Books and players differ on UTG play

[winky51]

Why is it I hear more and more about players raising with hands that in all the books they say just to call in early position? Is it different for the different levels? 2/4 3/6 5/10?

Hands like
AJ, ATs, KQs, KQ, KJs, QJs, JTs, 99-77

I generally raise with AJ, KQs, KQ, 99 depends.

[hobbsmann]

IMO as more and more players are tightening up in these games it pays to become more aggressive as many players these days play a very tight-weak game that is conducive to being run over.

[Bluffoon]

I tend to raise these hands in games where players cold call with worse hands. In games where players will fold worse hands and reraise and isolate with better hands I tend to dump them.

[SeaEagle]

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IMO as more and more players are tightening up in these games it pays to become more aggressive as many players these days play a very tight-weak game that is conducive to being run over.


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I completely disagree with this, in regards to playing more hands. As players tighten up, it's less likely they'll be calling you with worse hands and you'll be playing catch up and be out of position to boot.

The reason most of the books don't recommend playing middling hands from EP is because they were written before the poker boom when the average player was better than they are today. SSHE was written specifically to take advantage of the weaker players introduced during the poker boom and gives EP recommendations that includes far more hands than, say, HPFAP.

All in all, the hands the OP mentioned are very table specific. If you're at a table where a UTG raise is just going to get you 2 or 3 way (and often reraised), and a UTG limp is usually going to get you iso-raised, then you're better off just folding stuff like AJo and KJs. But if you're at a table where 3 or 4 people are going to coldcall your UTG raise, then KJs is a fine opening hand.

[hobbsmann]

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IMO as more and more players are tightening up in these games it pays to become more aggressive as many players these days play a very tight-weak game that is conducive to being run over.


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I completely disagree with this, in regards to playing more hands. As players tighten up, it's less likely they'll be calling you with worse hands and you'll be playing catch up and be out of position to boot.

The reason most of the books don't recommend playing middling hands from EP is because they were written before the poker boom when the average player was better than they are today. SSHE was written specifically to take advantage of the weaker players introduced during the poker boom and gives EP recommendations that includes far more hands than, say, HPFAP.

All in all, the hands the OP mentioned are very table specific. If you're at a table where a UTG raise is just going to get you 2 or 3 way (and often reraised), and a UTG limp is usually going to get you iso-raised, then you're better off just folding stuff like AJo and KJs. But if you're at a table where 3 or 4 people are going to coldcall your UTG raise, then KJs is a fine opening hand.

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I actually don't like my above post after re-reading so I guess I'll elaborate further below.

The above hands can't all be lumped into the same category and whether or not they should be raised UTG are very game dependent. In a standard party 5/10 game of the above hands I would be raising everything but QJs/JTs which I limp except for the very tight and aggressive games.

Reasons for raising hands like KJs/QJs/JTs will be mainly for pot building when we expect many players cold call with worse hands and allow us to be in a hand that plays very well multiway.

Raising 77/88 UTG needs a discussion of there own IMO. Value wise raising/limping a hand like 77 UTG is probably fairly even, but what I feel a raise gains us is a chance to allow the nittier opponents to fold marginal-good hands (A7s-ATs/AJo, KTs-KQ, possibly 88-99 etc.) and gives us a good chance to get into pots with the fishier opponents at the table. Also, having momentum in a hand will allow us to win various pots uncontested where opponents will fold incorrectly (read: a bet on an A high flop will fold other broadway cards that don't have gutshots to our underpair.

I could be way off on my thinking here and would like to hear from others on this subject, but in general I tend adopt a laggier mentality in all but the toughest games.

[SeaEagle]

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Reasons for raising hands like KJs/QJs/JTs will be mainly for pot building when we expect many players cold call with worse hands and allow us to be in a hand that plays very well multiway.


