Big Blind Big Slick

I really hate Ace-King.

I mean, I don’t hate it like I hate, say, frostbite or Justin Bieber.  You know, that unreasonable and unrivaled brand of hatred.  I hate Ace-King more like I hate pre-season football.  You’re very excited at first, but it so often lets you down…

Sophisticated poker players know it’s nothing more than the largest of drawing hands, and should be laid down with ease post-flop in the event you do not connect with the board.  But the patient player also knows how frustrating this lay-down can be when you’ve waited sixty-five hands to see A-K of diamonds, and the flop is 8-9-10 of spades.

Even the savviest of rounders can get stubborn with this hand and lose more than they should.  This is particularly true in limit hold’em.  In no-limit hold’em, you’ll more than likely take the flop with three or fewer opponents, as you’ll raise an appropriate amount pre-flop to limit the action.  In limit hold’em, however, you must raise in small predetermined increments.  This, of course, does not slim the field as effectively, and your A-K will often run up against four to six opponents.

Post-flop play contains similar obstacles.  In a no-limit game, you may bet three-quarters of the pot when your opponents check the 3-9-10 board.  These same opponents may even lay down hands like 6-6, 7-7, 8-8 or A-9 when you bet.  Being able to bet larger amounts, obviously, has the advantage of controlling the pot and limiting calling stations and gross suckouts.  You do not have this advantage in limit hold’em.  Nobody is folding A-9 on a 3-9-10 flop for $8.

But I digress.  This article is not meant to teach anybody A-K strategy.  Everybody has their own brand of winning big-slick play.  I simply want to discuss a typical A-K limit hold’em situation.

8-16 hold’em.  I’m in the big blind.  Five players limp, as does the small blind.  I look down at A-K offsuit.  I sigh and raise the field.  Everybody calls.  The flop is 3-4-10 and I check fold.

I realize this play looks unreasonably weak to your average player.  If I’m going to raise pre-flop, I need to continue firing bets on the flop, right?  Well, that’s not the way I see it.  I raise pre-flop because I figure to have the best hand.  I have no illusions of slimming the field.  That does not register as a justification to simply check my hand in the big blind, as so many novice poker players will attempt to argue. (“Well, I wasn’t going to get anybody out anyway!”  Why would you want people to fold when you have the best chance of winning?)

Furthermore, checking the flop is a must.  You have too many opponents.  What is the best possible outcome of betting?  Four or five of your opponents fold, leaving you heads-up or three-handed, out of position?  Then what do you do when the 9 comes on the turn?  Continue your farce?

I suppose it’s a pick your poison type of A-K anguish.  I choose to raise pre-flop when I likely have the best of it, and check to six opponents when I whiff.  This is quite dissatisfying and frustrating.  To me, however, it’s a preferable frustration to checking pre-flop and folding on the flop (failing to double the size of the pot when you have the best chance of winning) or raising pre-flop and getting stubborn with it, continuation betting your head into the wall (a far more expensive and tilt-inducing brand of A-K anguish).