Wired aces in a tight stud game

[incognito]

This hand actually came up in an online limit seven card stud tournament (high only), but I'm posting it here instead of the tournament forum because most of the traffic there is hold'em related.

Anyway, I'm dealt A [img]/forums/images/icons/club.gif[/img] A [img]/forums/images/icons/spade.gif[/img] in the hole and K [img]/forums/images/icons/spade.gif[/img] up.

A deuce brings it in two to my right, the player in between folds, I raise and everyone folds... I knew that this table was extremely tight (the lone loose player had busted out a couple of hands previous), so should I have just smooth called the bring in? There was another ace up around the table, but none of the other cards were especially threatening. What do you think?

[Al_Capone_Junior]

I don't think it's a terrible play to slowplay for one round when you have such a situation. It reminds me of those horrible days when I used to play 1-3 or 1-5 stud, and would be at a table full of tighty-Mc-whiteys (GAG).

Once I had an ace, three called the $1 bring-in, I raised to $2, and everyone folded. In those games, should you be so unfortunate as to end up in one, it's OK to slowplay one round with big hands like that.

Of course in a tournament, it's never really a bad thing to just take the pot right now.

al

[Andy B]

You can limp in and hope for a re-raise, but I think that a limp, especially with a strong door card like a King, is going to send up warning signals in a tournament. Assuming that there is a significant ante, I'd usually be happy enough with the steal myself. With a dead card, I'm actually not looking for too much action with this hand. You don't mention what stage of the tournament you were in, what the limits were, what your stack size was, what the stacks of the players behind you looked like, etc. All of this is important.

Hi Incognito,

IMHO, you played it properly. You can not allow the hands with 3 straight and 3 flushes to get one more card that fits as they will have a good chance to out-run you to the river.

When I catch someone slow playing a high pair, I pray for a 4 flush and try to make them eat the high pair.

Slow playing high pairs indicates to me the opponent does not understand the game. Maybe I don't understand it either as I don't consider J's a high pair. LOL

If what you described happens to me, I raise the max everytime I have a high card up, especially in late position. After doing this and checking on 4th they soon all will call my high cards bets. Finding that they are all high pairs, LOL.

It doesn't cost too much to change the way a table is playing or make em leave.

Some solid rocks have a personal rule to fold when bet--into. Hell, bet into them all the time.

Good luck,

John

[patrick dicaprio]

my brother once played a 1-5 hand at circus circus with rolled tens. he raised to 2 and everyone folded. ouch.

a tourney is a different ballgame. with other players out already presumably it was the middle of the tourney. in which case i would be Ok with just taking the antes. but early in a tourney it is ok to slowplay.

Pat

[34TheTruth34]

It kinda sucks that everyone folded, ideally you'd like to play the hand heads up. But I agree with whoever said just be happy with the antes. And also, start raising more often when you have the high card on board against this group (or when nobody else has a high card). I have a friend who is not that good of a ring game player (or non-stud tournament player), but he makes it to the final table of the stud tournament like every week. What happens is when he gets to the late rounds where the antes are getting higher and everybody is playing tight to avoid busting out, he raises like every other hand. You'd be amazed how often everyone folds. They have to know he can't have a big pair everytime...