HotDiggy1121

DJ Sensei – Full Ring No Limit DoJo
*How to maximize win rate at low stakes
Episode 1:Playing small to mid pairs. *

Back in the day, set mining was basically all one needed to do.
Played incorrectly, small pairs will cause tough spot – tough decisions.

General strategy:
100NL
Against nitty players, playing for a set is best. Against most players, these are good to take pots with. Not able to stack as many peeps with sets any more.
Some pros use them as bluffs successfully.
The change in environment changes the way they are played. VERY difficult to play OOP so OK to fold. They aren’t absolute anymore

**22CO – UTGraiser. *
Full stacks so clear call. Implied odds are at a max with UTG opener. *

536 monotone flop.
In most cases, villain has unimproved over cards so betting is reasonable. He’s not likely slow playing due to wet board. Villain check/calls so probably has over card spade. *

Turn 6d *
Goes check/bet for value (we should have bet for value.) We need to bet to protect because with 22, he has 6 more outs for board to counterfeit our pair. Villain has approx. 14 outs with 1 over card spade. River is 7c
Goes check/?. Are opponent s capable of making A-high calls? If so, bet. Bet small because we have to make it a good price for him to call to try to pick a few more bets up. DJ Sensei seems to want to check and see what we have at showdown. Villain had AQ with Q spades. We should have bet turn. If we get 2 streets out of him, we should be happy about that and check river back per DJ Sensei.

33CO – Open to 3x, BB calls.
652rainbow. *

Check/bet about half pot IP. BB check/raises. 12/7 is a nitty regular. 12/7 means he’s not bluffing nearly as much. We should be concerned. Do many opponents have balls to check/raise bluff? Downside is larger than upside. We have a gut shot and a pocket pair but it’s probably not a good implied odds situation. REALLY important to put opponents on ranges and think about which cards could come in relation to his range. Very hard to stack nits, so implied odds aren’t there so much.

44HJ – MP raiser3x. *

*Flat call is standard. *

Flop 587 monotone. *

*Opponent bets into us. Sometimes on this wet board, it’s a good spot to float and take pot away on future streets via bluff. Villain is 38/24 so villain is auto-cbetting. Check opponents’ cbet stats. We don’t have to make a play on every board. If board isn’t scary, ok to check it down. As played, we fold. Pretty tight fold. If you don’t know how much pressure to apply or his range then folding makes sense. Against weak opponent, it a good spot to call then outplay him. If you are going to call Preflop against aggressive players, don’t call then fold because they are going to give you money. This was IP, but note that when you play small pairs OOP it can be very tough if you don’t hit your set. *

55BB – Button opens to 3×. *

*We call. Against a wide button opener it’s probably best to fold. Implied odds aren’t there if we’re against a wide range. He’ll likely not have a hands good enough to call. Against a nit button opener, OK to call. Maybe ok to 3bet if fold-to-3bet is high. *

Flop K722-tone. *

We check/raise which is decent because he misses a lot. Check/calling is also an option. If he doesn’t have a K, it’ll be hard to continue unless he thinks we’re bluffing. CBET% low for opponent will likely check it back. Knowing your opponent is key to make a play like this. He needs to be able to fold for it to be profitable. When we get called, go ahead and fold. He could have weaker hands of draws to call that so reads are essential. Being called with a wide range of hands is horrible for the check/raise. One thing people always overestimate the number of draws our opponent will show up with. Normally, they have more hands that aren’t flush draws. Best to give up at this point. Hero chooses to barrel and is successful, but probably don’t take this line too often. This is the kind of play that pro have eliminated from their arsenal. !! In higher stakes, good opponents are going to polarize your range to bluffs or strong hands and your bluff range is bigger than strong hand range.

66BUTTON – UTG limp, MP limp, LP limp. *

*We raise to 7×. This is reasonable. We’ll take this down a fair bit. Only get called by UTG. When play limp/calls from UTG they probably have pocket pairs or maybe suited connector. He doesn’t have a monster ever. Maybe QJs that he wants to play. Opponent is 41/29 so he’ll have more of the Broadway playable hands that he doesn’t want to play. *

873 rainbow flop. *

*Villain donks into us. 90%, donk bets are bluffs. We should raise almost any 2 cards. With a bigger pair or stronger hand it’s better to call to get more value. With marginal hands, better to take the pot now. *

Turn 9 *

• If we hit our set he may have a straight. Villain betting larger on the turn is surprising. We showed weakness by flat calling flop so we’re in a tighter spot. A lot of his donking range is ahead now. The air in his range diminishes with that turn bet. Getting 2.7:1 now. Folding is good at this point. h1. Avoid this situation by raising the donk bet!!!!!! *

77MP –we raise and 1 caller:
Flop J542tone. *

Good board to cbet. If we check the flop we have to give up. The fact that it’s multiway pot we get more respect from raise. We could get ourselves in trouble to continue to barrel. Kh is a good barrel card on turn? A good solid player will expect us to barrel this turn. Many players won’t do anything about it, but some will see K and be licking their chops waiting for you to fire 2nd barrel. River 9h giving 3flush on board. 3rd barrel of 2/3 pot may get them off their hand. Will we get more folds by over betting than betting 2/3? Probably not. ½ pot bet will get looked up more often because price is so good. May want to consider a small bet to get him off busted draws, but 2/3 is best.