Not only is Melvin now in a terrible mood, but he now has to go out and spend $50 replacing his mouse before he can continue playing.ĭoes the above scenario sound familiar? Does it seem like your Aces just never win? Let’s consider some theory and strategy. This was because Melvin’s expensive optical mouse finally shattered as a result of being repeatedly slammed on his desk. Not only did Melvin lose the pot with AA for the 5th time today but he also timed out on his other 4 tables despite holding strong hands. Of course you have a 98% chance of not losing.Remember that you can learn more about Pocket Aces and how to combine cards with our Poker Hands Lessons for beginners! AA is the very worst hand to have against AA at just over 2%.

Aces use T-K and 2-5 to make str8's which can counter suckout the higher and lower pocket pairs when they make sets. It looks as though the middle Pocket Pairs, 66-88 have the best chance of sucking out against AA. It therefore becomes very profitable to play marginal hands against AA because they are easy to get away from if the flop misses and will often win large pots when they do hit. So in a deep stack situation, the relative size ofa bet is small compared to the size of the stack. However post flop, they have the power to improve to monsters. Take something like 65s or QJo, preflop they are weak hands and in typical tournament play it would often be very costly to see a the flop after a raise. This is because preflop, they are the nuts, but post flop they have little chance of improving. In this scenario, aces become a weak made hand. This is because players will have sufficient chips to play post flop without becoming pot committed. However in deep stack play (usually this wont occur in a tournament) aces loose much of their edge. To make this tiny edge pay off would take a lifetime.Īgainst aces it would be pointless to call an all-in at any stage.

There may be a very slight advantage to playing certain hands over others, but when aces come up, we are playing for stacks.

What beats what 5 aces in poker