Why not to lay KK preflop in a ring game

***** Hand History for Game 1573140958 *****
$100 NL Hold'em - Friday, February 11, 01:41:16 EDT 2005
Table Table 12099 (Real Money)
Seat 8 is the button
Total number of players : 9
Seat 2: jonybellagio ( $257.75 )
Seat 5: urkelbot69 ( $99.35 )
Seat 6: LuckyEights8 ( $143.35 )
Seat 7: nimbus2000 ( $110.2 )
Seat 10: acesup86 ( $172.1 )
Seat 3: RAMT6937 ( $71.65 )
Seat 9: Gravina ( $65 )
Seat 8: StukAgain ( $98.65 )
Seat 1: daddyselma ( $110.7 )
Gravina posts small blind [$1].
acesup86 posts big blind [$2].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to acesup86 [ Kc Kh ]
daddyselma raises [$8].
RAMT6937 folds.
urkelbot69 folds.
LuckyEights8 folds.
nimbus2000 folds.
StukAgain folds.
Gravina folds.
acesup86 raises [$23].
daddyselma raises [$52].
>You have options at Disco Lights Table!.
acesup86 is all-In [$147.1]
daddyselma is all-In [$50.7]
** Dealing Flop ** [ 3s, 4d, Ad ]
** Dealing Turn ** [ 2s ]
** Dealing River ** [ Ts ]
daddyselma shows [ Qh, Qd ] a pair of queens.
acesup86 shows [ Kc, Kh ] a pair of kings.
acesup86 wins $61.4 from side pot #1 with a pair of kings.
acesup86 wins $219.4 from the main pot with a pair of kings.
Infarc has joined the table.


I cant even count how many times this has happened to me.... push with KK every single time you can preflop in a ring game!

So, you don't worry about figuring out if AA is there, given enough hands you'll win in the long run, even if AA pops up occassionally and you get some bad beats now and then. Right?

To sum up. Just get your money in son and let the mathematics take care of the rest.

Ya I just dont worry about the guy having AA...I just say to myself if he has AA I'll just pay it off and move on.....I actually thought for sure that he did have AA this hand with the reraise of my bet but that just goes to show its hard to tell the difference between QQ and AA sometimes if they play it like that. So I have just made a decision to push with KK every time I would say I get up against AA way less frequently then I do QQ AK JJ

Edit: Does anyone know if there is any way you can look on Poker Tracker and see what hands your up against most with KK?

If you laid down KK preflop ill find you and cut ur nuts off.

I actually put a guy on tilt last night when he had KK. He limped in. I have 9-7o in the BB. He is 2 seats away. Flop comes 8-10-2. So at the moment I am open ended and have about $34.00. I check he raises allin which is about $7. I say what the hell and catch my 6 to beat his KK. He gets pissed and says nice catch and I say dont slow play kid. From then he went on to lose $20 more. I left the table at $157.00 on $25PL.

Oh sorry to rape your thread chief.

AA and KK are the two hands that are not laid down preflop in any cirumstances, you've shown why.

I'd VERY rarely lay down QQ aswell, but I do on some occasions.

Originally Posted by Corey

If you laid down KK preflop ill find you and cut ur nuts off.

I actually put a guy on tilt last night when he had KK. He limped in. I have 9-7o in the BB. He is 2 seats away. Flop comes 8-10-2. So at the moment I am open ended and have about $34.00. I check he raises allin which is about $7. I say what the hell and catch my 6 to beat his KK. He gets pissed and says nice catch and I say dont slow play kid.

He shouldn't have slowplayed it, but that's a pretty bad call on your part. You've got terrible pot odds on the call to begin with, and zero implied value because he's already all in - why call that? It's a straight-up gamble on a draw that isn't all that great. You can't even exploit his tilt unless he rebuys.

What seperates the good players from the bad ones is being able to lay down monsters in possibly losing situations.

