Be forewarned! This is going to be another "Aisthesis special" of over-analysis (comments as always very much appreciated).

I also started to put this in the B&M section because it definitely presupposes that you know your opponents and that they know you. In my case: extremely tight table image, essentially I'm an aggressive rock, and everyone pretty much knows it who has played with me. I'm also dealing here with a 2/5 NL game.

I should also, in light of this fact, also perhaps begin with my own raising policy: It's quite simply JJ-AA and AK. I was going only QQ-AA and AK for a while, but, in the long run, I think this gives AK too prominent a position against the big pairs. JJ also creates an addition "scare set," the value of which will become clear in some of the situations I'll deal with here.

Ok, my immediate motivation here is yet another KK vs. AA disaster to the tune of $500. I raise to $25, tight player (with a little PF looseness at times) re-raises to $60 (!), and I just move in. I don't really regret the all-in here, but I think I should have given him a "bad call" opportunity by going to $180 first. I do have a very short list (to which my opponent in the above hand now belongs but didn't before this one) of players against whom I am capable of laying down KK to a re-raise. Anyhow, I think, against players where you don't "know they have AA" here (and, as I say, there are very few), you can give QQ or AK a tempting call. But I suppose for the moment, I'm still calling the all-in with KK if someone comes back over the top yet again (with a few exceptions).

So, I guess the first part of my analysis is this: This player made a serious mistake here imo by making his re-raise so small. I have clear odds to draw to the set, and, now that I "know" he's only capable of re-raising AA/KK, I know I am drawing for a K set against this player. Now, let's look back at my raising range. I think with bets this small (I think a lot of these B&M players are converts from limit and hence end up making a lot of moves like that), you can easily lay down AK, but you can call the re-raise with JJ-KK (AA is an obvious re-raise regardless of opponent for me, anyway), and your opponent, if he accurately assesses your range of hands, has 3 different scare cards to deal with (J, Q, K). For me, anyway, I think I need to have about 10% of total stack depth on the re-raise to make this call with JJ-KK--in other words, with my initial raise of $25 and a stack of $500 (this guy had me covered), I can still make the call even against tight re-raisers for up to about $75. But I know I'm drawing to a set here, even with KK. So, here's one opportunity for opponents to make a mistake that's fairly frequent at my tables since a lot of them are coming from limit.

Now, let's turn the PF positions around here, and I (or you) am in the position of being potential re-raiser against a tight raiser, who's going to have roughly the same range of raising hands as I do (I think with this player that's pretty accurate, as I recall his showing an unraised AQs at least once). I think this is a player against whom one really wants to re-raise AK--he's capable of laying down JJ/QQ and more than likely has one of those since your own hand reduces the instances of AA/KK. And if he raises to $25, the re-raise can't give him odds for his own set (whether or not he recognizes this fact), so I think about $100 is pretty good on AA/KK/AK. Just as additional note: This move, against tight players, should add some good equity to AK against tight players.

Now let's consider some of these loose raisers that I've run into. One group of them has a fairly identifiable $15 raise on little pairs. But they are divided into 2 groups: the bluffy group and the straightforward group. Ok, to begin with, against the bluffy group, I think it's critical to re-raise AA/KK to an amount where they clearly have no odds to hit a set on the flop. Basically, one is in a "must call" situation on any flop whatsoever. These guys also often play a bit short-stacked, but I think about 1/6 of stack-size as amount of re-raise is pretty good. For example, if both you and bluffy little pair have $500, you need to re-raise to about $100--if they call THAT for the set, it's just -EV every time. Now, honestly, against these opponents, I think it's clearly ok to make this re-raise on JJ-AA (even if a tight opponent is somewhere in the field, you can still lay down your JJ to a re-raise from tight opponent with as yet undeclared holdings, and, more than likely, you exclude him from the hand--e.g., if he has AK or QQ) as well as AK. What's critical, though, is that you do have your tight table image here. I think it will be quite a while before getting a caller to that re-raise.

But there's also a non-bluffy group that likes to raise these smallish pairs to around $15. With these opponents, you can get by with a re-raise to more like $60, because against them, you actually CAN lay down your AA if they represent a set. Against these guys, I think the re-raise range, though, can remain exactly the same and has exactly the same advantages--given one's tight table image. Both of these moves should increase the equity of your AK.

Ok, those are the two types of raisers against whom I think one can make various kinds of loose re-raises. Basically, against both tight and little pair raisers, it's safe to re-raise AK, and against the latter you can also add in JJ and QQ (I'm not completely confident about TT just yet, although one can definitely consider it, too). What's particularly important is NOT to re-raise QQ against the tight raiser, because you'll run into AA/KK much too often.

