Quote:
Originally Posted by baudib1
I think you are just scared of losing.
That is part of it but the fear of making a mistake is worse. It's a personality trait I have. I do this with a lot of life decisions.
54s is a terrible hand to call here preflop because it performs horribly HU and you don't even know why you're calling. If you want to call suited cards then there are far far better ones to call with than this; if you are flatting 54s HU vs. MP PFR then you are calling WAY too often.
You aren't even considering the range of the PFR and that's a serious problem. If the PFR has a tight range you are running into too many strong hands and you will be unable to play your equity aggressively (no one has ever made money in Texas Hold'em by trying to get $1-$2 players to fold over pairs).
For example, you could probably flat 22 here instead of 54 and it will play much easier. First, because you'll rarely get squeezed and when you hit, you almost always have the best hand. So even though you are folding the flop the vast majority of the time, when you don't fold you're printing money.
When you flat 54s, you are burning money because you're either folding the best hand too often or paying off too often.
If he's opening much wider, it's more justifiable but you still don't flop well that often. When you do flop well, especially this well, you really need to pile as much money as possible in on the flop before your equity gets cut in half -- you're a favorite over 2 black Aces and you have the dummy end of the straight draw that will make the board really scary. Also, you have no SDV so exercising fold equity is paramount (this hand plays better against someone opening 30% than 22 does, but you need to push it when you flop big draws).
It's not like I'm a limp/calling machine. I'm just trying to mix things up a little. I don't always play 45s. But your point of "you don't even know why your are calling" is valid.
I've been sooooo card dead the last few sessions that I believe my image is a rock. Last session I got AT once, AA once, and JJ once. That was the extent of my "playable" hands. I just feel like a call like this every once in a while isn't horrible.
And back to the raise. My opponents just fold every time I raise now which I think goes back to image.
But "you need to push it when you flop big draws" is a great point. Something I haven't been doing.
FWIW, I don't think I'm playing horrible. I'm consistently winning, just not very much.