PokerStars - 125/250 Ante 25 NL - Holdem - 9 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

UTG+1: 39.64 BB
MP: 118.01 BB
MP+1: 27.36 BB
MP+2: 125.5 BB
CO: 41.1 BB
BTN: 32.64 BB
SB: 43.08 BB
BB: 71.12 BB
Hero (UTG): 63.48 BB

9 players post ante of 0.1 BB, SB posts SB 0.5 BB, BB posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 2.4 BB) Hero has A A

Hero calls 1 BB, fold, fold, fold, fold, CO calls 1 BB, BTN calls 1 BB, SB calls 0.5 BB, BB checks

Flop: (5.9 BB, 5 players) 9 T 4
SB bets 2.95 BB, fold, Hero raises to 10.62 BB, fold, BTN raises to 31.54 BB and is all-in, fold, Hero ??


I decide to limpl under the gun in to order to reraise in squize.
In an unraise flop with 5 players I knew I was in danger.
My first thoughts were that I am against a flush draw of QJ.
I pocket pair wasn't there since there was not raise with an exception of 4-4

same tournament 2 or 3 hands after in the money

PokerStars - 1000/2000 Ante 200 NL - Holdem - 9 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

MP+2: 60.1 BB
CO: 28.09 BB
BTN: 20.12 BB
SB: 16.03 BB
Hero (BB): 12.22 BB
UTG: 32.52 BB
UTG+1: 42.33 BB
MP: 20.56 BB
MP+1: 19.24 BB

9 players post ante of 0.1 BB, SB posts SB 0.5 BB, Hero posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 2.4 BB) Hero has 7 9

fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, fold, SB raises to 15.93 BB and is all-in, Hero ??

heres some advice you might not want to hear: Completely remove the limp rereaise from your arsenal. It is a play only done by new players or fish. Any competant player will immediately put you on a monster hand if you reraise your limp, and you'll get tagged as a fish.

If you want to trap with Aces, then you can call a preflop raise instead of 3betting, then jam over a squeeze. But sometimes you just raise and people fold, its part of the game

as long as I use this controversial method only players who cant refrain from hands like KK,QQ gets all in .For the history in 1st hand villain had A8 suited for flush draw.
My hand holded to bust him out

You are thinking that your opponents can see your cards. I assure you, if a player has KK or QQ preflop, they will be getting it all in and raising for pre flop raise. You dont have to take my advice but I can tell you for certain you should change your thinking to be succesful

Damnnn op good thing you didnt raise pre because A8s from bb def folds

Ur too good for the advice of noobs in this forum, why even post here brah? Pretty sure Ike , Chidwick and timothy adams have a group chat, it’s better suited for someone of your caliber.

Yeah OP pretty much what I was nicely trying to tell you ^

Listen we have all been in your shoes before. But you just have to accept that you are bad at poker right now and try to change how you play.

It just seems like you want us to tell you that you did the right thing when you didnt

I used to raise UTG limps with PP's but I don't do that anymore. If I had been playing in your game 99/TT would have been solidly in my range. Unless you had limped before UTG or UTG+1 I would be assuming that you had a monster (KK+ leaning heavily towards AA).

As played you have to call but you are very possibly behind T9 or a set.

The thing is that had you raised pre-flop I would be calling with 99/TT anyway so it really doesn't change anything from that perspective. But what you seem to be missing is that when you raise UTG you will very rarely be going 5 ways post flop.

It worked out for you this time but in general I would much prefer to be 2 or 3 ways in a bigger pot than 5 ways in a smaller pot.

Maybe this has been working for you in smaller tournaments where people don't give a lot of thought to cards they can't see, but in tournaments with decent players you will not be given the opportunity to limp re-raise pre-flop very often. And ironically when you do, even hands like QQ and sometimes KK will get out of the way if its an all-in.

This is not true there are plenty of times when limping hands will increase ev

Limping with AA to then rereaise a raise is not a +ev play. That is the most obvious fishy I have the nuts way to play

Evan you need to open your mind to different plays - anyone can limp a balanced range. It sounds like vs you I should limp all my weak hands and just print money with a reraise.

You don't see how easily exploitable that is?

Yes I guess I do.

I was exploited once fairly early in a Parx Big Staxx tournament.

A guy limped in EP (I didn't know if this was a habit or a one time event) it was called by a couple of people and then another guy raised like 4x. I called with a hand I don't remember (maybe 88 or something but it could have been better).

Then the original limper shoved, the original raiser re-shoved with AK and the exploiter turned over JTo which somehow won the hand. I would have flopped a set and won had I stayed in the hand.

