2-3 NL, this is the smallest game in the room. Hero has 500, covered by most. This hand is 2-3-6-6-20. Utg straddles 6, utg1 called dark and utg2 raised dark. No reads yet.

HJ calls 20, btn raises 80, hero in sb with TT..

You have less than 30 bets just stick it in and pray or buy in bigger

Probably 500 is the max buyin. I would shove too.

Btn reads/history matter. Sometimes when the straddle/dark raise are really big, some players play differently. If he is really tight passive you might make a crazy fold. But I am mainly just jamming.

Any reads on Button? His sizing screams that he wants action when he's got a significant amount behind (in terms of $$$$ which everyone plays with, not BBs). So I'd be cool with a fold in spite of being "25 BBs deep".

GcluelessNLnoobG

+1
+2

Assuming the button just sat down and we have zero info on him, I would just fold. We're already in a jam or fold spot pretty much so I have no problem folding a med PP pre. It's also a question of how much variance you can afford so if you love these types of juicy games like most players do, just close your eyes and jam.

Nothing to suggest anyone is scared money. It's effectively a single raise over a limp (OK obviously there are additional subtleties, but these multi-straddled/blind raise games can be pretty wild, YMMV) and absent any other info I'd just treat this like any other situation and jam. If it was a 3bet over a proper open then it would probably be a fold

Unusual spot. Only analogous examples I can think of, off the top of my head...

High stakes streams with multiple straddles - I notice many players will limp in from early position (and sometimes late position) with hands that would be strong enough to open raise over 2 or 3 blinds, but don't really want to raise over more than 3 blinds, and get re-raised. They'll balance this by limping in with hands that are praying for a raise, so they can back-raise.

Implication - perhaps decide if you're going with your hand or not. If your read is that the BTN is just screwing around, jam. If you think any of the players left to act will read your flat call as weak, and re-raise light, flat call, and hope they put in that raise, so you can jam with more money in the pot. Whichever way you go, buckle up and pray TT holds up.

A 1/3 game I played, that became 1/3/6 (straddle)-12 (dark, not live)-24 (ditto) late on a weekend when 6 of the 9 players got super-deep - all sorts of on-the-fly adjustments were made, including limping in from MP and LP with big hands, expecting the players in the 1, 3, 6, or 12 spots to be putting in a ton of raises with merged ranges.

Implication - pretty much the same as above.

I'm not sure how much we can read into BTN's raise, when he takes this sizing. Maybe he's weak and doesn't want to risk too much. Maybe he's got AA and is praying someone wants to get spicey. Likewise, unless the HJ is clueless, I wouldn't assume he's weak when he flat calls. Some reads on both would help.

I don't think it's a must-jam scenario, with TT, even though we're effectively only 25bb's deep at $500 eff, when the HJ flats and the BTN raises. It doesn't seem very likely that a jam will get called by many worse PP's or a lot of weak AX. We're going to be shown JJ+ and AK/AQ/AJs a lot, if we get called.

Another analogous scenario would be sitting on 25bb's in the late stages of a tournament, while other opponents have shorter stacks, and the ICM implications are significant. Facing an HJ raise and a BTN 3B, how great do we feel going with TT for our tournament life, facing this action, when we can fold, and expect others to get knocked out before we do?

Result: Hero jammed and everyone folded. Btn tanked for a little bit, I think he was light and was saving face. I agree with Doc, I don’t think we get called by worse that often.

Hmmm...not sure that's the move I was suggesting, but I understand it, and I'm glad to hear it worked out.

Only a couple random additional thoughts, related to odd situations like this.

Adding additional blinds supposedly improves the game by spurring action, but I've sat in games where straddles had the opposite effect. Like, 6 of 9 at the table just want to play 2/5, but grudgingly agree to doing the $10 straddle, but now everyone is nitting it up, because 6 of 9 are playing outside their comfort zone.

