10 Handed- Fold AJ UTG; Raise AQ UTG?

[CobraGoat]

i find, through stats and 2+2 advice, that i've come to always fold AJ when im UTG in a 10max game. However, i almost always raise, unless its a VERY LAGRO table, AQ from the same position?

Is this suspect?

[Godfather80]

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i find, through stats and 2+2 advice, that i've come to always fold AJ when im UTG in a 10max game. However, i almost always raise, unless its a VERY LAGRO table, AQ from the same position?

Is this suspect?

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I dislike raising AQo UTG a great deal. This move folds all of the hands that might pay you off, while keeping all of the hands that are slightly to greatly ahead of you. Limping AQo is okay, but raising it seems -EV to me.

[CobraGoat]

where in line do you begin raising with it?

also, if i limp, i feel like its much more difficult to determine where i am on a flop then if i had raised.

Not raising AQ from UTG preflop is very -ev in my opinion. It allows other garbage hands [low sc] to stick around trying to bust your hand. It will make you play your hand very weak/tight post flop worrying about what kind of hands took the flop with you even if you hit your TPTK or TPGK.

[Godfather80]

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Not raising AQ from UTG preflop is very -ev in my opinion. It allows other garbage hands [low sc] to stick around trying to bust your hand. It will make you play your hand very weak/tight post flop worrying about what kind of hands took the flop with you even if you hit your TPTK or TPGK.

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Q: What hands are calling you when you raise AQo UTG?

A: Stronger hands that AQo.

Why raise OOP with a marginally strong hand? Your profit from AQo UTG will only come from those times you hit an A or Q on the flop and a weaker A or Q calls you down. If you raise and knock out the "garbage" hands, as you refer to them, then there's nobody left to pay you off.

AQo is weak OOP. Don't feel the need to protect it or worry about SCs "busting it". AQo is only a 60/40 favorite over SCs, so it's not as if they will be running you down. You'll be letting go most of the time anyway on the flop, so don't get attached and start giving SCs behind you tons of implied odds just because you happen to make TP.

[Godfather80]

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where in line do you begin raising with it?

also, if i limp, i feel like its much more difficult to determine where i am on a flop then if i had raised.

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Full ring, I'll begin raising AQo in MP if it is folded to me. With any limpers, I'm calling.

I understand that limping makes you feel unsure of where you are on flops, but remember that raise or not, you are going to be OOP and therefore should be very cautious anyway.

hands calling you preflop are, AJ-A10-Ax,KQ,KJ,QJand 22-1010 [anything higher will bring a re-raise]. What hands are you afraid of? AA/KK/QQ and AK. So i dont understand how you can say only hands that beat you are going to make this call preflop. I agree that your oop but 2/3rds of the time your taking it down with your C-bet making you profit from this hand over the long run.

[Godfather80]

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hands calling you preflop are, AJ-A10-Ax,KQ,KJ,QJand 22-1010 [anything higher will bring a re-raise]. What hands are you afraid of? AA/KK/QQ and AK. So i dont understand how you can say only hands that beat you are going to make this call preflop. I agree that your oop but 2/3rds of the time your taking it down with your C-bet making you profit from this hand over the long run.

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I don't know where you get the figure that 2/3 of the time you will be taking the pot down with a C-bet on the flop. That seems both optimistic and oversimplified. I also don't see why you want to play a raised pot OOP with a hand that can only make TP and 1 straight.

If you are in a game where players are routinely calling 4xBB raises from UTG with Axs, then tighten up and make money on your real hands. In this game you describe, it makes even less sense to raise anything UTG. Play position and big hands.

The scenario you describe means you raise 4xBB and 2 or 3 callers behind; then, you C-bet the flop? C'mon, you must see that it's just chip-spewing to C-bet into 3 loose players. How is this line making you any money when you are missing 2/3 of the flops (more than 2/3 actually, considering some of the Q flops will also contain a K)?

ok you make a good point as i play 6 max. But then wouldn't it make more sense from what your saying to throw AQ away preflop UTG. Having several players limp + hitting your A or Q doesn't mean it's going to pay you off anymore/ any less then raising this OOP. Your either going to win a little pot or lose a huge one.

[Godfather80]

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ok you make a good point as i play 6 max. But then wouldn't it make more sense from what your saying to throw AQ away preflop UTG. Having several players limp + hitting your A or Q doesn't mean it's going to pay you off anymore/ any less then raising this OOP. Your either going to win a little pot or lose a huge one.