4+ all ins against me(and they aren't total fish), i'll lay down KK/AK

On a single table tourny, if you have QQ and the largest stack and somebody goes all-in with 1/2 to 3/4 or your stack, would you call? This happened to me two nights ago. There were still 8 people left. I folded. I wasn't happy but didn't want to bascially get knocked out on that hand. Plus I had just finished out of the money twice in a row. He did go allin 1 or 2 times after that hand, but not before. Good laydown? I ended up 2nd.

Prior hands at the table and potential reads aside......

That guy was a fish, pure and simple. You don't rereraise preflop with QQ in a ring game. You call either the first raise or the reraise, or if you really know your player well, fold QQ to that kind of PF aggression.

Most of the time I would expect in a preflop rerereraising all in situation that you will find out when the cards flip over that you are screwed, holding KK and your dick in your hand praying for another K on the board.

Mark that guy down in your books and be happy you were not playing against someone who knows what they are doing.

He shouldn't have slowplayed it, but that's a pretty bad call on your part. You've got terrible pot odds on the call to begin with, and zero implied value because he's already all in - why call that? It's a straight-up gamble on a draw that isn't all that great. You can't even exploit his tilt unless he rebuys.

Well I was open ended on the straight needing a 6 or J to get my straight so a total of 8 outs. His all-in was very small of $8. He had been very talkative all throughout the game. So I decided to what the hell and call. His damn problem for limping in with KK. I owned him he said nice catch XXXX <--- cuss words, I said dont slow play it bud. He then got very pissed, my reply was simple but harsh, "then rebuy" his "dont tell me what to XXXX do" then he rants and raves he buys in with $10 more i just said "tilt much" He goes all in ever my KK. Well I call and I win the pot with my reply see thats how you play KK.

Well shit happens i caught cards and made $157 on that table that night.

Originally Posted by Corey

Well I was open ended on the straight needing a 6 or J to get my straight so a total of 8 outs. His all-in was very small of $8.

The odds are what they are regardless. If the current pot is less than $8, he goes all-in for $8, you're getting worse than 2:1 odds from the pot on a draw that is not quite as good as 2:1 even with two cards to come... it's a money-loser. The amount he's going all in with really doesn't factor into it unless it's less than the current pot (giving you better than 2:1). In which case - call away, you're probably at least breaking even.

This reminds me of the discussion I keep having with some guys in my home game where they fixate on stack size (even in cash games) and how much it is to call. They look at it in terms of what the money means to them personally. If it's just fifty cents to call, they'll call - even with a four out draw and a current pot of 40 cents or whatever. It's not about how much the amount is, just how much relative to the pot. It either makes you money or it doesn't. This call doesn't, although it happened that on this particular occasion it gave you the illusion that it did.

Originally Posted by r8ed

On a single table tourny, if you have QQ and the largest stack and somebody goes all-in with 1/2 to 3/4 or your stack, would you call? This happened to me two nights ago. There were still 8 people left. I folded. I wasn't happy but didn't want to bascially get knocked out on that hand. Plus I had just finished out of the money twice in a row. He did go allin 1 or 2 times after that hand, but not before. Good laydown? I ended up 2nd.

My opinion, if you finished ITM then you did the right thing. Chances are he had AK or a lower pair. Why go AI preflop with KK? He didn't want callers probably, but you never know. Maybe he had AA and figured a fish would call him. The goal is to get ITM, not go toe to toe on a hunch.

I just laid down AK with 4 players left and I was a fairly short stack. Guy one off the button raises 3xbb, I call, BB goes AI and the first guy calls. I could have gone AI with them. But I had 125 chips left in my stack. I folded like a cheap suit. The first guy had QQ against AQ (the BB). The queens hold up and the BB gets knocked out. I go from -33 for the buy in to +27 for getting ITM in 3rd place. From there I was pretty much dead with only 125 chips, but the point remains. If you can fold and fight back to get ITM, then that's what you do.

Good laydown.

Originally Posted by r8ed

On a single table tourny, if you have QQ and the largest stack and somebody goes all-in with 1/2 to 3/4 or your stack, would you call? This happened to me two nights ago. There were still 8 people left. I folded. I wasn't happy but didn't want to bascially get knocked out on that hand. Plus I had just finished out of the money twice in a row. He did go allin 1 or 2 times after that hand, but not before. Good laydown? I ended up 2nd.

