Hi All, need advice again, this time on high pairs AA & KK。I play fairly safe and will going allin pre-flop with only those two pairs. Looking through my stats and I have noticed that my chance of winning for AA & KK is about 85% but the average pot size is only 22BB, but when I do lose the 15% of times the average pot size jump to 90BB.
This is how I usually play , pre-flop 5BB+, flop 15BB+ Turn Allin
The way I see the problem is when I’m winning the opponent usually fold on flop and turn which only give me around 20BB wins rarely allin. But when I do lose, my entire buyin goes in the pot which is very disproportional to my winnings. My EV for KK & AA is like 0.2.
what am i doing wrong, its making me scared of playing high pairs. Any advice would be appreciated thanks

You're over valuing your big pairs. Even at beginning levels, villains rarely will go all in for stacks without a hand that can't beat TPTK or over pairs. I'd cut down on the size of your flop bets and look at checking on the turn with unimproved hands on safe boards. If the board isn't safe, a small bet is enough to make sure the draw isn't getting odds.

How do you play other hands preflop?

Analyse the hand histories of the big pots you lost. You probably overplayed your hands (e.g. betting too often on scary boards, and/or calling post-flop raises with one pair).

Think about why you're betting. When you're ahead on the turn and shove all in what happens? When you're behind on the turn and shove all in what happens?

Does your betting pattern change if you have TPTK? How about a set? How about a draw?

Look at it from villains perspective. If you face betting as aggressive as you describe, are you calling with anything less than a combo draw or top two? If someone bets the way you describe, do they have any bluffs in that range?

A pretty common betting pattern, as an in position aggressor, is to bet preflop, bet the flop, check back the turn, and then bet smallish on the river (or call smallish). I can't speak to how big to size the bets (I play mostly MTT's, so the sizing would be 2.2 to 3 bb pre, 4 to 5bb on the flop, and then maybe 10 bb on the river. I know cash games, sizing has to be bigger) Do this for a range of hands, including some bluffs and missed draws.

All good advice above but - get this through your head first:

AA & KK pre flop is a monster.

AA & KK on the turn is JUST A PAIR.

This...

obviously get it in pre if villain raises you, but eventually, to be successful at cash, you MUST learn good post flop play. Or you can short stack buy in and play the same way you're playing now (not advised since this really eliminates post flop all together and you lose a ton of hand experience but if you must to build a BR then do what you must!).

Just had two bad beats with AAvsQK and AAvs22. After calming down and read the advice thinking it over. I realise that is putting too much expectation on top pairs postflop. If i treat them normally as a top pair i can prevent a lot of the big losses. Thanks all


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