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You could probably fold AQo UTG in full ring and not do much worse than limping it. The fact is: with any hand OOP, you have got to play smart postflop to avoid the "winning small pot/losing big pot" phenomenon. You must actually play poker. Hopefully, after limping, you can make some money of late position Axs when an Ace hits on the flop and you lead. But, you won't be stacking anybody ever, unless they are really foolish or severely cold-decked. This is the exact reason why I'm unlikely to play a big (ie raised pot) OOP with non-premium cards: big risk with minimal reward.

ok, this turned out to be a very educational post on somewhat strong marginal hands oop. Great advice godfather.

[Godfather80]

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ok, this turned out to be a very educational post on somewhat strong marginal hands oop. Great advice godfather.

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I'm only bumping this back up to make sure I didn't just give bad advice late night last night. Anybody else wanna chime in on the subject for my benefit?

[beavens]

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ok, this turned out to be a very educational post on somewhat strong marginal hands oop. Great advice godfather.

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I'm only bumping this back up to make sure I didn't just give bad advice late night last night. Anybody else wanna chime in on the subject for my benefit?

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i think your advice about playing hands like this OOP is very good, but you've also got to think of all the lousy players out there that will call a raise with hands that are even worse off than AQ.

for every decent player that calls with hands that crush you, there are a bunch that will call with worse hands.

would your advice change if this was 6max instead of full ring?

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ok, this turned out to be a very educational post on somewhat strong marginal hands oop. Great advice godfather.

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I'm only bumping this back up to make sure I didn't just give bad advice late night last night. Anybody else wanna chime in on the subject for my benefit?

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I am quite interested in hearing your strategy for AK UTG. From the points you have made, all of which I believe are valid and reasonable, you could make the same argument for limping AK in EP. I generally like to raise it because it makes postflop play easier, but I limp on occasion as well. I primarily base these decisions on table conditions.

[Godfather80]

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ok, this turned out to be a very educational post on somewhat strong marginal hands oop. Great advice godfather.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm only bumping this back up to make sure I didn't just give bad advice late night last night. Anybody else wanna chime in on the subject for my benefit?

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I am quite interested in hearing your strategy for AK UTG. From the points you have made, all of which I believe are valid and reasonable, you could make the same argument for limping AK in EP. I generally like to raise it because it makes postflop play easier, but I limp on occasion as well. I primarily base these decisions on table conditions.

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I think Amoeba, TWP, and wtfsvi wrote quite extensively on AKo UTG in full ring in somebody else's thread a while ago. I took most of my thoughts out of their's.

Basically, raising AKo UTG also puts you in the same treacherous waters that raising AQo UTG puts you in. The advantage AKo has over AQo is that any pair you make will be top pair. I will probably raise 30% and call 70% with AKo UTG, whereas I almost never raise AQo UTG. I raise AKo UTG on occasion simply for Shania (ie so any observant opponent can't be sure that I have QQ,KK, or AA when I raise UTG). Going over my stats and the stats of others (through their posts), it seems that most tight-ish players need to tighten up in EP and loosen up in LP. Personally, I find it difficult to play big pots OOP and try to minimize those situations. Since my goal is to win money and not pots, I want my big action to come when I have the advantage of both premium cards and premium position so I can fully exploit my opponents. Of course, if circumstances dictate, I will play a big pot in any position if I feel it is +EV. What I'm saying is: I'm doing the majority of my investing in position because I've found investing OOP to be tricky and difficult.

DISCLAIMER: I don't play 6-max. My comments within this thread are not relevant to 6-max. I'm sure that the UTG raising standards in 6-max are quite different.

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ok, this turned out to be a very educational post on somewhat strong marginal hands oop. Great advice godfather.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm only bumping this back up to make sure I didn't just give bad advice late night last night. Anybody else wanna chime in on the subject for my benefit?

[/ QUOTE ]

I am quite interested in hearing your strategy for AK UTG. From the points you have made, all of which I believe are valid and reasonable, you could make the same argument for limping AK in EP. I generally like to raise it because it makes postflop play easier, but I limp on occasion as well. I primarily base these decisions on table conditions.

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I think Amoeba, TWP, and wtfsvi wrote quite extensively on AKo UTG in full ring in somebody else's thread a while ago. I took most of my thoughts out of their's.

