Fold AA preflop?

Ok so I found this interesting discussion in another forum involving folding AA pre-flop. This is how it goes:

There's some debate about this. I have done it before - incredibly rare of course. I had a deep stack late in a tourney before the bubble and was at a table with a few other deep stacks. I picked up AA in big blind, and after a small stack went all-in, both deep stacks (both had me covered) went all in on top. I know that AA does not do good in multi-all ins and wanted to ensure that not only I made the money, but still had a chance to win the tourney. So I folded and watched the cards make a monster for one of the big stacks and felt great about my play. I went on to the final table wondering if I stumbled upon a secret - or maybe it was just luck that I wasn't going to triple up that hand.

Anyone else try this - or maybe you think its crazy?
-buonafide

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This was my reponse to him:

No, no , no and no. I understand the situation you were in (near the bubble and covered in chips) but, the short stack was short stacked and could have just trying to steal the blinds with ANY TWO cards. The first deep stacked guy probably read this as well and was expected to be light (Axs, 22-99, SCs,). The second guy however, could have identified what the first guy was doing, thus getting it in with a range that he considered was crushing the first guy due to that situation. So we can put the second guy who went all in with a range like this: KQs, AQo, AQs, AKo, AKs, TT-KK.

Ok, so putting all this info into an odds calculator we get something like this: first guy we gave 60% of hands, Second guy we gave 15% of hands, and third guy we gave 5% of hands. And of course we give you Pocket Rockets to close the action.

Against 3 players all in pre-flop you have 61% equity. They all have around 13% equity against YOUR actual hand. This is a dream spot to Triple up in a situation where everyone will be pushing super light due to the bubble mechanics and ICM pressure. To win in the FT, the more chips you have the better the chances for you to win it. Had you tripled up in that spot, your chances of winning would've been greater than the value of any min cash.

In conclusion, this was a terrible mistake given that circumstances. Remember, the fact that you would've lost for whatever reason doesn't justify a bad play. Don't be results oriented, always look for the best spots to maximize value and improve your chances of winning.

Cheers,
TheRomeo2K

Anyone agree with me here? If not, please leave your responses as to why you don't agree. #Embrace #Debate

It is like same what opponent have because we have aces in normal tournament and we are getting chance to triple our stack. This is like slowroll call allways.

One scenario where I may fold AA on the bubble is in a satellite tournament when I have enough chips to cash (compared to the short stacks) but when committing to an all in for a high percentage of my stack.

Unlike a standard MTT, a satellite pays out the same prize in multiple spots therefore you don't have to necessarily come in first.

I find this a very interesting statement:

I know that AA does not do good in multi-all ins

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Me being somewhat of a noob to serious poker, is this true and does anyone have stats on it?

Jamie

aznman08 said:

One scenario where I may fold AA on the bubble is in a satellite tournament when I have enough chips to cash (compared to the short stacks) but when committing to an all in for a high percentage of my stack.

Unlike a standard MTT, a satellite pays out the same prize in multiple spots therefore you don't have to necessarily come in first.

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Yeah, this is one of those unique situations where it *might* be ok to fold. It all depends how many players are involved in the AI.

SeaRun said:

I find this a very interesting statement:



Me being somewhat of a noob to serious poker, is this true and does anyone have stats on it?

Jamie

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Yes it's true. The more players involved in a hand, the less strong your hand becomes (even if it's KK or AA). I gave examples of how much equity the AA had against 3 players with their respective ranges. You can try playing around with an odds calculator and see for yourself.

I think folding AA in that spot is not what the most players do. Maybe you should fold JJ - QQ

Yeah, folding aces here is a huge mistake. Given that this is a mtt we have an excellent spot to triple up and masdivly increase our expectation of a deep run. The only reason to be folding AA pre flop in a tournament is in a DON/sattelite situation where our value from winning the pot isn't worth the equity our hand has. Which is pretty rare as it is.

The one other possible reason might be if you some how sattelited into a once in a lifetime event where the buy in is many many times your standard buy in. If that were the case and you were coming to a big pay jump/the money bubble then it might be okay to take the safer route since you don't expect to ever reach the long term. Even then folding is actually -ev

I agree with you. Even aces up against five random hands has around a 50% chance of winning. The mindset was wrong as you said there being results oriented and that you just want to make the min cash and that he would have been in a great position to win (depending on how deep it was).

aznman08 said:

One scenario where I may fold AA on the bubble is in a satellite tournament when I have enough chips to cash (compared to the short stacks) but when committing to an all in for a high percentage of my stack.

