I know it's a very rare play but if the stacks are deep enough can you fold kings before the flop? I know DN said he'd never done it and Harrington thought it was stupid and certainly it's fairly impossible in a tournament with the blinds as high as they are. But if you've got enough chips... TJ Cloutier says that on the first level at the WSOP two kings isn't a big enough hand to go broke with before the flop. Here's the hand from tonight that got me:

$1/$2 No-Limit at the MGM-Grand, playing 8-handed.

Hero is UTG+1 with $240
Villain is CO with $260 (and the only player with more than $140)

I'd been there for about five hours and had an up and down run (hand gets cracked, double up, hand gets cracked, double up, hand gets cracked, double up) but recently got winner for $120 on the night. Every hand I showed was a top starting hand and the villain had been playing for about 90 minutes and seemed a fairly solid player, mostly picking on the people that couldn't fold A7.

Preflop:
Hero is dealt K K .
UTG Limps for $2.
Hero raises to $10.
3 Folds.
Villain raises to $30 (20 more).
3 Folds.
Hero raises to $110 (80 more).
Villain raises to $260 (all-in).
Hero calls off $130 (all-in).
Villain shows A A (at least my suits were live)

I don't
crack aces and a good night gets shipped to the other side of the table. I think I went wrong on with my second raise. I overbet the pot and was pretty well committed to it at that point. When he moved in I was getting 3-1 on the call and had to be right almost 100% of the time since I'm only a 4-1 dog. If I'd only raised another $50 or $60 then that 4th raise would have left me stammering but I probably could have saved my last $150. I knew he had a good hand (AA, KK, QQ, JJ, AK and maybe TT or AQ) when he re-raised and that 4th raise, 99.99% pure aces.

Maybe.

If you're exceptionally deep stacked, and so is the villain, maybe. And only then if you have an incredible read, or, he happens to turn his hand face up.

Kings run into aces from time to time, I don't make it a habit to fold Kings preflop.

I wouldnt make it a habit either. If you play with the guy day in and day out then mabe. But a guy I ahve never met I am in all day. I have seen too many people make the same play with jj and QQ. I figure if I win more than 50% of these I will be fine.

I agree with you.

You did overbet and he pushed. That to me is a move someone does only with Aces, although more than a few jackasses play 1/2 nl in a casino.

But, you said he seemed OK.

I might've folded here.

I've never folded KK pf. There are situations where you could argue it but I dont think that this is one of them. With your stack size after the reraise you are just not getting away from them.

Phil Gordon's book say that the 4th raise means aces. His belief is that the only way a person will make a 4th raise is if they have pocket aces, everyone else will stop at three. Plus he limped utg until you showed strength. Still a tough laydown that I don't think I am good enough to make.

Phil Gordon's book say that the 4th raise means aces. His belief is that the only way a person will make a 4th raise is if they have pocket aces, everyone else will stop at three. Plus he limped utg until you showed strength. Still a tough laydown that I don't think I am good enough to make.

Phil Gordon's book say that the 4th raise means aces. His belief is that the only way a person will make a 4th raise is if they have pocket aces, everyone else will stop at three. Plus he limped utg until you showed strength. Still a tough laydown that I don't think I am good enough to make.

Hey guys... Phil Gordon's book say that the 4th raise means aces.

=)


that said, before I took my head out of my ass and learned a thing or 2 about poker I would have done this with qq jj or even like AK suited.

I know it's a very rare play but if the stacks are deep enough can you fold kings before the flop?

No.

Stop asking.

good luck.

Live play, I could fold 20% of the time, and only when the other player is ABC or just a tell machine. Online, the money goes in.

I folded them once, and I was right - up against Aces. I thought about doing it 2 other times, but I didn't have enough evidence to do it, so I called, and both of those times it was the Aces too.

I wouldn't make a habit of it, but once in a blue moon, if all the signs point to Aces, it might be wise to save yourself the money. Once in a BLUE MOON.

In a cash game I would lay down KK after he went all in. Even if I had put in a much as you already did (because, like you said you still would have had $150) My experience in cash games is that the 4th reraise before the flop is AA 99.99% of the time.

If you read Phil Gordon's book he says the same thing and he even tells a story about how he laid down KK in the final stages of a tourney against Phil Hellmuth (Hellmuth had AA).

