How often can you lose with AA or KK, vs low hands

[yetbam]

In your opinion, how often do you lose with premium AA and KK hands against so-called bad hands like 46 off or 22 off? It's happened to me a few times, and it's actually quite frustrating. How do you handle these types of situations to stay focused?

 

[CRStals]

If you are losing to hands like 46 off suit or 22 with hands like AA or KK, all you can do is chalk it up to variance, or how you played the hand. How did a poker player get there starting out with 46 offsuit? Was your pre-flop strategy sound with AA or KK? Because if you are raising / three-betting with your premium hands, and they are calling with 46o, you don't want them to leave your table...

 

[enno]

If you are losing to hands like 46 off suit or 22 with hands like AA or KK, all you can do is chalk it up to variance, or how you played the hand. How did a poker player get there starting out with 46 offsuit? Was your pre-flop strategy sound with AA or KK? Because if you are raising / three-betting with your premium hands, and they are calling with 46o, you don't want them to leave your table...

Completely agree with this post. May I add a situation where the donk pushes your raise or 3bet, which I have seen happen. He could be on the short stack where a call is acceptable, but if he has you covered-you call and lose-you would be the one leaving the table (been there done that). Isn’t this a time to consider a fold?

 

[Flyer35]

All the time, but mostly in Omaha. In fact I've started folding the AA KK hands pre-flop to save chips.

 

[finaltable1]

Quite often I'm playing Blast at 888, other poker sites called it Spin&Go, Spins, Twister e.t.c. It's 3 handed hyper turbo sit and go with short starting stack.
In this variant of HoldEm players rarerly fold suited connectors or one-gappers...
so
when the blinds go up, you're on the big blind, 1.8BB stack and 46os, opponent goes all-in, if you fold - your stack will be 0.8bb. What will you do?

I had a session where I've lost approx 40 games in a row, 6 times having premium pocket pair JJ-AA.

If you want to learn how to handle such situations and stay focused and also practice top 3 and HU decisions being short stacked - then you might be interested in playing such spin&go sessions. Keep loading new ones after you win or bust, this way you won't have time for frustration, you always have to stay focused on new decisions... Actually i believe it's a rule for any online poker format... playing just 1 or 2 tables is not only boring, but also doesn't really help you to beat the variance. The more you play - the less your results are affected by luck. So if you've played your first million of hand and still find that AA-KK isn't profitable for you, then don't blame luck or poker site, you need to take a closer look to your pre and post flop strategy.

 

[Claudiunm]

AA and KK are hands that are as strong as they are dangerous for your stack.

First, we need to start from the principle that no hand is sovereign in Poker.
From there, we can understand that with premium hands you should clear the table pre-flop to be heads-up with just one other player, or at most two. The more you clear the table, the lower the variance will be.
After clearing the table pre-flop, evaluate the relationship your hand has with the flop and pay attention to your opponent's stance and be prepared to fold if the situation is not favorable. Remember that you don't need to win all the chips in a tournament to win. What you need to do is not let your stack go to zero.

 

[reeseflamees]

Sometimes it happens. But most of times I win this hand all in

 

[pltelles]

It is very common in online poker, I find it very strange, as it goes against statistics. Which leads me to believe that there is manipulation online, making marginal hands gain strength.

 

[R.Holynskyi]

In your opinion, how often do you lose with premium AA and KK hands against so-called bad hands like 46 off or 22 off? It's happened to me a few times, and it's actually quite frustrating. How do you handle these types of situations to stay focused?

Such unfortunate situations happen quite often, but I've learnt to ignore them, I just keep playing and go for the win. I don't have a goal to win with all the strong hands, although it would be nice. I do have a goal to win the tournament, and I'm trying to do my best not to lose this chance.

 

[EarnDAStack]

It's math,

It happens the mathematically correct amount of times.

GL

EDS

 

[fundiver199]

There are many free equity calculators online, that can tell you, how often each hand is supposed to win, if for instance its AA vs. 64o. One of the best is Equilab. I highly recommend downloading this program to your computer, if you dont have it already. As others have said, also look at, how the hands were played. Did you for instance just call preflop instead of 3-betting giving the opponent a good price to enter the pot with 64o and crack your aces? Or did you lose to much, once they had sucked out on you? Focus on your decision making and not the outcome. If you are not sure then post the hand to "cash game hand analysis" or "tournament hand analysis".

 

[Poker Orifice]

Completely agree with this post. May I add a situation where the donk pushes your raise or 3bet, which I have seen happen. He could be on the short stack where a call is acceptable, but if he has you covered-you call and lose-you would be the one leaving the table (been there done that). Isn’t this a time to consider a fold?

No.
Typically one should be playing to win.... not 'playing to not lose'. In MTT play it is crucial to try to accumulate chips and it's a bad plan to pass up on +ev spots.

