I just started playing poker this year and still trying to learn. I decided to play a $1.50 SNG on PokerStars, and I am looking for your thoughts on the very first hand of the game.

Blinds are 10/20 no Ante.

It folds to the HJ who limps. I'm on the button with JTo (with the T of Clubs) and make it $80. SB and HJ both call.

$260 in the pot, flop is 56J with two clubs. SB check, HJ bets $20. I decide to raise to $130 to get anyone of a weak flush draw + I have TP.

$650 in the pot, turn is 6 of clubs. SB bets $100, HJ calls. I imagine one of them is trying to trap with a flush, but I think I'm getting a good price, especially if another club hits on the river.

$950 in the pot, river is an Ace (no club). SB bets $500. HJ calls and I fold.

Thoughts on the hand as played? Or any recommendation on what I should have done differently?

Thanks!

you can argue for a limp behind preflop as JTo is quite a weak hand and at 1.50 the blinds wont iso much. i would say QJo is a must iso, T9o is a limp behind and JTo can go either way
postflop wp i would do the same all streets

Agree with the other guy. limping is good here.

I would raise more on the flop. You need to protect your hand and
charge draws more. Then again I typically raise more than most 2+2
players would.

Limp behind 100%. Early levels of STTs are all about tight, positional, chip preservation play. Don't spew chips with raises like this.

These tiny donkbets are pretty much always drawing hands so you have to watch out for the turn card and betting pattern.

Uh oh, the flush hits and the board pairs and now quiet SB suddenly wakes up and bets into two players who have shown aggression. Big red flag. And HJ calls after donking the flop (remember what I said about tiny donkbets?), another huge red flag. And if you think one of them might have a flush, why are you calling to draw to another club? You don't think one of them has a club higher than the T? You should fold the turn my friend.

Bottom line: you spewed a chunk of your stack in a marginal spot on the first level of an STT. That's a no-no.



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I don't want to be too critical as you've only started playing recently but this hand is a mess. Fold pre. You don't have a good hand, its the 1st level, you are likely behind one or both your opponents limping ranges and your rarely getting two folds when you raise.
As played call otf. Raising here is really bad. There's fds but it's unlikely both your opponents have one and your mostly folding out worse and getting called by better when you make this flop raise. Your responsible for creating a monster pot here without a monster hand in the 1st blind level. This is not winning sng strategy.
As played the turn call is probably mandatory as your getting bout 6-1. River fold is good but you should never have allowed yourself to get into this spot.
I only scanned the replies but some of them seem pretty I'll advised. Don't limp otb ever.

I’d play it exactly as you have.

Fold pre. We need to be conservative and tight in the early stages and get more aggressive as the blinds increase. JTo isn't a hand we want any part of this early in the tournament.

Can limp behind or raise, think doesn't matter too much. Just don't do this:

It's bad, exactly other way round is true: You want to play lots of hands especially IP vs weak players early. They're weak, they make lots of costy mistakes pre and post, you want to profit from that. Don't be a nit

It's bad, exactly other way round is true: You want to play lots of hands especially IP vs weak players early. They're weak, they make lots of costy mistakes pre and post, you want to profit from that. Don't be a nit [/QUOTE]

This is true for players who have the skill set to take advantage of weaker players mistakes and fold strong hands when they aren't good. If you are one of the weaker players than playing tight ranges in the early rounds is preferable.

I don't think being a nit to avoid IP postflop play vs microstakes players is a legit approach to win dolares at poker

Early levels of STTs are the one time where being a nit is the correct approach.

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I give up, GL at teh pokerz.

Think with sippin_criss there is one guy remaining who might chose to post a helpful comment at times.

So a post that disagrees with you isn't helpful?

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Can you explain why this is true?

Because doubling your stack doesn't double your $'s like cash. You could double up in the first level and still not cash.

Personally I would fold this hand pre and play very strong hands or big suited connectors. KQs,QJs,JTs,T9s or pocket pairs to try and hit a nutted hand, then bet bet for value. If you are betting/calling off your stack when the chips you gain will probably not be that detrimental towards the end, then it is really -$ev.

Fish may get an ego boost or feel good about winning so many little pots but I usually take a big one down against somebody overplaying top pair, weak two pair and flush/straight draws.

This is correct and was mathematically proved many years ago. Because of the prize pool distribution in STTs, the chips you gain early have a negligible impact on your prize pool equity. You actually increase your equity far more by letting other people bust out early than by doubling up. I don't have a good link at my disposal but there's been lots of stuff written about the difference between chip ev and $ ev in STTs.

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Image 1
Image 2

As you can see from the top two images, doubling your stack doesn't necessarily double your $ equity.

For example, if you were playing a $7 SNG on stars and you flipped first hand and won you would gain 14.33% of the prize pool which would be about $5.57. This may sound good but in the long run you are risking $7 to win $5.57 which makes this slightly -EV. Btw you need about 56% for this to be breakeven, however if you have an edge over the table do you want to be risking these chips.

I also find that stealing the blinds a few levels later gets me back to starting stack after playing tight throughout the previous levels.

All in all, if you win a 20bb pot early on with levels 20/10/3 you gain about 400 chips which is 400/9000 = 4% of the chips in play.

Win a 10bb pot later on with levels 120/60/15 you gain about 1200 chips which is 1200/900 = 12% of the chips in play.

Personally for OP I would fold these hands early on and concentrate on trying to get as much money in with your nutted hands QQ+, flushes, straights, sets instead of playing with hands which will most likely give you TPWK and tough spots when playing against aggro fish.

