Playing suited connectors out of position...

jayjayhooks

When playing low stakes limit holdem, specifically 5-10, how much value should I be putting on these types of cards from the first 3 positions UTG? It depends.. I know, so lets assume that the game is fairly loose, as it almost always is in B&M cardrooms. Talking 5-7 players taking a flop regardless of a raise coming in from anywhere but UTG and cutoff, in which case we still may see 3-5.

I cant seem to put a value on hands like 7-8 suited to j-10 off , which i have no problems sizing them up from middle to late position. These hands are definite money makers when there is 4-6 players involved, which is generally the norm. But it is not uncommon to see 7+ or even family pots at this limit.

Even though most people will telegraph thier intentions of calling or folding at this limit, you dont have much time being the first to act to assess how many callers there will probably be. Any one have any moral problems with slowing down the action from UTG to make these assessments?

Because with 7+ animals in the pot, you can be sure that your going to end up with the baby flush pretty frequently, or when you hit your open ender on the turn, theres often a bigger draw... or how about the times you get sucked into calling when you end up with low pair shit kicker and a gutshot, or even an open ender? Is there any +EV in calling these hands from early position?

A final question, does anyone know anything about these data pools I keep hearing about? A collection of real money hands, that can be sorted to find out how often these types of hand showdown a winner...

Thanks guys.

Big Mike

The answer, as you suggest, is 'it depends'

Mostly it depends on how well you play post flop. Since there will almost always be 5+ players in each pot, I have no doubt that 78s or JTo could be profitably played in early position because each has the possibility of making a big hand capable of winning a lot of bets. I would rather play JTo than A9o from ep for that reason.
The problem comes when the flop is J42 and you have your JTo utg. How do you play it now and are you likely to lose a lot more than you win to something like KJ?

Personally I would avoid playing JTo or similar unsuited broadway cards in early postion. A case could be made for folding a hand as strong as AJo in a game like that. AQo and AKo are raises, never limps. KQo too, maybe.

The suited connectors in ep - I wouldn't play anything less than that 78s you mention, but I would raise it (I very rarely open limp playing limit).
In reality though you could fold all suited connectors up to JTs and not be giving up very much at all in early position.

zunni74

I tend to fold all but 9Ts+ in early/mid position. Nothing like limping this type of hand and facing a raise or re-raise and have to make a decision. Even 9Ts+ I'll throw away a % of the time (say 33-50) Now this is also at my 'sino where there is a 2/5 game to suck up the uber fish, the 5/10 game will have more folding than a 'sino where the smallest game is 5/10. If you've got a decent handle on the table and know you are almost 100% sure you will get at least 5 callers behind with almost 0% chance of getting re-raised then I'd see a flop with 9Ts+ always...

Big Mike

jayjayhooks;171464 wrote... or how about the times you get sucked into calling when you end up with low pair shit kicker and a gutshot, or even an open ender?

Just as an addendum; an open ended straight draw (as long as it's not to the bad end) is a monster hand in a 5+ handed pot. ie you have 78s on a 56K board. You're not getting sucked in, you love that flop and should be betting and raising/REraising vs 4 or more players. A pair and gutshot is also very strong. With 78s on a flop of 67Tr you are in very good shape in a multiway pot.

jayjayhooks

Thanks big mike, as for the open ender response I wasnt talking about a 56k board with 78... i was talking more a 679 board, where you hit a low pair with shit kicker, and an open ender. Thats where you get sucked in. You cant be sure your drawing live, but considering all your additional outs, your almost always going to be getting the odds to call. This kind of flop is beautiful if its rainbow against 4 or 5 players, but when up against 7+ or if the flush draw is present and isnt your suit, your under a lot of pressure.

I dont even really consider the j42 flop a problem if theres 5+ players, little invested is little lost. But when the flop hits 108Q, ill feel the pressure. Back to square one, mid pair mid kicker with a gutshot that doesnt even make the nuts. Id have to be really on top of my game to be able to muck that consistently post flop.

