Playing AK in early/middle of a tournament. |
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Posted Thu May 17, 2007 11:09 am GMT by AHBrownell
In the last couple night I've encountered two situations with AK and I've wondered how I should be playing it.
Okay, so the first hand came up between get_that and annette_15. Both are successful tournament players. Annette raised UTG with AK, it got to get_that on the button who reraised with 99. Annette put in a 3rd raise of about half her chips. Get_that moved all-in (he had about 5k, covering Annette's 3k), she called. This was about 30 minutes into the tournament. I was very shocked to see this play by both players.
I was curious if we think its worth taking these types of risks early in a tournament? I never do this myself, but watching two successful players stick it in with semi-strong hands competely surprised me.
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The second hand happened last night. I was UTG with AK during the 60/120 level of a 6-handed tournament. I raised it to 300, it was folded to the BB (with 2x my chips) who min-raised to 480. I was not sure what to do here so I made the cautious play and called. I missed the 9-high flop, he led out for about 3/5ths the pot, which looked weak so I called preparing to take it away on the turn. The turn was a Jack and my opponent now bet about 2/5ths the pot, which confused me - it looked weak, but it was still a substantial bet considering it was nearly 1k chips (the pot was now 3K+ chips). I was faced with making a play for all of my chips against a player I did not know very much info about (he had recently moved to my table) --- with Ace-King-high. I thought for a few seconds and decided that my 3.4K chips were enough that I could fold and pick a better spot.
What I am curious about - is what should I have done with this hand preflop? Should I have 3-bet it? Or should I have raised the flop? Folded the flop?
I find AK a very difficult hand to play when faced with a reraise in these relatively deep-stacked conditions. HELP! 
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Posted Thu May 17, 2007 2:08 pm GMT by Jauron
The first hand really depends on the situation. If it's a huge tourney with lots of people and it's early it is probably correct for each player to do what they did as you are generally more concerned with collecting chips than surviving early. The more players there are the more inclined you should be to gamble it up IMO. The few the players in the tourney the more conservative I get early on, especially if the blind structure is good. Some of this has to do with your edge as a player and how close you are to the money.
The second hand, stack sizes are going to make this decision a lot easier to make. If you are both deep I don't mind smooth calling and seeing a flop, if they are shortish I probably push here. If it is in the middle and we hold position I like the smooth call more often.
I don't normally get very sticky with AK, I either play it fast or give up to aggresion most of the time post flop. I don't like creating situations where I am calling for big chunks of my stack with it though, unless I am fairly short of the blinds are so big I have to.
Posted Fri May 18, 2007 7:46 am GMT by supafrey
I hope that first hand shows you how much of that "I need to save my edge for better spots" logic is absolute bullshit.
Posted Fri May 18, 2007 7:54 am GMT by MrDarling
I guess that if you play loads of MTT's and you a properly BR'd to play those its a good move to take a race early on. If you double up early you can pretty much push the table around to increase your edge, and if you bust - well, you can shortly play another one.
For the rest of us, who works like dogs to qualify to a big tournament that might not be the best option. If it took me 3 stages of S&G's to get to sit in an MTT, I do not want to race early on. Maybe its a mistake. Or weak. But hell, I'm a weak MTT player.
Posted Fri May 18, 2007 8:45 am GMT by Jernej Zorec
despite Anette being aggro and her open range from utg is silly wide
after 3 bet i cant see get_that to be ahead
but what pav said is absolutely right
Posted Fri May 18, 2007 3:04 pm GMT by xDiamond_CutteRx
| supafrey wrote: | | I hope that first hand shows you how much of that "I need to save my edge for better spots" logic is absolute bullshit. |
I'm glad someone said it.
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