AJo and KQo UTG

[Guido]

So I moved up to 15/30 a few weeks ago after playing 10/20 6-max for about half a year. I used to raise these hands UTG at the lower limits but I'm not so what to do with them at 15/30. At 30/60 or higher it's probably a fold but I'm not completely sure about that. I've tried to find some threads about this using the search function but I didn't get any useful results. So if this has been discussed a lot here please point me in the right direction.

Just would like to know what most do with these hands.

Thanks,

Guido

[philnewall]

fold fold, my reason is that the most likely outcomes will be either you'll win the blinds or you'll get 3-bet by a hand that dominates you.

[Michael Emery]

Unless you can play them both very well you never lose much by folding them. My order of preference is usually fold, call, and rarely raise, with these hands.

Mike Emery

[helpmeout]

I fold them both. I use to raise them in low limits because you get bad players cold calling with trash.

At 15/30 as has already been said you get 3bet by hands that dominate you.

So unless you have super reads you usually pay off when you hit the flop and get shown AK or an overpair to your J.

[Barry]

[ QUOTE ]
fold fold, my reason is that the most likely outcomes will be either you'll win the blinds or you'll get 3-bet by a hand that dominates you

[/ QUOTE ]

In a "typical" party game the most likely outcome is that you will get cold called by a few hands that you dominate. I normally raise them. Yeah, there are some tables where they would be a fold, but then your best bet then is to find another table; there's plenty of soft ones around.

There seems to be a thread about this every 6 months or so. I tried a search to find the last one, but but for some reason it doesn't find anything before the 1st of the year, which was the last time we went through this.

[Peter_rus]

I raise AJo routinely. And i raise KQo starting from UTG+1 in 10-handed game 15/30 game. Both are positive after a bit more than 100 times i get them there (and they're both positive from UTG+1 and UTG+2 as well). I also raise ATo starting from UTG+2 and it feels quite good too.

You don't really care much about 3-bet. 3-bet doesn't mean you're lost 1.5BB's immediately. It improves your chances to push out blinds and occasionally you hit the flop and win. You also can win pot PF by stealing which adds to UTG raise around 0.09-0.11bb/h and to UTG+1 raise 0.12-0.15bb/h immediately depending on your image.

[Peter_rus]

Stats shows that you're stealing blinds from UTG around 10% of time at 15/30.

Probability you will be 3-betted or called by hand that dominates you is close to 29%.

So you will be called/3-betted by dominated/worse/slightly better hand (like 99) around 60% of time though you'll be out of best position postflop around 80% of this time.

According to PT queries i made 15% of time you'll see a flop you will have best position.

So let's say 30% of time you'll lose 1bb, 10% of time you'll catch 0.83bb's from blinds, and 50% of time you'll face worse or slightly better than yours hands out of position and 10% of time you'll face worse or slightly better than yours hands having best position. Let's say this last fact leads to 0.5bb/h-0.6bb/h of your advantage so you'll see 0.05-0.1bb/h advantage overall which is quite close to borderline raise/fold. But let's assume that loose players (who usually tend to cold call dominated hands PF) are also not good postflop and therefore you'll catch additional money postflop even without position, making your winrate higher.




If players against you 3-bet only hands that dominate you and fold the rest. 30% of time you'll loose around 1bb (assuming that even dominated hand has some chances to win and occasionally also win huge by back domination postflop like AJ against AK with J84A3 board)and 70% of time you catch blinds of 0.83bb's. This leads for you to win around 0.10-0.30 bb/h advantage depending on how much people pay to you when you're ahead and how much you'll pay when domitated postflop.

Actually i think AJo UTG and KQo are enough good hands to make them profitable at limits higher or equal 3/6 at Party by playing them with raise.

In very loose games they both are easy limps from UTG's.

[CanKid]

Nice Peter

[Nate tha' Great]

[ QUOTE ]
At 30/60 or higher it's probably a fold but I'm not completely sure about that.

[/ QUOTE ]

IMO, if you're not at least moderately comfortable with the idea of raising AJo or KQo UTG, you're probably in the wrong hold 'em game.

[DcifrThs]

[ QUOTE ]
I used to raise these hands UTG at the lower limits but I'm not so what to do with them at 15/30. At 30/60 or higher it's probably a fold but I'm not completely sure about that.

[/ QUOTE ]

at the right games its correct to raise both even in limits well above 30/60. it depends on the texture of the game (players acting behind you)...LIMPING kqo utg, however, is just not something i do.

at 30/60 i habitually raise both. or at the very least, fairly frequently do (and if not--uber loose game-- i toss KQo).

-Barron