Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

I was playing in a game that i thought was loose but passive. the hand was

Ihave As 9s

in small blind. Three people limp in and i raise. The big blind folds. Everyone else calls. (9 small bets)

the flop Ts 5d 9c

i bet. one player calls. the others fold. (11 small bets)

turn card Ks

i bet. player calls (7.5 big bets)

river card Kd

i check. player checks.

Even though i won i'm not sure if i handled the hand correctly. Can someone help. Thanks. <font color="blue"> </font> </font> </font>

Re: Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

I don't like this hand.

A9s four or five handed out of position the entire hand is not where I want to be. The limpers may hold K-T and in a passive game it may be tough to know where you stand. It may also be tough to pump a flush draw if you hit it because of your position.

That said it is not a big mistake either.

We will see what others think.

Re: Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

I think you need to continue to bet the river. Looks like to me the dude missed a staight draw.

Re: Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

If you bet the river he's definetely not going to call. he missed a straight so checking would give him the chance to bluff.

I think you played it fine. If you think the villain has a pocket pair then betting river would be a good move.

Re: Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

I don't think you played this badly. The flop raise is fine in a passive game, I think. You may or may not be best here, but you probably have good equity. In my experience, even in passive games (especially live), many players will raise an AJ/AQ/AK preflop, but will limp with pairs, even as high as TT.

I've played plenty of hands like this and have been shown hands like 77, but this is more likely a busted straight. I've also been shown a hand like T8 (again, in passive games) enough times to be worried about betting that river for value. I'm not worried about the K.

Also: Don't give the results of the hand in your original post; it influences the way we think about the action. Welcome to the forum.

Re: Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

I don't like the pre-flop raise. Our hand is pretty marginal, especially from the sb. I would just take advantage of the cheap price of limping in here.

The rest looks good, as long as you were intending on calling a river bet.

Re: Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

[ QUOTE ]
I don't like the pre-flop raise. Our hand is pretty marginal, especially from the sb. I would just take advantage of the cheap price of limping in here.

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I hope this isn't a hijack, but this is a question I've had for a long time. For a long time I've been in the habit of raising hands like mid-pairs and mid-suited aces from the blinds behind a table full of limpers. I feel like I got that idea from Ed, but I don't have the book in front of me right now.

Lately, though, I've just been calling/checking these kinds of hands here, and have been feeling pretty weak about myself. I hate to beat preflop dead horses, but what are the merits behind raising or checking/calling here? Does anyone remember SSH saying anything about this situation, or am I just hallucinating?

Re: Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

I think you need to weigh out a few things when making the decision to raise from the blinds against limpers.

1) How much equity does your hand have?
2) Is it possible to be dominated?
3) How well does it play OOP against multiple opponents?

A9s for example.
1) We might have a slight equity edge here
2) Possible to be behind a weakly played AT
3) Difficult to play OOP, bit of a weak kicker on the ace and pairing the 9 will often leave us with 2nd or 3rd pair.

AJs for example
1) Almost definitely have an equity edge here
2) Very rare for an AQ or AK to have limped here, most likely have other J's dominated.
3) Plays okay OOP. Our ace has a good kicker, and the J will often be top or 2nd pair.

If you find a section in SSHE that deals with raising limpers out of the blinds, please PM as to the page numbers. I'd like to go over that.

Re: Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

I remember one of the hand quizzes says not raising AJ suited out of the lines is as big a mistake as limping with 72o. Or something very similar to that.

Re: Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

[ QUOTE ]
I remember one of the hand quizzes says not raising AJ suited out of the lines is as big a mistake as limping with 72o. Or something very similar to that.

[/ QUOTE ]
If my post wasn't clear, I was intending to give reasons why I thought raising AJs from the blinds is correct.

I could be wrong about not raising A9s, I don't know. Against a single limper I would always raise it, but when a few people limp in I think it gets harder to play the pairs OOP.

Re: Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

I think I raise this type of hand if there are 5+ limpers or 2 or fewer limpers. I think with 3 or 4 limpers, I just call from the blinds. I either want a big multiway pot or to get it heads up with one or two other hands. I don't know if this is correct, but it's what I'm comfortable with.

Re: Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I remember one of the hand quizzes says not raising AJ suited out of the lines is as big a mistake as limping with 72o. Or something very similar to that.

[/ QUOTE ]
If my post wasn't clear, I was intending to give reasons why I thought raising AJs from the blinds is correct.

[/ QUOTE ]

The example (p. 259) is actually raising ATs out of the BB behind six limpers, so it splits the difference. I guess ATs can make a straight, so it's got that advantage over A9s, but otherwise it seems like a raise here is still in order, no? I've been too wussy to pull the trigger with this lately, but I used to do it as a standard play. I'm getting soft in my old age.

There's a paragraph on p. 88 about raising with a pot equity edge, but it talks there more about the consequences of raising (tying yourself to the pot) than reasons for doing it. It sounds like a case could be made for both.

For some reason I really thought I remembered an example of raising something like 66 from the SB when the table limps in, but I guess it wasn't in SSH.

Re: Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

[ QUOTE ]
I think you need to continue to bet the river. Looks like to me the dude missed a staight draw.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is not a reason why we should continue to bet the river. In fact, if we are confident we are always up against a missed draw and generally isn't calling down a worse hand, we should check the river.

Re: Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

Belloc,

I think the answer is that you should make the decision based on what kinds of hands you think your opponents are playing. Project a range of hands for them and decide to raise/check/complete accordingly. Against a table with a vpip of 21% or something and somehow 4 limpers, I'd be very wary of raising this, particularly if some of the limpers are tight and weak pre-flop.

Re: Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

[ QUOTE ]
The example (p. 259) is actually raising ATs out of the BB behind six limpers, so it splits the difference.

[/ QUOTE ]
But your comparing a hand with 3 limpers vs a hand with 6 limpers!!! There is a huge difference. In the case of 6 limpers with ATs we are raising for value on the flush and straight making possibilities of our hand. We could also raise hands like 55 here for value.

SSHE is also for the most part dealing with small stakes live games where people limp all sorts of crap. With hands like ATs and this many people going to the flop, we have a fairly big equity advantage over them.

A9s with 3 limpers is very different.

Re: Im just getting started, did i play this hand correctly?
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The example (p. 259) is actually raising ATs out of the BB behind six limpers, so it splits the difference.

[/ QUOTE ]
But your comparing a hand with 3 limpers vs a hand with 6 limpers!!!

[/ QUOTE ]

Actually, I'm not. Remember, I totally hijacked this thread to bring up a situation where we're considering raising out of the blinds (SB or BB) behind a table full of raisers. Then I made the mistake of mentioning the OP's A9s hand again in the process of explaining myself. I know it sucked of me to have done that, but at least I admitted it at the time.

[ QUOTE ]
There is a huge difference. In the case of 6 limpers with ATs we are raising for value on the flush and straight making possibilities of our hand. We could also raise hands like 55 here for value.

SSHE is also for the most part dealing with small stakes live games where people limp all sorts of crap. With hands like ATs and this many people going to the flop, we have a fairly big equity advantage over them.

A9s with 3 limpers is very different.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree with all of this.