AK Out of Position

[jakally]

Had an up and down night last night, and for the first couple of hours wasn't at the races.
Kept getting myself in situations that I wasn't comfortable with.

One of these is below.


6 max, £2.50 / £5 NLHE.
Been at the table about 1 hour.

Players in hand :

UTG + 1 (£350 stack) :   Donkish, gets involved in too many pots, stays in hands longer than he should.
Button :  (£680 stack)    Solid TAG, plays position well, and usually knows where he is - doesn't stack off lightly.
Hero :     (£590 stack)    Reasonably tight image (I think!).

(The stack sizes are from memory, so may be a little bit off either way).

UTG :          Fold
UTG+1 :      Rs to £15
Button :      Rs to £50
SB :            Fold
BB (Hero) :

What do you do here?


I put UTG+1 on a very wide range, and not necessarily that strong (has been raising slightly larger with VGood hands), and Button knows this, therefore his range is probably something like ATs + and 88+.

Out of Position happy to take what's there so decide to reraise.

BB (Hero) :   Raises to £150

Button  :      Calls (Without too much delay).

What range do you put him on now?


Flop :     


Hero to act - what do you do now?

Played this hand real bad, therefore all advice appreciated.

[AdamG]

if u reraise pre flop and get 1 caller from tight player, i would fire most flops 2/3 of it as a continuation bet and lay it down if he / she comes over the top

i like the rereraise pre flop as it puts u on monster AK - JJ+ etc and theremore on Q high flop u c-bettin isnt so bad as you could have AQ KK AA and wanted him to hit the Q but if he comes over the top all i can put him on would be 88 or QQ... so i would definately fold to raise on flop.

[Bongo]

I think I might fold preflop, it just seems to me that you're getting into a situation where it's hard to win a big pot but easy to lose one. 

Has the button been reraising the donk a lot? I'd imagine it's hard to bluff someone who is very likely to call.

[jakally]

Has the button been reraising the donk a lot? I'd imagine it's hard to bluff someone who is very likely to call.

No button has been relatively solid - raising good hands, folding otherwise.
Don't think he would call reraise without a v.good hand.

[temp0r]

if he's a solid tag then he also knows the utg+1 is raising with crap alot of the time. he could have AQ or JJ/1010/99 which would at least call a continuation bet here. i think i'd check-raise all in. that way he only calls if he has QQ or possibly AQ/KK if he puts you on A10 of hearts. if you're up against AA here it's unlucky. you're too short to try and make a steal bet by this point given the money in the pot.

[TightEnd]

I might get pilloried for this, but AK OOP to a r and a rr with rr from TAG...fold pre-flop

difficult to play post-flop and tough to get away from if you half hit (top pair type hand) and face heavy action

[TightEnd]

As played CB and fold to raise, slow down to a halt if called

[Moskvich]

The disclaimer, as always - I don't really play much 6-max and definitely not at these levels, but it seems to me that...

The reraise pre-flop gets close to committing you. It's a £320 pot and you've got £440 back. He's called another £100 to win a max of about £660, so he's not doing it for set value, he must think there's a decent chance he's ahead here, despite the fact that you seem to be committing. I don't know what he thinks you've got, but maybe it looks like you want to take it down now - KK/AA perhaps wouldn't need to make the pot quite this big preflop, given the risk of losing its customers.

I'd guess his range now is something like TT+ AQ+. Maybe not even TT. Even if he's got TT/JJ it looks like he's decided to go with it on a decent flop, and this isn't terrible. The chance that the Q has put you ahead is pretty slim.

If you shove then TT/JJ will probably call given his preflop decision, and AQ will wonder what on earth you're doing shoving if you've got QQ-AA and call. You might get rid of another AK. If you c-bet £200 then again he probably shoves anything except maybe AK and you have to decide whether to call your last £240 to win a £960 pot.

If you check then maybe he bets something that you beat and you can shove, but I can't find anything that you beat. And even if he's got something that you beat he won't be able to find anything that he beats, so probably won't bet anyway.

Maybe he bet-folds 99-JJ to a check-shove, but again it's £240ish to call into a £960 pot, so if he bets I'd have thought he's now totally committed to it, even if he wasn't preflop. If he is committed then you're about 25% against a one-pair hand that isn't KK/AA, which means that in this situation you lose about £167 on average. Given that he might have KK/AA or a set then check-fold looks quite a bit cheaper, though check-shove maybe better if you think he can bet-fold and also for poncey metagame reasons.

All in all, it kind of looks like the reraise preflop puts you in a position where there isn't really much you can do that looks very appetising.

Maybe a min reraise pre-flop is better, perhaps looks stronger and leaves you more room for manoeuvre. Gives him odds to flop a set, but also gives him room to fold when you both miss.

Preflop shove isn't really any good against his range as you see it, assuming he doesn't give it credit for a monster. If he calls with TT+ and AK then that means he folds 56% of the time, winning you £70. When he calls you win 40%, so 17.5% of the time you win about £600 and 26% you lose £590. Which averages out at losing about a tenner. If he calls tighter than this then maybe it just about works.

Preflop fold avoids the need for the neurofen and looks like it might be the best bet.

[WellChief]

Nice reraise preflop, although maybe slightly larger would be better in future, say 175.  Now check-fold, he's not folding any of his range that he calls preflop here if he's as described.

[Tragic]

Agree with wellchief on this one. Pre flop fold advocates i think are focussing too much on the fact that in this hand he did call, this will not happen too often from a TAG. Given that he does call, on this flop you must check fold. £175 is a nice raise pre, he may well check behind a check anyway and give you a free card.

[Longy]

Nice reraise preflop, although maybe slightly larger would be better in future, say 175.  Now check-fold, he's not folding any of his range that he calls preflop here if he's as described.

Yep i agree as well, i like preflop. This flop get rid of none of his range apart from another ak, check/fold.

[MKKfish]

Agree with wellchief on this one. Pre flop fold advocates i think are focussing too much on the fact that in this hand he did call, this will not happen too often from a TAG. Given that he does call, on this flop you must check fold. £175 is a nice raise pre, he may well check behind a check anyway and give you a free card.

Agreed

The check may be interpreted as strength anyway and you get the free card.

As to the check/all in..... never, no, please.

[jakally]

Nice reraise preflop, although maybe slightly larger would be better in future, say 175.  Now check-fold, he's not folding any of his range that he calls preflop here if he's as described.

Yeah, I think you are right, £175 may have been better.

I check folded, but it felt really weak.
On the flipside, if I put another bet in I am committed and will lose my stack well over half the time.

I have felt that overplaying AK has been a leak recently, and I was probably conscious of tha when playing this out.

In terms of folding preflop, against this kind of opponent (i.e. who would make the reraise with a decent range) then I don't think I am ever folding. If you don't reraise with AK in this spot, what are you going to do it with - just AA!).

Thanks for the feedback.