AK is possibly the most troublesome hand in NL hold em, ranking alongside JJ in the difficulty it poses in a lot of situations. Indeed the hand which causes the most exits from NL hold em tournaments is AK. I was talking about this hand with muse earlier on msn and thought I would post a thread up on it... My take is like this..How I play it depends ENTIRELY on the sort of game I am in, in a cash game or a tournament and indeed if the tournaments blinds are at the low middle or large stage. In a cash game on the internet I will seldom raise preflop with it in a full ring game on the net for a lot of reasons. What you basically have is a drawing hand and if you raise upfront with it and called a few times, what are you going to do if you miss the flop? Believe me on the internet if you choose to play aggressively and bet hard at a baby flop after raising in early position with AK you will most likely be called (and be behind) by someone who has a pocket pair or a small piece of the board - and then you have invested even more money in a pot you are not likely to win at that point.
I like to limp with this hand in cash games and give my opponents no idea of the strength of my hand - letting them all limp in with their AJ and K10 type hands which you will make a mint off time and time again on the Axx and Kxx flops you connect with (when you get these flops just play your hand hard and you will find yourself paid off nicely most of the time). By limping when the flop comes pish pish pish you can just muck your hand and noone is any the wiser with you having invested the minimum.
If you want to raise with AK, which can be a profitable raise, then I would say the best place to try it is the button or when you are fairly sure you will "become" the button by raising. In this way if you miss the flop and are checked to you can take the free card off and possibly hit an A or K on the turn. If I raise with AK and only get ONE caller I will probably bet the flop regardless of what comes, especially if the player is weak tight - I will never bluff multiple opponents. Remember and exercise some caution at flops where you have top pair but it is highly possible someone has two pair IE AJx or KQx and you will find AK is highly profitable in cash games.
Shorthand the play changes somewhat. If I am going to play AK in a shorthanded game it is almost always for a raise preflop, but the thing to note here is if I am going to play a shorthanded pot at all I generally find it better to come in for a raise rather than a limp. This way your hand is as disguised as when you limp with it in a full ring. Play on the flop and beyond shorthanded/HU is a lot trickier than full ring and it would be hard to to go indepth with it here, I will try in another thread later on. However the same thoughts should be running through your mind as I mentioned earlier.
Tournament play I play it a lot differently, especially when the blinds become big (It's a great reraising hand but a poor calling one!) but I will discuss that later. Loads of people disagree with me and raise everytime they get AK in a full ring cash game regardless of position and opponents.
Jez
