Okay, it's already Monday here, and the current Cotw is up there for nearly two weeks, so I thought I'd post it now:

Playing in limped pots

This topic is going to be of decreasing importance the higher you move up, since you will see less and less limped pots, a) because there will be less limping and b) because limpers will be attacked more often as you move up. But all throughout the micro stakes you will still be playing in your fair share of limped pots.

In this post I'm going to try to organize and present some ideas and concepts associated with limped pots, but bear in mind

that I cannot give you teh super expert strategy, just provide some thoughts and experiences.

Why play a limped pot?

Okay, you have probably read KurtSF's Cotw post an the corresponding thread on isolating limpers.

So why would you want to play a limped pot instead of raising? – there are generally two scenarios for playing a limped pot:

• you are in the BB, a couple limpers to you, and you have a very weak hand yourself.
  
  You will be OOP throughout the hand unless everybody but the SB folds. Depending on your opponent's playing style and limping ranges, you will often be better off taking the free play and seeing a flop, planning to either luckbox a strong hand and get paid off, or maybe steal the pot postflop when nobody shows any interest and the board seems favorable.
  
  Now, if only the SB limps to you, you should by default raise almost ATC, but sometimes you know that your SB is very sticky and showdown oriented, and also limps his strong hands, and you have 72o, and you think you'll be better off seeing a flop, maybe taking small stabs postflop when the board comes dry and he keeps checking to you – or of course you can win big pots off of him from time to time when you happen to catch a great (2pair+) flop.
  
  
• You decide to limp behind in position or complete your SB
  
  While it is true, that limpers generally have weak hand ranges, it can be less advantageous to attack them preflop if you have a speculative hand.
  
  Say you are on the button and hold 67s. If there are two set mining nits limping in front of you, you will often be better raising it up and taking it down on most flops with a cbet, and only play a big pot if you make a strong hand. But if there are 3-4 loose, passive, and showdown happy players limping, it can be more profitable to see a flop in position. With raising, you will still see a likely multiway pot, which will now be bloated and have a rather low SPR, have little fold equity even on later streets, and a hand that you won't often be able to value bet multiway. And if you happen to hit two pair or better, your opponents are likely bad enough to still pay you off with a huge array of weak hands, even if you limp behind and keep the SPR huge.

Always keep in mind to look left before making your decision preflop, whether to limp behind, iso raise or fold, and evaluate how likely it is that you will get raised/3bet/called by the players left to act, given the number, position and player types of the current limpers, and your action.

Now, HOW to play in a limped pot

In order to know how you should play your hand – first think about all the different factors that play a role in that decision. So let's make some observations about the nature of limped pots, and their implications.

• The SPR (Stack to pot ratio) is generally bigger
  
  That means, as you might know, that top pair type hands go down in value and speculative, implied odds hands go up in value. Well, that seems obvious, you wouldn't want to play a limped pot with AA, since your hand is strongest when the money goes into the pot preflop and on the flop. And conversely you wouldn't want to play a 3bet pot with a low SPR and a hand like 67s.
  
  Now, your implied odds on draws are naturally better when your opponent's ranges are stronger, and worse when their ranges are weaker, which means that because villains are generally limping weak ranges, that your implied odds should be somewhat limited. However, implied odds also go up when your opponents are bad, passive, call too many bets, call big bets with insufficient odds and generally go to showdown too often. Great, because the majority of limpers are going to fit that description perfectly
  
  Remember: given 100BB stacks in a limped pot, the SPR is roughly equal to that of a single raised pot when you are like 250-400B BB deep. So plan your hands accordingly, and always keep the deepness in mind when a villain shows that he wants to play a big pot.
  
  
• The pots are small
  
  Yeah, that is kind of redundant, because when the SPR is big – of course the pot is small. But I'm bringing this up, because it has effects that are not really covered by SPR. SPR theory centers about what hands people (should) want to play big pots with, and it deals mainly with commitment.
  
  But what happens in small pots is – people are reluctant to fight hard for them, because it seems „not worth it“, or whatever. Most people will (semi)bluff less in small pots. They might take a stab here and there with a decent draw, but they will rarely raise you without a really strong hand (or what they perceive to be really strong). When they miss they often just want to go on and see another flop. Remember that we are talking about general guidelines here. Of course you will come across the occasional fish dark tunnel raising bottom pair, Ace high or a gut shot on the flop in a limped pot. On those players a small pot has the opposite effect – they put you on **** and bet/raise. So if your opponent is bad aggressive, watch out and adjust your betting and continuing ranges accordingly. But in general you will face mainly weak and passive play, and you should be able to quickly spot the exceptions.
  
