F*ckin Jacks

[PinkSteel]

"Hoping" is the only usable word there, but yeah, I think I was figuring that with what was in the pot, I could see if a spade or another J came. I'm still learning, and I've actually won a few bucks each of the last three months, but I also still play hands like this, then look at them afterwards and wonder what on earth I was thinking.

[pho75]

I just went back and looked at all my JJ hands in PT. Out of all my overall winning hands, it ranks 15th with an average win rate of .95BB/Hand.

I looked at all 69 hands and found that I limped in with it only 12 times. The hands that I won were mostly short stacks that called my preflop raise and then went all-in on the flop with draws/middle pair/nothing. The biggest pots I won were where I had the caller dominated like AJ or KJ with flops like AJ9 or J62.

When I chose to make a continuation bet (which was very often) on boards like K66 A82 I never made it less than 3/4 of the pot and most often pot sized. I won the pot a suprising number of times.

The few occasions where I tried it on a bad board like AQ6 with 2 suited and more than one caller, I got into trouble.

Interestingly, many hands I lost were alot like yours. The board was bad, I took a shot, got called, and then proceeded to lamely call 2 more small bets.

For me JJ is a premium hand that should be played strongly before the flop and can take alot of heat from small stacks. After looking over my hands, I don't think I'll ever take a stab at the pot out position with two overcards on the board especially when one of them is an ace.

[snappo]

I would bet like $4 on the flop. If I get called/raised there I'm done with the hand. Check/fold from then on.

[PinkSteel]

Thanks for the replies, this was very helpful in straightening out my thinking. I was thinking way too much about making best hand and too little about winning pots.

At the risk of beating a dead horse, here's "What have you learned, Dorothy?"

* Yes, Jacks are worth raising from EP/blinds, not only to try and take it down pf, not only to isolate, but to help disguise other big hands that you would raise with.

* If you succeed in isolating and are HU, yes, you should lean toward leading the flop if you missed. But you have to make a real bet, because a primary purpose of making that bet is to fold your opponent if *he* missed. I now realize that my small flop bet was the worst possible play.

* After the flop, if you're unimproved, you're done.

[Always Rockets]

[ QUOTE ]
Thanks for the replies, this was very helpful in straightening out my thinking. I was thinking way too much about making best hand and too little about winning pots.

At the risk of beating a dead horse, here's "What have you learned, Dorothy?"

* Yes, Jacks are worth raising from EP/blinds, not only to try and take it down pf, not only to isolate, but to help disguise other big hands that you would raise with.

* If you succeed in isolating and are HU, yes, you should lean toward leading the flop if you missed. But you have to make a real bet, because a primary purpose of making that bet is to fold your opponent if *he* missed. I now realize that my small flop bet was the worst possible play.

* After the flop, if you're unimproved, you're done.

[/ QUOTE ]

[img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img] nice summary,, its nice to see people actually summarising what they've learned to put it in the memory bank.