Location: Winstar Casino
Game: Pot limit Omaha
Blinds: $2-5-10
Player 1 $1,600 vs Unknown regular straddle $2,400
Player 1 is in seat 1, unknown is in seat 6


It’s a 2/5 Pot limit Omaha game with a mandatory $10 straddle. This particular hand the player after the straddle posts a double straddle to 20, he is told there is no double straddles allowed and it is a blind bet. The UTG player calls, Player 1 has AA95 and limps in. Seat 2 and 3 call, it arrives at the $10 straddle who states “well lets juice this pot up for whoever gets lucky after the flop” and raises to $120. It folds to UTG who calls; Player 1 raises pot to $520 total. It folds to the original raiser who calls and the UTG folds. There is roughly $1,290 in the pot.
Flop comes KJ8, unknown checks to player 1, Player 1 shoves for $1,080. Unknown calls, the board finishes out 6, and 4. He shows KKQ3.

Thoughts and side notes:
I (player 1) decided to limp with the Aces because they were bad aces, three to the same suit and cards that didn’t work well together and I’d rather see a flop before committing myself to the hand. The unknown is an aggressive opponent who is willing to gamble and raise with most reasonable holdings. Once it gets back to me I can either call and decide to disguise my aces incase an ace flops, or I can raise. I feel that raising is best for two reasons: I can either take down the pot preflop and win $320 without contest but also raising to $520 allows me to stick the other $1,080 in on any decent flop thus taking away his equity to call me down preflop ‘knowing I have Aces’ and try to catch up. Against his range I feel that its best to play for stacks knowing that he has to catch on the flop to continue.
After the flop comes down I don’t feel that I can ever check there since I would be giving up the aggression and can easily be giving him the key to the pot.
One last side note: Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi was sitting in the 9 seat and I felt it was possible that the unknown was thinking that I was trying to show off for The Grinder and make a play for the pot.

Questions:
Was it right to try to isolate with the AA95 preflop?
Was it right to shove on the flop?
What, if any changes, do you think was a better play throughout any stage of the hand?

Before asking why Mizrachi was playing a 2-5-10 PLO game, He was in town for a $3,000,000 tournament and was playing in the cash games until day 2.

Its greatly appreciated to hear yalls comments!

played it fine, though you could certainly raise the first time. the way you did it, you got a bunch of money in with the best, got outflopped, oh well.

raise it the 1st time around. As played with 1290 in the pot and 1880 behind easy bet/call.

The straddle guy played it horrible.

Aces vs. Kings, what are you gonna do, happens in PLO and Hold 'em, all this proves. You did a limp reraise play like in Hold em which is fine. I'd raise 1st time around as well, but this way worked out perfectly to get more money in pre-flop as a better than 2-1 favorite (tough to ask for better in PLO). Against an aggressive player as described, I'd think perfectly fine to lead for a shove.

i would've raised it right from the get-go but there's nothing wrong with limp/rr.

as played, with <1 PSB left, there's nothing you can do.

Villain played it horrible obv. But.... this flop is horrid for you andmaybe you should have checked that flop and pray for a low spade....and fold if another club or a,k,q,j,10,9,maybe 7 comes....I just would have figured this guy would only call that preflop with KKxx, broadwrap or maybe the other aces, which he could have a nut flush draw on you?

preflop perfect but after maybe you could have saved that 1k

no

I really don't think its proper to do a raise to start with because the aces are so weak that it only accomplishes one of two things: a couple of people call the raise and think to themselves that its likely I have AAxx just because that seems to be the natural assumption people make when you raise in Omaha; either that or I raise in mid position and someone reraises enabling me to get it all in PF, but I feel that's a rare situation that people dream about more than actually happens.
I don't think its right to check the flop because as it was mention, the villain will most likely bet any 7-through-k turn along with the clubs. Thus I would have no idea if I'm still in the lead and he's just bluffing or if he in fact has it, remaining peddle to the meddle just seems proper instead of giving him the initiative.

The board seems bad, but I think he's a smart enough player to lay down most pairs PF thus his majority range being suited connected cards, ie. 2345 ds, 5678 ds 910JQ ds, and I think I'm ahead against the majority of his hands that its correct to continue with the PSB

they were playing 5/10/20 plo this weekend up there. very tempted to play but stuck to 5/10 nlh. saw some guy cash out for like 18k. i think it was right to isolate hu with aaxx but that game is really weak so you might want to wait for better spots, but with all that money in the pot what were you gonna do?

btw is this nathan gamble? i saw this posting on fullcontact a couple weeks ago and recognized the screename

I think OP. played the hand pretty optimally. Got to limpreraise AA and get more than 33% of his stack in pre so he can autoshove post. Like, how much more perfect does it get than this? Not much, not much.

yeah, I think this was the best possible scenario for you (regardless of the results). you got it in with AAxx vs KKxx. It's a tough flop, but a lot of those flops he has to fold, and when he does have some pair/draw combination where he's a favorite over your aces, it's normally not going to be more than the 2/1 pot odds.

even though the betting went 33% pre and the rest post, you have to think of it as essentially getting it in preflop with your aces, where you're almost always a significant favorite.

I think limping with your aces is ok. not because they're ragged, but because it's tough to play UTG versus a table full of limpers most of who'll just call your raise. I like to make some non-pot raise (maybe 60% to 80%) to sweeten the pot, and shut down if I miss.

If you play $2-5-10 I think you know that this hand was played fine, just got unlucky. As to whether to raise the first time around; I would also had gone for the limpraise as the only thing a standard raise would've accomplish seems to be a multiway pot with kind of awkward stack/pot ratio and a bad hand.

tl;dr
nh
unl
gg.

dr?

hero should say "lets juice this pot up" and then raise to like $50 when the action is first to him...

i stopped at