If anybody believes this math is incorrect please let me know as it may help my own game

Agree that sippin_criss is top class. I'm not advocating playing as a nit across the board and I don't play like that myself in the early blind levels. I do think a tight approach early is the best strategy for new/inexperienced players. As you improve you can widen ranges. It's doesn't have to be tight to the point of being a nit either.

me2

Definitely isoing, extremely profitable vs the population. I actually go a slightly bigger sizing though in Iso situations this deep.

Fold preflop with your lack of experience I’d play tight


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Hi pal,

I play a lot of low-stakes SnG games, I'm not an expert by any stretch but I study regularly and focus on these games in particular.

If it's your first hand in a game with unknown players then a raise with that hand is not really desirable or profitable play. Occasionally you see OOP limpers trapping with top 5% of their hands, but that's not always the case at the micros.

Their calls suggest that they're playing with broadways, middle-higher pairs or SC cards. I've not read much of the other guys' posts on this thread but my advice would be to look at the play on the flop. Two calls to your raise should have set alarm bells ringing. Draws are definitely possible (most passive micro players call despite the bad price they may be getting) but I'd say you're against overcards, a better jack or a strong draw/p+draw from either opponent.

A 6c is one of the worst cards you could've asked for, it improves them more than it improves you. The turn would be a fold for me given the size of the pot, the aggressiveness of your villains and the texture of the flop. Folding 2p is not great but it's not something that you can expect to be best in this runout.

Hope that helps, man.

OP: Whenever people have strong opposite opinions, there is usually truth in all viewpoints. Humans are eerily binary, unable to see past the black and the white and unable to comprehend reality in all its complexity without breaking it down to A vs B without realizing there is some truth both in A and B.


I am an unexperienced player as well and am sure my viewpoint is faulty but would like to help a fellow beginner, so here goes:

I know about the tight/aggressive vs loose/aggressive debate in the early stages of a SNG and don't pretend to have an answer. I would say at the high stakes I'm sure treating the early levels of a SNG as a cash game is essential (as are other things, such as balancing your range and so on). Otherwise I imagine you would get destroyed.

However, this is a low stakes donk-and-go and you are inexperienced yourself. I guarantee playing tight/aggressive and allowing room for your opponents to make the mistakes they are most capable of making (which will eventually cost them their tournament life) is the option that will make the most money.

You need a way to simplify your decision-making process. Imagine a ratio of energy expended vs. money gained and assess each situation in that light as well. If you are playing a single table with the aim of learning then breaking down each multiway situation in this manner is great, but if you're looking to multitable and make money avoid multiway bloated pots with marginal holdings (and no real certainty that you are ahead at all or will be ahead on the turn or river). There are better spots than this.

I'm inexperienced but can see merit in practically all the choices. By raising preflop, you want to isolate in position, which is great (but will never get the job done at these stakes). By limping you keep the pot small and play some postflop (the flop action will be multiway regardless of your raise, so by keeping the pot small you at least don't make the pot disproportinally big to your middle-strength hand). Etc. Etc.

At these stakes and with my skill level, however, I'm folding. Why?

1) The flop is likely to be multiway regardless of my action preflop (I sometimes bump it up to as high as ~150 preflop with AA in similars spots simply because I know I'm getting called. Especially after a series of limpers, since the limpers interpret my move by projecting their own behavior on to me - they are more likely to do this with a middle-strength hand to steal the dead money).

2) It will take a great deal of energy for me to maneuver through the streets. None of these players are folding on the flop with any piece of the board whatsoever, any draws, any "premiums" that were "trapping" preflop (AK or the like) and so on. It's simply not worth the effort of painstakingly evaluating the flop, turn and river against several loose passives that have extremely wide ranges early in a SNG like this.

Stick to the usual, boring, efficient stuff:

- In the early stages let them kill themselves off. Villains will do crazy things. They don't perceive stacks in blinds, they just aesthetically evaluate whether a bet is big or not, which makes room for insanity early on. Similarly, they judge their stack to be "short" after having lost a couple hundred and continue to play irrationally. Avoid big pots with marginal holdings. Avoid multiway pots with marginal holdings.

- Bomb for value with very strong holdings when opponents are likely to be drawing.

- Set mine when stacks are deep enough (villains will give you their stack on a top pair or worse).

And most importantly, learn ICM push/fold spots, both nash equilibrium and custom ones and exploit them mercilessly later on. Villains on these stakes will usually shove too tight and call too tight, making them easy to exploit (you shove wider and call tighter).


As for the hand itself, I think you played it in a reasonable manner on all streets. Kudos for folding the river, you were beat for sure. The mistake was not the hand itself but the decision to play such a hand in such a context.

If this were a higher stakes SNG (in my experience even $5 SNGs play considerably different with all the usual loose passives nitting it up incredibly and folding to simple C-bets almost all of the time if they miss) where I know my raise will get the job done, I would definitely raise JTs on the button to get heads up with a weak player then punish him for playing out of position.

I think ensuring you preserve your fold equity until the blinds hit 100/50 is the way to go when starting out. At this stage 3/4 of the maniacs will be gone. If one of these double you up great if not don’t panic. Work out who the nits are and use your stack to steal and 3 bet the middle stacks who don’t want to bust. Simplicity is the key at this level.

You have received answers from both sides. I probably fold preflop.

Sometimes, I maybe flat behind pre, and call the flop bet (calling up to 1/2 pot cbet - 130chips) but not raise. I feel the hand is too weak and I don't think that a raise folds out both players. On the turn, I probably just fold. I don't think that you are going to have great equity at this point in the hand.

I am sure that I have leaks, but that is how I would play it. Also, it is low stakes and there will be many better spots to play.