blonde poker forum

playing the 125k guaranteed on bet365 yesterday.

find myself in middle position with AK diamonds. Blinds are fairly high but not too bad and I just limp in.

A couple of callers and he flop shows 234 2 diamonds, SB leads out and I flatcall as does the button.
5 hits on the turn making me the low straight and SB bets again (he's got the 6 and we all know it but doesn't price me out of the pot) I flatcall again.

The 3rd diamond hits on the river. he raises again I reraise all in and he calls.

Nice double up.

Now after that hand we are both having a discussion about this as I explain to him that, a while ago, I stopped auto raising with big drawings hands like AK, AQ pre-flop (I still do it sometimes of course but tend not to these days). He thinks I am a dud for flatcalling with them. (and Doyle Brunson and Harrington agree with him)

I reckon that in todays game of extremely agressive players, slow playing the AK can be more profitable when you hit than constantly raising with them is. They are nothing more tha drawing shand afterall and I find it happens a lot that if you do stick a large number of chips in that you get busted when you completely miss the flop.

However, I mainly play HU games on line and in the HU shootouts slowplaying AK works a charm against most scandies and Yanks as they don't expect it.

Any thoughts on this in tourneys? I can see arguments for both sides on this one but I just think autoraising pre-flop with them (when there haven't been any raises pre-flop) mainly leads to trouble...also because you are put on the old AK immediatly (I prefer to raie with rubbish just to pick up the blinds)

When the blinds are quite high i think you can get away with it but i wouldn't do it if everyone at the table had a relatively big stack.

blinds were fairly high compared to chip stacks in this case.... if the blinds are very small I ussually find there are a lot of nutters at the table raising it for me (even the 125k yesterday (50$ rebuy) had an amazing share of nut jobs and bingo players) so I don't have to...

I should add that i would prefer to raise if i think i will pick up the pot and I don't like playing A-K with a lot of people in the pot.

ps. I take it you've got your broadband working now then.

lol ...AOL dial up baby :(...I can play online at home now...but can't doa ny browsing while I do...thank Goodness I'm at work again :)

I mix my play with AK/AQ it all depends on the table.  After all, AK/AQ are drawing hands so, depending who am I against I will either limp or raise.

Therefore not so nuts IMO


If I think I can pick the pot, I raise with any two....

I agree that you shouldnt always auto raise with hands like AK suited - mix up your play so that your opponents struggle to put you on a hand.

But why on earth are you discussing how you play with your opponents in the middle of the tournament?!?!?!?!?!? ???

was after the tourney that we discussed it my friend.

I think that the power and profitability of AK comes from reraising . I dontmind a limp in if the stacks are big enough.

I'm not sure I buy this whole "AK is a drawing hand" thing.  Surely it is all relative?  For any given hand, if you are behind, then you are drawing; if you are ahead, you are not drawing.  If you are up against 22 then you are drawing.  If you are up against AQ then you are ahead and it is your opponent who is drawing.

I don't really understand the point you are trying to make in this thread.  In the hand you have posted, the fact that you had limped with AK was irrelevant.  The guy made a straight and couldn't/wouldn't believe you had a flush.  What has the fact that you limped with AK got to do with it?  You could have had 92d and the hand would have played out the same.

A considerably better example would be if the flop had come TJQ and an opponent with QJ paid you off.  Has that ever happened to you though?  But, I would imagine that if he filled up on the turn, you would totally pay him off and curse for having not raised preflop.