I personally don't think I would ever lay down KK in a tourney especially in the early stages but in a cash game especially in 1/2 nlh (which i play a lot) it easy to tell when someone has AA before flop when so much raising has taken place.

I'm not saying I should fold on the end, my mistake was putting in the oversized 3rd raise ($80 more into a $65 pot). It was really dumb, it lets him fold jacks, queens or AK when I want a call and then against aces I'm committed and have to put in the rest of my chips. When he moved in I actually said, "Well, I think I just walked right into the cooler." and then put in the rest of my chips. I knew he had to have aces or kings but I was getting big odds and hoping I was wrong.

Folding Kings is a hard thing to do, no doubt. If you have less than 50BB it's impossible. Less than 100BB it's almost impossible. But when stacks are deeper than that (which they were in my case) you just have to know who you're playing against. In TJ Cloutiers book, I've come to disagree with a lot of his advice but the one thing he's absolutely right about is that if you're a good player and you stare down your man, your instincts are going to be right more often than a mathematical analysis of the situation.

BTW: I did a little mathematical analysis anyway. If you've got two kings and think you're opponent has to have either aces or kings then you have a 22.6% chance of winning the hand. So you'd need 3.4:1 or better to make the call. I was getting 2.7:1 and probably still should have folded. If I'd just raised 60 (instead of 80) more I would have still been getting 2.3:1 and hopefully would have dropped. More odds vs hand ranges.

Hand range: Win %
AA, KK - 22.6%
AA, KK, QQ - 50%
AA, KK, AKs - 38.3%
AA, KK, AK - 46.8%
AA, KK, AKs, QQ - 52.11%
AA, KK, AK, QQ - 55.8%
AA, KK, AK, QQ, JJ - 62.3%

So even against a fairly loose 4th raise you're only 62% which you have to take but I don't see a lot of good players won't go in for the 4th raise with less than AA or KK.

I have this exact same experience. Done it correctly once, thought I should do it a couple of other times but didn't, and ended up against AA. Same advice from me: Don't make it a habit, or even something you consider often. But if you're up a player who you just know isn't putting all their money in without AA or KK, and you hold KK....its time to pause at least

Mark

I thought I walked into this last night at a 1/2 table. Raised to $8 UTG at 7-handed table. Button min-raised. BB called. I re-raised around the pot. Button called. BB called. Flop came low. BB checked. I bet around 3/4 of the pot. Button moved in. BB folded. So much money in the pot that I had to call, and resignedly thought, "Show me aces." He flipped over queens, and I took down a monster. Don't know what he was thinking.

I think the only reason to fold KK PF would be something like, in a tournament, next player bubbles out, and three people are already all in. Then your fold can be worth a lot of money. But you're not in a tourn. of course.

Remember DN did the same thing a few months back in a tourney thinking he had some guy read for aces, and the guy turns up QQ instead after DN folds?

Kings run into aces once every 24 times you hold them approx. Play them for the nuts, and that 24th time when you actually run into aces... well, you at least have a 1 in 5 chance of sucking out trips.

I had a buddy who just loved pushing preflop with AA and KK. Those were the only hands he'd do it with. In 3 years, he pushed with them 95% of the time, and "weirdo pushed" with exactly 0 other hands.

Somebody mucked a king face up accidentally, and I had KK.

I raised, and he instapushed.

So I folded. I felt horrible about it after.

I did it one other time, but it was a really weird situation in a tournament.

wang

For some reason I had it in my brain it was about 1 in 40 times. Can someone confirm/deny?

Mark

1 in 24 is correct

NO WAY can you fold KK for 130 more here. There is about 370 in the pot it costs you 130 to call. If he has AK, QQ, JJ 1010 less than half the time here that means positive EV for you. I understand making good reads and when I am playing well I often call other peoples cards to a tee. But just as often as I think someone might have flopped a set of fours when the board reads A54 they actually flopped a set of fives.

The point being that when you are getting almost 3 to 1 on your money with the second best hand in the game you don'f fold it because you aren't going to be dead right 100% of the time. If he raised you 1000 more than you could consider folding because now you aren't even getting a good price on your hand but for 130 more you have to have the courage to stick it in the pot. Its called a cooler and not even Phil Hellmuth could avoid that one.

Villain isn't the UTG limper.

Well said joe,

You can construe a situation where you should lay down kings (it's a tournament, blah blah blah) but in a cash game...no. Just get used to eating it when you run into aces and plan on reloading. If you can't reload, you're playing too high.