Unlike a standard MTT, a satellite pays out the same prize in multiple spots therefore you don't have to necessarily come in first.

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Theromeo2k said:

Yeah, this is one of those unique situations where it *might* be ok to fold. It all depends how many players are involved in the AI.

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NO it doesn't. How many players are involved in the allin has nothing whatsoever to do with whether or not we're calling with AA on the bubble of a satellite.
"'might' be okay to fold" you're joking though... right? But I think maybe you're not because of the comment after (depends on how many players ... ).

You can't win TWO tickets in ONE satellite. (< think about that valuable tidbit of info.)

We had same discussion like yesterday on this forum. Loafes pointed out a good thing that i have to agree and see it logical and justified, if i by any chance won a 200+ ticket and im on the bubble of 250k gtd and the min cash is 10 time of my entire bankroll i would fold 100%

In any other case that it is not involving now well known and already more time mentioned don or satellite with same tickets issued folding aa is a huge huge bullet in the head mistake....

If anyone is interested in math and game theory background, dmorris brake it down in some tread few days ago, it is a nice read for any "aa losses equity" soul here...

ill lurk it and i can post it here...

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dmorris68 said:

Even in a 9-handed AIPF with every playing having a pp from 66 to AA, AA is still a far and away favorite (24.3%) against any other single hand, with KK having 17.8% equity down to 66 having 6% equity.

I think where some people get the idea it's good to fold 5+ handed is the fact that after 4-handed, AA is no longer >50%, i.e. all the other hands combined have >50% equity, so AA is more likely to lose to any ONE of those hands than to win. However they're forgetting that EV decisions aren't made in a vacuum strictly on >50% equity, they're made on long-term EV.

In a 9-handed AIPF with 66-AA, we're still a 3:1 favorite to win 8:1 chips/money. That's a +EV decision all day long, even considering the differences between cash game equity and tournament equity.

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Here it is.

Thanks for the great post David!


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Poker Orifice said:

NO it doesn't. How many players are involved in the allin has nothing whatsoever to do with whether or not we're calling with AA on the bubble of a satellite.
"'might' be okay to fold" you're joking though... right? But I think maybe you're not because of the comment after (depends on how many players ... ).

You can't win TWO tickets in ONE satellite. (< think about that valuable tidbit of info.)

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If there are 9 players remaining and only top 3 places pay (they all pay the same), 7 players go all in and you're last to act holding AA. Wouldn't folding be a more profitable situation because of the numbers of players that already went All In? I mean, if you fold there will be you, the other person who folded and at least one winner out of the seven; which would propel you to cash. So, yeah it DOES depend on the number of players AND situation. That's why I said *might* and wasn't joking.

DrazaFFT said:

Here it is.

Thanks for the great post David!


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Thank you for sharing this post in this thread. It's great info to have in the back of your head and review it whenever needed

the only stuation where i fold aces are in a satties that gives tickets for a bigger tourney, when i am comfortable in chips therefore it doesn´t make any sense to risk the ticket (first place=to 100th)

for example, we were like 110 remaning players and just the biggest stack was the rest of us to the edge, so i didn´t want it to risk what i´ve done in 2 hours just to get more chips (meaningless)

the rest of the times i´ve got aces i´ve played them ( i have fold them postflop a lot of time, for instance if 4 cards same color in the board i´m forced to fold unless i have the nuts)

I concur with you, if one has the chance to triple and busts some other players why not? i´ve lost several times with aces because, there are not any two that wins all the time,

I am going all in 90% of the time. Maybe there are some extreme rare spots were I would fold. Like 6 players left in a double or nothing game and 5 players win and I have a good chip stack.

I would go all in on the bubble, I will make an all-in raise, but I probably wouldnt call one if in this particular situations. AA loses nice percentage over 3-4 people, so unless you flop a set or something your hand will suddenly not be so good. So, if Im on the button and see a raise and a lot of limpers I'd certainly go all in, but if I see that many people before me already in, I'd fold. Im usually almost never folding any PP's even deuces, but when the time is right I wont even hesitate. The worst thing is when you have been playing Fold'em for 10 minutes waiting for a hand, and you suddenly got one you know you should fold, but you cant, and eventually losing the tourney over it.

Wow! You might have stumbled upon a tremendous poker tactic. I do not know If I could do it because I would figure to make money off of one of the deep stacks in an all-in situation - regardless if the small stack won or not.

Maybe if one or two more deep stacks were involved in the all-in which accumulates to 5 all-ins and only one of those being a short stack. Now your up against 4 all-ins and the probability of aces holding up in this circumstance is far more tougher to do.

