1/2, 8 handed home game.

Villain 1 in the CO is decent but a little tight. $500 stack.
Villain 2 is on the BTN, he's a fish but has shown to be capable of folding. $180 stack.
Hero is in the SB with a $270 stack. On to the hand.....

All early positions limp to V1 (CO) who opens to $7. V2 (BTN) calls, hero in the SB has 8hTh. I elect to call here because I expect the rest of the table to call and I think suited one gappers play great multiway and for a relatively cheap price. I would like to hear y'alls thoughts on this call. The entire table calls. On to the flop.....

Flop: $50 (no more getting raked out) Ts Jh Ah.
Hero checks and it checks to V1, he bets $15. V2 raises to $45. Hero?

I like your pre flop play and why you made the call pre

I fold to V2's raise, when he raises on that board even though he is a fish would expect him to have a strong hand and with V1 in the hand who had bet as well I would fold. Think there is a chance of a better pair being held by someone and maybe even a better flush draw, think bottom pair and T high flush draw looks good but isn't that good in the situation

fold pre, fold the flop

Preflop is OK as long as you remember your fishing for a particularly favorable flop not a random single pair. This is true only at tables like the one you describe, where a reraise is unlikely. At more aggressive tables you should fold his most of the time.

Annoyingly you got a fairly favorable flop but folding is still best. V2 has a lot of two pairs and could have flopped a straight, a set, or even a better flush draw. He could also show up with some silly hands like AK or Q9 if he is a bad enough fish but there are not enough for it to be worth while for you. One of the advantages of seeing cheap flops like this is that you can also bail cheaply if the situation isn't good. V2's bet commits himself to this pot and he doesn't have enough money for it to be worth sticking around.

Folding pre is way too tight. T8s plays well enough multi-way to defend from the small blind, when you can get in cheap. If it's 3-bet behind you though, cut your losses.

See bolded. Get used to it, because that's wining poker.

Usually a pair and a flush draw OTF is awesome. In this case it is not. As stated above, tank for about 10 seconds to let the hurt simmer, then shrug, muck and move on.

Or more simply, if you called, exactly what turn card are excited to see?

I’m surprised at the responses you’re getting for preflop.

Fold pre: Suited 1-gappers don’t play well from OOP nor in multi-way pots. This is because even if we get to see a flop, our hand suffers from RIO against better suited hands which are mostly present in every players preflop range. When we do flop a draw we won’t have a lot of maneuverability postflop at low 5 SPR (little Fold Equity if we semibluff, if our draw hits it will usually be an obvious flush and it will be hard to collect value). Further, you didn’t include stack sizes of the rest of the table. Any short stack who limped pre might jam over the raise to collect dead money. Further, UTG might have limped a strong hand and go for the limp reraise. So we don’t always even get to see a flop.

Fold flop: Given action, your two pair outs likely aren’t live. There’s even a chance your flush outs are dead. There are four other players with uncapped ranges in the hand.

Calling pre would be more reasonable, although still too loose, if the raise had came from the first player to enter the pot. Calling now, with the entire field left to act, is simply reckless. In poker, you want good cards, or good position, or preferably both.

In a cardroom against people you have little, to no history with, I would mostly agree with folding T8s OOP. However, that isn't the case here. However, I'm also (possibly incorrectly) assuming some post-flop skills, which would be absolutely required.

The point I will agree is a bit of an issue is the effective stack sizes and low SPR. Personally, I think the $180 in V2's stack is enough, and the $270 effective especially. I would also point out that the SPR to V1's stack, when Hero called was 10.

I think having the rest of the field left to act makes the call pretty hugely negative -EV. Plus the effect of rake must be considered: we lose $6 from a $56 pot. Our equity share 8ways might be like 12-15% of the $50 pot, for like $6-$7.50, but we paid $6 to see the flop, so raw equity profit is $0-$1.50. But then I remember that poker theorists claim that we underrealize raw equity from OOP, so EV is gonna be less than the above. Then factor in that one of the other players might back-raise jam and we lose our whole $6 bet some fraction of the time. Makes this all an unattractive situation.

I recall a thread from 2p2 a while back where an online player posted their database stats for EP opens in 9max 25NL. They were making money on all hands in their opening range except for 87s,98s, T9s which were big losers. I just think suited connectors are very hard to play OOP and personally speaking I feel in the past I have overestimated my ability to make profit with certain hands. Very wary now of playing dominated drawing hands from OOP multi-way, despite the fact I consider my postflop skill set to be quite good. These hands play much better heads up or in position IMO.

