Flop Play 20-40

[Rick Nebiolo]

I'm curious why no one questions defending a solid hijack position raise and an immediate cold call by a "loose, somewhat passive player" with 76o and a "suspect image"? This used to be frowned upon.

I must live on Planet Fold.

~ Rick

PS As an aside, I much prefer defending my blind with this sort of hand head up.

[CardSharpCook]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm curious why no one questions defending a solid hijack position raise and an immediate cold call by a "loose, somewhat passive player" with 76o and a "suspect image"? This used to be frowned upon.

I must live on Planet Fold.

~ Rick

PS As an aside, I much prefer defending my blind with this sort of hand head up.

[/ QUOTE ]

Examine your reasons for wanting to play a suited connector HU.

[Rick Nebiolo]

[ QUOTE ]
Examine your reasons for wanting to play a suited connector HU.

[/ QUOTE ]

Note that lmd's hand is offsuit but I'll try to tackle this for two-way and three-way pots.

In a three-way pot where the blinds two opponents have showed pre-flop aggression AND are likely to continue with aggression post flop, 76o has very little straight equity when it flops a draw. If it flops a pair (35% chance) AND the flop is otherwise OK (but not great) most players are going to be bet off their hand or buried as second best much too often. That's where I'm having trouble finding the equity in calling. Of course things may be different for a player as tough as lmd.

In a two-way pot against a very tight, tough raiser my default play is to fold unless the opponent has a pattern of over attacking my blinds. But against a not so tough raiser I'm going to flop enough pairs (getting 3.5 to 1 on my call) and outplay my oppnent on our misses often enough postflop to make it worth it.

Another way of looking at it is that I find it's a lot easier and profitable to defend oneself when weak if you aren't being attacked from two spots.

-----

Soft of but not completely off topic: In a full ring game you defend with 76o (and similar hands) when up against five or more opponents (Tommy Angelo may disagree [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]) mostly because of the equity derived from your straight draw.

Need to go to sleep and I'll try to respond (or defend myself) tomorrow. Hope lmd gets off his knob and chimes in.

~ Old Man Rick

[evanski]

This hand is not suited.

[mike l.]

it's good and the rest of the hand is more interesting. the hand as a whole is interesting. anatta and i talked about it for quite awhile and really profiled your opponent and got in his head and the right play is check-fold the turn but usually you will get a free card on the turn and then you go ahead and bet-fold any river.

[mike l.]

"As an aside, I much prefer defending my blind with this sort of hand head up."

i dont. i prefer it when there's a pot to claw after, a good player to make fold, and a bad player to pay me off.

[Rick Nebiolo]

[ QUOTE ]
"As an aside, I much prefer defending my blind with this sort of hand head up."

i dont. i prefer it when there's a pot to claw after, a good player to make fold, and a bad player to pay me off.

[/ QUOTE ]

In a better world it works this way. But the addition of the second player too often means it's you (OK, maybe me) that gets knocked off the hand.

~ Rick

[andyfox]

I'm positive that, for me, playing 7-6o against an UTG raiser, no matter how many cold-callers, is -EV. I suppose I coinhabit planet fold with Rick. And I'm starting to play 2-2 sometimes.

[Rick Nebiolo]

I should have stressed that the UTG in this case is the "hijack seat" because the game is short. Since opponents are more willing to attack blinds when short the open raise is so much more likely NOT to be an overpair so you can defend against most opponents with lots of hands.

You wrote: "playing 7-6o against an UTG raiser, no matter how many cold-callers, is -EV"

Here's a case where you don't want to listen to Tommy [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Against a field you should play any small offsuit connectors or one gappers (except the very smallest blocked connectors e.g., 23) getting 13 to 1 or better. It's probably right to call getting 11 to 1, but by not doing so you can reduce swings, since your edge, if any, is very small. Also note that an UTG raiser is likely to fire out when you flop a draw, giving you a chance to checkraise for value.

The time not to play small offsuit connectors out of the BB against a raise is when you have two to four opponents. OTOH, in an unraised pot you can call from the small blind with shorter odds, since your pair equity has gone way up.

Anyway, this is the stuff we used to discuss a few years back. Now it seems everyone wants to make spectacular moves and outplay their opponents without reasonable hand values.

Just an old man's observation and opinion [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

~ Rick