  Another factor coming from pots being small is that villains, while folding a lot, will peel a lot of flops with weak hands like gut shots, bottom pair, underpairs, overcards and general A high hands, etc. Does that mean betting with a weakish draw or middle pair becomes unfavorable? Hell no, first because they still fold a ton (take out Flopzilla, plug in two limpers' ranges and play around with certain boards, think about what hands they will continue with.), and because you chose your bet sizing wisely . Second, because there will be a lot of situations on the turn where you can successfully double barrel them and take down the pot. Just because they peel the flop with Ace high, doesn't mean they will call down with it. (Again, I would strongly suggest playing around with different boards and ranges in Flopzilla). And third, because you mainly take the betting lead - especially over two streets - with equity, you will make strange hands on turns and rivers to suck out on them. You will end up with weird backdoor draws coming in, stupid two pair hands, etc. - it's going to be a lot of fun! And oh, what fun it is to bet two streets with a straight draw only to check down the winner unimproved on the river.
  
  
• The pots are multiway very often
  
  While sometimes you will check the BB against a single limper, more often than not limped pots are at least 3way, and regularly even 4 to 5 way. Again, the lower the stakes, the more likely it is that more players are going to see the flop.
  
  Generally, people play way more straight forward in multiway pots, i.e. betting and raising their good and very good hands, checking and calling their mediocre hands and draws, and checking and folding hopeless stuff. Note that that isn't a bad trait, and you should play more straight forward too in multiway pots, just because the sheer number of hands involved a) increases the average hand strength of a winner at showdown and also b) increases the likelihood of seeing a showdown.
  
  
• The villains are bad, unobservant, non hand reading players
  
  That means, that you can chose your bet sizing as you wish, i.e. bet exactly the amount that you think will be more profitable, without fearing of giving away your hand. You can bluff really small, you can bet smallish when you value bet thinly, and you can bet bigger, sometimes even overbet, when you have a strong hand.
  
  Well yeah, that's obvious. But also you don't have to care about what you represent for the most part. Against thinking players a scare card is only a scare card if it decreases his hand strength and it also strengthens your range. The last part doesn't matter against non thinking opponents. When their 2nd pair becomes 3rd pair, and there now is a possible straight on board, it doesn't matter whether it makes sense for you to have outdrawn them, because all they care about is their hand.
  
  That also means that you can often times lead flops on good cbet boards, regardless of the fact that you would have raised preflop with the majority of the range that you will be representing, because they simply don't care, and they miss flops so much.
  
  Also you can value bet a really wide range. They are bad players for a reason, they will call you with Ace high no kicker to „see another card“, peel with bottom pair to „see if you're bluffing“, call pot sized bets with gut shots, etc.

Okay, so enough with the blah blah, how do you play those pots? a.k.a. cliff notes

• Take small stabs at small pots often – whenever you have equity in the pot and nobody has taken initiative, bet out. Whenever the board is dry and nobody seems to want it – bet out. Be first to act in the game of chicken
• The fewer players in the pot, the weaker the hand you want to be willing to bet. The later the position of the limpers the more often you'll want to bet. (As a general rule of thumb, two mid to late position limpers and you're in the BB – bet pretty much anything that can make a hand by the river. 4 limpers from everywhere, and be a lot more cautious, betting merely good pairs or better and good draws).
• Be very cautious when the pot gets big, and always remember the SPR on the flop
• Take stabs
• Barrel a lot of turns when you get called by a lone opponent (obviously, the more callers you get, the more reluctant you should be to bet again)
• Take a lot of stabs
• When they raise, they usually have it. So fold your weaker draws (two pair draws, idiot end gut shots, gut shots on two flush boards, or on paired boards, etc) and continue with your strong made hands and your better draws. Use some common sense (and Flopzilla) to determine what hands you can consider strong given opponent's general tendencies, board texture and SPR.
• When JT makes the nuts in a multiway pot, someone has JT
• Take even more stabs
• Always value bet your good and OK hands (and generally use exploitative and hence exploitable bet sizing)
• When somebody checks to you in a limped pot – they rarely have a hand they are happy about. When somebody checks twice to you in a limped pot – they never have anything.

fristtttt

nice

this is why open limping the cutoff and button is so profitable.

Exactly what I needed, and have found to agree with. Nh op

thank you sir

Good info, thanks!

You've been in a bad mood since you're moved to TN. Really, the post needed a thumbs down sign, especially after the OP specially said he wasn't an expert.

Very nice post.


Sure does seem like it, haha.

Good COTW.

I like to limp behind other 2-3+limpers with sc's and low pocket pairs. thast standard right?

is this true for every hand not just limped pots lol

I've found it to be true in 3bet pots on more than one occasion.

good post...

