Mike Caro

I think the answer to your question depends entirely on who you are playing and when you act in the hand. Let's say you get your Ace on the river and you are first to act and you either check or throw out a value bet and your opponent pushes all in. Now what? Unless you are 100% sure you have your opponent outkicked, the deciision depends greatly on your stack size and I would say the decision differs greatly in a cash game vs. a tournament. I would say in a tournament it also differs based on how deep you are in the tournament and, again, your stack size.

But ignoring all those things, I would guess an Ace is your most profitable card. Ace - rag in this case only loses to a straight, full house or the case ace, which your opponent has a 1 in 45 chance of having.

Personally, though, I probably wouldn't win much money on that board. That really is a terrible board for AK. There are so many playable hands that have AK crushed, especially if you decided to get fancy and slow play AK pre flop.