Just opened a new table and and 30 minutes into game of 1-2 nl with everybody sitting right around 200 in chips. Older guy in early position makes it 15 ...6 callers ...I am in the big blind and look down at j9.....call or fold???? Also there is no one left to act after me

J9s is one of the better multiway hands to play. I'd definitely see a flop here.

Calling a big pf open here is generally bad being oop with a RIO hand. Other posters will disagree, pointing out our fantastic pot odds/implied odds and saying their skill edge post will make up for our weak holdings/being oop.

I doubt that's true for most of them, and I don't mean to call into question op's post flop skill, but if I had to guess, I'd say you (and I) should probably be folding.

Commence nit-bashing in 5.....4......3.......

I was confused and convinced myself it was was worth calling but I felt like a fish putting in the 13 bucks...flop Ah kc 10h ....I check and original raiser bets 25 ...1 called...action on me...????

IMO, I think that rather than discuss the flop & subsequent action, we should discuss how you became confused pre & convinced yourself it was worth the call, despite feeling like a fish while calling.

You know what: I'm going to change my initial position here and advocate for a fold. $200 deep isn't nearly enough for J9s. I'd rather see at least 200BBs in most of those stacks for this to be worthwhile.

Anyway, as played, you're in quite a poor spot now. You can only realize your equity with two cards and you're not drawing to the clean nuts with anything going forward. If this were heads up and you could put your opponent on the top end of his range, then you want to play for stacks, but in this situation I'd fold, particularly after his bet was flatted by another player.

Welcome to the forums!

I suggest first calculating the IO by taking the potential payoff (effective stack+pot) vs. your investment (call). So ($200+2+1)/$13 which nets you 15.6-1.

Flopping a pair is ~32% or ~2-1. However, your pair may not be good enough to win.

Flopping two pair is ~2% or ~49-1.

Flopping trips is ~1.4% or 73-1.

Flopping a straight is 76-1 with scs, likely higher with a one-gapper.

Flopping a flush is 118-1.

Based on your potential max payout of <16-1, and the above odds of hitting the flop, it’s a clear fold. You are also oop which is an impediment to building the pot should u hit.

As played, you probably have little fold equity (raising to get a better hand to fold) so I’d just call and hope to hit. May not get a full payoff, another drawback of calling this hand pre.

GL!

Would you have played J9o instead J9s in the same situation?

OK, time's up. I'm gonna describe to you the proper and correct way to look at the game in this situation. If you want to become a winning player think hard and try to understand what I'm telling you.

Why play J9s when the raise is $15 and gets 6 callers? - The pot gets to be $105 before your call. If you call the pot gets to $120 with $185 left. In this situation the SPR becomes 185/120 = 1.5 - You are in bad shape with drawing hands with that SPR. You cannot play properly being on a draw with that kind of SPR. In this situation you need a pocket pair 22+ or AK, AQ, AJ. Hands that materialize fast on the flop into a big made hand (a Set or TP type hands) so you can move 1/2 stacks in OTF and the rest easily OTT.

With drawing hands in big pots and SPR small you not going to be able to call big flop bets and draw. What you need is a big SPR. In those type of games you describe the fact the the pot gets raised in EP and called by so many players, it creates an artificially small SPR due to the fact of building a big pot preflop. Your hand being playable is a function of what SPR you get on the flop after you see the action before you decide. ..., By the way, J9s is trash, another words suited trash. That hand can be played on the BT to attack the blinds or to defend the blinds with a 3-bet against a "weak" raise from the players in the CO/BT. Having a suited trash, OOP and getting a small SPR is an abortion of a train wreck.

I don't really think preflop is a flat against a 7.5x open and us only having 1.5 SPR going to the flop. We're a dog to everyone playing their top 25% of hands and our relative position amounts to nothing in an 8-way pot where there's no initiative and all 7 players act after us are just going to play to the strength of their hand. Can't really squeeze at this depth either because any sizing commits you, so you have to go pretty strictly linear here. So I guess that leaves fold. Which is whatever, 7.5x opens from old guy EP openers are not something you need to mess with much, regardless of who else is coming along for the ride.

