$1-$2 NL, full table.

Hand 1, villain is young guy, may or may not be drunk. All I've seen from him is that he will limp in with any two cards and call any preflop raise. He is a station calling with any piece of the flop, and may call all the way to the river with very weak holdings. As a result his stack goes up and down in large chunks. He almost never bets and when he does it is usually a very small percentage of the overall pot. I have around $340. Villain has around $140. I'm in SB with two black jacks. Villain is on button. Couple of limpers. I decide to check in the SB because I figured a raise will only be a pot sweetener. I want to hit a set and crush a fool who overvalues his hand as I've only gotten to showdown with a couple of hands and they were bigguns. Flop is 8 high with 2h, 3h. I pot it. Everyone folds to villain who calls. Turn is 7 (not a heart), I bet around 1/2 the pot. Villain calls. I put him on a draw, or he is overvaluing his 8. River is a 6 (flush draw does not hit). I bet 1/2 pot. I decided to make a smaller bet in the off chance he hit a second pair or straight as I did see him limp-call preflop with a 10-2 off suit and called with bottom pair until hitting a 10 on the river giving him two pair earlier. Thoughts on my line.

Hand 2. I'm on the button with $300is stack. Villain is in the small blind with $250ish. Villain straddles every time he is UTG and will will raise when his turn to act preflop when straddling if there is no raise preflop. He does this from teh BB too. As a result, two or three limpers I have J-10s OTB, I decide to limp. Be bets $15 from the SB. Folded to me, I call. Pot is like $40. Flop is 10-6-4 rainbow. He leads for $20. I call. He can very easily have missed overs here and is just continuing his preflop aggression. Turn is Jack. He things for a bit and checks. I check behind as I feel he has missed and would fold but may bluff the river if I check behind. River is a 6. He thinks and timidly bets $30. My action? Thoughts?

Hand 1: your hand is too strong to setmine, raise it to 4 or 5x +1 for each limper and play post flop...
Raise pre and get value, any call he makes is equivalent to u printing money, if u think this way, u will win

raise your jacks

raise river

Hand 1: I like the smooth call with the Jacks. At first glance it's easy to say NO you should raise with that hand! But obviously you had a feel for the table, and you adjusted as such. I probably would have raised it there, but I'm not against that move. And it's tricky...none of the other players at the table would ping you for Jacks.

Hand 2: Just call the river. If you raise two things happen: 1) He has a set of 6's and you're crushed. 2) He's going to fold. So unless you just think you're good and want to protect your hand...then call.

hand 1 raise pre, then just bet,bet line
Hand 2 ok bet turn ASP raise/fold river

Your hand histories are difficult to read, look at other posters threads, see how they do it and use hand converters.

Hand 1-pre is fail
h2-Turn is fail

Results:
Hand 1, donkey rivered a second pair. I stand by my decision to limp, though usually I raise here. I just had a feeling everyone would call and I can't do much if an A or K flops.

Hand 2, I called. Something smelt fishy. Villian had AA. I immediately kicked myself for not betting the turn. I wanted to give him rope to hang himself with a bluff on the river and he sadly improved.

Ask for advice then stand behind your donky play, go somewhere else

Hand 1 should obviously be a raise PF. You obviously aren't listening to that advice, but you really need to. Its very bad to not raise there. Your objective is to win a big pot at showdown (you say so yourself) and raising makes that a whole lot more likely. It also reduces the chance you take a hugely multiway flop and end up winning the pot.

I would have bet the turn and river closer to pot. Especially against a guy that you've noticed likes to call down.

Hand 2 I would have raised PF but its not terrible by any means to limp. The turn you need to be betting. You have a strong hand. Don't get all FPSy. just bet turn and bet river.

As played, I would raise the river I guess. The 6 isn't so great bc we can't beat overpairs. But after he checks the turn it would be relatively weird for him to have a hand that strong. i would raise on the smaller side because we need him to call with some pretty marginal hands.

hand 1 raise preflop and just keep betting.
Your letting some idiot who limped with two random cards, or the bb flop ANYTHING.

hand 2, bet turn obv...

as played call river

I haven't read a single post by you that is helpful or constructive. Keep it up.

Hand 1:
JJ is a nice hand pre. First in? Raise it up! Once you opt not to do that, you have chosen to play a small pot with it. That's fine, but the donkey isn't the guy who rivered 2 pair.

Hand 2:
Pre fine.
Flop fine.
We gin the turn and check? Pfffttttt. Why? If he has an overpair, he likely calls a bet. If he has AK, why give him a free card to hit his 4 outter? We don't get any more out of that hand by checking back.
As played, I hate that board pairing and our villain now betting. We now beat AJ and a bluff. Doesn't look like a bluff, and I doubt villain raised AJ from the SB. I probably call the river but I hate myself for it.

That is great, but your opinion means little, a drop in the ocean if I must say.

The OP asked for advice, gave him a different play, if he doesn't care to ask why that method would be best, then that is his fault. It is not my job to go around and answer his questions in depth when all he is asking is simply asking for thoughts or what his action should be.

Clearly I told him his pre-flop on hand one was bad. He has JJ and the villain is limping ATC pre-flop and calling any pre size, is it that hard to realize you need to raise here to get the most value? Obviously you want to find the dudes maxiumum calling size pre. If he is calling 50 pre-flop then by god raise 50. If he stops calling at 25 ATC pre, make it 20. Does not take much thought to think of these things..

On to hand 2:

The pre-flop limp knowing the dude will raise is not horrible but I would raise here. As played flop, you can call here, I don't mind. Turn you need to bet, you just picked up two pair and you are now needing to gain value from this hand. You are most certainly ahead and by checking you only lose value going into the river also you allow him draw for free.


Does this help you out JACK?

Really the dude doesn't need my thoughts but clearly needs to think about the hand and I am sure he can rationally figure out what was wrong with those hands, they were borderline beginner/dumb.

And most importantly...passive.

He posted the hand for a thought process not to just get someone to post "do xxx". That doesn't help him. That doesn't help other people reading this forum. And that doesn't help you. It doesn't accomplish anything.

If he could "figure out" what was wrong with the hands he wouldn't have posted them. he posted them to hear an intelligent discussion about what he might have done better.

It would help you as a player to include your thought process because 1) its useful to think analytically about why you do certain things and 2) other people might comment on why your thought process is good/bad. So do whatever you want, but its not in anyone's best interest.