Basically, raising AKo UTG also puts you in the same treacherous waters that raising AQo UTG puts you in. The advantage AKo has over AQo is that any pair you make will be top pair. I will probably raise 30% and call 70% with AKo UTG, whereas I almost never raise AQo UTG. I raise AKo UTG on occasion simply for Shania (ie so any observant opponent can't be sure that I have QQ,KK, or AA when I raise UTG). Going over my stats and the stats of others (through their posts), it seems that most tight-ish players need to tighten up in EP and loosen up in LP. Personally, I find it difficult to play big pots OOP and try to minimize those situations. Since my goal is to win money and not pots, I want my big action to come when I have the advantage of both premium cards and premium position so I can fully exploit my opponents. Of course, if circumstances dictate, I will play a big pot in any position if I feel it is +EV. What I'm saying is: I'm doing the majority of my investing in position because I've found investing OOP to be tricky and difficult.

DISCLAIMER: I don't play 6-max. My comments within this thread are not relevant to 6-max. I'm sure that the UTG raising standards in 6-max are quite different.

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I am curious GodFather, what hands do you raise UTG? I raise AQo and AKo UTG every single time, not to mention a few other hands.

If you could provide a link to the post about AQ and AK utg by TWP and AMOEBA i would appreciate it.


Raising AKo UTG, just for the sake of Shania seems a little extreme to me. What do you do with JJ? Personally, I think it is imperative to raise with a variety of hands from a variety of position if you want to maximize you winnings in NL hold em.

What do you think?

[Godfather80]

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ok, this turned out to be a very educational post on somewhat strong marginal hands oop. Great advice godfather.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm only bumping this back up to make sure I didn't just give bad advice late night last night. Anybody else wanna chime in on the subject for my benefit?

[/ QUOTE ]

I am quite interested in hearing your strategy for AK UTG. From the points you have made, all of which I believe are valid and reasonable, you could make the same argument for limping AK in EP. I generally like to raise it because it makes postflop play easier, but I limp on occasion as well. I primarily base these decisions on table conditions.

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I think Amoeba, TWP, and wtfsvi wrote quite extensively on AKo UTG in full ring in somebody else's thread a while ago. I took most of my thoughts out of their's.

Basically, raising AKo UTG also puts you in the same treacherous waters that raising AQo UTG puts you in. The advantage AKo has over AQo is that any pair you make will be top pair. I will probably raise 30% and call 70% with AKo UTG, whereas I almost never raise AQo UTG. I raise AKo UTG on occasion simply for Shania (ie so any observant opponent can't be sure that I have QQ,KK, or AA when I raise UTG). Going over my stats and the stats of others (through their posts), it seems that most tight-ish players need to tighten up in EP and loosen up in LP. Personally, I find it difficult to play big pots OOP and try to minimize those situations. Since my goal is to win money and not pots, I want my big action to come when I have the advantage of both premium cards and premium position so I can fully exploit my opponents. Of course, if circumstances dictate, I will play a big pot in any position if I feel it is +EV. What I'm saying is: I'm doing the majority of my investing in position because I've found investing OOP to be tricky and difficult.

DISCLAIMER: I don't play 6-max. My comments within this thread are not relevant to 6-max. I'm sure that the UTG raising standards in 6-max are quite different.

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I am curious GodFather, what hands do you raise UTG? I raise AQo and AKo UTG every single time, not to mention a few other hands.

If you could provide a link to the post about AQ and AK utg by TWP and AMOEBA i would appreciate it.


Raising AKo UTG, just for the sake of Shania seems a little extreme to me. What do you do with JJ? Personally, I think it is imperative to raise with a variety of hands from a variety of position if you want to maximize you winnings in NL hold em.

What do you think?

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While I agree that at higher limits it becomes necessary to raise with a wider variety of hands in EP; at 100NL and below, your opponents aren't really paying attention enough to warrant it.

If I can still get action when I raise my premium hands from EP, I have no reason to add other hands that are weaker. To clarify, position is so important to me that I won't play anything other than premium hands for a raise when I don't have good position. I will only add hands to my EP mix when it seems that my opponents are folding to my premium hand EP raises too much.

Again, as long as you are getting action from your UTG raises, why play hands weaker than QQ for a raise? AQo and JJ are incredibly troublesome OOP when played for a raise. QQ is the crossover hand here and very difficult to play well OOP in its own right.

It is imperative to invest your money in +EV situations to make money in NL. +EV situations are few and far between when you are OOP. To be that aggressive player that you want to be, become hyper aggro in LP and a maniac on the button.

I wish I had the link to the thread, but the subject was something like "why I don't raise QQ UTG in full ring" or something along those lines. Somebody else can refresh my memory on the actual title.