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I know the poket rockets (A A) is the best drawing hand in poker.

But if you see a king in the flop, what strategy would you follow in betting?

Also, which hand do you consider the best hand to raise pre-flop and why?

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It is inaccurate at best to describe AA as a "drawing" hand. – John Dibling May 1 '12 at 14:22
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This is really 2 questions: A) How do you play AA when a K comes on the flop? and B) What is the best hand to raise PF and why? However, the second question is probably not appropriate for this site. – John Dibling May 1 '12 at 14:24
@arvind_cool As a few others have answered, the question(s) has too many dependent variable to give a good answer to. Poker being extremely situational, these types of question are most useful in the form of hand historys that are more specific and retell the scenario in detail. Please take a look at the FAQ to understand why this has been closed. Thanks. Also, simple equity analysis is possible through Pokerstove and similar programs. – Toby Booth May 2 '12 at 23:14

closed as not a real question by Toby Booth May 2 '12 at 23:08

It's difficult to tell what is being asked here. This question is ambiguous, vague, incomplete, overly broad, or rhetorical and cannot be reasonably answered in its current form. For help clarifying this question so that it can be reopened, see the FAQ.

2 Answers

The answer to any question in poker is "It depends" (if I think about it, this should be every poker player's motto). This is very true, especially when it comes to your question.

What you do if a King is on the flop ? Depends. Usually, the only way your opponent can beat you that way is if he has pocket kings. Depending on the way he plays, do you think he might have that ? Other ways he can beat you is if he gets lucky and simply makes a better hand. Even 7-2 can beat pocket aces if the board is 3-7-Q-J-7 (just an example).

Be aware that, even if pocket aces are usually the best, on average you'll win with that hand in 85 % of cases against 1 opponent and in about 70 % of cases against 2 opponents (assuming you go all the way to the showdown). The rest of the time, you can lose. So you must be cold when calculating your chance of winning. Having some sort of emotional attachment to these premium hands is not good. I have folded plenty of pocket aces and pocket kings when I saw that it made sense. Avoid going all the way with these hands JUST BECAUSE they're the best.

I don't know exactly what you're trying to find out, but I hope this helped.

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AA IS the best hand, pre-flop. That's just "by definition," because it's the highest PAIR.

The other reason AA is the best hand pre-flop, is because if no one "improves," AA will then beat any other hand.

But the flop changes things, because if someone "improves" and you don't, your AA may be second best.

Another reason that AA is so good is because if someone has say, KQ, and improves (by ONE card) to a pair of Kings, your AA is still good. Only if s/he started with KK will a "one card improvement" help the other player beat your AA.

But in an example above, a player that drew "trip" 7s to 7-2 offsuit beats your AA because s/he experienced a TWO card improvement.

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AA is the best preflop hand, but not "by definition". The reason is that it has a positive expectation against each other preflop hand. In the moment where 3 community cards are fixed, this may change. – azimut Mar 20 at 11:27

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