The implication here is, yeah, we may be "only 25bb's deep", but there's a good possibility a lot of the people sitting at 2/3 aren't going to poke their head out and get involved with worse than TT or AJs when the BTN opens to $80. They're not looking at the $137 in the pot, or the $500 in their stack, they're just trying to figure out how big a hand they need to get involved for $80, with only $420 behind, versus folding and letting go of the $3 or $6 they already put in.

That's why I think reads are really important here. Playing 1-3-6-12-24 with 6 of 9 players deep-stacked and willing to push hundreds of dollars across the table, every hand, with worse than TT or AJs, is different than playing short-stacked with players who are mostly just looking to not lose $500 in less than a few hours.

Taking down $137 pre in 1/3 with TT is a great result.

It's a 100% shove if BTN is raising 20%+. (Would you be shocked to see K8s/A9o or 22/54s here?)

Majority shove if they're raising 15%+. (Probably needs to include ATo/KJo because people under-raise suited hands.)

Minority shove if they're raising ~10%.

Anything less than 6% (~AQ/99 + some a smattering of other strong suited broadways and pairs) is a 100% fold with 5.5 uncapped ranges LTA (counting limper as still a moderate threat) and one player being outright ahead of you almost half the time.

We don't have a flat or small 4b strat regardless. (Certainly not with this hand.)

ANY info would help tilt my decision one way or another: age, dress, overall comfort level (eg: shuffling chips), how deep they are, how many reds are in their stacks vs big chips, anything. Yes, I will even accept race as a read this ONE time.

For some players, the absolute dollar amount matters more and will treat this like a 3b spot; for others, they just think "OMG DEAD MONEY AND I HAVE THE BUTTON" and go HAM here. I would usually default to the former in the smallest game in the room, but given the deep stacks and all the blind action in one of your first hands at the table, you can probably make a Bayesian inference that this is one of those "going HAM" tables.

I'll bite.

What's "going HAM"?

Yeah youre effectively 25 BB deep, trivial shove barring some sort of massive read on the guy who went $80

Hard As (or scatalogical term for hindquarters) a Motherf#*#*. Basically a new slang term for going nuts and not caring about the consequences.

As for the OP, it seems like a very tournamenty situation. Not liking the sheer number of players to get through, but OTOH, we get to add a quarter to our stack if it gets through. As it did for OP, congrats.

And maybe the table will settle down, and stop playing Guts...

I've gotten knocked out of tournaments twice, getting short stacks in three ways pre flop, holding TT. Both times I ran into an over-pair and AX.

I kinda hate jamming pre with TT now.

Depending how short "short" is, it's not a bad move. TT is what, a top 3% hand by PokerStove? Hard to find better, in the 15-20 hands you might have before you get blinded down to any two and go.

Better than calling the shove with TT a lot of the time, lol.

The Jay-Z/Kanye track dropped almost 14 years ago, so y’all are really aging yourselves..

Telling me I shouldn't feel stupid doesn't stop me from feeling stupid, but thanks for trying.

First time - limp, I raise, terrible semi-OMC prone to spaz jams, EP limper re-jams, I'm priced in, call. My tens vs OMC's A7s (told you he can spaz) vs UTG's JJ. JJ holds. I'm out.

2nd time - UTG open from LAG. CO jams short stack. I'm on BTN with TT. I re-jam. UTG snaps it off. UTG has QQ. CO has AK. AK spikes TPTK on the flop. I'm out.

Rational brain understands TT is a good hand. Results oriented brain no longer likes TT as a pre-flop jam multi-way with short stacks.

Figure that experience likely colors how I look at this spot. Math says TT is good enough for OP to shove. But knowing population tendencies of low-stakes players says we never win if we get called, so we're just praying no one calls.

You are up so much over the years. How can you hate variance this much, it's crazy! This is a clear get it in. If you lose, whatever.

Sent from my Mi 9T using Tapatalk

i dont even think this is the bottom of shoving range lol

Yes that's where you want to be against a range of JJ, QQ, KK, AA and AK or AQ. At least 50% and probably 20% that's if only one person calls.