Suited Trash in SB, Opponent Skill Level

[DavidC]

Hey guys.

If 2 bad players limp, and I'm in the sb, I would love to play 92s here, as it could profit.

But if 2 good players limp, should I still complete?

--Dave.

[Sykes]

Good players open-limp?

i'd do it. it could work out.

Yes, nearly everytime. Although I'd prefer more than 2 limpers with a suited hand as weak as 92s. 53s would be fine, at least it connects. Still... you're only paying a half-bet to see a pot of 3.5 bets - you're getting 7:1. And getting away from your hand when you miss the two-pair, straight or flush draw is very easy.

Two open-limps from good players usually just mean two cards ten or higher. Or a low pocket pair. Either way, not a terrible situation for you.

[DavidC]

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Good players open-limp?

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Think about it.

[Wetdog]

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Good players open-limp?

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Think about it.

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Kind of like 3 wise men tying their camels to a tumbleweed. /images/graemlins/wink.gif

Or low pocket pairs. Sure, it's .25bb. BB could check and you have 4 bets to try for the flush, 2 pair, trips flop. This is a gambling forum is it not?

[deception5]

I usually want one more player before I limp such a poor hand.

[bozlax]

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I usually want one more player before I limp such a poor hand.

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And at that I want a pretty good read that BB won't raise.

I think the whole any-two-suited-in-the-SB is oversold. You're only about 8:1 to flop a four-flush, 15:1 to make a flush by the river. Without additional draws (connectedness, high-card value), this gets mucked.

With 3 limpers before you, there's 4.5 bets in the pot and it costs you .5 to complete, so you have 9:1 odds. That's more than enough to justify completing. And that's just looking at conventional odds!

Also, sometimes you do not need to hit your flush/straight to win. Bet out your draw on the flop and in some situations bet out the turn and you can take down the pot unimproved.

With 3 limpers before you, I definitely see playing any 2 suited cards in the SB as profitable. With 2 limpers I would limit it to suited connectors.

What do you mean 15:1 to make the flush by river? Isn't making the flush by river ~2:1 when you flop a 4-flush?

[bozlax]

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With 3 limpers before you, there's 4.5 bets in the pot and it costs you .5 to complete, so you have 9:1 odds. That's more than enough to justify completing. And that's just looking at conventional odds!

Also, sometimes you do not need to hit your flush/straight to win. Bet out your draw on the flop and in some situations bet out the turn and you can take down the pot unimproved.

With 3 limpers before you, I definitely see playing any 2 suited cards in the SB as profitable. With 2 limpers I would limit it to suited connectors.

What do you mean 15:1 to make the flush by river? Isn't making the flush by river ~2:1 when you flop a 4-flush?

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Huh? More than enough? What are the odds that you'll flop a flush? Two pair? One pair and have it hold up? Put some numbers behind this to convince me that 9:1 odds is more than enough to play 92s. What if BB raises and everybody calls?

And 15:1 is the odds preflop of 2 suited cards turning into a flush by the river, since that's what we're talking about.

If BB raises and everyone calls, then if you make your flush (or two-pair, trips, fh), you just made more money against his TPTK, set, a-high, or whatever. (Not to mention I know many players who are hesitant to raise from the BB with many hands. They justify it with "I have to hit to win and this won't eliminate anyone.")

I'm not saying you want your one-pair to hold up and win. That's not the idea with 92s.

Okay, I understand what you mean by 15:1 now.

[bozlax]

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I'm not saying you want your one-pair to hold up and win. That's not the idea with 92s.

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This is my point, tho. You say getting 9:1 is more than enough to justify calling, but you're only 15:1 to make the only decent chance you have to win the hand. And that needs to be reduced, slightly, to account for the times that you do make your flush and lose to a better hand (this being a case where I don't think it balances out with the times that you catch a different winner).

[Aaron W.]

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This is my point, tho. You say getting 9:1 is more than enough to justify calling, but you're only 15:1 to make the only decent chance you have to win the hand. And that needs to be reduced, slightly, to account for the times that you do make your flush and lose to a better hand (this being a case where I don't think it balances out with the times that you catch a different winner).

