KK Against Muppets

dvdfan

Looking for an optimal strategy to play KK or QQ on pkr.com 25c/50c level. Fortunately the majority of players are very loose and i find myself not getting the most out of premium pairs. When i get KK-QQ and i raise around 5-7 BB im getting 2-3 callers from muppets playing A9-A2 range or the likes of JTo. The problem is if the board comes JAx and they have JTo, theyll bet out and/or call either way to the river, if they have Ax they might call bigger bets but with JT they only call small bets and probably fold on the turn to another pot sized bet but not likely on the flop. Now this is great for all other scenarios when im hitting TPTK or set+ theyll call to the river all day with middler pair or top pair bad kicker but im getting no luck with KK-QQ. It leaves me in a tricky situation because i need to RR them or bet pot on flop and river to find out if they have the overpair and this is not good as i should be trying to keep the pot smaller not bigger, however if i just check/call medium bets am i playing the hand badly?

Heres 3 KK scenario's from recolection,

KK, i raised $2.50 2 callers
Board comes A7x Rainbow
I check, 1 more check and 1 bet of $1 - 2 calls
Turn blank i check, bet $4 and 1 caller and i fold
They show down A7o and AQo

(Again i dont want to re-raise thay min bet on flop as im just building the pot yet calling the $1 here isnt good.)

KK, I RR a $1.00 Raise to $3.50 (Should have raised more - lack of concentration) 2 callers
Flop came AJx we all check
Turn blank i check, raised to $4, 1 fold and i call
River he bets $4 again and i had to call expecting to see A2o but he shows JTo

KK EP villain raised to $2.50 (taught about RR as hes loose player but after the other hands i knew i would be in trouble playing KK on an ace high flop even though i had position on the raiser so i decided to keep pot small and i should have no trouble building a pot if there was no overcard)
Flop again AJx 2 callers, we all check
Turn blank he bets $1, i call and other player folds
River Blank he bets $6 and i think giving the weak betting till now he has something like KQ or small PP and i call and he shows AJ

I know these were all horrible flops but as you see because the opponents are so loose i find myself winning small pots or losing small pots with Big pocket pairs and i dont know the correct strategy in these situations. Against a decent opponent im raising this or RR this PF and check/folding to the overcard but against these type of opponents im lost??

valor

dont have much time now to respond to each hand but this

"so i decided to keep pot small and i should have no trouble building a pot if there was no overcard"

is really really awful, backwards thinking

a-k-47

yea think more positive, everyone gets bad beats... less negativity dvd and you should be fine

dvdfan

valor wrote:

dont have much time now to respond to each hand but this

"so i decided to keep pot small and i should have no trouble building a pot if there was no overcard"

is really really awful, backwards thinking

But thats the problem im having, i feel im being forced to play incorrectly because theyre calling with Ace rag here alot. How should i play this with KK to take advantage of their v.loose play, is it just a case of being unlucky coming up against overcards 3times in a row with KK and should continue to play it "correctly" regardless of my opponent (i.e Raise Pre-flop and RR if neccessary) and i should be looking to build a pot and check/fold preflop if im unlucky enough to hit the overcard AGAIN.

phantom_lord

dvdfan wrote:

is it just a case of being unlucky coming up against overcards 3times in a row with KK and should continue to play it "correctly" regardless of my opponent (i.e Raise Pre-flop and RR if neccessary) and i should be looking to build a pot and check/fold preflop if im unlucky enough to hit the overcard AGAIN.

yup

dvdfan

a-k-47 wrote:

yea think more positive, everyone gets bad beats... less negativity dvd and you should be fine

Only seen your post after i replied to Valor. Yeah i guess so, not really bad beats as such because i only lost 2 small pots and won a small one, its just im wondering whats a good strategy to take advantage of the looseness of their play and should i auto fold to any bet after an overcard against this type of opponent that will go to the river with Middle, bottom or top pair bad kicker. I felt calling them min raises was bad as it just set me up to call a bet on the river

phantom_lord

(taught about RR as hes loose player but after the other hands i knew i would be in trouble playing KK on an ace high flop even though i had position on the raiser so i decided to keep pot small and i should have no trouble building a pot if there was no overcard)

just saw this, this is really bad! kings are a monster, raisy daisy pf! you want as much of his stack in there as possible pf.

a-k-47

Only one other optimal play pf and thats to limp only in EP. Hope for LAG to raise Ax, re raise big make him pay. Wouldnt recommended playing that way to often. Just continue playing abc poker, dont always be afraid of the ace on the flop, alot of players make awful attempts at representing it.

BobSloane

Doyle Brunson said something in supersystem about proceeding with KK on an A high flop about how it is up to the individual situation and players etc. If you had JJ on an A high flop or TT or QQ you'd be prepared to drop it i'm sure. I will always continuation bet with it at least but I'm not staying into the bitter end cause I had a great starting hand. KK is a huge hand- but only pre-flop. Like having the red aces on a flop of 8 9 10 spades when you are getting callers or resistance. You see people overplaying AK as well when they miss the flop completely and the flop is co-ordinated. You shake your head in disbelief when they call a push and get shown a set or straight against their A high.

Its still only one pair that you have with 2 outs to improve. Sometimes I think people look at AA or KK and figure they've the hand won already its just a question of how much they're going to win. I'm guilty of this myself

tacker

On pkr you need to jam as much in the middle pre flop as possible.I dont know how the 25/50 plays but in 1/2 and 2/4 limp ep and reraise works.Nobody folds A10 preflop on pkr

breadmonkey

tacker wrote:

On pkr you need to jam as much in the middle pre flop as possible.I dont know how the 25/50 plays but in 1/2 and 2/4 limp ep and reraise works.Nobody folds A10 preflop on pkr

So why isn;t everyone playing there? Should I play there?

dvdfan

Pros for pkr.com are obvious but the cons are:

You cant multitable, even having ipoker and pkr.com can cause alot of lagging, if you tweak the settings on a good pc you might get 2 ipoker tables and 1 pkr. Its very unlikely to get poker tracker running at the same time though.

You cant take any notes, you cant use any poker software with pkr.com like poker tracker,pokerspy,poker office etc

I cant seem to make myself into a winning player on tribeca playing 25/50 but on pkr.com ive made a nice few bob because although ive alot to learn the vast majority playing there are shocking. 2 sessions ago i turned $50 into $225 playing 25/50 $50 buyin. Didnt play anything special just tight abc poker, but its fairly easy to consisntently win a few bob.