. You have the information that the other players are weak right now. Use it. Get them to make mistakes (calling without enough pot odds).

In later rounds, you're not going to have that advantage. You're going to be more likely to make a mistake yourself. So why not get more money in the pot when your opponents are likely to make a mistake than when you're likely to make a mistake?