I told a friend of mine that I think Ace Rag is not only a **** hand in high limit games but also a **** hand in very low limits as well - such as a $2.00 buy-in tournament. He insists that because it is low limit the quality of players are very poor which in turn makes it a good venue to play such a bad hand. Any comments would be appreciated.

If you lose with ace-rag at showdown hand after hand after flopping a pair of aces then stop playing it.

If you win with ace-rag at showdown hand after hand after flopping a pair of aces then keep playing it.

If you can't figure out when your pair of aces is outkicked then play a different game, it's probably one of the easiest folds ever for me if I flop a pair of aces with ace-rag and someone plays it very strong. With low limit games, it's even easier. People play their high aces very strong after flopping a pair, so your friend is right most of the time. If you flop two pair with A7, you can easily stack a bad player that has AK, or if you flop just the ace, it should be easy enough to let go.

Most of the time it is played as a suited ace, meaning you are hoping to flop something close to the nut flush and/or straight flush. You aren't really looking for just a pair of aces or top&bottom pair.

Your friend is right.

In a $1 or $2 buying tournament, you see all-in preflop races between AK and Q7 let us say. Well, A2 is still beating Q7 (not by as much obviously). Even more true for freerolls.

What incredibly bad advice.

If someone is playing the top 50% of their hands allin, I still would be unlikely to call them with A2o.

Hand 0: 51.504% 47.87% 03.63% 5941608048 450383970.00 { 33+, A2s+, K2s+, Q2s+, J4s+, T6s+, 96s+, 86s+, 76s, 65s, A2o+, K5o+, Q7o+, J7o+, T8o+, 98o }
Hand 1: 48.496% 44.87% 03.63% 5568403404 450383970.00 { A2o }

Ace rag suffers bad reverse implied odds. In limit poker we will never make up what we invest preflop by flopping two pair or better. In no limit, we might, but we suffer such bad punishment when we flop an ace finding out whether we are beat, that we simply should have folded preflop. We can certainly raise ace rag in either game format from the late positions profitably, but thats mainly due to the card removal effects of us having one of the aces.

Just because we are playing with a bunch of fools that cannot play well, does not mean we should stoop to their level and play bad poker as well. We will get the money by maximizing our expectation with every decision. That means we fold trashy aces from early positions. We fold trashy aces against raises. We steal with trashy aces from late positions, and usually fold when we are raised again.

To suggest that we can be profitably playing ace rag, flopping an ace, and finding out if our opponent plays strong suggesting a bigger ace, or weak suggesting no ace, is truly folly. Our odds of flopping two pair with A7 and being up against AK/AQ are horrifically low. Our odds are much better to flop a seven and be up against 88-QQ, and what do we do then? Fold TPTK? No, we simply lose more money. It is simply usually negative expectation to call a raise, raise up front, re-raise, or call a re-raise after stealing with a trashy ace.

4Card

short version: Ace rag doesn't win much money when you pair the ace, and when your top pair is 7s with an ace kicker, it'll get expensive too.