If you're losing money with KQo, then dont play it.

Depends on my swagger and how aggro the table is, but im almost always at least calling with KQo UTG. If u can make decent reads and hand analysis at table theres no reason you shouldnt make money with KQo even UTG.

It's usually as simple as not stacking off when your opponent is betting and trying to make the pot big, but when they are checking take them to value town and own that QTo or random draw they hold.

Its not like playing OOP at 1/2 is even that hard - because none of the avg villains really have any clue about how to use position to put you in a world of hurt. At that level you will encounter mainly two types of villains:

(1) when you check to them they will bet if they have a hand and check back if they don't. they will rarely even semi-bluff draws when checked to. so if they bet they have a hand (at least a decent pair or something) and if they check they missed. they will fold their air to a bet and call with a huge range {draws, pairs, all kinds of stuff}
(2) guys who will ALWAYS bet when checked to. A lot of them may not even know why they are betting and they sure as hell don't have a plan for the rest of the hand and 90% of the time they don't know what they should do if check-raised. Their thinking process goes something like "Well he checked, i'ma bet" and pretty much stops there. these guys are also extremely exploitable. although they will "monkey bet" a lot, they will still fall into the same pattern as most other low stakes rec players - they will call way too lightly, not really bluff all that much (especially for big money), and play their hands rather face up.

I know this is a bit of a rough guide - sure there are some guys who will bet draws, bluff a bit more - but it is damn accurate.

What 1/2 players are generally not doing is:
(1) floating flop c-bets IP
(2) double floats
(3) bluff-raising
(4) representing scare cards/ draws
...
and these are the things that really make position so friggin powerful in this game. The thought "I think villain has a strong overpair/TPTK type hand here, yet I think he is capable of folding it, so I am going to raise turn and bomb river if called to get him off a range that is capped at 1pr" does not go through ANYBODY's mind at this level. Its people who do the above and think deeper that make playing OOP really, really hard.

At 1/2, f*k it - position matters a lot less and I'll be opening KQo for pure value because there is a boatload of hands that (although they're suited) you dominate that are just itching to call.

Yeah, if your standard opening raise size is small enough to entice all of those K7s, K8s type hands to call, or if you have people at your table who will call with that sort of trash even for 6 or 7 bb, you definitely want to be opening KQo UTG.

There is no real reason to fear domination. You're dominated by AQ and the combos of AK that they won't 3 bet, but you dominate KJ, QJ, KT, QT, and whatever other suited kings and queens they call with. Being dominated sometimes should just cut into your profits some; it shouldn't eliminate the profitability of raising this hand at most tables.

Another reason you should not fear domination is because card removal effects mean that most of the time you're dominated, you'll miss the flop with the dominated card, and having the initiative as the pre flop raiser means you will win a lot of the hands that are 2 or 3 way where you raised KQ, got called by AQ, and the flop comes down J95 or whatever. You'll lose a c-bet on ace high flops, but you should normally be shutting down after that, anyway.

Raising KQ and getting called by AQ and flopping a Q is actually pretty unusual. Moreover, it's not like you should be auto-stacking off anyway. Most boards will run off in a way that at least put you on guard. If you raise KQ and the flop comes down Q high, you should instantly realize that barring the possibility of a straight for you, any ace, jack, ten or nine is a potential second pair for somebody who called your flop c-bet. That's a lot of cards to dodge, and if we dodge them all, then that means that the other 4 cards on the board are clumped together in the bottom ranks, and we have to start thinking about 2 pair combos like 86 and low straights.
I'm not advocating plating scared, just that if you are carefully evaluating board texture, it's not often you'll flop top pair and be excited to get stacks in by the river. Most of the time you'll see a thing or two on the board you're not really happy about, that will have you thinking b/f rather than b/c. So even when you are dominated, you should almost never lose a stack.

Great post... Just wanted to add that when I open KQ, flop top pair, and two or three bets go in postflop against someone else who flopped top pair, I have them outkicked more often than they have me outkicked.

Also, I've always kinda felt that KQ makes the most profitable straights. Not sure if this is really the case though.

This. Based on other posts, I think I'm slightly tighter preflop than most two-plus-two posters, but for some reason, I seem looser on this point. KQo is dominated by premium hands, true. But AQ AK have only 4 combinations of each and QQ+ would 3 bet you. 3-betting is very uncommon at 1-2 and you can be fairly certain that if you are 3 bet you are dominated and I will fold to a 3bet 99.9999% of the time here. So if you are 3 bet, you at worst lose $10, or whatever your initial raise was.

If it is the case that the hands that dominate you will always 3 bet here, and no hands that you dominate will 3 bet you, then the reverse is also true....If there are NO 3 bets then you are NOT dominated here. At least where I play, people will call a $10 raise with much, much worse than KQ meaning you are generally getting value out the hand. Also, the players who will only call with better than KQ are the same ones that will respect a UTG raise and fold. I think the most common result with raise $10 UTG with this hand is that you get 2-3 callers, make a cbet on the flop, and win $30.

Remember that it also has decent nut straight potential, it is an unsuited connector with fair TPTK potential.

I'd also be fine with folding this. But I think if you're playing that tight you need to be consistent.

A lot of people will limp MP with low unsuited connectors, which is a much bigger leak, imo. I think limping is terrible here though. I think limping UTG is the worst possible thing you can do with a hand like this because you have no initiative, the pot will probably be raised pre by someone in late position. Now you're in the dubious position of wondering what you opponent has, playing a pot out of position, with no initiative. If you play a mediocre hand like this, you must retain the initiative.