OK Chaos, you're focused on one specific aspect of the hand and not seeing the larger picture. First, this is a live home game where there is a high frequency of the same people playing together, so your image is even more important than in a casino setting. You want to be seen gambling with them. Second, I keep stressing that to play mid suited connectors and gappers OOP you need better than average post-flop skills. Specifically hand reading, knowing your likely relative position and calling tendencies of your opponents topping the list.

So, at a limp happy table where a raise that is going to be perceived as small (it wasn't), a lot of people are going to stay in.

As to your 25NL example, it's a pity you don't have assess to the data. I wonder how many of those hands were 6 ways, or more when the Hero entered. All you said was EP, not from the blinds where Hero already knows something about the hand. In short, that example is all but useless in this spot.

Yeah, I don’t remember the 2p2 post. Years back. Agree it’s not relevant to this spot. More of an example of a person who was surprised that conventional wisdom at the time was wrong for them in their pool — just a person overestimating their ability to play marginal hands and realizing it by looking at the data. Nowadays, suited connectors aren’t included in EP opening ranges for 9max. At the time of the post they were, though.
Too bad we’ll never be able to collect data in live poker to tell for sure whether this hand is profitable in this multi-way spot.
FWIW I think this is a fine call in the BB closing the action.
If I want to give a loose image (I do), I personally would 3bet this hand to $30-35 facing this weak open.
We can agree to disagree.

I am pretty much never folding pre at this table. ($7 is laughable at the games I play, but that's moot -- this is a good hand in this situation when you know the table.)

Fold flop. Good, but not what we were hoping for. We could have called one bet.

Fold pre IMO. Why play a middling hand in the absolute worst position possible, with no initiative? A raise is okay here too, but I think folding is best and calling is worst. Play drawing hands with position.

I fold pre and don't sweat it.

Post is an easy fold to a raise in a million way pot, and especially since we don't close the action.

Preflop: According to Equilab ranges, if 8Ts is in your opening range, you are playing a minimum of 25 percent of your hands. This range excludes suited connectors T9s and below and pairs below 66. So if you consider opening wider in position with those suited connectors and small pairs, you are approaching being a maniac.

Furthermore, if you just call with 8Ts, rather than 3-betting it, you are actually not a LAG but a loose-passive calling station. You also have to consider the BB. Is he capable of 3-betting? I can go on and on here with further analysis, but let’s be clear: 3-betting 8Ts in the blinds is already a leak. Calling 8Ts in the SB even multiway is the way to bankruptcy.

On the flop: you have to consider how often V1 is going to re-raise if you call. V1 is “a little tight”. Is he tight-passive or tight-aggressive? Did he limp-call pre with AT, TT, or KQ? If he re-raises, you are not getting the odds for a call, and you’ve just lost $52.

You also have to consider how often the action will shut down if get lucky the 1 out of 4 times and there’s a nine or a heart on the turn. Are V1 and V2 calling stations? Flushes are not disguised hands. How often will the villains fold with three hearts? Let’s say an 8 comes on the turn. Are you going to bet the lowest two pair after a re-raise and a call on the flop?

Fold pre, fold flop.

If you're gonna play this pre you really should be 3betting it, but truth is you should be folding it pretty much always. Calling is the worst option and it really isn't all that close either imo.

Thank you everyone for the responses. I still think calling pre flop was the best option but it's been interesting reading others opinions and it's definitely made me think. After the flop and V2 raises, I decided to go all in and they both folded. I'm sure most of you won't like this move lol and tbh I'm not in love with it but in the moment I thought I had enough outs (9 for the FD, maybe another of the 2 T's) plus the fold equity that I had at least a 50% chance of winning the hand. I also thought it would be better to realize all my equity rather than to just call the flop then have to fold on the turn if I don't improve. Looking back on it I'm a little surprised V2 folded considering his shorter stack but I also know him to overfold a little bit which gave me even more reason to shove. Also with this being a home game I like to have the image of being "gambly" to increase my odds of getting action later especially since I'm pretty sure most of them think I'm too tight.

Feel free to roast my thought processes. Any constructive criticism is welcome!

I like it.

Agreed, if we're playing T8s it should be a 3b from SB... I'd probably go to about 40. Folding is fine. Hate flat calling the most.