Quote: Originally Posted By gator993 on 11/18/2009
Ok I dont have the hh saved, but will for now on.

We were five handed and Knee was on the button with 88. I was SB and another equal stack was in BB if I remember correct. None of us had more then 8BB at that point and that might be generous.

Knee limps putting roughly 1/6th of his stack in giving both blinds a free/cheap flop. What happens if the flop comes all big cards? I think you probably fold to a bet. At that point you move all in and get no calls and take both blinds and antes adding 25% to your stack.

I think limping 88 is not optimum. Maybe limp with a much bigger hand if you have super aggressive players behind you but I think the limp with 88 was not best.

It worked and you won but it took almost a perfect flop for that.

I thought I had more chips at that point but maybe not as I know you had me covered. My thinking there was that there was already one limper, maybe a second? But after you and the BB there were at least 4 to the flop. If I have a small/medium pair and I can see it agaisnt several callers I like that. Gives a chance at hitting something big while someone else catches cards.

My fear was if I raise I dont really want to have to make a choice after the flop when I have already commited 1/2 my chips. If I go all in all I am picking up is the blinds and ante, if I get called its a coin flip at best.

I decided to limp because if I hit my set it is going to pay me off big more often than not agaisnt 3 or 4 people in the pot.

Other limper(s) definitely make(s) a difference.

There were no limpers before you. You were first in the pot. It was a 3 way pot with you and the blinds (I wish I had the HH but now they are being saved to my hard drive so further discussions will have actual facts).

Set mining is good for earlier in tournies or when stacks are still deep. This was not one of those spots. Down to 5 handed when antes and blinds are high (your M had to be no more then 5) its time to pick them up when ever you can because it adds so much to your stack already.

88 is a favorite against the blinds. Its time to ship them in. If you get called by an overpair its a cooler and thats poker but most likey we both fold. We would practically have to call off all our chips there. Honestly you probably should be shoving there as light as any ace, any pair, almost any K but I probably would do K9 or so. Then some hands like QJ TJ 910 I think are all ok plays.

TM and others what do you think?

Limpers bring an interesting scenario if that was a case lets say the table looked like this.

Blinds 400/800 125 ante

seat 1 7800

seat 2 12000

Button 3500

SB 3800

bb 4000

Seat 1 folds, seat 2 limps for 800, Button has 88

Whats the play?

Like I said yesterday, without limpers it's a shove (or a fold if you're not there yet and don't have the stomach for it).

With the limper scenario you give, and assuming no reads on seat 1, I think it's probably still a shove. There are one or two people in our group, however, that would be screaming "monster" to me if I saw them limp there. Good spot for it, with the chip leader behind you likely to try to steal or maybe just come along, and the other three stacks with M's in the 2 range, and likely to shove into you with a really wide range.

Gator I am almost positive that someone at the top of my screen, so it would be towards the right hand side of yours had limped first. I can't see myself making that move if someone had not.

This however does illustrate my inexperiance with tournamnets as I mostly play ring games. There limping and looking for a set almost always is a good play where her because of the chip stacks remaining it becomes a problem.

I also have found that I play vitrtually two different styles from the cash games and the torunaments. In the cash games for the most part I am tight and grinding out a few chips at a time waiting to get a big hand and catch someone for all their chips.

In our tournamnets however I have taken a more agressive appraoch as I feel like the blinds go up so fast that you have to make more moves in a hurry. Again, maybe just my tournamnet inexperiance.

Yeah, even in a non-turbo tourney, you do have to try to steal/semi-bluff/stuff like that more often to accumulate chips, unless you just luck into an early premium hand that pays off.

I'm hoping our bump in field size continues or at least maintains. To me, that does make early level patience at least a bit more tenable. That suits my game. I think I was two hours into the Daily Dollar before I played a biggish pot.

Even though it might be dumb to discuss strategy with people you play against every week, I think it's good for me overall. I read plenty of stuff, including periods where I troll 2+2, but I'm not really comfortable jumping into the fray there. Here, we have a nice selection of people a bit ahead of me, a bit behind me, and right on my level, which I think is kind of ideal for learning from talking out hands.

In the scenario I put up the chip leader is the limper...I have to be honest I hate limping from any position with any hand at this point in the tourney.

Sticking to this scenario I still think its push or fold and Im ok with fold if not leaning towards it.

When it gets to our hero with 88 there is 2625 in the pot. A shove is a raise of 2700 and makes the pot now 6125. So the Chip leader now needs 2700 to win 6125. He has to call with almost any hand hear assuming hes not limping with 2-7 or complete garbage but you have to put him on some sort of hand.

I hate the Villans play here in this made up scenario. Unless holding a monster trying to get a mid pair or Ace to push you have to put pressure on the blinds if you are playing this pot.

Maybe I just hate limping in the end game more then most.

Quote: Originally Posted By tylermathias on 11/19/2009Even though it might be dumb to discuss strategy with people you play against every week, I think it's good for me overall. I read plenty of stuff, including periods where I troll 2+2, but I'm not really comfortable jumping into the fray there. Here, we have a nice selection of people a bit ahead of me, a bit behind me, and right on my level, which I think is kind of ideal for learning from talking out hands

When I started typing my thoughts up I thought "this is going to haunt me on Tuesday nights". But Im with you I read other forums but don't have a group to throw hands off of like this. I think my overall game will get better discussing hands here but Tuesday nights will get tougher.

Yeah, I transposed Seat 1 and 2.

Assuming optimal play from the chipleader you're right. But protecting the chiplead gets in people's head.

As far as hating the cl's limp, I guess it depends. If you know everyone's slowed down and you have a moderate holding you hate to fold, you can take a flier for what, 7% of your stack, likely see a flop, and either hit something or apply pressure later if the spot seems right.

knee, Tournies and cash games are 2 completely different animals.

Cash games is a grind. I always keep pots small until I hit the big hand and try to get paid off. Mike McD said your trying to win one big pot ever hour. Not so in tournies. Chip accumulation is key and push/fold is a huge part of the end game especiailly in these fast structures. Theres a concept called ICM (independent chip model) which I tried to learn a couple years ago. I don't know it well enough to teach though unfortunately.