Here is another in a lengthening series of hands where my KK runs into AA. This is the 3rd time in less than a week, including this one vs. “Cinderella” who never raised me and this one I managed to lay down the following night.
Now I’m playing online in Bovada’s Zone Poker game, at the micro stakes (6-handed). Blinds are $0.10 / 0.25.
Here is a replay of the hand, on ShareMyPair. The key question here, as always and to be explored in detail below, is “what is his range?”
To recap the hand, I have KK on the button. UTG raises to $0.75, UTG+1 calls, and I 3-bet squeeze to $3.10. UTG and UTG+1 both call.
Flop ($9.65): Js 8s 5c. At first glance, this is a somewhat drawy board, but should be a good flop for my hand. I hope somebody has AJ.
Both villains check, so I bet $6.00. UTG then check-raises all-in. He has me barely covered. UTG+1 is short-stacked, with only $4.25 behind and calls. All this action is rather unexpected. Now there is $41.50 in the pot and it will cost me my remaining $15.60 to call. I’m getting 2.66:1 pot odds. Should I call? I need to have equity of at least 27.3% to justify calling.
I call.
Let’s look at this hand on Flopzilla. For starters, I’m going to ignore UTG+1 since he is short-stacked and I’m not calling his bet. Then I’ll explain why that might be a mistake.
UTG’s range (for calling my 3-bet) should be something like this: 77+, ATs+, KQs, AJo+, KQ, QJs. I’m giving him “credit” for calling a bit wide here, as many villains would be expected to play tighter. On the other hand, he might interpret my 3-bet as a light squeeze play, since I have the button and there was another caller, and I have no other information about him (or her?) as this is Zone Poker and everybody is anonymous on every hand.
Now I’ll narrow the range to hands that can check-raise all-in, as sets, two pairs, overpairs, top pairs, flush draws, and open-ended straight draws. Based on this portion of his original range, here is what he can be shoving with:
Set 15.8% (JJJ or 888)
Overpair 34.2% (AA, KK for a chop, QQ)
Top pair 39.5% (AJ, QJs)
Flush draw 10.5% (AsKs, AsQs, AsJs, AsTs, KsQs, QsJs)
OESD 0.0% (T9 and 76 not in his original range)
Against this range, my equity in the hand is 54.5%. I definitely have to call.
What if I narrow his range for calling my pre-flop 3-bet from out-of-position, perhaps removing QJs and AJo?
Now it looks like this when he shoves on the flop:
Set 23.1% (JJJ or 888)
Overpair 50.0% (AA, KK for a chop, QQ)
Top pair 11.5% (AJ, QJs)
Flush draw 15.4% (AsKs, AsQs, AsJs, AsTs, KsQs)
OESD 0.0% (T9 and 76 not in his original range)
My equity is now down to 43.5%. Things aren’t looking so good, but I’m still well ahead of the needed equity of 27.3% to break even on my call. This still looks like a proper call.
I guess I shouldn’t feel to bad here, but this is the 3rd KK v. AA hand I’ve played in about a week. When do I get to play AA v. KK? Hopefully soon… hopefully at higher stakes… hopefully mine will hold up.
But wait, there’s more!
After UTG+1 put his short stack all-in, there are 2 separate pots. The main pot has $22.40 in it, and the side pot has $19.10 including the portion of my flop bet that exceeded UTG+1’s stack, along with the portion of UTG’s all-in bet that exceeded UTG+1’s stack up to the amount of my stack. It will cost me $15.60 to call, so my odds from the side pot are 1.22:1. I need equity of at least 45% to justify calling based on the side pot alone. If I fold, I sacrifice my equity in the main pot.
The key point here is that my equity in the main pot is different from my equity in the side pot due to the presence of another player. If these villains’ hands were reversed, for example, I would have lost the main pot, but won enough in the side pot to wind up with a profit on the hand.
To get this entirely right, I should develop a range for UTG+1’s hand, as he called twice pre-flop and then shoved in a short stack on the flop. I’m still not going to do that, as I’ll never, ever put 76o in his range and that’s what he had, for an open-ended straight draw on the flop. If I plug his actual hand into the equation with my actual hand and UTG’s ranges, my equity in the main pot goes down. There are now more outs against me.
With the wider version of UTG’s range (including QsJs and AJo), my equity against both of them is 33.4%. Removing QsJS and AJo from UTG’s range, now my equity against both of them is 27.7%.
I still thing calling is correct, but it’s much closer when looked at this way as my equity is inherently lower with another player involved. If I were to slow down – not really possible on Zone Poker as you only get 15 seconds to take action when it’s your turn, but imagine this were a live game and the stakes were higher – I might be able to reason my way into folding here.
On the other hand, folding to a check-raise all-in on the flop when I have an over pair to the board, is never a huge mistake. Time and time again, I’m simply beat by 2-pair+. Time and time again when I’m not beat, the villain will draw out anyway.
On the other hand, I would have cheerfully stuck it all-in pre-flop had UTG simply asked for it then. Sigh. By waiting until the flop, UTG actually gave me a chance to be able to fold…
