Playing Big Pocket Pairs in Early Position
There is little in poker that can compare to looking down pre-flop and seeing a nice, big pocket pair staring right back at you. Big pairs like aces, kings and queens can have a weird effect on players, often making them feel like they’re already guaranteed to win the hand without even seeing the flop. In reality, pocket pairs truly only represent an opportunity for you to pick up some chips as long as you play them correctly, while on the flip side, playing a pocket pair like it’s invincible can lead to some large losses.
How you play your big pocket pair is actually pretty easy to figure out regardless of whatever position your in, as the situation almost always calls for a raise. In early position, rarely will you ever want to just limp in with a hand like aces, kings or queens. Some novice players don’t mind limping with big pocket pairs because they feel that the more people that are in the pot, the more money they win. The truth though, is that you want very few players to stay in the hand to see the flop, as that just gives you more opponents with more hand combinations that can catch the cards they need to beat out your pocket pair, which remember is just a single pair and is beat by any other type of made hand.
You should want only one or two players to see the flop with you at this point, so be prepared to make a bet that will get anyone with medium to trash hands to toss their cards in the muck. This will eliminate garbage hands like J-5 that may catch a big flop and have you dominated without you having any idea. If you bet 2.5 to 3 times the big blind (which is standard), you should only get called by players with middle pocket pairs or hands like A-Q, etc. Knowing this, you can now see how the flop comes and judge whether or not you’re in good position to proceed with being aggressive with your hand.
By: Chris Iaquinta
