Small pair problems

[DrLAXLAX]

I am relativly new to poker. Playing only NL Texas.
Pocket pairs 22-88 is my bigest leak in game. I cannt use pokertracker becoz site dont have hand histories. May be some of you can give general guidelines about this.

[ajmargarine]

****If you are new****, limp in preflop with these hands as much as you can. Try to see as many flops as you can cheaply. If it's a miniraise preflop from somewhere, and it looks like there will be 4-5 people seeing the flop, then play also.

But, don't call preflop raises (3xBB and above) with these small pocket pairs just yet. They can be OK if you are head to head and have position on the raiser. But if you are new and just figuring things out, maybe just hold off on that. Plug the leaks first by stopping what you were doing completely with the small PP's, and then add things later like calling a legit preflop raise in LP with small pockets hoping to steal, or reraising in LP preflop with 77, hoping to steal.

Basically, you want alot of people in the pot with you, hence the limping, and to hit trips on the flop. If you hit trips on the flop, which will happen 12% of the time, you will have to figure out how to get the most $ in the pot dependent on your table. Sometimes you can slow play a bit, sometimes it's best to just lead out the betting (most people will think you have Top pair). It's table dependent.

If you don't hit trips, you pretty much are always folding to a flop bet, unless you end up with an open ended straight draw and have pot odds to call, or have 88 with a 742 board.

Hope this little bit helps.

--aj

[subzero]

Also look at stack sizes. You're 7.5:1 to flop a set or better when you have a pocket pair. If someone raises and everyone folds to you, don't call if the raiser's stack is small. You want his stack (and your stack) to be big enough to pay you off better than 7.5:1 on your preflop call if you hit the flop. Oh, and you also have to feel confident that he will give you action if you hit.

If you don't hit your set, you should fold to heavy betting until you're skilled enough to play some post-flop poker.

[Sephus]

you should be limping and calling raises with these hands.

in general, always call if the raise is less than 5% of the smaller stack (between you and the raiser), always fold if it is more than 10% (unless the pot is multi-multiway), and use your judgment in between. in general, these hands play best against AA/KK/QQ so if you think that's what someone may have, you should be more inclined to call.

if you don't hit your set, you should *usually be done with the hand.