Now there's yet another category of loose raiser that I've observed (sometimes identical with little pair raiser, but this player makes a different raise for "big card" hands). This loose raiser can be raising JJ-AA or pretty much any decent ace (certainly including AJ, sometimes even KQ or AT) to around $25-$30. Against THIS kind of raise, I think you definitely want to re-raise only AA/KK. With any pair or with AK, it's better to flat call. With the pairs, I think the play is fairly obvious, but with AK, you get a sweet opportunity to drag along something like AQ or AJ when you both hit the ace (not particularly nice if your opponent hits 2 pair, but that's pretty unusual anyway and often identifiable). And you can just silently lay down your AK with no problems on flops where Q or J shows up as high card and the raiser likes the flop.

Against this kind of raiser, it might also not be such a bad move to re-raise only KK (you don't want to let them hit their A, obviously), simply because a flat call with AA can also give you a nice opportunity. The only problem I have with that is that a J, Q or K flop could also mean a set that cracks your aces, and you're in trouble yourself. So, it's probably better to just take down this kind of loose raise with AA right away as well. They've basically set you up to get a decent uncontested PF pot, and I don't mind doing that with AA, really. I don't know, I guess if you have AA and they like a J-high flop, then there are only 3 JJ hands over and against 6 AJ hands that they might have. But, I don't know, against me, if I were to flat call a raise with AA and bet it hard on the flop, they'd probably conclude that I had hit a set more than likely (and a JJ set would be good, AJ wouldn't). I don't know whether I really want to get into figuring out which one of those they have, actually, so I think I'll stick with re-raising AA here for the moment.

Any comments very much appreciated!

Thanks for the post Aisthesis, nice analysis. Playing high PP is so important, seems like on some days most of the profit comes from these.

bump.

Well, 2 pair is just a risk, but bear in mind that 2 pair is actually a horrible NLHE hand if that's what it takes to win. The main thing is that with 2 distinct cards (and it's the same for any 2), you only hit 2 pair 2% of the time or once in 50!!! So, the implied odds are actually horrible.

Essentially, if you're in a battle K3 (or KX) against AK and have to call a raise to $20 (4xBB at my table), then you have to win $1,000 every time you hit! I normally don't even have that kind of stack in front of me.

I really tend to just assume that anyone playing a hand that needs 2 pair to win is just oblivious to kicker issues and/or odds. They HAVE to be willing to go quite a long way with just their K, and, if I have AK, I'm going to let them--not betting the turn super hard (half-pottish), just dragging it along. If they play back at me, representing that they have my AK beat (on a KQ3 board or such), then I'll just have to decide whether or not I'm beat. The problem here is that they tend to get almost equally excited on the same board when they have K4.

I really think a lot of these players are in the "beginner" category, and playing against beginners isn't entirely trivial because they don't know the value of their own hands. So, they may actually be completely honest in representing a monster with the K pair, no kicker. It's somewhat frustrating and embarassing to lose hands against these guys, but I'm really trying to get over this psychological aspect. They're also usually somewhat passive (again being very uncertain about the value of their own hand), so you're going to be the one (usually--there are definite exceptions) who's putting out the bets as a general rule.

I think all you can really do is just go with a pretty secure hand that you know is strong, you'll win most, lose occasionally. And then just not worry much about the losses if you've played it correctly.

A couple of example, since a few nights ago, we had a couple of players in exactly this category.

First, a hand of mine: I have 88 and beginner has K6. Flop comes 865, and he bets into me about $25. I raise him to $100, and he moves in for a total of about $200. I'm pretty sure he has no clue regarding connectors, so I don't think he has the straight. Of course, the board turns into a straight, so we split the pot, but I have to have been something like 95% favorite when the chips went in.

Same player calls a raise from a decent player at the table who has AK. This time he has A3. Flop doesn't help either, and both check. Turn comes an ace. Decent player bets out around $25 (pot was probably $50--the decent player is often way too passive imo, but whatever), and beginner moves in for something like $125. Believe it or not, decent player lays down. The ensuing conversation was actually very revealing. Beginner actually thought he had the best hand!

This beginner is obviously not terribly passive, just completely oblivious to kickers. So, basically, if he makes his 2 pair, so be it, I'm going to double him up. But 98% (!!!) of the time he won't (at least not on the flop, but it's only a 3 outer on turn and river anyway), and he loses his stack (barring strange boards) to my TP strong kicker.

These sound like VERY interesting calculations, and I'll be most interested in seeing what you come up with.

I really think betting out AK (on any street if it comes to that) unimproved is a huge mistake against the kind of player who will call a raise with AX or KX. There's no telling, really, what they might have hit or what they might call.

If you're the initial raiser, the raise just has the effect of thinning the field and giving you additional leverage if you both hit in the way you want. The 2 pair is, at least in my thinking, really just an aggravation, and it does detract from your EV unless there's some way to identify it and lay down.

But the thing is, if someone's down for calling a $25 raise with K5, are they really going to then lay it down on a flop of KT2? I just don't see how they can. If they're not a rank beginner, they may start having second-thoughts on the turn, but they're already in so deep that the laydown gets more difficult still.

By the same token, I think this is also the kind of player where I don't want to make any kind of attempt to proceed with QQ if overcards show up.