 

[SPANKYSN]

If you are losing to hands like 46 off suit or 22 with hands like AA or KK, all you can do is chalk it up to variance, or how you played the hand. How did a poker player get there starting out with 46 offsuit? Was your pre-flop strategy sound with AA or KK? Because if you are raising / three-betting with your premium hands, and they are calling with 46o, you don't want them to leave your table...

Memory is a tricky thing...one remembers when AA gets beat by 46os, and forgets the other 99% of the time it wins. One also has to consider the stakes...these things happen more in freerolls than $1-2 tables...players make bad moves when they have no "skin" in the game.

 

[fundiver199]

Completely agree with this post. May I add a situation where the donk pushes your raise or 3bet, which I have seen happen. He could be on the short stack where a call is acceptable, but if he has you covered-you call and lose-you would be the one leaving the table (been there done that). Isn’t this a time to consider a fold?

Not preflop unless its the bubble of a satellite or DoN, and you have enough chips to fold your way into the money. Lets make it a little scientific by pulling out ICMizer and look at a theoretical situation from the bubble of an MTT. To make it easy I choose a 45-man SnG from PokerStars, since the payouts in these are very similar to most MTTs. Its down to 9 players on the final table, and 7 places pay, so this is essentially the bubble. Blinds are 300/600, and everyone have identical 7.500 stacks, so we are 12,5BB deep. UTG moves all-in, and it folds to us in BB.

If we are a "donkey" and call off with 22, we lose 2,41% of the price pool, so thats clearly not good. If we call off with 64 offsuit, we lose 4,64% of the price pool, so thats even worse. However if we fold AA, we lose 4,71% of the price pool, so now we are a real super donk, even worse than the donk calling off with 64 offsuit. Folding mistakes are just as bad and expensive as calling mistakes. And honestly if we are not thrilled about calling with AA in this situation, why are we even playing poker? The guy calling off with 22 or 64o is at least having fun.

 

[hutzpaf]

In your opinion, how often do you lose with premium AA and KK hands against so-called bad hands like 46 off or 22 off? It's happened to me a few times, and it's actually quite frustrating. How do you handle these types of situations to stay focused?

You can't always win with a big hand, mathematically impossible, remember this.
---> AA or KK against a random hand

 

[fundiver199]

---> AA or KK against a random hand

Actually I am a little surpriced, that the difference between AA and KK is not larger than this. But I guess, its because, its relatively rare, they actually have an A, if their range is literally any two cards. In a more common situation of being against a range of top 20% hands, the equity of KK drop to around 75%, while the equity of AA stay more or less the same at 85%.

 

[sandy358]

Actually I am a little surpriced, that the difference between AA and KK is not larger than this. But I guess, its because, its relatively rare, they actually have an A, if their range is literally any two cards. In a more common situation of being against a range of top 20% hands, the equity of KK drop to around 75%, while the equity of AA stay more or less the same at 85%.

Welp, AA and KK are virtually the same hand with the difference that KK can get outdrawn by the hands with aces, while AA can't and the fact that AA dominates KK, which is not that big of a factor here.

 

[bruno13xs]

Losing with AA or KK is not uncommon, I've lost a lot of hands like that but I've also played a lot of times, so there are always variables so the more you play with AA and KK you'll win and lose.

 

[Kerasuss28]

In your opinion, how often do you lose with premium AA and KK hands against so-called bad hands like 46 off or 22 off? It's happened to me a few times, and it's actually quite frustrating. How do you handle these types of situations to stay focused?

Years ago i broke my pc because had very ugly downswing with cash game session,
I lost 10/15 times in row whole buy in with AK and AQ vs worse hands ..
now i think it’s just every hand a coin flip 50/50 or you win or you lose 50% 🤓

 

[RALF_AK]

...when a loss occurs with these hands or any other premium hand, it is usually because one of the players involved in the hand made a wrong play or when the blinds are too high and someone is forced to call or go all in with these low hands or any pocket pair...

 

[martinoni]

Pre flop I think its like 20% of the times

 

[Flyer35]

You can't always win with a big hand, mathematically impossible, remember this.
---> AA or KK against a random hand
View attachment 386591View attachment 386592

The problem with these stat generators, they don't take context into account. 'Random' hands aren't usually getting played against AA or KK, and they definitely aren't getting played all-in against those hands. If AA/KK decides to limp you get 3 or 4 or more callers and then the stats are more valid but also worse for the AA/KK hands.

 

[hilary antonik filho]

Today I lost with KK and was eliminated, I'm just moving on to the next tournament.
Before I would get nervous and stop playing, I consider it normal to lose with AA and KK

 

[riff_raff312]

Well now this is not really as puzzling as you would thing after all it is online poker and just another slot machine random selection of cards.
Unlike sitting with 6 to 9 people at a table with a deck of cards where you can look at the read the player,or even count the cards.
What ever you think or do it's all a game of chance just have fun.

 

[ROYALROAD]

It all depends on the situation. Even in AA and KK, it is important to be humble.