What would you do?

[daneo68]

Iceman, Since I have only been playing on line for a short time I would like your opinion of a hand I played:

The table is a .25-.50 nl full table. I am on the BB and hit [Ac]. UTG +1 raises to $1.00 and MP raises $2.50 pre flop. I have a stack of about $25 and make the decision to move all in. My thinking is due to the size of the table, I could steal the pot of about $5 or someone would call, and I like my chances. Sure enough UTG +1 folds and MP calls without hesitation. Flop, Turn and River produce nothing and chips slide my way to double up. MP mucks his hand and leaves the table immediately so I could not see what he had. Was this the right play? Should I have played it different?

[iceman5]

Most of the time, I would reraise to about $6 or $7, but there have been times in a game like this one where Ive gone all in preflop. Nobody will believe you have a AA when you do that. Even if they both fold, you still win 8 times the BB with no risk at all. Thats not a bad proposition.
I know a guy who did an experiment and went all in preflop every time he had AA or KK (maybe AK also, I forget) and he got called a suprisingly large precentage of the time.
This wont work at higher stakes though.

[excession]

that guy was me! - it was on the PS 25c/50c tables and the call rate for my all-ins was 40%

it helped that I bought in at $20 on a $50 table so folks were willing to gamble against the 'short stack'

[daneo68]

Excession, yes it was on PS. If you don't mind me asking, what did you call with? I had the same thing happen again the next day at PS. I again got AA on BB only this time I was on the .50/1.00 nl. Only started with a stack of $40 and was at $36.50. MP raises to $5 and I immediately go all in. MP called the all in with JJ. I won that hand as well ending up with a Straight. Again, I don't know if this is the correct play, but it has worked for me so far. I will say that I probably am not experienced enough, (nor do I have the bank roll) to be playing at that level. gl

[Jav]

If you think there is a decent chance that you will get called by a dominant hand, then going all-in pre-flop with AA is a great play.

The key to your hand is that two people had already raised. The re-raiser is announcing that he really likes his hand, and it can be hard for someone to fold that kind of hand.

Many of the times you will just win the bets already in the pot (which isn't bad especially since you then have a 0% chance of getting outdrawn). But when you do get called, you will generally only get called by hands like KK, QQ, AK, and JJ. All of these hands play very poorly against AA.

[excession]

For the experiment I went all-in or called all-in with any of AA,KK,QQ or AK

Nowadays I tend to re-raise all-in over the top with AA against anyone and with KK or QQ vs any player with pfr% of 5% or more.

I only go all-in with AK when limped to by several players when I'm in the blinds as a rule (and usually as a one off early to try to establish an image as a 'bad' player.

I can only imagine calling all-ins with AA KK or QQ (and I'd look very carefully at PT stats on the bettor before calling with KK or QQ).

I'ts certianly a worthwhile move on the low stake NL tables as so many folks call you with rubbish, but you need to have a lot of patience with bad beats sometimes..

I had a dreadful run of 5 in a row last week - I got all-in pre-flop as follows:
AA vs KK (lost to trip kings)
KK v ATo (lost to Ace on flop)
QQ v AKs (hit set but lost to river flush)
KK v QJs (flush again); and
AKs vs AQo (yep the queen paired)

I then got AA and KK and just won the blinds with them!!

But so long as you have the roll, all-ins are a very profitable move in the fishy waters of the NL $50 ring games...