Now, postflop, this changes. This is one of the reasons I don't like pushing preflop.

I did it just ten minutes ago. Multiple raises prelfop, two all ins in from of me with fairly deep stacks. Turns out I had the best hand, was queens vs jacks. Dude ended up tripping jacks so I felt better about myself.

Well, this is bad advice. You should actually be more likely to fold kings since you can get much deeper stacked. If you've got 300 bb in front of you, you're against a tight opponent who's got you covered, and you're willing to give up your whole stack under any circumstance with KK, you've got a leak in your game.

If you ever lay down kings in a game, w/o a solid read, you honestly suck.

You shouldn't. It was a terrible fold. Folding KK when it is good is a far bigger mistake than calling against AA even when you suspect he may have it.

1 in 24 sounds about right for a full table game.

ummm.

Thanks a lot buddy. If you don't make big laydowns once in a while, you're not really thinking. Was it a mistake? Perhaps. Terrible? not remotely. Iggy understands stack depth.

Doesn't Phil Gordon say this also?
Ok, that's a joke.

Tough, because that 4th raise from a solid tight player basically screams aces. And he's got you covered. Personally, I can fold. I'll probably need an extended smoke break, but I can live with it.

Then again, if there's any wiggle room in your read on the player, then like you say you're getting a not too-terrible price to call, but that's after you more-or-less priced yourself in. You could only wish that either a.) you hadn't re-raised quite so much; or b.) the stacks were even bigger and you wouldn't feel stuck on it.

The problem is, I don't see what a re-raise to $60 or even $80 would accomplish there. Could you have got off it if you'd re-raised to $90 and then he pushed?


Oh, and you're supposed to suck out.

If you are in a situation where you are genuinely afraid enough of losing your money that you will lay down kings, you need to cash out and take your winnings home. If you ran up your intial buy-in to 300BB once, you can do it again (unless you cleaned out the fish and the table got tough, in which case you should be cashing out anyway). Regardless the recurring theme here is that if you can't stand to lose what you have on the table, you should not be playing.

As I said, you can always contrue some elaborate situation. I suppose if you were in a cash game with 1,000,000 BB and there was one player with 1,000,001 BB and everyone else had 10,000BB and you had your case money on the table, then maybe you think about folding, if you know that the other chipzilla would ONLY risk it on aces...

But, if you have 300BB and are getting it all in preflop, you are probably making some other errors as well. Regardless, laying down kings is incredibly weak, and if you let yourself get pushed off that hand, you will get robbed blind, deaf, dumb, and insensate.

Not sure why any of this was directed at me.

I said maybe, if he happens to turn his cards face up, then I would.

No

No

I'm pretty sure I'd get dumber if I read this whole thread... so I just skimmed it, and I think this needs to be reiterated.

I wish Smash would post more here.

I wish he would too, but there's a lot of stupidity in this forum he'd have to put up with if he did.

The problem with having any success at all in limit hold'em (and smash has a lot) is it naturally makes you a limit hold'em intellectual elitist. It's a much more analytical, mathematical game, and us NL players like to just whip it out on the table and see who's is biggest.

They don't mix well with us plebian no limit players.

I love both games... but I always worry if I work on one too much it'll cost me in the other.

I broke a 6-max NL table last night. Feels good to be alive.

Ah, its been a while since I posted, this is a good enough thread to splash back in here.

You can only fold Kings preflop when you are absolutely certain your opponent has pocket Aces. Simple enough, right? Well, you are almost never in a situation you can put your opponent on only aces. You need to be playing against the tightest weakest mouse of all to know that their reraise means aces. You have to know for certain that would be the only hand they would push on.

So 95% of the time or greater, you are getting your money in there with kings. So it comes down to money management, you could call all in kings preflop every day all day and maybe one day you will run into aces three times in a session, it happens, so you gotta have enough of a bankroll to withstand losing some buy ins. Don't sweat it.

Never worry about losing a buyin in situations like these. Set over sets, overpair vs overpair, someone catching a flush, etc etc, they are no limit and any sort of poker's inevitabilities which you should be able to just shrug off.

Long story short, to the op's situation, you're playing your kings, esp live. You see his aces, the board doesn't help, dealer yells out, "chips on table 11" and you keep playing solid and getting your money in where it should get in.

GL at the tables.