20/40 9 handed

UTG limps, HJ over limps, I raise QdJd in SB, BB calls, all call.

AhQs8c...I bet, only the UTG calls

UTG is new to the game. He's 50 ish, seems selective pre but probably a smidge too loose, he has raised pre and shown strong hands. He has been pretty quiet overall. I have no good Intel regarding his peel or bluff habits.

He probably sees me as a tight TAG.

AhQs8cKd...how do you proceed here?

i c/c and fold ui

Why invest 2 bets pre when it does not give you much fold equity OOP? Too many people in pot.

While you may be a wee bit ahead of limpers' range, it is difficult to capture that equity out of position. It's awful to be in the position of having to call two big streets to see if he's got an 8 or weaker Q.


On turn, villain's play is consistent with an ace that he's worried about, so he may check behind and give a free shot at a straight. Checking turn also let's him bet 8s.

Flop, turn, both?

For value.

Preflop raise is generally standard for me unless there are significant reads or history of UTG, HJ, and BB .

Turn and river I would chk/call unimproved as default to see what UTG open limp range includes

agreed

agreed

I think this is the play.

The key here is to check the turn broadly.

I usually auto raise pre here but I think I agree with you. However, if the BB is tight and might fold I still raise. Two lp limpers have far less hands that might dominate ours so I raise here for sure.

Pre is fine to fill out your range -- you can't only raise Ax and PPs; this hand has great equity.

Flop bet is marginal; turn is an easy check as betting accomplishes little.

If the flop bet is marginal, what hands in our range should we be betting? Would betting the weakest ace in our range also be marginal?

I bet all rivers until raised, where I likely fold. Have to keep firing, I sense a draw or weak ace.

hand plays great multiway.
smooth call entices BB in right?

I wouldn't say "entices," given that calling half a small bet in the SB means that BB is absolutely playing any two cards.

Even if SB raises, reopening the action, BB should consider playing a fairly wide range. Nobody else is folding. There is a risk that some yahoo will back-reraise, but that shouldn't have too big an impact on BB's calling range.

I suppose but it's pretty thin, especially if we read either UTG or HJ as nits. From the OP I put them on 11%-20% and I'll make BB call 75%, so we're about 29% hot and cold which I would consider an obvious play for value. The times that the blind folds we have about a third of the equity so that's even better.

But if they're the type to be limping AJo (or being tricky with KK) then we're more like 26%, 31% when the blind folds [where 28% is fair share of a seven-bet pot].

This ignores where BB shows up with a monster, which shades down our equity slightly.




Less important than such a thin H&C margin though is how this hand will play postflop. I started to say we're cutting down our own implied odds, but QJs seems like a neutral implied odds hand. It lays RIO to KJ+, KQ+ but gets IO from straights and flushes.

One theoretical thing I'm never sure of: On one hand it seems bad to build a pot for no reason OOP because I want to play for more money IP. On the other hand the principle I take from NL is that you'd rather be closer to all in OOP. In limit poker I take that to mean that a bigger pot gives you easier decisions OOP because the size of the pot offsets positional advantage. (Imagine your "stack" in LHE is the number of bets you can reasonably put in postflop.) So the two factors seem to offset. Would appreciate if anyone can help clarify my thinking

And finally, of course there's mixing up your game with QJs which has value if your opponents are observant.


Anyway I don't think it's a good play or a bad play here, just the sort of thing that good aggressive players do without thinking and maybe don't realize how marginal it is.

Are you saying implied odds are great so therefore we should cut down our implied odds?

Imo you got it, which is pretty irrelevant but its what i think, you want bigger pot OOP close to all-in for NL pf, if you think your hand is good, because you cant make a lot of mistake postflop where the bets are much higher versus a smaller pf investment if you play OOP but with a big stack.

In limit, the cost of bets are fix so the mistake postflop are less costly ( but still important) so it less of an issue to play a big pot pf OOP with a hand thats is "easy" to play postflop .

I think position is much more important in NL than in limit because the amount of money that move postflop is much bigger per street.
So i dont see why you think its contradictory.