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Preflop play is NOT about pot odds (http://archiveserver.twoplustwo.com/showthreaded.php?Cat=&Board=&Number=495010&page=&v iew=&sb=5&o=&fpart=)

[Henke]

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With 3 limpers before you, there's 4.5 bets in the pot and it costs you .5 to complete, so you have 9:1 odds. That's more than enough to justify completing. And that's just looking at conventional odds!

Also, sometimes you do not need to hit your flush/straight to win. Bet out your draw on the flop and in some situations bet out the turn and you can take down the pot unimproved.

With 3 limpers before you, I definitely see playing any 2 suited cards in the SB as profitable. With 2 limpers I would limit it to suited connectors.

What do you mean 15:1 to make the flush by river? Isn't making the flush by river ~2:1 when you flop a 4-flush?

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Huh? More than enough? What are the odds that you'll flop a flush? Two pair? One pair and have it hold up? Put some numbers behind this to convince me that 9:1 odds is more than enough to play 92s. What if BB raises and everybody calls?

And 15:1 is the odds preflop of 2 suited cards turning into a flush by the river, since that's what we're talking about.

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Say the probability of flopping a flushdraw is 11%. Probability of flopping a flush is 0.84%. Two pair (using both cards) 2%. Trips using one of the cards is .0135%. However, the flushdraw will only come in about 35% of the time, so we should put it at 3.85%. This sums to about 8%, or 11.4:1. Of course the flush might loose sometimes, the two pairs/trips might also get outdrawn. But sometimes we will also draw out after flopping a flushdraw, and sometimes a pair of nines might even win! So I think it might be playable against crappy opponents, given that BB will almost certainly not raise.

The amount of times you miss your flush but make two-pair, trips, or better (or your semi-bluff bets make them fold) null out the amount of times you lose with a made flush.

Also lets say you flop a pair of twos with your flush draw. You now have even more outs!

Against looser players who stay too far with weak draws and weak pairs... you're more than likely to gain at least six more small bets from them (or 3 BB). Say you bet on the flop and only two of them call (a very conservative estimate for loose games). You bet on the turn and one calls. You bet on the river improved to 2-pr or better and win.

And against tighter players, they are more apt to fold their weak draws and weak pairs, so you have a better chance of winning unimproved. Especially on raggedy boards when you're in the blinds.

[bozlax]

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This is my point, tho. You say getting 9:1 is more than enough to justify calling, but you're only 15:1 to make the only decent chance you have to win the hand. And that needs to be reduced, slightly, to account for the times that you do make your flush and lose to a better hand (this being a case where I don't think it balances out with the times that you catch a different winner).

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Preflop play is NOT about pot odds (http://archiveserver.twoplustwo.com/showthreaded.php?Cat=&Board=&Number=495010&page=&v iew=&sb=5&o=&fpart=)

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Great post.

I'm saying that 92s isn't automatic from the SB. That's all.

And for me, it's not about pot odds, although that's what this part of the thread has devolved into. It's because (for me) there aren't enough ways to make a winner out of 92s, against any number of opponents, for it to be worth an extra .25BB per time I see it.

[bozlax]

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given that BB will almost certainly not raise.

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Which is where I started. I play this if I have a strong read that BB won't raise.

Yeesh! Next time I'll just go poke a hornet's nest with a stick.

[Henke]

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given that BB will almost certainly not raise.

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Which is where I started. I play this if I have a strong read that BB won't raise.


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Yeah, I read that, and that's why I put it in a different font...

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Yeesh! Next time I'll just go poke a hornet's nest with a stick.

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I'm sorry if I offended you, wasn't ment that way. Just wanted to clarify your argument with some numbers...

[deception5]

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With 3 limpers before you, there's 4.5 bets in the pot and it costs you .5 to complete, so you have 9:1 odds. That's more than enough to justify completing. And that's just looking at conventional odds!

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Sure, but the question was about 2 limpers before you.

[deception5]

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Preflop play is NOT about pot odds

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This is true to an extent. But pot odds are a relevant factor in preflop play, just not the only factor. The problem is that against bad players you generally will need to show down the best hand. With terrible position and a crappy hand like this you don't have much room to outplay your opponents postflop (unless they are absolutely terrible beyond the typical bad players). You simply won't hit enough and will have to check fold on the flop. K4s is miles better than 92s.

