One of the dudes in my study group insists on 3 betting 22-55 from the blinds vs a button open even when the open raise is just a min raise.

I am trying to convince him that we want to flat a lot of hands out of the bb especially and esp vs a min raise and so we don't want to use a perfectly good calling hand like 33 to 3 bet.

He made some good arguments; we are always happy to get folds when we have a small pair (almost every hand is making a mistake to fold), when we do go post flop we will have a stronger range to flop against giving us better implied odds when we do flop a set. Our implied odds with a small PP are usually not great vs a wide button open range so we don't make much when we set mine against that range. And we can even use a hand like 33 to five bet jam against the right players because it will often very nearly the same equity as TT vs a 4 bet, gii range from the button (I mean, as long as that range does not contain exactly TT it will be VERY close).


I thought these were pretty strong arguments and, while I am not quite convinced yet, I wanted to run the idea by ya'll and see what you think about 3 betting baby pairs vs a button open (especially a min raise) at or around 100bb effective.

What do we think about this?

I tend to agree with you. If he's 3betting small pairs he's probably either 3betting too much or not calling enough. There are a number of suited crap hands like 74s, 63s, 53s that will realize more equity 3betting than flatting that I prefer to use, which I don't think is the case with small pairs because they have such lousy playability post flop.

edit: Also unless you want to go balls to the wall with them via zero-ish equity bluffs you're creating a checking range in 3bet pots that is too lopsided to check folding because its very hand to c/c multiple streets when you face nothing but overs. you'll allow them to free-roll equity with hands that would fold to bluffs with smaller suited hands that can actually bluff with some sort of equity.

the more I think about it, it seems pretty poorly thought out to me.

The main justification is usually also that you can 3b/5b them and they play well as a shove compared to 74s or whatever. I don't think that makes up for the bad stuff kevin outlined though.

Thanks to you both. I think you both know I respect and invite input from you specifically and you are really just backing up the kinds of things I was already thinking. So thank you both a lot and I'm glad the three of us are in consensus. that makes me feel pretty safe about giving this as advice.
THNX

anyone else?
Please feel free to chime in, didn't mean to sound like I was shutting down any further discussion. I'd be happy to hear other people chime in and say "yeah, you guys are right don't 3 bet small pair (and "here's why" would be great)

and ESPECIALLY if you actually think we are missing something that makes 3 betting hands like 22 and 33 from the blinds vs button min open. Your thoughts are more than welcome.

agreed with all of u.

I would check their attempt to steal stats. If it's high I might consider 3betting once in a while but wouldn't consider doing it every time as a matter of course. If their attempt to steal is low and they are nitty I probably would just fold here, but I'm pretty tight on the blinds.

I like calling out of the BB because you'll usually have odds to do so, but I admit that I struggle with these hands out of the SB - as mentioned setmining just isn't that profitable vs a wide button open range, and you have to fold to most cbets.

call out of BB 3bet out of SB.

3betting out of SB
- i 3bet whole range SB to prevent BB from seeing a pot for free and being able to squeeze insanely profitably
- also helps to try and enter the pot with an uncapped range vs. a loose RFI range
- also helps to try and close out pots preflop to prevent playing them IP
- as a result i want to 3bet all pairs as a part of this top x% of hands range

3betting out of BB
- now that we're getting a good price on a call and closing action we can call a lot more
- can opt to go more polarized now, calling our middle hands, and 3betting the strongest and weakest ones, folding the very weakest hands
- prefer to not 3bet small pairs as a result because they play very profitable as calls

furthermore, small pairs benefit from medium sprs (~10-30 or so) because we don't really NEED to flop set to win pot with spr of 1 (with 33 we do obv but not with 99 or TT or whatever) so having smaller spr is worse because yea we'll get paid very often but the amount of money we're investing to set up this scenario is not worth it