OTF, I'd put 100 on top and GII.

This is not how implied odds work.
First of all there is already ~100 dead in the pot, so the potential payoff with around 200 behind would be (100+200/13=)23:1. Also, with 7 opponents in the pot, the likelyhood of multiple of players putting in money obviously increases. Under the right circumstances we can triple or quadruple up (septuple up even ).

Secondly (and more importantly), we don't have to flop 2 pair+ to be able to profitably continue in the hand. As seen above we can flop J high and still have a significant amount of equity. In this particular case we are likely to have an equity advantage even against 7 opponents.

IMO, the main question should be how well we can realize our equity on different runouts and how much money can go in when we do. Being oop in this hand obviously hinders both those things, but i cant imagine folding this when we are getting 7:1 direct odds and, as mentioned, >23:1 IO. We are suited, semiconnected and can actually dominate some typical multiway hands like T9 or 98.

AP, c/r and gii seems good. We should have some FE and our it's gonna be obvious/hard to get value when we just call and hit our draw. The initial raiser can have sets obv, but if we can fold out something like AQ it's a massive win also.

I agreed with you right up until this point. Our equity's behind the field, so we actually have to make up equity in order for this to be profitable. That doesn't seem likely to do when flopping a pair of 9s means we have to fade 7 checks because we're too shallow to continue with a pair + double backdoor stuff. We pretty much need to flop a 8+ out draw to so much as breakeven facing any action whatsoever on the flop. Meanwhile, bluffing opportunities are few and far between giving us limited opportunity to make-up equity (notwithstanding the very rare times we flop 12 outs, and a 1/4 PSB folds out the majority of the field before the action's back on us).

^i haven't looked up the exact numbers, so i might be completely off, but i think the odds of flopping a FD are like 9% and the odds of flopping a SD with a 1gapper is like 6%. Add in another ~4% for when we flop 2pair+ and were up to 19%.

Meanwhile we have to call 13 to play a pot of 120. (13/120=)0.108=11%.

19%>11%, so even if we give up 1/3 of our equity because we are oop and dont have fold/bluff equity, we are still breaking even. That doesn't seem unreasonable.

Again, i haven't looked up the math so please correct me if i'm wrong.

It's not always a numbers thing. If you are fairly new to the game with little experience, then fold. If you are experienced and one of the better players at this table, then call. Just have to be honest with yourself.

As played, you can call the flop...small flop bet gives you good odds to call.

Comparing how often we get to realize our equity to our pot contribution isn't meaningful. Our equity isn't 100% in the hands where we're in contention for the pot. In most those cases, it's <35%.

How exactly do you intend to leverage your superior poker ability with a 1.5 SPR OOP to 7 players? Are you going to lead cram the flop and then go down the line, folding out players by summoning holographic images of each player's innermost fears until they flee their chips and cards to go cry in their mother's bosom?

We are 8handed to the flop. The average equity is 12.5%. If we have 35% we are printing money.

I missed the callers, my bad, thought it was HU.

Obviously, u don’t have to flop 2-pair, trips, etc. rather your potential return is a sum of the variables. These do not consider RIO.

When u dream of a double/triple-up the lower probabilities I listed are in play. My point is to get a fair return on the call. That is a fundamental concept.

If u think J-high has significant equity advantage vs. 7 opponents, GL.

We have <35% equity <15% of the time.

You compared our pot contribution to the frequency we realize our (non-100%) equity as if that's the number of times we win the pot.

IOW, in the last post, you mentioned the frequency we realize our equity without factoring in what our equity is that we're realizing; in this post, you're saying how favorable our equity is without factoring in how much we get in that situation. You have to factor the two numbers together for it to be meaningful to compare it to our pot contribution.

Thanks for all the information..I would never play j9 from EP usually but all the callers made me confused. Turn comes queen of spades.... giving me the nuts

Yes you're wrong and I'm gonna tell you why

The thing is not that we have to call $13 and play a $120 pot. First you don't have a hand to play in a $120 pot because the SPR is already at 1.5 - Your hand needs time yo materialize because it's a suited trash drawing type of hand with a gap. So, the post flop bets will be large when you still need to see more cards. You aren't drawing to the nuts. Even if you hit the flop 33% of the time for a pair you'll not gonna be good by the river. You try to play a drawing garbage OOP. No good !

