First Hand of a Tourney

Well said kikolo. Not to mention the sheer volume of people who have no problem throwing all of their chips in preflop at the beginning of the tourny.

I don't play AA scared. It IS a nice hand. No offense Kik, but I respectfully disagree. And only EARLY in a tourney- I agree with you late or mid tourney, but first hand, its a crapshoot imho and although I will raise those hard and hope for the best, the best doesnt happen more often than not.

I am more of the opinion that there are too many chasers PERIOD who can NOT be shaken to risk everything too early. Less so about specific hands.

But I hear ya

I know you play in the low limit games, there are tons of chasers all around. It is tough because those low limit games are fun and cheap, but the bad players ruin things.

As for "the best doesn't happen more often than not", going with statistics, AA by far has the leading percentages of winning at a full table. I do not have the exact numbers, but I believe that it is over 50%.

As for too many chasers, you could always have that, and it happens. When people flop the nuts flush draw, they really want to hit it. So they chase and chase and chase for excessive amounts of chips. We have all done it and we have all seen it happen to us. It is a just a part of poker, a bigger part of online poker, and a HUGE part of low limit online poker.

If you say that you would not prefer AA early in a tournament, then what hand do you want to play? AKs like said earlier? Alright, with AKs aren't you chasing? As silly as this might seem, you are chasing a pair draw. A flush and straight draw also accompany this hand. If you don't like these chasers and drawers, than why be one yourself? I know that this seems stupid, because of course we are going to play AK and most two face card hands, but when playing these, most likely you will miss.

As for the first hand of a tournament, which this whole thread originated around, I would LOVE to see AA when the cards are first dealt. That would be fantastic, especially in late position. Someone is likely to raise preflop since this is the first hand and everything, and there is nothing I love more than seeing a nice raise before I am to act with AA. Come over the top with a heafty reraise and make them make the decision. In situations like this, if you get a call it will not be from a drawing hand like suited connectors. You won't get many callers, probably only the one that raised, and even if you don't get a caller, you win more than the blinds. In a situation like that with AKs, I might be hesitant on how much I raise. I don't like committing a large number of chips into a pot with just over cards like that since there is a possibility that I will hit nothing, but I do like doing this with AA.

Alli, I am glad you disagree with me because this gives way to an in-depth discussion on one particular topic. This is what a forum is all about: having nice arguments and debates which force us to think deeper about a small aspect of poker.

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Here is why you want AA on the first hand of a tourney. I was playing in a $5.50 18 man SNG. This is my 7th hand of the tournament that had only been running 5 minutes:

PokerStars Game #2480860486: Tournament #12055536, Hold'em No Limit - Level I (10/20) - 2005/09/02 - 14:34:44 (ET)
Table '12055536 2' Seat #7 is the button
Seat 1: mellowman70 (1100 in chips)
Seat 2: Moebius28 (1430 in chips)
Seat 3: 700bowler (660 in chips)
Seat 4: bigbluff232 (1470 in chips)
Seat 5: Gatorcuse (1340 in chips)
Seat 6: Terps 10 (1340 in chips)
Seat 7: cky12 (2090 in chips)
Seat 8: QR2D2Q (1790 in chips)
Seat 9: allysongrace (2280 in chips)
QR2D2Q: posts small blind 10
allysongrace: posts big blind 20
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to cky12 [As Ac]
mellowman70: raises 20 to 40
Moebius28: folds
700bowler: calls 40
bigbluff232: folds
Gatorcuse: calls 40
Terps 10: calls 40
cky12: raises 230 to 270
QR2D2Q: folds
allysongrace: folds
mellowman70: calls 230
700bowler: calls 230
Gatorcuse: calls 230
Terps 10: folds
*** FLOP *** [4h Ah 3d]
mellowman70: bets 830 and is all-in
700bowler: calls 390 and is all-in
Gatorcuse: calls 830
cky12: raises 830 to 1660
Gatorcuse: calls 240 and is all-in
*** TURN *** [4h Ah 3d] [3s]
*** RIVER *** [4h Ah 3d 3s] [9s]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
Gatorcuse: shows [Qd Kh] (a pair of Threes)
cky12: shows [As Ac] (a full house, Aces full of Threes)
cky12 collected 480 from side pot-2
mellowman70: shows [7c 7h] (two pair, Sevens and Threes)
cky12 collected 1320 from side pot-1
700bowler: shows [2h 8h] (a pair of Threes)
cky12 collected 2710 from main pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 4510 Main pot 2710. Side pot-1 1320. Side pot-2 480. | Rake 0
Board [4h Ah 3d 3s 9s]
Seat 1: mellowman70 showed [7c 7h] and lost with two pair, Sevens and Threes
Seat 2: Moebius28 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 3: 700bowler showed [2h 8h] and lost with a pair of Threes
Seat 4: bigbluff232 folded before Flop (didn't bet)
Seat 5: Gatorcuse showed [Qd Kh] and lost with a pair of Threes
Seat 6: Terps 10 folded before Flop
Seat 7: cky12 (button) showed [As Ac] and won (4510) with a full house, Aces full of Threes
Seat 8: QR2D2Q (small blind) folded before Flop
Seat 9: allysongrace (big blind) folded before Flop

I get AA, reraise 11.5xBB more preflop, and get three callers. Yes, you obviously get a lot of callers. This bet should have been an isolation bet, usually getting all of the limpers to fold and just the raiser will call. Well that did not happen, but no big deal. I flop a fantastic hand. There are 3 to a straight and 2 to a flush, but I didn't figure anyone had a straight, even though one player was playing a horrible hand that was on the level of the hand that would make the straight. Well, I get all 3 callers to go all-in. I have the lead on the flop, hit my boat on the turn, and everyone is drawing dead on the river. This is EXACTLY why you want AA, ANY time in a tourney. It was better that I had this early because I wouldn't have gotten those calls late.

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Kik, this is one of the worst displays of poker I have ever seen. We are all now dumber for having seen it. ( obviously I am talking about the other players in the hands, specifically, all of them......more specifically, the morons who called all in bets with KQ and 82s.) But on the flip side, good job, I hope you kept the lead until the end. That was a mighty fine start.

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Napoleon, don't be jealous that I've been chatting online with babes all day. Besides, we both know that I'm training to be a cage fighter.

Thanks. It was 3 horrible plays. I'm still playing, 5 left (on the bubble for money). I'm in 2nd with twice as many chips as #3, so doing fairly well.

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As far as the AK vs AA "debate" if you want to call it that...to me it is a no contest. AA everytime. I know everyone wants to quote brunson and say that " you will either win a small pot or lose a big one" but do me a favor and, those of you with PokerTracker, check your results by starting hand....If you have played over 10,000 hands, I Guaran-fucking-tee you that AA is at the top. The people who lose more than they win with AA are one of 2 things.....A) liars B) people who cannot lay down a hand when it is obvious that they are beat......I guess I should add a third category c) people who try and be tricky and slowplay aces ( cardinal sin in 95% of the cases)

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Napoleon, don't be jealous that I've been chatting online with babes all day. Besides, we both know that I'm training to be a cage fighter.

Kikolo, showing that some players call all-ins with garbage doesn't really add much to this discussion, I mentioned that the players are of a decentish standard for a reason. Against bad players I will take AA anytime, they will lose more money than they should on bad hands.
And of course AA will have better stats in poker tracker, but not neccessarily first hand of tourneys against alright players.
I don't know, I'm pretty undecided, I'm happy with either hand first up.