Def a smallish raise or fold imo, leaning toward the raise, esp. if the table is weak.

This seems fairly easy to me, simply fold unless its a nitty table.

What about akoff on the bb or sb? Give answers with a few limpers, table full of limpers, shallow stacks, deep stacked, etc.

I see your point, as a standard

I think there is no possible way you can book a profit opening KQ o under the gun. As somebody said, it's hard enough to play AK off Utg. You guys are fooling yourselves thinking it's profitable.

I read this earlier. It didn't seem right but I wanted to get home and check my PT before responding. In 48 occurances at a 9 handed full table I'm 150BB/100 with AKo. UTG+1 is 24BB/100 in 54 occurances. It's playable.

AKo is not hard to play UTG.

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Four dog, WTF @ 2 posts a year, lol. The quintessential man of few words ITT!

One of the issues with looking at KQo UTG in isolation is that you need to look at how it fits with the rest of your game. If you are playing LAG because of the table conditions, then KQo is a perfectly acceptable opening hand in EP. That said, I wouldn't be playing KQo instead of a lot of A-broadway suited hands. You're just going to being dominating a lot more ace hands than king high hands, simply because people don't call as many Kx hands as Ax hands.

For many players, opening up their BTN or CO game is going to be more profitable than opening up their UTG game. Personally, I don't think anyone is losing much value by folding KQo or gaining much value by playing it UTG. I can think of a lot of other hands they are losing more value with in LLSNL.

Agreed, Venice.

A lot of this depends on your post flop skills, obviously, but UTG, I open KQo most of the time, ATs most of the time and AJs up always.

But my range is pretty wide for a llnl tag. The range I usually default to is to open $7 or $8 with 22+ KJs+ and JTs, T9s, and 87s.

That's a decent default range for me in my game based on my raise size. The most frequent adjustment I make is to drop the lowest ranked hands and increase my raise size to $10 or $11 at tables where raises get multiple callers.

This. If your post flop game is at least decent you should always be raising KQ, AJ UTG. I'd raise to $12 usually, dropping to $8 at really tight tables and upping it to $15 if there are a couple loose players and I would to get it down to 2 or 3 players

man, a lot of you guys really need to read up on poker theory

hate to be such a party pooper all the time but there is a reason why it's not a standard raise UTG, and it's fairly obvious and well known why it's not, if you study these types of things

if you are making money from it, it's because you are a much better player than your opponents. I imagine at 1/2 it might be profitable because people don't know what they are doing, but if they play in any sort of standard pf range, it's not a winning play.

In fact if you are breaking even with it at a skilled table, it's probable that you are the best player at that table.

That's not to say you shouldn't raise it, even at a good table, because if you can manage to break even with it, you can get paid off more often off the top of your range, because you will be able to play high VPIP profitably. It's a very useful hand to use for balance but it is and always will be a bluff in full ring poker.

People play all kinds of K's and Q's and can't fold top pair. If i'm in a situation where I think KQo isn't a great hand to open with then I'll probably be changing tables quickly. You have to be really bad/a nit to fold it on the average 1/2 table.

Dont fold this utg would br pretty bad for anyone with decent postflop skills

Sent from my GT-I9300 using 2+2 Forums

The fact that people are even discussing this is so unbelievably typical for llsnl. Full of nits. This is a raise literally all day long. Definitely folding KTo and sometimes KJ but KQo? Please...

You got it all twisted up. It is really exploitable if you only open JJ-AA and AKo utg, NOT the other way around.

hahahaha yeah firstly its not exploitable secondly who the ****s gonna exploit you

As always, if the game is good, it depends how well you play post. If your post play is up to par, then passing KQ on a table where players will jump over each other to call with AT KJ QJ and other crap such as this is a waste of a good hand.

It is what it is though, so you have to understand its value and how to play it cautiously postflop.

If you are playing in a good game and have a significant edge over the Villains on your table, I would open-raise KQo UTG often.

On the other hand, if you are playing in a tough game, or you are barely on par with the average Villain on your table, I would open-fold KQo UTG.

It really is heavily dependent on a myriad of factors.

raise or fold pre, never limp, (never limp any hand utg period)

I am almost always opening it though, unless the table has multiple good players or my image is trash.

I feel like the being dominated discussion is over blown. If you have a decent gauge on how your opponents play and their ranges, this really shouldn't be a problem very often. generic example if a super agro player flats the raise we can rule out AK and discount AQ, if OMC snap calls, we include AK, maybe even give it more weight.

When we raise utg we're repping the top of our opening range, we're cbetting most flops assuming it's not 4 way or whatever, so we should be able to find out where we're at pretty quick. Granted if we flop top pair we should almost always be betting it, but this can be a good hand (KQ) that you use to balance w/ and check some top pair flops.

I feel if your paying attention domination shouldn't be a concern really ever. I would say if you open KQ utg/ep in general, and get 3 bet, it's usually a fold, I strongly recommend not playing KQ oop in a 3 bet pots against your avg vill. That's where you can get in trouble, single raised pots, not so much.

this to.

leak. I'm not talking about KQ specifically, it's a raise or fold for me too. But at a lot of loose passive tables, for example, limp pre with 22-77 is best and its not even close. We raise and get 4 callers and have to check fold or we can limp and get paid huge. Of course at tighter tables I'm raising 22+ UTG like always