In this situation you need to play 22+, AK, AQ, AJ, KQ type hands that flop made hands (Sets, TP or miss). You don't want to be drawing with a 1.5 SPR (if you don't understand what SPR means read Ed Miller). You got to master this concept in order to become a better player in the future.

Note:
This type of SITUATIONS create artificially shallow stacks for the simple reason that a medium raise called by so many players, 6-7 dudes in this case) makes the pot too big and the SPR too small and your all drawing hands go down the public toilet contrary to the incorrect popular misconception that drawing hands play well in multiway pots. Yes, they play well in a unraised multiway pot where the SPR is big.

I understand...thanks for explaining

Yes, the SPR is the KEY component always, not the pot preflop but what you suspect the action may be at the flop with so many players in a big pot already. Always the SPR take precedence even when you are in position. A big SPR gives you time to peal another card for a reasonable price (drawings), while a small SPR gives you the opportunity to play for stacks when you materialize fast on the flop with a flopped Set or TPTK (22+, big Ace or big King)

If you are in position, for example, and have limpers upfront and you have 22+, AK, AQ, AJ, KQ, you raise to shrink the SPR down to be able to play for stacks by betting 2-3 chunks of the stack and get called on your big flopped hands. If on the other hand you hold drawing type hands and have limpers upfront, you can limp or make a small raise to keep the SPR large so you can call and draw on the flop for a reasonable price.

With big flopped hands you want unreasonable big bets on the flop while with flopped draws you want manageable/small-medium bets on the flop. So, you need a small SPR or a big SPR, respectively.

Ok, we got a favorable flop with the 3rd nut flush draw & a gutshot str8 draw.
It's not likely we are up against a better flush draw, as the opener bet $15 & you have the J & the A & T are on the board, so I only see him making it $15 pre with KQ vs your flush draw.

We check. Opener bets $25 & the 6 players who flatted pre fold. You call.

The pot was $121 pre [SB folded] & $50 = $171 - $7 rake - $1 tip = $163/$25 = 6.52:1

Why on earth is V betting $25 OTF on that coordinated board into 7 players?
To maintain the initiative with his AQ/AJ & 'see where he's at', trying to get value with a flopped str8 with KQs of some other suit, or just another 1/2 Rec player?

You are at the mercy of your V[s] OTF because you do not have the initiative & are out of position. What if the flop was AQT, he bets $25 & one of the other 6 puts in a 3/4 pot size raise [$163 after he calls + ~$120] with his TT? You fold or put in your whole stack on a draw?

You 'know' this guy can't be raising that much without KJ or a set & he would have raised pre with AA/QQ, no? Well, I can see a Rec flatting pre with QQ.

If you call & it goes HU, you are putting in ~34% of the money into the pot with ~39% equity vs a set, however, you have ~$40 of your $200 left behind. What are you going to do with that if the board pairs OTT? Fold? Not likely. So get it in now?

So now, you are putting in $185 into a pot totaling $508, or ~36.4% of the money with 39% equity. However, almost 1% of that equity is a tie. A long-term profitable situation for someone with the bankroll to handle the swings. These type situations also come up & if you are not prepared to handle them when they arise, then why play for the easy scenario where the initial preflop opener bets $25 into a $100+ pot, everyone folds, you call & turn the current nut hand?

I'm not saying that I never call $13 in the BB in this situation, as I have & will continue to do so, in a happy game, where I'm running good, up a bundle, liquor flowing, banter all around & I want to make a meta-game 'I'm in a gamble mood like you 'all' kinda' play.' People don't like giving their money to a bump on a log.

"It is not he who acts last who wins the most money, but rather he who acts last most often." - Tommy Angelo

[DISCLAIMER] - I am not a Crusher at NL because I am not winning 10 BBs+ per hour over my last 2000 hrs of play & I average 1000 hours per year.