Big Game- early stages with KK

[Rexas]

I think people usually lead here to find out where they are, or to protect. So when you raise, sometimes they have "found out" and some people will fold a Jack face-up, sometimes people will have 66 and also fold, as well as some random bluffs or worse pairs.

Also, they might fold on the turn or river, especially if they are bad cards for your perceived range and their hand.

I think calling keeps them thinking they probably have the best hand, which is the crucial thing here imo. You can call 3 streets, bet turn and river big, raise the river on some runouts (e.g. board pairing or just general bricks, or sets for us obv), raise the turn if he bets really small (some people do this). Overall, I think calling will win you more chips long term.

I definitely agree with alex here. By raising the flop we give the a guy a chance to fold a lot of hands, including his bluffs. Very rare to see a guy bluff donk and then just give up. By calling I would expect to get value from his bluffs for at least one more street, and from a J on potentially all three streets. Guy can pretty easily, imo, have like 10/10 or something similar, think there's only one over, so lets bet and hope he has AK and flats. Then he fires most turn cards that aren't an A, and we get two streets off an underpair, happy days. I think Pleno and Nit Tendencies are pretty spot on that he rarely donks this flop with a better hand than KK, so why do we want to give him a chance to fold any of these hands?

I dunno about you but when i have AK and try to raise this board they hold onto top pair like their first born fkn child.

Their range for leading this board is definitely made up of a lot more than top pair, I'm not even sure if a strong J leads this board very often. Probably better if I put speech marks around the "lets bet and put him on AK" bit, made it a little unclear that we aren't thinking that, it's what they are :p

Next time you're in this sorta spot, and you do have AK, fold it face up. I'll lay you odds that they say "I KNEW you had that!"

[muckthenuts]

I think people usually lead here to find out where they are, or to protect. So when you raise, sometimes they have "found out" and some people will fold a Jack face-up, sometimes people will have 66 and also fold, as well as some random bluffs or worse pairs.

Also, they might fold on the turn or river, especially if they are bad cards for your perceived range and their hand.

I think calling keeps them thinking they probably have the best hand, which is the crucial thing here imo. You can call 3 streets, bet turn and river big, raise the river on some runouts (e.g. board pairing or just general bricks, or sets for us obv), raise the turn if he bets really small (some people do this). Overall, I think calling will win you more chips long term.

I definitely agree with alex here. By raising the flop we give the a guy a chance to fold a lot of hands, including his bluffs. Very rare to see a guy bluff donk and then just give up. By calling I would expect to get value from his bluffs for at least one more street, and from a J on potentially all three streets. Guy can pretty easily, imo, have like 10/10 or something similar, think there's only one over, so lets bet and hope he has AK and flats. Then he fires most turn cards that aren't an A, and we get two streets off an underpair, happy days. I think Pleno and Nit Tendencies are pretty spot on that he rarely donks this flop with a better hand than KK, so why do we want to give him a chance to fold any of these hands?

I dunno about you but when i have AK and try to raise this board they hold onto top pair like their first born fkn child.

Their range for leading this board is definitely made up of a lot more than top pair, I'm not even sure if a strong J leads this board very often. Probably better if I put speech marks around the "lets bet and put him on AK" bit, made it a little unclear that we aren't thinking that, it's what they are :p

Next time you're in this sorta spot, and you do have AK, fold it face up. I'll lay you odds that they say "I KNEW you had that!"

Just making the point that just because we raise doesn't often mean we get folds. Sometimes i will have ace high or nothing in these sort of spots so it'd be nice to protect that by having KK in there too.

[cambridgealex]

I think people usually lead here to find out where they are, or to protect. So when you raise, sometimes they have "found out" and some people will fold a Jack face-up, sometimes people will have 66 and also fold, as well as some random bluffs or worse pairs.

Also, they might fold on the turn or river, especially if they are bad cards for your perceived range and their hand.

I think calling keeps them thinking they probably have the best hand, which is the crucial thing here imo. You can call 3 streets, bet turn and river big, raise the river on some runouts (e.g. board pairing or just general bricks, or sets for us obv), raise the turn if he bets really small (some people do this). Overall, I think calling will win you more chips long term.

I definitely agree with alex here. By raising the flop we give the a guy a chance to fold a lot of hands, including his bluffs. Very rare to see a guy bluff donk and then just give up. By calling I would expect to get value from his bluffs for at least one more street, and from a J on potentially all three streets. Guy can pretty easily, imo, have like 10/10 or something similar, think there's only one over, so lets bet and hope he has AK and flats. Then he fires most turn cards that aren't an A, and we get two streets off an underpair, happy days. I think Pleno and Nit Tendencies are pretty spot on that he rarely donks this flop with a better hand than KK, so why do we want to give him a chance to fold any of these hands?

I dunno about you but when i have AK and try to raise this board they hold onto top pair like their first born fkn child.

Their range for leading this board is definitely made up of a lot more than top pair, I'm not even sure if a strong J leads this board very often. Probably better if I put speech marks around the "lets bet and put him on AK" bit, made it a little unclear that we aren't thinking that, it's what they are :p

Next time you're in this sorta spot, and you do have AK, fold it face up. I'll lay you odds that they say "I KNEW you had that!"

Just making the point that just because we raise doesn't often mean we get folds. Sometimes i will have ace high or nothing in these sort of spots so it'd be nice to protect that by having KK in there too.

Nice to have KK in our flatting range to protect it too then? Otherwise we just flatting Jx and worse?

Not saying balance is an issue in a live MTT, but since you brought it up, it also works the other way.

[pleno1]

Well jx seems better to protect as we have a big blocker to his bet/call range, same with sets. Raising kk/aa and a few combos of bluffs perhaps 65 and kq all bdfd or something seems reasonable ish?

[pleno1]

Well jx seems better to protect as we have a big blocker to his bet/call range, same with sets. Raising kk/aa and a few combos of bluffs perhaps 65 and kq all bdfd or something seems reasonable ish?