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Aces In The Big Blind?


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Unless I'm wrong again, raising with 2-2 would be a bad idea. There are only 2 cards in the deck that are going to help out of the 50 unseen cards. And if you don't hit your set, you are behind, unless by some freak instance 4 different people have A-K, four more have J-Q, and the other one has 3-4 and the flop is 7-8-9. Calculate the odds of that! Even if you hit your set, you are going to have people with hands like 4-4 and 5-5 getting odds to hit their set. Not to mention the gutshots and runner runner draws that will correctly call.
Don't worry about what happens postflop when raising preflop, when you know it's going to be a community pot. You can always c/f the flop, or proceed with drawing according to your odds.Think in terms of equity preflop. I don't have pokerstove here, but I'll run 22 vs say top 40% hands for 9 limpers, or even a random hand, and see if our equity is >10. If it is, then it's a value raise, believe it or not. It seems very counter-intuitive, but when you really think about it, it makes sense.I can further explain the implications of equity when I get home, if need be.- ZachEDIT - 22 vs 9 random hands has a 12% equity. Since 12 > 10, raising is profitable, albeit marginally. Furthermore, if they are all limping with better than average hands, our equity actually increases, as it implies a lot of their pair outs are gone.
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After reading the ton of excellent responses (special thanks to Caneda, Actuary and Zach :club: ), I can now see how my argument was fundementally flawed. I suppose two things in my mind were prevailent in my mind when making my arguments. 1) The tons of times I have been stung with aces in a family/community pot situation where I play them exactly how I'm supposed to and still get sucked out on.2) Short term does not equal long term. My thought of saving bets preflop does not make me more money over the long term. Thanks to posts like those above, it reenforces why I come to General Strat on FCP to learn instead of the 2p2 forums.

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I pretty sure I won't be raising 22-55 out of the blinds.Even if I ever do get 8 limpers.given no one is committed to SD, I don't think our smal preflop equity edge warrants the raise. We will almost always have odds to see a turn anyway..I would raise T9s as I've said before.I can't defend this vehemently.+ 1 For Strategy Forum!!!!

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I pretty sure I won't be raising 22-55 out of the blinds.Even if I ever do get 8 limpers.given no one is committed to SD, I don't think our smal preflop equity edge warrants the raise. We will almost always have odds to see a turn anyway..I would raise T9s as I've said before.I can't defend this vehemently.+ 1 For Strategy Forum!!!!
Most of us aren't raising 22-55. Like I said, our equity is 12%. We aren't missing out on that much by just limping.
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Most of us aren't raising 22-55. Like I said, our equity is 12%. We aren't missing out on that much by just limping.
Plus then if we hit our set, we can go for a huge check raise on the turn, as long as someone bets.
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The only thing I can add is I see why there is confusion in this scenario.First, people hate getting there aces cracked. It always seems that border line is the 50%. If aces don't hold up most of the time when you raise in these situations, why bother.Second, a lot of strategy says you need to be deceptive(lesser so with LHE) but there situations where you do not do the proper move at one time to get better EV out of another.Combine these two facts and it makes sense that people can find creative reasons not to play the AA for a raise in this situation.Misguided but I hope it's understandable to those being a little hard on these poor folks. For those who think they should not raise, just listen to all the facts that have been stated.And if by chance you run into this scenario and feel like mixing it up. WHY?If you have ten limpers, they will be oblivious to anything but the big wad of cash in the pot. The last thing they are thinking of is if you have aces, 72o or you peter hanging out on the table. They're in for the money and will find any excuse to stick around for it. That's the case with most donks without having the full table calling araise.So in this case do the proper EV move and raise on the BB.2cents(not even)

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Second, a lot of strategy says you need to be deceptive(lesser so with LHE) but there situations where you do not do the proper move at one time to get better EV out of another.
This is where people need to review FPS (Fancy Play Syndrome).
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The only thing I can add is I see why there is confusion in this scenario.First, people hate getting there aces cracked. It always seems that border line is the 50%. If aces don't hold up most of the time when you raise in these situations, why bother.Second, a lot of strategy says you need to be deceptive(lesser so with LHE) but there situations where you do not do the proper move at one time to get better EV out of another.Combine these two facts and it makes sense that people can find creative reasons not to play the AA for a raise in this situation.Misguided but I hope it's understandable to those being a little hard on these poor folks. For those who think they should not raise, just listen to all the facts that have been stated.And if by chance you run into this scenario and feel like mixing it up. WHY?If you have ten limpers, they will be oblivious to anything but the big wad of cash in the pot. The last thing they are thinking of is if you have aces, 72o or you peter hanging out on the table. They're in for the money and will find any excuse to stick around for it. That's the case with most donks without having the full table calling araise.So in this case do the proper EV move and raise on the BB.2cents(not even)
This is the biggest EV opportunity you are going to have in this hand unless you flop a boat or quads. There's NO reason to not take advantage of it.Secondly, mixing yup your play refers to stuff like c/r TPTK instead of leading out, etc... This is way too big of an edge to give up.Also, I know you aren't telling us to check, I'm just adding to what you said :club:- Zach
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I remember a long discussion once about whether it was ever proper to fold pocket As pre-flop in a tournament situation.This reminds me of that, and smash going ballistic on people that said there were indeed times when you should fold pocket As pre-flop.smash: "You obviously hate money"In LHE, not raising AA pre-flop from the BB with limpers = hating money.MontyPS There is one isolated situation where you should fold AA pre-flop in a tourney, but that's obviously another flame-worthy discussion.

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For the record, there is a situation outlined in Harrington on Hold'em where it is MATHEMATICALLY correct to fold AA preflop. I actually read an article in Canadian Poker Player while I was bored as hell getting dealt 8-high for an hour straight at the casino tonight.It's specific to a satellite tournament situation however, and it's a very rare occurrence, obviously.You're bang on about not raising in the BB = hating money though :club:- Zach

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