If you are sitting at home reading this article, chances are you’re just like me – you love the game of poker. Whether you’re in it for the thrill of the game or you’re trying to make a living, playing online offers several distinct advantages over the “live” game. The online game is a faster game, which essentially means more and potentially larger pots and more risks per hour than a standard B&M (brick and mortar) game. When you see a larger volume of hands, chances are that during each session you play, you are bound to see something that leaves you speechless, shaking your head, mystified, or (shudder at the thought) having to re-buy. In this column, each week we will take a look at a different hand that fits the previously mentioned criteria. My involvement in the hand notwithstanding, I will try to remain as impartial as possible, and for the hands that I didn’t win, I will keep my bitterness to a minimum. (At least, this is my intent)

I think it was Doyle Brunson who once said that Pocket Aces only has outcomes, you either win a small pot, or you lose a big one. From my own personal experience, I have to agree with him. In a perfect world, you want some action when you pick up the best starting hand in hold em, but you don’t want too many callers. Ideally, this is a hand you want to go heads up with or at most have 2 players. Any more than that and you’re asking for trouble. Why is that? Well, at the end of the day aces alone are just a pair and are subject to being beaten. That’s just the nature of the beast. If you have a lot of drawing hands out there against you, someone will probably hit and take a huge chunk of your stack.

On that note, here comes this week’s hand of the week. I was playing $1-$2 no limit hold em online recently. I must admit, I was running well for the week but in this particular session, I was taking a beating. I just was not running well at all. The game was a full 9 handed game and as is the case online, there was tons of action at my table. I was in the cutoff seat and looked to see 2 black Aces. Finally, I thought to myself, my luck was about to change. Or so I thought. There were 3 limpers before me and I raised to $15 to go. Unbelievable, I got 5 callers. This immediately set off alarms in my head. Like I previously stated. I wanted this action heads up which is why I raised as much as I did. So here we were with $90 in the pot and 6 players.

The flop was a nice one for me 3d-8c-10h. Rainbow flop, completely disjointed. It was checked around to the player ahead of me and he fires out $40. To me, I suspected he was trying to steal the pot so I decided this was an obvious raise or fold situation. I came over the top for my remaining $200 in a bid to take down this pot right then and there. It was folded around to a players 2 seats to my right and he called immediately. I took this as a very ominous sign as he couldn’t possibly be drawing.

The initial raiser thought for a minute before he finally folded. Our cards were flipped over and he shows pocket 3’s for a set of 3’s. I now had exactly two outs. The Turn brought the 10c giving my opponent a full house and my situation looked even bleaker. I needed a miracle on the river.

Incredibly, I got my miracle. The River was the beautiful Ace of hearts giving me my full house and I took down the pot. I breathed a huge sigh of relief.

How have you fared with your aces? Send your experiences to info@pokerstrategyking.com and we’ll get a forum going.

Until next time, may the chips fall your way.

Click here for the Hand of the Week Archive