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If you're in a game where you'll get called in several places, why do you want to raise these hands? Why not limp and expect a limpfest? You don't fear a raise since you'll still get several callers. But the best way to play QJs is multiway for a single bet, which you're encouraging with a UTG limp. The worst way to play this hand is 2 or 3 way for 2 bets OOP, which you're encouraging with a UTG raise.

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Raising 77/88 UTG needs a discussion of there own IMO.

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I want middle pairs either HU or many way. I don't mind a raise multiway, since I'm looking for a set and I'd like to tie weak draws to the pot. Ideally, I'd like HU or 3-way to be really cheap so I can bet at a ragged flop and have the pot be small enough that overcards will fold. Unfortunately, I can't usually get HU for 1 bet by limping from EP, so I raise in a tight game and limp in a loose one. PF aggression doesn't matter as much with PPs as it does with, say, QJs, where an early raise (and/or reraise) makes me wish I'd read the table better and just folded.

[winky51]

Had to think about this one. If you raise you might get some callers but not a tons of them in a loose game, and they also might reraise back. So why raise when your out of position? Why not call and wait for the flop to bet a good hand? Don't you want to encourge multiway action for your broadway suited connector?

BUT on the other hand if you are guaranteed 6-8 callers on the flop anyways and almost no chance of a reraise except with AA or KK then it would seem right. Big pot tons of suckas' and the chance to hit a monster draw or draw to a weaker draw.

In the books they do say in a tough game fold these hands up front. But I wonder why they don't say to raise them?

In general what level could you make this play 1/2 and below?

[flair1239]

Kind of have to think about what the hand likes.

PP prefer to be shorthanded or have many callers. You kind of have to look downstream and visualise the effect your raise will have.

Big off-suit cards like to be shorthanded. A potential problem with always raising however... (this is something I have been playing around with), I believe with a hand like AJo, you might make many hands that are in a bad way against you fold, while many of the hands that give you trouble will not fold. So you are folding out hands like A9s and QJo, while other hands are not folding.... but if you have a situation where people will consistently call with dominated hands, then... it is hard not to raise most of the time.

The suited broadways, I vacilate on. I would say I am about 50/50 and it really is table dependent for me. I know I really am not wild about raising QJs and playing against a late position cold call and a BB complete. Whereas for some reason it does not really bother me to limp, get raised, and then a CC, followed by a blind complete.

Reason being, frequently depending on the CC (when I raise) I find typically, I am folding to a lot of turn raises after a continuation bet, and far to often I am paying off a hand that may have been incorrect to call a UTG raise (like AJo or KQo). So with the exception of KQs, I really like playing my suited broadways multi-way, so I am probably limping a lot more than most.

But by that same token I usually end up leaving a table, where limping with suited broadways is trouble. So I probably limp more up front with these hands, because I am spending more time at tables where I think it is the right play.

[speirs]

I just want to add one thing. I raise 99 a lot UTG. I was looking at an old pokertracker database recently and I could see though that 99 from UTG costs me money. Maybe the sample size was too small but still makes you wonder.

[Bluffoon]

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Had to think about this one. If you raise you might get some callers but not a tons of them in a loose game, and they also might reraise back. So why raise when your out of position? Why not call and wait for the flop to bet a good hand? Don't you want to encourge multiway action for your broadway suited connector?



You raise when people will cold call with worse hands because you are getting money in the pot with the best hand period.

BUT on the other hand if you are guaranteed 6-8 callers on the flop anyways and almost no chance of a reraise except with AA or KK then it would seem right. Big pot tons of suckas' and the chance to hit a monster draw or draw to a weaker draw.

In the books they do say in a tough game fold these hands up front. But I wonder why they don't say to raise them?

In a tough game everybody is going to fold unless they have you beat. Then they are going to reraise and isolate you and you will be playing out of position against a better hand. I play up to 5/10 and I can find games where I can raise these hands at all levels
In general what level could you make this play 1/2 and below?

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I play up to 5/10 and I can find games where I can raise these hands at all levels