This was peculiar in that the all-in was way out of proportion to the hand. And in the end it was clear that it was done because the guy didn't want to be raised after limping - not some exploitative master plan.

If this is what you mean then yes it can happen. But it doesn't happen often IMO.

Mostly the re-raise isn't so massive that it causes an all-in at the early levels of a tournament.

But maybe I'm missing your point? Is the exploitation that a guy can limp a weak hand like a SC or a very small pair or 64o in early position and nobody will raise so he gets to see the hand cheap? That type of exploitation only works if it is done once a tournament with people who don't know you (and for the record I have been thinking of doing that for years with hands like T9s and then after the flop act like I have AA... But I don't do it because if I connect with a flop like T9x and bet or raise they will think I have AA and fold anyway. Now yes if I completely miss and get people to fold that would be great and why I am doing it but for some reason I haven't done it. Much...)

But overall, when I raise early position limps by people who have limped before in EP they almost never raise. And when they do raise they generally have the big hand I am putting them on. They usually show me because that is their victory. They had AA. And they got me to raise their limps and they almost got me to call - because I tanked.

But maybe the one or two times I folded and they didn't show me, they had a hand like JTo and exploited me. I prefer that to the time where I raised the limper with 66 he went big and I called with my last 25 bb's and lost to his AA.

So please exploit me by limping in early position. As a masochist it will help me enjoy poker even more than I do already.

Anytime you have aa and put $ in the pot. It’s always +ev. If you decide to limp aa and the Re raise the raise. This is very +ev. Whether or not it’s a balanced strategy is a diff conversation.

This assumes Evan is stupid. People can see your frequencies and adjust.

Most poker players are stupid tbh and won’t adjust or see frequencies

fair

I’m not saying that his play is great off a 60bb stack.
There are plenty of times/ stack sizing where limping as a strat can definitely increase ev. So the one guy who came in blasting saying that limping is fishy blah blah blah he’s just regurgitating stuff he heard somewhere without thinking about it

it's def good to have a overall limping strategy utg especially in certain tables. if you limp AA utg , you should be limping KK, QQ, A5s , KQo, ATo etc to have a decent limp rr strategy, add in some pocket pairs , other broadway with decent playability for a limp call range.
However I don't think op was thinking that far, if he's only limp rr AA and open raising every other hand then thats obviously very bad and predictable. I could be wrong of course, i apologize to op if I am wrong.

this is my point. We can be as GTO optiomal as we want and yes limping can be implemented blah blah blah. You are taking it too literally, lets look at OP and what advice he needs. Does OP seem like the type of player that plays near optimal strategy and can incorporate a balanced limping range? No. No offense OP, we were all there. I was trying to give him the best advice I would have wanted when I played like him. It sounds tough, but its more helpful in the long run than telling a fun player about a "balanced limping range"

Vs the limp-rr I'm pretty quickly folding everything I'm isoing you with except QQ+,AKs and not a single one of you--or anyone else on this planet for that matter--is going to implement a strat that will take advantage of my exploit

but people are ****ing stupid and will not adjust properly and plenty of tables with ******s who'll iso willy-nilly and both of these things are clear incentive to exploitatively limp some combos and print.

that being said, there's no indication any such ******s are playing with you in the hand in question--so don't limp

it's a legitimate decision, probably fold vs almost all people but vs sickos it's completely justifiably to find a call once in a while

the only way you're really short-changing yourself here is by not at least entertaining either option of fold or call

you always make posts telling people they need to play exploitatively (tbf there's a lot of truth to that) then you call someone out for playing exploitatively?

let's be real: you are never, ever, ever going to implement a l-rr strat that exploits that strat that Mr. Rick outlined

good thread. I think much depends on the game, the players, etc. one rule of thumb I go by is that good players who are trying to read the mind of bad players ALWAYS give them too much credit. I guess you could call it an odd form of psychological projection. That said, limping with aces, and then re raising CAN be more profitable than raising initially. yes, it might give yourself away to many players, but not all. and yes, there are times that you get QQ to fold, but there are also times that somebody 3 bets, you get another caller, and now you can move all in and win more money than you might have otherwise, or you put in a smallish re raise that a bad player feels he just "has" to call. so, in a game where EVERYBODY is solid, it might be wrong to limp with aces. but that rarely happens, even in games (or tournies) with relatively large buy ins.

You will trap yourself just about as often as you trap the other guy when you make this play, and the pots you lose are going to be much larger than the pots you win. And by larger, I mean when you win you will usually pick up the opening round of bets but little more, and when you lose it will be for stacks. This play is usually a fail.