AA in position facing a third raise on the flop

Game type: NL 6-max, cash game
Your image: You have picked off some bluffs with gutsy calls
Misc notes:
Your hand: A♠A♦

The setup: Preflop, Player A raises to $21, a little over 3x the BB. You decide to just call, and the blinds fold. The flop looks a little trickier than you’d like:

8♦7♠6♠

… but since your opponent rarely raises preflop, you feel comfortable about the strength of your hand. Player A leads out for $40, a bit under pot, and you raise to $100. Now Player A dink re-raises you, making it $191 total to go. You both have about 600 remaining behind. What’s your play?

9 COMMENTS (Jump to comment form)

John B.

I’ll push hard here. If he’s got a pair of 7′s or 8′s, good hand. If not, he probably has a pair like 99 to KK. Force him make the decision to play them or not.

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Mary

I fold, John’s idea about the pairs are good, I think the player you describe has AK in the spades, or John’s trips. I am always afraid of a reraise heads up.

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Andrew

I call, looking weaker than I am. He is forced to make a decent sized bet on the turn, acting first. Then I can get all his chips in. If i push on the flop he might be able to get away from it.

I really don’t care what card falls because I put him on kings, queens, or jacks. Maaayyybe tens, so if a 9 falls and his bet looks strong I might fold.

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drhoho

All in, definately.
If he really hit a set or str8, just bad luck.
Most likely he hit the overpair. No reason to fake weaknes, better chance he calls all in here than after a scarecard.
And if he should be on a draw, make him pay for it, dont want to get in trouble.

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Josek

Move all in. He can not have AK of spades cause im holding the Ace of spades. Since im holding the Ace of spades im not too worry about the flush draw.

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mykel

i agree with everything DHQ says except the more sophistocated the player, the less likely to push. the more sophistocated the player, the more likely you should be to push. a lesser player is more likely to be playing a pair that tripped up on the flop, or suited connectors and flopped gin. the more sophistocated type is more likely to have a hand like 99 to kk that would pay you off.

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Cristiano

I am afraid of trips or straight and flush draws for i have run into those straighs far too often.
I am inclined to fold here. Were it a tournament I would raise large, but since it is a cash game i see that any bet might commit me to the pot and the pot odds are not good enougth.
On the other hand, since I have made some gutsy calls my opponent might believe I am on a draw and may also have an overpair also, so i would not criticise a push here.

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Anonymous

First off, your opponent opened out of first position with a pretty standard bet (3x). It is very possible that he is play a middle pocket pair. A $40 bet tells me he’s comfortable with his hand even after the scary flop. We know he’s not on a flush draw because we have the Ace of spades. The straight draw doesn’t scare me here either. He already has a hand. When he reraises my raise to $191 it seems like a tester bet. Once again, I get the idea that he wants to see if I have a hand and would also like to see me give up the pot right there and lay my hand down. Still, I feel that he’s comfortable.

With so many potential draws I would assume that he would make it larger than $191 with that raise if he had a set.

I would put him on a solid PP like KK, QQ, JJ. No draws. It’s possible that he hits his set, but I seriously doubt it based on his reraise to my reraise. A standard raise four handed with a middle PP preflop is very normal.

So my play here would be to push all in.

But I push, and hope he doesn’t have the set, and if he does than good for him.

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Bob

The situation you got yourself in here is bad because whoever played this hand was not thinking!
Ok I understand just the call pre flop. Yep that is acceptable here. SO our villain leads out $40 into a $51 pot. Now we make a $60 raise to $100.
This is an awful raise – what are you hoping to achieve. With a raise we want to get sustantial information or get value from it. Here is does none. We raise such a small amount and of course he reraise as he feels comfortable. This could be any wide range of hands. This raise needs to be a good sized raise of $140 +

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