Yes it was a good laydown for sure. You are facing either a coinflip against an over zealous AK or, more probably, 80% dominated by KK or AA. Especially this early on you cant take that much risk for chips. Build it slowly and use that leverage for later on. Wait until someone goes all in late in the tourney UTG when their stack size is 3BB's. They'll flip over some crap like J9o. Next hand, preflop raise the crap out of people and they'll fold cuz your QQ is what's fresh in their mind.

I won the hand didnt I dale? Sounds like your getting pissy cause I played a hand like a fish. I knew my pot odds, but do you ever get that gut feeling of, fuck it? I mean fuck who cares about the math of poker get some balls and make the fucking call. If you catch you catch. Still his problem of limping in with KK. I had the BB with 9-7 I made a bet of $2 before that of a semi bluff he reraised to $8 only making it $6. I hit I win

oh well I win I take money.

***** Hand History for Game 1599879152 *****
$100 NL Hold'em - Wednesday, February 16, 12:42:37 EDT 2005
Table Flying Without Wings (Real Money)
Seat 9 is the button
Total number of players : 10
Seat 2: ForFour ( $401.71 )
Seat 3: awmahn ( $273.68 )
Seat 5: NCSUpokerman ( $128.4 )
Seat 7: CoolRiverRon ( $115.32 )
Seat 8: jaypops96 ( $109.65 )
Seat 10: thinlemur ( $210.45 )
Seat 1: acesup86 ( $168.75 )
Seat 4: QuickZipper ( $99.75 )
Seat 9: Ronin29 ( $103.4 )
Seat 6: holee ( $97 )
acesup86 posts small blind [$1].
ForFour posts big blind [$2].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to acesup86 [ Kd Kc ]
awmahn folds.
QuickZipper folds.
NCSUpokerman folds.
holee calls [$2].
CoolRiverRon folds.
jaypops96 folds.
Ronin29 folds.
acesup86 raises [$9].
ForFour raises [$23].
holee folds.
acesup86 is all-In [$158.75]
>You have options at Delivate Fantasy Table!.
ForFour calls [$143.75].
** Dealing Flop ** [ 7s, 9h, 4d ]
** Dealing Turn ** [ 2d ]
** Dealing River ** [ 9s ]
ForFour shows [ Qh, Qs ] two pairs, queens and nines.
acesup86 shows [ Kd, Kc ] two pairs, kings and nines.
acesup86 wins $336.5 from the main pot with two pairs, kings and nines.

Originally Posted by Corey

I won the hand didnt I dale? Sounds like your getting pissy cause I played a hand like a fish.

Not pissy, my man, just trying to save you some money. Poker's a long-term game... you don't make money making calls that are bad in the long term. Personally it doesn't bother me however people choose to play, but if you're here to increase your profitability, I'll tell it like it is. That to me is the beauty of this site - the guys here who won't put up with the BS and just tell you flat out whether you played it right or not. 'rilla is a great example. Mr. Aces here is too.

Originally Posted by Corey

I knew my pot odds, but do you ever get that gut feeling of, fuck it? I mean fuck who cares about the math of poker get some balls and make the fucking call. If you catch you catch.

Oh yes. I've done it before, and I've sucked out before, and I've not sucked out too. Bottom line for me, you, or any other poker player who wants to make money though - you can't make that call regularly and be profitable. It's not about "fuck it" or having balls or any of that shit. It's only about making your reads and making good calls and raises. In this case, you're behind, the draw is not great - there's no money in this in the long-term sense. Most of the time when I've made that call it was because I was on tilt and not playing very well. Sucking out only helped justify bad decision-making on my part. I like getting the money, but it probably wasn't good for my development as a player having my bad play reinforced.

Again, not being pissy or anything like that. By all means play how you want to play. But if you want my advice (and you're not required to want it), this is a bad call - all feelings aside. Feelings don't matter. If you're behind, you're behind. Your odds are the same no matter what your gut tells you.