In my own personal experience, I have had aces hold up many times against 2 all ins. Without worrying about the short stack, I would say shove it.

Although after watching the flop in this case you definitely made the right choice.

This is a snap call just about every single time....2 instances where I would consider folding....1) your on the bubble of a satellite 2) your in a HUGE tourney and the money is a truckload more than your BR....Folding here in a normal tourney is a very -EV play...for your going to b winning more than half the time and have a much better shot at winning....This was a terrible fold by the guy with AA....Play to win..not to min cash!

trent32la said:

This is a snap call just about every single time....2 instances where I would consider folding....1) your on the bubble of a satellite 2) your in a HUGE tourney and the money is a truckload more than your BR....Folding here in a normal tourney is a very -EV play...for your going to b winning more than half the time and have a much better shot at winning....This was a terrible fold by the guy with AA....Play to win..not to min cash!

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Basically this. In any other situations, if you are afraid of losing while you have the BEST DAMNED HAND IN THE GAME, gambling probably isn't something you should be doing.

Ill ask in this tread too, does anyone here have a HH to show that he actually folded AA pre?

We all keep looking for almost unlikely situations as examples to justify the fold, first hand of wsop me, big buyin bubble, double or nothing, bla bla bla bla the truth is that most of AA folders here make a lot of -EV decisions but actually consider to fold in huge +EV situation... Why because you heard that AA loses equity with more players in hand, yes but that implies for post flop play, and in a preflop with every single player more in the AIPF you getting way better pot odds than you lose equity, read dmo post even in a 9 handed game you are 3:1 to win but you have 8:1 pot odds, cmon how not to call there????????????????? yea i remember don, sat bubble, blablabla, but i wanna be sure that people understand why they should call in this situation because most of the time they face this decision it wont be in 250k gtd, it would be in a tourney where they are stacked to play in, in the don that they are stacked to play and it is just one buyin up or down and what if you fold atd they split the pot and then they suck on you when you get shortstacked and shove with worse...

Im saying all this because here will come new players and member, they will lurk the forum and they will think that they should fold AA on bubble and they'll put it in stone. This is wrong!!!! In 99,999999999999% of situation call is a +EV in .0000000000001% the fold is ok but result oriented and thus -EV

DrazaFFT said:

Ill ask in this tread too, does anyone here have a HH to show that he actually folded AA pre?

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I did on accident once because I was in too much a hurry .

Theromeo2k said:

If there are 9 players remaining and only top 3 places pay (they all pay the same), 7 players go all in and you're last to act holding AA. Wouldn't folding be a more profitable situation because of the numbers of players that already went All In? I mean, if you fold there will be you, the other person who folded and at least one winner out of the seven; which would propel you to cash. So, yeah it DOES depend on the number of players AND situation. That's why I said *might* and wasn't joking.



Thank you for sharing this post in this thread. It's great info to have in the back of your head and review it whenever needed

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Maybe try reading what I wrote again because you seem to have missed out on what I wrote.
If you still don't get it I'll post in more detail (but please tell me I won't need to)

I agree with the people who said that AA loses value based on the number of hands that are in pre-flop. From my experience players tend to push pre-flop with mid to high pocket pairs or AK, AQ, KQ, ect.. So you're holding AA against 77, AK, KQ. I'd say out of the 4 hands the 77 would have the greatest chance of winning based on number of outs. Sure you have top pair but if the guy holding the 7 hits his set you are pretty much out of the hand looking for the final A in the deck which could have been folded with a rag card.

I'd say in his situation he did the right thing. Though it is a tough thing to do folding rockets.

I never fold AA pre flop.I dont see any logic to fold the best pre flop hand.

I Well never fold aa reflop an i am sure i am not the only one aa is the Best hand

DrazaFFT said:

This is wrong!!!! In 99,999999999999% of situation call is a +EV in .0000000000001% the fold is ok but result oriented and thus -EV

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This is wrong because it considers only hand EV and omits tournament EV. Folding AA is +EV in the unlikely sattie bubble situation where you have a very high probability of folding your way to a ticket or package but losing would bust or cripple you.

For example, you're the #2 stack and you estimate your probability of winning a ticket by sitting out is 90%. The chip leader is shoving every hand, so his range is any two. He shoves again, everyone else folds and you're last to act with your AA.

If you call and win, your probability of winning a ticket increases to as high as it can go, 100%. With AA vs atc, you'll win 85%. So your EV is 0.85 tickets. You should fold because your tournament EV if you do so is higher, 0.9 tickets.