I really like the stab parts..

Nice CotW toedder, thanks.

JT is so so true lol.

Tks for this

I prefer raising those. The only hands I like limping after limpers are suited aces, because I don't want the dude with the worse FD to fold his hand (and partly because I can make better 2 pair). Then again, if anyone has that, there's already 4 of the same suit out and the chances of us hitting the flush are slim.

Generally, the only reason to limp speculative hands after limpers is when the limpers have a very low fold to cbet stat, so punishing the limpers might result in a flop that is hard to play when you miss. If all the limpers have standard (50-ish) fold to c-bets I prefer to just raise it up (just remember to make the raise big enough, so you don't get a chain reaction of calls), hopefully get one caller and win the pot with a cbet.

Also, if you limp a hand like 22 the only way to win it postflop is by making a set. But you are playing against really passive opponents who don't raise (and if they do, your bottom set might be dead), it's difficult to win a big pot. By raising you give yourself several ways to win the hand (small pots preflop, small pots when you cbet, huge pots when you make your set and got a much better SPR and thus much easier to stack someone).

I am not sure i fully understand what you are saying/implying with this remark. Are you saying the statement you quoted is terrible? I am not a native speaker and some nuances get lost, maybe you can elaborate a bit further?

Well, I didn't make that statement to justify a bad post, it was merely to say that it will likely be incomplete in some regard, and that some parts might be inaccurate and/or open for debate. Also that I do not feel I am the most competent guy to stay in the thread and play the role of an expert.

Well, depending on the number of limpers, their stack sizes, positions and tendencies, and the players left to act, there are certainly spots to raise, spots to limp and spots to fold SCs or SPPs. I am not sure on that, but I think being more inclined to raise 57s and to flat A4s is backwards, as you will get called with worse and be able to value bet more often with A4s than you will with 57s.

If 4 limpers have a fold to cbet stat of 50%, you are not going to see 4 folds very often. It obviously depends on how many limpers there are, and how likely they are to call you preflop. The more limpers, the more likely a multiway pot, and the less likely you are going to be able to profitably cbet 8 high.

That is true of course, bottom set can be meh when stacks go into the middle in a limped pot, depending on villain(s) and board texture. I guess I just want to point out, that there are conditions under which you won't be very profitable when raising speculative hands against a horde of limpers.

Nice work , thanks alot

WTF are you talking about? For a guy that has been around 2+2 for 7 years you certainly post a lot of useless crap.

Thanks, for post.

Good posts, glad you took a stab at it.

A few other times where limping behind can be profitable: One is when a tight player limps UTG or UTG+1, where you been active iso-raising on the BTN/CO, get a few callers behind and have a hand the plays well multiway against limping range but sucks against everyone's continuation range. Like A3s, K9s, 25s, etc. but in this situation you have almost no FE preflop and on the flop. Or completing in the SB.

Becareful of overestimating your IO, as people tend to have hands with less showdown value, so while the SPR may be greater, your IO is not as high as you think.

Thank for the article.

This is a huge, huge leak for SNL players, if you're Iso-raising 22 vs. limper(s) you're risking multiple callers pre-flop and if you Cbet you're risking multiple callers post-flop with a hand that has no showdown value or pot equity 7/8 times. If your opponent is just as likely to stack vs Top Pair, No Kicker as he is vs. a Set, then the hand strengths are relative but the frequency at which they flop is not; I'd take K9s over 22 vs. fish all ****ing day for an iso-raise.

Unless you're facing 1 limper who limp folds to your iso-raises or folds to your cbets, where raising ATC is profitable, you're just throwing away your money to a raise with a Small PP vs. limpers and you feel like a complete idiot when you iso-raise a Small PP and the reg behind you squeezes your raise.

Limping behind is fine, if not optimal, in these situations and I think you guys are losing absolutely stupid amounts of money to this according to the HEM reviews I've done.

Edit: You limp behind with Axs because Ax is your opponent's continuing range to the iso-raise and you don't want to bloat the SPR when you're holding A no kicker vs. a ton of fish who are holding the same thing. The value of the Ace is HORRIBLY overrated vs. fish because they will out kick your A6s with A8o more than you thought possible compared to K or Q high cards. You're also trying to keep as much suited trash in as possible for the cooler, IMO, and you want to school the fish together so they all draw to crappy outs by feeding on the pot odds they give each other and you show up with the absolute nuts on the end.

^^ Good point breath, I'd never really even though of that.

Just looked at the db, saw that the small pps were turning a profit and left it at that. Perhaps I need to reevaluate my play in some situations.


Good post OP. I think most of us leave alot of money on the table this way, and just focus on the larger (in terms of BBs) descisions.

very solid post, nice effort