AA played too slow?

[TylerDurden]

A hand from a $15 turbo SNG on stars, I played this hand somewhat slow since after the flop I had isolated and figured I wanted to give him a chance to catch up a little, I actually read him for unimproved AK or AQ.

Incidentally, this is not remotely my standard AA play, I would raise raise raise 99% of the time but with position and considering his raise was big enough to get it 3 way at most I didn't want to reveal my hand too much with a reraise preflop. Later on I made moderate bets to keep him along.

As you can see, it all worked out and I destacked him rather than getting the smaller pot that I'd probably have gotten if I'd reraised bigger at any point, but I'm left wondering if I played this right, of course I'd never usually play aces like this but in this particular set of circumstances I'm not so sure.


PokerStars Game #1638421910: Tournament #7619759, Hold'em No Limit - Level I (10/20) - 2005/05/04 - 21:07:21 (ET)
Table '7619759 1' Seat #6 is the button
Seat 1: pollock024 (1340 in chips)
Seat 2: dorado12 (1700 in chips)
Seat 3: Duxley (1480 in chips)
Seat 4: INTIMITATOR (1380 in chips)
Seat 5: iamgod1234 (1390 in chips)
Seat 6: Bitmonkey (1540 in chips)
Seat 7: nickangel (1480 in chips)
Seat 8: birmingham10 (1480 in chips)
Seat 9: vega69 (1710 in chips)
nickangel: posts small blind 10
birmingham10: posts big blind 20
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to Bitmonkey [Ah As]
vega69: calls 20
pollock024: folds
dorado12: folds
Duxley: folds
INTIMITATOR: raises 80 to 100
iamgod1234: folds
Bitmonkey: calls 100
nickangel: folds
birmingham10: folds
vega69: calls 80
*** FLOP *** [9d 3c Td]
vega69: checks
INTIMITATOR: bets 100
Bitmonkey: raises 140 to 240
vega69: folds
INTIMITATOR: calls 140
*** TURN *** [9d 3c Td] [9s]
INTIMITATOR: bets 100
Bitmonkey: raises 300 to 400
INTIMITATOR: raises 640 to 1040 and is all-in
Bitmonkey: calls 640
*** RIVER *** [9d 3c Td 9s] [6s]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
INTIMITATOR: shows [5s 5h] (two pair, Nines and Fives)
Bitmonkey: shows [Ah As] (two pair, Aces and Nines)
Bitmonkey collected 2890 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 2890 | Rake 0
Board [9d 3c Td 9s 6s]
Seat 1: pollock024 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 2: dorado12 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 3: Duxley folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 4: INTIMITATOR showed [5s 5h] and lost with two pair, Nines and Fives
Seat 5: iamgod1234 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 6: Bitmonkey (button) showed [Ah As] and won (2890) with two pair, Aces and Nines
Seat 7: nickangel (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 8: birmingham10 (big blind) folded before Flop
Seat 9: vega69 folded on the Flop

[dsaxton]

I don't see anything wrong with the play. It looks like the blinds were starting to get to the point where players start making some reckless plays out of desperation, and you could probably expect him to bluff on the flop if you showed some weakness preflop. As long as you're raising on every subsequent round, I don't see a problem here.

I saw a hand of the Poker Superstars Invitational where Chip Reese just called Gus Hansen before the flop with A-A to induce Gus to bluff on the flop. When Gus bluffed, Chip moved all-in.