[VoraciousReader]

My perspective's a little different: I don't have a lot of faith in MY post-flop play, so I muck this hand nearly always, even from the SB with limpers. Evaluating the flop is still a weakness in my poker game and I will be playing this in the worst position. Really, the only way I would play this would be to instamuck if I didn't flop a 4-flush or trips. I think I would want at least 2 more players in the pot before I completed. And as someone said, I'd want to be pretty sure BB is not going to raise.

[bozlax]

[adjusting skirt]No offense. I'm just feeling a tad put-upon. /images/graemlins/frown.gif[/adjustment]

[bozlax]

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With 3 limpers before you, there's 4.5 bets in the pot and it costs you .5 to complete, so you have 9:1 odds. That's more than enough to justify completing. And that's just looking at conventional odds!

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Sure, but the question was about 2 limpers before you.

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This part of the thread had turned into 3 limpers. Somebody posted they'd want one more limper than OP was providing. I said that even with that I'd want a read on BB, yada, yada. Then this came out.

[deception5]

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This part of the thread had turned into 3 limpers. Somebody posted they'd want one more limper than OP was providing. I said that even with that I'd want a read on BB, yada, yada. Then this came out.

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Interesting, it was me that wanted one more, I didn't realize the response was to that /images/graemlins/smile.gif

Indeed it was. With 3 limpers, I'd complete with a wider range of suited cards (read: any). With only 2 limpers, I'd only complete with suited connectors, even as terrible as 52s.

[Aaron W.]

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Preflop play is NOT about pot odds

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This is true to an extent. But pot odds are a relevant factor in preflop play, just not the only factor. The problem is that against bad players you generally will need to show down the best hand. With terrible position and a crappy hand like this you don't have much room to outplay your opponents postflop (unless they are absolutely terrible beyond the typical bad players). You simply won't hit enough and will have to check fold on the flop. K4s is miles better than 92s.

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You're hardly ever looking at pot odds. You're always looking to implied odds. You don't limp a baby pocket pair because you have pot odds to catch a set. You don't limp T9s because you have good pot odds. The times you limp because you have good pot odds are times when you want to limp because your implied odds are gigantic.

Implied odds are a function of your chances of making a hand and the chances of your opponents to pay you off when you do. It's also a function of position and villain's skill levels as these affect their liklihood of getting paid off.

Usually when I say something like "I'm getting 9:1 in the BB to call the early position raise", I'm really thinking that I've got a 5-way pot with some suited stuff and excellent relative position to build up a nice pot if I flop a good draw.

I never said anything good or bad about OP's 92s. I just think that the conversation was drifting in the wrong direction.

[deception5]

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You're hardly ever looking at pot odds. You're always looking to implied odds.

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Ok, point taken. Good post.

[DavidC]

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With 3 limpers before you, there's 4.5 bets in the pot and it costs you .5 to complete, so you have 9:1 odds. That's more than enough to justify completing. And that's just looking at conventional odds!

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Sure, but the question was about 2 limpers before you.

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Yeah, I'm specifically moving this as close as I can to break even situation or slightly lower.

One thing that I haven't seen anyone say yet is that with a bunch of guys in the pot, your four-flush can actually have some +EV to it if more than 3 people are seeing the turn and none of them have sets or higher flushes.

FWIW, in my OP I almost put 3 limpers, but I changed it to 2 on purpose.

Part of the value that these hands have in this situation is that we get to put in double-flop bets and quadruple turn and river bets, because we only put in half-bets to start. As a result, the future of the hand is really juicy against bad opponents...

Against better opponents, though, who are less likely to bet with a marginal hand when a flush card hits the turn, less likely to overcall on a flush turn card after multiple people have called on a ragged board, less likely to overcall the river, etc. etc. these hands lose some value. That's what I'm trying to get at.

I've moved to the 2/4 game, where, especially during the daytime, you'll often find some pretty damn tight tables with some very decent opposition (at least equal to myself in skill, so maybe not "very decent" but at least "uncommonly decent" for what I'm used to).

Something worth noting about this hand is that similarly to it having double implied odds, it also has double-reverse-implied odds... /images/graemlins/smile.gif If you'd limped from the button and lost 5bb, that's -5x your pf investment. If you limp from the SB it's -10x, right?