Playing AK out of the Blinds

The aspect of hold ‘em that most new players master first is pre-flop play. While it’s easy to get ‘lost’ in a hand on the flop, and tougher still to learn how to navigate the scores of tricky river situations that one is faced with in the course of a given session, the pre-flop decisions tend to be pretty straightforward. You’re dealt Q J offsuit under the gun, for example, and you fold. You have A J suited on the button after four limpers, so you raise. Hold ‘em is a game that can take years to master, but most serious students of the game can boast a pretty strong pre-flop game after as few as 100 hrs. of table time.

That said, there are some pre-flop situations that many new and intermediate players still have trouble with, and one of those is figuring out how to play AK out of the blinds. This week we’re going to explore this situation, and look at the factors one should consider when deciding whether to raise or flat call.

Situation 1: When 1-2 other players will be seeing the flop with you.
If I’m playing a ‘short’ pot, where only a couple other players are in the hand, my decision on whether or not to raise pre-flop with AK in the blinds hinges on whether I think my opponents will lay down their hands if they more-or-less miss the flop. For example: If the flop comes something like Q T 6, I want to be against players who will fold hands like K 9, or 8 8, if I bet this flop after having raised pre-flop. The reason for the pre-flop raise here is that it essentially helps you set up a steal play on the flop. If you don’t think you can steal on the flop if you miss, then you may just want to flat call and see how the hand develops.

Also, there is a type of opponent who will almost always ‘put you on AK’ if you raise pre-flop. This kind of player—who usually has calling station tendencies to begin with—will gleefully call you down with any pair if there’s no A or K on the flop. Against this type you obviously would just want to flat call pre-flop, since you’ll be able to then represent a larger range of hands on the flop if you should decided to semi-bluff.

Situation 2: When 3-4 other players will be seeing the flop with you.
In a spot like this I’ll raise pre-flop over 90% of the time; in fact, it’s as close to an ‘automatic’ pre-flop play as there is. With 3-4 other players involved, you stand to win a nice pot if an A or a K falls on the flop; something that will happen about 30% of the time. Also, if you miss the flop your hand has become fairly easy to play, since you rarely need to concern yourself with trying to bully your ace high hand through a field of five players. When the flop comes T 9 5, for example, you simply check and hope for a free look at the turn. If someone bets you evaluate your pot odds, and if they’re favorable you take a look at the turn (hint: if the flop is a ‘rainbow’, there will be enough money already in the pot to justify taking a look at the turn for one small bet. If the board is two-suited you’d probably need to have running flush possibilities in order for a call on the flop to be a ‘no brainer’).

Situation 3: When 5+ players will be seeing the flop with you.
Now here’s where it gets interesting. When considering whether or not to raise in a spot like this, there is one prevailing consideration; i.e., are your opponents the types of players that are just as likely to chase a long shot draw in a medium sized pot (the kind of pot you’ll have if you don’t raise) as they are in a large pot (the pot you’ll have built if you raise pre-flop)? If the rest of the table is filled with incorrigible chasers, then you might as well raise pre-flop. If, however, they’re the type of players who take the pot size into account, then you may just want to knuckle.

Why is this? Because against players who account for the pot size you’ll be giving them fewer chances to make mistakes by raising pre-flop. With a pot that’s near 15 small bets before the flop action commences, everyone will be getting the proper pot odds to continue on with whatever goofy draw they happen to flop. Also, note that even if you’re able to check raise a late position bettor on the flop your opponents will still be getting in the neighborhood of 6:1—9:1 on a flop call. Considering their implied odds, this makes it correct for them to call with all types of hands like gutshots, mid pair with a running flush out, etc. etc.

Since these players are accounting for the pot size, though, they may fold these hands on the flop if you don’t toss in a pre-flop raise. This means that you’ll be winning smaller pots, but that you’ll be winning the pots more often. With hands like AK (and other big but vulnerable hands, like Q Q, J J, T T, A Q offsuit, A J offsuit, etc.), your chances of winning the pot when a lot of people see the turn go down faster than the size of the pot goes up. Thus, you’d like to do what you can to keep as many people as possible away from the turn card. Frequently this means just checking in the blind in a multi-way pot, and going for a check-raise on the flop if you hit it. If your opponents do in fact factor in the pot size when making their flop decisions, you’ll be able to get them to fold far, far more often on the flop with mediocre hands if you keep the pot small before the flop.

Against terrible players, however, this doesn’t apply. If they’re all going to the river anyway, then you might as well raise pre-flop. Note that by raising pre-flop you’re not diminishing your chances of actually winning the pot, because everyone is going to try to chase you down anyway. But, you are building yourself a bigger pot for those times that you do win. This last concept cannot be over emphasized. If your chances of winning the pot are going to stand at around 30% regardless of whether you raise pre-flop, then a raise simply means that the 30% of the pots which you win will be as big as possible. You raise your variance slightly by raising pre-flop here, but that slight upswing is more than mitigated by your large increase in expectation.

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Other Poker Strategy Articles:
AK in Late Position
Poket Pairs vs. Suited Connectors
Some River Considerations