Pocket Tens vs. Dan H. at Legends

[bruce]

$5000 buyin WPT event at the Bike. Blinds are 150/300/50.
I am UTG with pocket Tens. I have roughly T7500. I open
raise to T900 and Dan H., two to my left makes it 2100.
Dan after raising has around T6000. Everyone else folds and I call.

Flop comes Q 2 4 rainbow.

I check and Dan H. bets T2000. What's my play? Comments
appreciated.

Bruce

[MLG]

With that stack I limp preflop a lot. That small reraise gives me fits, especially since you raised from strong position and he made such a small reraise. I might fold preflop there despite the fact that I generally will slit my wrists before folding to a tiny reraise. I do fold the flop I think.

[Seadood228]

[ QUOTE ]
With that stack I limp preflop a lot. That small reraise gives me fits, especially since you raised from strong position and he made such a small reraise. I might fold preflop there despite the fact that I generally will slit my wrists before folding to a tiny reraise. I do fold the flop I think.

[/ QUOTE ]

Spot on IMO. I think Dan's move is coming from way too much strength to have any comfort. He's in EMP and miniraised an UTG raiser as a shortstack. I'd put him squarely on QQ-AA and play accordingly.

I like a limp with this too given the information and stack sizes.

[bruce]

Boy I hate limping in this spot. It's level six and we're
going to adjourn for the day in another 45 minutes and I am very shortstacked. Pocket Tens is too good a hand not to play and limping IMHO is bad. I don't have enough chips to play for set equity and if I probably have the best hand why not play aggressively? I have shown some larceny but I haven't been splashing chips like a maniac. I will be raised virtually 100% of the time
if I limp. From my perspective at the time this may be
a defining moment for me. I need chips and I have a decent
hand. If I limp what's my play if I am raised by a large
stack. I'll be OOP. Do I call and see the flop or do
I push BTF?

Bruce

[scott8]

Stop n go.

[fnurt]

[ QUOTE ]
Stop n go.

[/ QUOTE ]

TT is a brutal hand for the stop-and-go. There is almost no chance of gaining EV over a preflop push.

[Jason Strasser]

Bruce,

This is a very good hand to think about IMO. I agree with you that I dont love limping. I think you gotta raise here with 20bbs or whatever and there are more benefits to raising here than folding. Yes, the small reraise is annoying to deal with, but a vast majority of the time you'll just get called or you'll win the blinds. If you limp and someone raises and you call its just not as happy a place for me as opening UTG and dealing with whatever comes your way.

Now, the small reraise is troubling. Chances are Dan is not messing around here. You raised UTG use that info to your advantage. He's probably not going to look down at AQ 65s or whatever and decide to put in a raise. When he raises you, I think you should either commit your stack or fold, as I dont really see how you can justify getting it all in on a 555 flop but not a Q high flop... The difference between the two is really not much and I'm going to assume you didnt call his raise with the plan to check fold any non-ten flop.

Good players can make this laydown preflop. Its troubling, annoying, etc etc, but I really think you either gotta find the fold in you, or jam it in there (or maybe call to the flop with intentions of not folding very much). Simply calling the raise and check folding this flop doesn't feel right to me.

-Jason

[MLG]

I'm limping with the intention of raising all-in somewhat frequently.

[bruce]

Thanks for the reply. Let me extrapolate. Twice previously
I had folded to reraises by Dan. From his perspective I felt like he knew I was trying to rob him, which I was when I attacked his blinds. He was in the small blind and big blind, respectively, when he reraised me and
I was forced to fold. When he reraised me with my smallish stack I felt
like folding was a poor option. Firstly if I survived there was the metagame issue and secondly I felt like there
was a fair chance he was guilty of larcency with his reraise. Thirdly Dan H. was playing quite differently than
one would expect from play described in his book.

Bruce

[West]

If you'll really be reraised virtually 100% of the time you limp, I'd think limping with tens and then reraising/pushing would be just fine.