ITH Poker Forum

[Bluedaq]

Any advise?

Playing strong and medium hands JJ,10's,9's. To AQ AJ preflop.

say you have over 25 bigblinds
Raise jacks middle position button calls flop comes 786 (two diamonds) bet flop button moves in as you covered.

QQ raise utg HJ (tight player calls) 10107 bet hj moves all in as you covered

AQ raise utg three calls flop comes AKJ two clubs bet player next to me moves all in. He is bad enough to move in with A10 or A9 but I canotnot beat many hands.


Is it better to check/call these hands these are from tournaments hands and survival is more important then cash but I feel that I manage play very large pots out position.

[nsidestrate]

Any advise?

Playing strong and medium hands JJ,10's,9's. To AQ AJ preflop.

say you have over 25 bigblinds
Raise jacks middle position button calls flop comes 786 (two diamonds) bet flop button moves in as you covered.

You have to look at the numbers. Let's say you have 2,500 and blinds are 50/100. You raise to 300 pre-flop and get called in two spots (Button and BB). Pot contains 950. Your stack is 2,200 and the pot contains 950. You can never fold an overpair in that situation. When you bet, you presumably bet somewhere in the neighborhood of 700. The button shoves and the pot contains 3,850 and you have 1,500 to call. You are getting over 2:1 and you could easily have the best hand there.

If you are only called by the button, it is closer but in the end the analysis is similar. Because the board is draw heavy, there is such a good chance that he has a draw that I think you have to call.

QQ raise utg HJ (tight player calls) 10107 bet hj moves all in as you covered

Agsin, this is a function of potsize. If you have read the Flynn, Miller book, it talks about stack to pot ratio. If you raise with 25 BBs, your SPR will be around 3 with one caller, which makes it very hard to get away from overpairs. A flop like TT7 will get slowplayed by most Tens and a shove is more likely a hand like JJ or 99 or 88, so I'd generally call here too.

AQ raise utg three calls flop comes AKJ two clubs bet player next to me moves all in. He is bad enough to move in with A10 or A9 but I canotnot beat many hands.

Also a tough spot. He could easily have KQ or KT in addition to the hands you mention, as well as a pair plus flush draw or a gutshot plus flush draw. I'm probably stacking off here too.

Is it better to check/call these hands these are from tournaments hands and survival is more important then cash but I feel that I manage play very large pots out position.

I doubt it. Although you can easily get into bad spots playing OOP, betting is almost always better because you don't let anyone catch up and win more pots by default. If you play check-call you are probably equally likely to face a big decision by the river anyhow.

[russ fox]

Any advise?

Playing strong and medium hands JJ,10's,9's. To AQ AJ preflop.

say you have over 25 bigblinds
Raise jacks middle position button calls flop comes 786 (two diamonds) bet flop button moves in as you covered.

QQ raise utg HJ (tight player calls) 10107 bet hj moves all in as you covered

AQ raise utg three calls flop comes AKJ two clubs bet player next to me moves all in. He is bad enough to move in with A10 or A9 but I canotnot beat many hands.


Is it better to check/call these hands these are from tournaments hands and survival is more important then cash but I feel that I manage play very large pots out position.

In nlhe, you are always playing the player. If your opponent is one who only moves in when he has the goods, then you have easy folds; if not, then how tight is he?

For my answers I assume that your opponent has a similar stack size to you. Clearly if he's short you have easy calls.

Hand 1: [you have JJ; flop 678 with 2 diamonds]. I hate jacks. I don't know anyone who likes them. "There are three choices you can make with jacks: raising, calling, or folding, and two of them will be wrong." That comes from one of D.R. Sherer's books that I read years ago.

I'd likely call, as your hand is better than his most likely hand (A8, 98, d draw).

Hand 2: [you have QQ, flop TT7]: This is much easier. This is a good flop for your hand--given the paired board he's much likelier *not* to have a T. He could have KK or AA, too, though. I'd call.

But I'll point out that I recently played a tournament, was in a similar position with QQ on a flop of KKx, moved-in, and somehow my opponent found a call with KK.

Hand 3: [you raise UTG with AQ (3 call), flop AKJ with 2 clubs; you bet, next player moves in].

I haven't a clue what I'd do here, but I know what I wouldn't have done: raised UTG with AQ. I'd fold. Unless we're short-handed, or I'm at a very tight table, I will dump AQ from UTG because I'll be left with decisions like this one. I'd rather play 76 late than AQ UTG.

Last, you ask about check-calling versus betting. I'll do both--it just depends on what I think is more likely to get/save me money. There is no one right way to play but there are wrong ways.

-- Russ Fox

[nsidestrate]

Oops. I didn't realize this was in "Ask An Expert" when I answered earlier.

My apologies.

[Bluedaq]

Oops. I didn't realize this was in "Ask An Expert" when I answered earlier.

My apologies.

No thank you for your response.

[AlamedaMike]

Oops. I didn't realize this was in "Ask An Expert" when I answered earlier.

My apologies.

I thought that you are an expert? My bad, I guess.

[Tommy Angelo]

Any advise?

Playing strong and medium hands JJ,10's,9's. To AQ AJ preflop.

say you have over 25 bigblinds
Raise jacks middle position button calls flop comes 786 (two diamonds) bet flop button moves in as you covered.

QQ raise utg HJ (tight player calls) 10107 bet hj moves all in as you covered

AQ raise utg three calls flop comes AKJ two clubs bet player next to me moves all in. He is bad enough to move in with A10 or A9 but I canotnot beat many hands.


Is it better to check/call these hands these are from tournaments hands and survival is more important then cash but I feel that I manage play very large pots out position.

Hi Bluedaq,

I don't have any advice on these hands. For me, if I were playing these hands, my decision in each case you described would hinge on the exact circumstances at the exact moments that the betting unfolded. I don't play tournaments, and I don't play online, which means I usually have a lot of information and history and hunches to draw on because I am looking at my opponents and they are looking at me. As I sit here picturing myself in the betting situations you described, I can tell you that at the moment my bet goes in on the flop, I would already know what I would do if my opponent went all-in for several times the pot size. Sometimes I would call, and sometimes I would fold, depending on who it was and how I thought they might play various ranges of hands at that moment against me, considering how I have been playing up to that moment. The only thing I know for certain is when they raised, I would never think, "Oh shit, now what?" I'd already know what I would do before I chose to bet, and my bet amount. If there is any good advice I can give, it would be just that. If you bet, and the guy goes all-in, and then you decide what to do, then you made what I call an "anticipation mistake" by not anticipating the raise.

It's hard for me to imagine a scenario where the decision was close enough to warrant being posted about for which I would say "this play is right and that play is wrong." I don't think there is such a thing as right and wrong. Those are merely words, they are labels, that we assign to ideas. There is no absolute right or wrong in my opinion. Right and wrong only exist when a human mind thinks they do. Maybe they should have changed the name of "Ask an Expert" this month to "Ask some dude who has no answers."

Tommy