Live Poker Poker Forums

What do you guys do in these spots? Live 1/2 NLHE game, so far the whole table has generally played loose and passive. Assume you cover all players unless indicated otherwise.

(1) An opponent who has limped into about 40% of pots but not raised one so far in the two orbits you've been at the table raises in early position to $15. He has about $160 in his stack. A bad player who is seeing almost every flop calls (he has about $130 in front of him). You cover both players and have J 9 on the button.

(2) Five players limp in, all with stacks between $100 and $250. You have K 6 on the button.

(3) An opponent raises to $20 in early position and it folds to you in the big blind with K 9 . This opponent is generally passive with weak hands and draws, but bets aggressively with made hands and cannot release a good hand no matter how clear it is that he is beat. He is sitting with just over $720 in front of him and you cover. You've played about five orbits at the table with him, and while he is seeing 50% of flops, this is only the second time you've seen him raise preflop. The previous time he was called in two places, fired a 1.25x pot size bet on a flop of 8 7 5 and took the pot down.

1 - I'm not thrilled that the SPR is low, but I still think we can profitably call here IP. On one hand, it would be nice if it was HU, but I think we actually prefer more players since PFR has a strong range and we'll likely need to hit a strong flop regardless.

2 - I'm experimenting with playing as many pots as possible IP with bad players. That being said, I think K6o is still in my folding range here. I have no real basis for this, but I'd say my cutoff is K9o and all suited Ks.

3 - This seems like a clear fold 100bbs deep. Being 360bb deep, knowing that we might even see a free card if he has something like AK and misses (and could take the pot down w/ a turn bet), and also knowing that when we hit we will get paid vs his good hands all combine to make me want to call here.

1) I used to call here but I think I fold these days
2) definitely think I'd fold
3) I'd just fold, don't see this being particularly good spot to call.

1) call
2) fold
3) dont call. fold or 3b

I fold all 3

Hand 1 is just because stacks are pretty shallow and you're going to be dominated too often

Hand 2 is just a bad hand that has a very hard time making nutted hands.

Hand 3 I fold because of his giant preflop raise and the fact that our hand plays pretty poorly out of position.

@ All, Are you never calling K9s OOP no matter the effective stack? If you are, then at what depth would it be?

1) Fold-Effective stacks are too shallow after a 7.5x raise and two callers.
2) Fold. K6o is terrible even with position.
3) Call. I actually like a call here. You're super deep w/ the villian and he can't fold a hand. I'm just trying to smash the flop (2 pair +) to stack him. I would be giving up on most flops.

1) Fold-Effective stacks are too shallow after a 7.5x raise and two callers.
2) Fold. K6o is terrible even with position.
3) Call. I actually like a call here. You're super deep w/ the villian and he can't fold a hand. I'm just trying to smash the flop (2 pair +) to stack him. I would be giving up on most flops.

+1 to this

1) If our only plan is to catch big on the flop, then fold. If we had a read on the opener (like he is super fit or fold po-flop) and a good read on the middle player, then we can call and out play them po-flop. But, without the reads, it's a fold.

2) I need reads, but I call here 50%+ with the intention to steal the flop, use my TPWK as a bluff catcher, or catch a bunch of sixes. :-)

3) Call. I hate it when my only plan is to try and catch the flop, especially OOP, but that's my plan here.

We need to be wary of reads that are only 2-5 orbits of info. Yes, it's a game of incomplete information, but we need to gather more info.

1) I'm folding preflop. I like Bart's 10/20-25 rule. So essentially for this pot we'd want to be able to make at least 300, but closer to 375(for gappers). Stacking both villains would only be 290, so I think this is a fold.

2) total garbage hand, get rid of it.

3) we're 300+ BB deep here, this is definitely a call.

1) I like Bart's 10/20-25 rule.

Can you elaborate?

Can you elaborate?

Bart didn't really come up with it -- it's just a rule of thumb for the type of implied odds we need to play speculative hands. 10:1+ for set mining, 20:1+ for suited connectors. As the game has evolved and people are generally more aware po-flop, we need those implied odds to be higher than we did 5 or 6 years ago.

We are like 7:1 to catch a set (and our sets don't always win at showdown), so ~10:1 should be profitable to set mine.

We are like 15:1 to catch trips/2pair/ with suited connectors, more often we'll catch a monster draw but we're often flipping with that hand... and these hands too won't always win at showdown, so ~20:1 should be profitable to set mine.

Speculative hands are best played:

1) When villain's range is super tight, appropriate effective stack size, and villain never folds TPGK or overpair. We call to catch and then get stacks in when we do, ez game.

2) When villain's range is wider but we have a good read telling us that we have fold equity po-flop. We can semi-bluff profitably with our combo draws, we can float with our small pairs... in both instances we out-play villain to be profitable.

3) Overlimping can be profitable, too, if we have table mates that will play big pots with two pair or less in limped pots (look for the elderly rocks who love to limp QQ/KK and go to the felt versus 4 players po-flop).

I think 10:1 is too small to set mine. I think you need a minimum of 15:1.

Can you elaborate?

Just to add to spewtastic's post: It's 10 times (for pocket pairs) the raise size in the stack (effective stacks, of course) of the preflop raiser.

Ty spew/meow.

It does seem like 10:1 is too small though considering how often we hit our set and don't win a ton of $.