When to slow-play pocket aces

I recently had the pleasure of playing in the 2015 European Poker Tour series in Barcelona, Spain.

The trip started out horribly, as I lost with three of a kind or two pair on numerous occasions. However, I maintained my sanity and ended up making a deep run in my last tournament of the series, a 2,200-euro deepstack event.

When we got to the final table, I had a stack of 21 big blinds. There were no obvious short stacks, so I was not overly concerned with moving up the payout ladder.

With seven players at the table and blinds at 10,00020,000 with an ante of 3,000, a loose, aggressive player with a stack of 1 million raised to 43,000 from second position.

Sitting on a stack of 420,000, I looked down at A♠ A♣ and called from third position. I was hoping one of the players yet to act would go all in, allowing me get my entire stack in before the flop. Instead, the cutoff and small blind just called.

While most amateurs would think it disastrous to see a flop against three opponents while holding pocket aces, professionals realize this has the potential to be a highly profitable situation.

Often, someone will make one pair and be unable to fold.

For example, if I am against K-J, Q-9 and 4-4 and the f lop comes K-7-5 or Q-7-6, I am almost certain to double up. Of course, I will occasionally run into a flop like K-9-4 or K-J-5 and go broke, but the risk is well worth the possible reward.

When you have a short stack, your goal with your absolute best hands should be to extract maximum value from them, not to protect them from hands that are drawing relatively thin.

The flop came 9♣ 9♠ 6♣. The small blind checked, and the initial raiser bet 93,000.

I had to decide whether to go all in or call. Folding was out of the question: Even though I might have been up against trips, I was likely ahead. If I called, I would allow either of the players yet to act to call with their strong draws, whereas if I went all in, I’d make them fold.

In case anyone had a strong made hand such as Q-Q or 8-8, I wanted to get all in on the flop, because a scary card could come on the turn that would allow them to get away cheaply.

Either way, I accepted that if someone had trips or a full house, I was going broke. But I wanted any draws to fold, so I went all in.

To my surprise, everyone folded. I did not expect the initial raiser to make a continuation bet into three players on a somewhat coordinated board with absolutely nothing, but he did.

Since the initial raiser likely had a marginal hand, if I had gone all in before the flop, he almost certainly would have folded, and I would have ended the hand with a stack of 530,000.

Instead, I ended the hand with 706,000. To achieve this result, I had to take on a bit of risk, but it was worth it.

Don’t be afraid to slowplay pocket aces when you have a shallow stack, especially if calling (instead of reraising) will disguise that you have a premium hand.

After this hand, I went completely card-dead, but I continued to slowly chip up and eventually finished in fourth place for 30,000 euros.