Overcards plus one of your cards is dead

[Jacob_Gilliam]

This situation occurs quite frequently where I play (Pacific Poker, between .50-1 and 2-4). I get dealt split jacks or whatever, 1 of my jacks is dead, and there is an Ace and a Queen behind me. There coming along to fourth no matter what I do or what they have. How do I play this type of hand? Raise, call, muck? All these pots are multiway usually 5-6 to see fourth, not counting me.

[TheSalche]

If you've got an overcard (ace or king in the this case, depending on who calls), then I think I raise for information. If they re-raise, you can be positive they have you pretty well beat, and you may want to fold 3rd then. When they call it becomes player dependent. Is this the kind of play that might call with (AK)Q, (10J)Q, or a 3 flush? If they will call with those hands, along with calling with an overpair, watch 4th and 5th closely. If you can't get rid of them on 5th, its time to slow down, and possibly check/fold.

[Jacob_Gilliam]

No, no, no. This is Pacific. They'll call with any three random cards, and everyone with a pair is staying til the river.

[peritonlogon]

With a hand like that I think you play it passively since you will rarely gain information with a bet, you have no idea whether you have more than your share of pot equity and your fold equity is approching zero along with your chances of knocking more than one person out. Also, folding 3rd is a good option since your chances of making a hand that can win a big pot are low and pacific's antes are low enough that you can always wait for a better spot without costing yourself much.

[benwood]

Roland is correct.Just fold.Your downside potential is much bigger than your upside potential.

[Michael Emery]

[ QUOTE ]
No, no, no. This is Pacific. They'll call with any three random cards, and everyone with a pair is staying til the river.

[/ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]
There coming along to fourth no matter what I do or what they have.

[/ QUOTE ]

Its late and I dont feel like typing out the very lengthy response that this would entail. However, I will say that if this is the case, if they play any holding whatsoever, folding a pair of jacks, even with one dead, is obviously wrong. What we should be arguing about here is whether to keep the pot small and limp or raise instead. This depends on several factors and would require that lengthy response I dont feel like typing. But folding against people who are playing three random cards just because there is a dead jack, is leaving money on the table.

Mike Emery

[beta1607]

I think in this situation you have to just call. Split jacks don't play well in a large multiway pot and you want to make it easy to ditch your hand if other people get aggressive or catch good.

[patrick dicaprio]

call with what? hoping to catch the case jack??

Pat

[blumpkin22]

I'm sorry, but you are being ridiculous, and so is Roland. Roland is normally dead on, but I'm afraid he is mistaken here.

Fold a pair of jacks when people are playing 3 random cards? Are you kidding me? Okay, so there is one dead jack. So what. The situation would be far different if there was, say, a dead jack, and your kicker was very dead also.

The correct play is clearly to call if raising does not narrow the field. You want to keep the size of the pot small to magnify the mistakes your opponents are making. On later streets, particularly fifth street, you want to raise or check/raise accordingly to narrow the field, unless you have not improved and one or many of your opponents have. This sometimes means raising with a hand that is second best at the moment. 7CSFAP describes this situation is a fair amount of detail.

But seriously, folding that hand is just wrong. It's not dead enough to not be worth playing.

[Jeffage]

Well, this is one of those situations that's fun to argue about b/c it doesn't really matter lol. First, are the aces and queens totally live? What's the ante in this game? If the aces and queens are live and the ante structure is tight, I'm tempted to fold this OOP against two overcards. This is actually an interesting situation in that I'm more tempted to fold than raise if they will call a completion w/ a wide variety of holdings. That's because I will be in a guessing game firing lots of barrels on later streets. If they will only call (or reraise) with certain types of hands (even w/ loose standards, they wouldnt call with 'anything'), I feel a little better about raising bc I will be able to play better later.

That said, I think against two live overcards OOP with one of your jacks dead, I MAY fold. It depends on the factors listed above as well as how my opponents play later. One overcard, I'm going to definitely raise. With two, I'll see what I feel like doing.

Jeff