And thank you zunni, but I dont think I have to think twice before making the call after a raise or even a re-raise as most of the time if there are 4-5 players that are giving indications of calling, ill be getting somewhere around 10-1 implied odds. Pretty sure id even call 45s at 10-1 preflop in a limit game.

shoveit

jayjayhooks;171585 wroteThanks big mike, as for the open ender response I wasnt talking about a 56k board with 78... i was talking more a 679 board, where you hit a low pair with shit kicker, and an open ender. Thats where you get sucked in. You cant be sure your drawing live, but considering all your additional outs, your almost always going to be getting the odds to call. This kind of flop is beautiful if its rainbow against 4 or 5 players, but when up against 7+ or if the flush draw is present and isnt your suit, your under a lot of pressure.

on this board, i'm raising or c/r it 100% of the time. if you bet, it's just going to intice others along and you don't want to chop the pot with K8 SOOTED when the straight hits. so you want to try to pump and squeeze ppl out as much as possible. although i don't see K8 suited folding, but because we have a pair, we're practically free-rolling them (read: only 3 outs for the K).

on a 56K board, i'm c/c or c/r, simply because you don't want to squeeze ppl out when you have a draw like this. you want as many suckers to put in one bet on the flop as possible. the dream scenario would be if the player direction on your left bets and everyone calls and you raise that motherfudgepacker. at the lower limits, once ppl put one bet in on the flop, they feel like they've put a piece of their soul into the pot and they will call 3bets if the original bettor reraises so don't worry about ppl folding. this way, when you do hit (read: 1/4 times) you're going to hit a massive pot and super +EV with all those bets on the flop.

note that this should only be in lower limits where a lot of ppl see the flop. in the higher limits where the games are tougher, like zunni said, i'm pretty much folding everything in EP, except 9Ts+. if the games are really aggro, i'm waiting for monster hands in EP cause suited connectors just aren't going to be profitable.

jayjayhooks

Thanks shove it, good information.

Ive been doing a lot of homework lately, and ive learned about a concept called pot equity, which basically sums up everything youve said in theory without using examples.

Essentially pot equity is the amount of the pot that your hand will be entitled to based on the frequency that your hand will win in a showdown.

Ie, you have a nut flush draw on the flop, your odds of the hand winning in a show down will be 30% ish, assuming you have no other way to win. However your true odds are likely to be much higher, because you could back into top pair, or two pair etc.

But lets assume you have just 33% for simplicity. Basically, you stand to win 1 in 3 times no matter how many opponents you have which means that if there are more than you and two other players, you want as much "dead money" in the pot as possible. Since these players are very likely to have as little as 10% of winning in a showdown, the more money they put in, the more money you and the players with higher chances of winning in the showdown will profit at thier expense. Even if you dont win this hand, your EV skyrockets over time.

Heres an example:

Hand 1 - 33% in showdown
hand 2 - 20% "
hand 3 - 15% "
hand 4 - 12% "
Hand 5 - 10% "
hand 6 - 7.5% "
hand 7 - 7.5% "

Even if your hand is Hand 2, its wise to raise since you and Hand 1 will both benefit from all of the dead money being called by the loose players who are married to thier gutshow draws, or overcards, and bottom pairs.

If the pot is 100$ (for simplicity) after the flop, each players pot equity would be the same in dollars as thier chance of winning in a show down is in percentages. Regardless of whether or not they are in the lead at the moment.

lunatic

Hey jay,

Keep in mind that like you said, pot equity theory assumes that all hands are going to showdown. For example say you have something like 67s in early position and the flop comes with a pair (say above 7 for argument's sake) but also gives you a flush draw. If there is a bet to you with a bunch of people behind you are you gonna go to the river? What if there is a bet and a raise? I guess what I'm trying to say is your pot equity might be the same but you might not make it to the river depending on the action and your opponents. I am not saying it is useless, just that it is easy to misapply it.

To answer your original question, I probably draw the line at about 67s and above and I'm not too crazy about playing the lower end of that at all so I won't always play them. I am not a pro by any stretch of the imagination so I don't like playing marginal hands out of position. In no limit, it is a different story because my implied odds are bigger so I'm more willing to play these hands out of position especially if the game is passive. But in limit, you really need those post flop skills if you wanna be playing these hands all the time.

jayjayhooks

lol, its definitely easy to misapply this theory lunatic. Especially since sometimes your going to be so far behind on the flop, that you think your in first. lol Not to mention the times that you are going to be drawing dead.

Again this theory would probably only come into play in small stakes games, where your opponents are likely to make the first fundamental error. Playing too many hands, and going to far with them. It also helps greatl in multiway, passive pots.

But you dont necessarily have to go to the river, you can use pot equity assuming seeing just one card as well. Instead of your flush draw being 33% to hit with two cards to come, you just assume 20% for one card... if you miss, you can fold. But i can rarely see a situation where you wont be getting great pot odds to see the river, so this may not be all that effective.

Im still new to this theory, so if ive missed anything fundamental, my apologies. And its a little counter-intuitive to the theory of poker in general, because its basically telling you to make a mistake, in order for your opponents to make even more mistakes. You make a single -ev bet, in order to induce your opponents into making multiple -ev calls.

canaDah

tough to value a 0