Sick of Slick - Part III

In my last column, I outlined my view of how to play A-K as the first one in when playing no-limit hold'em with blinds of 50-100 and a stack size of 3,000, about 30 big blinds. My recommendation was as follows: With A-K suited, usually make a normal raise. On occasion, especially if you are comfortable with your opponents, limp in with the intention of going all in if raised. Tend to avoid the limp and reraise play with A-K offsuit. There are two reasons for this: If you get all in against another A-K, he may be suited and a small favorite. More importantly, you lose the opportunity of doubling up with a flush versus a flush.

What if your stack is much smaller? I would tend to play the same way with a stack down to about 15 big blinds. As my stack gets smaller, I will stop attempting the limp and reraise play. There is less to gain if I am lucky enough to make a flush over a flush. The blinds that constitute the pot represent an ever-increasing percentage of my stack. Winning just the blinds will increase my stack by 10 percent or more.

By the time I have less than 10 big blinds, I am just going to move all in unless I pick up a tell that someone on my left is about to raise. Then, I'll let him raise and move all in when it gets back to me. Why is it correct to move all in rather than make a normal raise? Let's look at the math. If I have 900 (nine big blinds) and raise to 300, and someone reraises enough to put me all in, the pot is at least 1,350 (150 in blinds, my 300, and his 900.) It costs me 600 to call. I am getting odds of almost 2.5-1. The only hand that is favored over my hand by more than that is two aces. I am a small dog to pairs lower than kings, pick 'em against another A-K, and a favorite over any other two big cards. So, what is wrong with making the normal raise and then making the automatic call if there is a reraise? The flaw in this strategy is that I'm not putting enough pressure on my opponents. A lot of the time, one or more of them will flat-call. Two-thirds of the time, I will miss the flop and have to guess what to do next. There is no reason to leave myself with a tough decision. I simply move in preflop and let them make the tough decision. This way, I will always see all five boardcards.

What if the stack is much bigger - say, 50, 100, or even more big blinds? Now it is true deep-stack poker. For those of you who play mostly tournaments, this will seldom occur after the first few levels. For those of you who play mostly cash games, this will be a normal state of affairs. As the game goes on, the winners will always have deep stacks, and very often, the losers will rebuy for as much as they can in an attempt to get even by winning a big pot from one of the winners. If you are extremely uncomfortable playing a deep stack, you are forced to quit after winning a few pots. This means that you end up leaving some very good games, with steaming losers. It is much better to become comfortable playing a deep stack. (Many games establish a cap, maximum loss per hand. This allows cowardly winners to keep on playing and also keeps the losers in action, since they can't rebuy for some humongous amount and lose it in one hand. While I don't like caps from a theoretical point of view, I do like the fact that a cap will often keep a game going much longer than it would have gone without the cap. It is certainly no fun to lose a big pot, and then have the winner quit because he doesn't want to risk losing everything back in one hand.)

I wish I could give you some simple foolproof guidelines for playing A-K with a deep stack. In fact, I wish someone could give me some. As the first one in, it is generally correct to make a normal raise. It is also generally correct to make a normal continuation-bet on most flops, whether they are helpful or not. The problems come when you are raised, either preflop or on the flop. At this point, you probably have at most 10 percent of your stack in the pot. You certainly don't want to put in the other 90 percent as a big dog. On the other hand, you can't keep throwing away your good hands every time someone raises or reraises. So, what is the right thing to do? As they say, "it depends." In a live game, you can rely on tells, patterns, and gut feelings. These are the spots where players with great table feel excel. The real superstars, from Doyle Brunson to Daniel Negreanu and Gus Hansen, are sometimes incredibly accurate in making these decisions. I can't tell you how they do it. I'm sure that there are many occasions when they couldn't tell you, either. In my next column, I will try to give you some ideas about what to look for, and will examine some deep-stack situations.

Steve "Zee" Zolotow, aka The Bald Eagle, is a successful games player. He currently devotes most of his time to poker. He can be found at many major tournaments and playing on Full Tilt, as one of its pros. When escaping from poker, he hangs out in his bars on Avenue A - Nice Guy Eddie's on Houston and Doc Holliday's on 9th Street - in New York City.