Semi-new player here, need advice about strategy w/ KK.

[Phantaroth]

Background info: I've been playing poker for about one and a half years, only low stakes or free. I do have experience, but not with more advanced games, and not that much experience winning tournaments.

Ok so I was in a MTT 1$ tournament on pokerstars, i was in aboutttt 150th position out of 450 people left, i get dealt KK in the small blind. I have 6,500 chips. This guy in bad position goes all in for his 800 or so chips. There There are a few guys to act after me, so hoping to see a re-raise i simply call the original all in bet. There is one other call and we go to the flop.

The flop is 6 3 9 Hearts. I'm first to act, and I go all in hoping to get a call with QQ or JJ or 10 10 or Ace of hearts. He calls but unfortuantly, he has A9 hearts and obviously wins the hand.

If anyone can critique this or offer up some advice, that'd be helpfull!

Thankyou.

[WildBobAA]

Don't mess around if you don't want to get outdrawn. Raise make it 3000 or so PF.

[guldus]

in the good ol days he wouldve been shot for havin the 2nd nine of hearts.

[chardrian]

It's that new Stars tourney where they play with 2 decks.

[Phantaroth]

My mistake then the flop was 63 something else, but the flop numbers weren't really important to the situation. :P

[chardrian]

What were the blinds?

Bob's response covers it though. When you call with a monster (KK or AA) you are inviting them to get beat. I'm not saying this is a horrible approach, becuase you can also destack other players by doing so. But when they do actually get beat, you need to realize that you sort of asked for it.

[Sprayed]

I push it or reraise. I want 1 or 2 people in only.

[Phantaroth]

BB was 150 if i remember correctly.

I understand the risks of getting beat when trying to do stuff like that with big hands, but more specifically... If you guys -were- doing that and the flop comes 3 hearts, all low cards, no straight draw, what do you do?

I'm probley still going to play a style of how I currently play pre flop, but I'd rather work on not getting beat after the flop Like I did in the above situation.

Now, the obvious answer is for me not to push all in... But I still feel like I have to bet big. Since im first to act, if I check and he has like AQ, Ace of hearts, he can check and get a free turn. I don't want that.

So what would you suggest I do? The pot is already about 2,400, and i have 5,800 chips left when im first to act with KK with three low hearts on the board.

[chardrian]

You are looking for an answer in how to save your chips post flop here.

Unfortunately, in this situation, there is no answer. You have to bet that flop and with your amount of chips left you are going to pay off any raise because there is too much of a chance that your opp has the hands you listed above.

Sometimes there is really nothing you can do about getting knocked out of a tourney. The planets weren't aligned for you on this one and they were for your opp. If you had more chips then maybe through a series of raises and previous reads you could put your opp on a higher hand then yours and lay it down. But you don't have enough ammo to make that read.

Good thing there's always another tourney.

[gabe]

no problem with it, just be prepared to lose

[Phantaroth]

I'm fine with losing, I just try and make better decisions next time and I wasn't sure how I should have played this one instead

[Easy17]

the only thing you might have tried is to push preflop and hope to push the A9 out.

but in low stakes tourneys like $1 people will go all in with A9 np, so i think your preflop wasnt too too bad. Pushing the flop is what you should do there, if he is going all in on a flush draw, he is behind in the hand and generally you will win most of those. If its higher stakes or hes a better player he may fold that draw to a big enough bet.

but your particular situation i think theres nothing you can do here to avoid getting destacked, other than playing really weak tight, checking flop and folding when the flush hit. But thats going to be losing you $ over time even if you saved it on that hand.