I suck at playing in the BB against limper

[derosnec]

this situation happens a billion times a day for me

opponent completes sb
i have 94o or some other typical hu crap hand

flop is JQ2 or TK6 or whatever (point is that it has one or two medium cards and everyone loves limping with Q4, J8, K2, etc)

so as usual i check and fold to the inevitable flop bet

are you guys leading, c/r'ing here a decent amount, check-folding, or raising pf?

[sweetjazz]

First, is this limit or no limit?

Either way, I am happy if a player is willing to regularly limp his button, as it lets me see flops for no additional cost. If this is limit and he is limping his very worst hands, then you obviously want to put a fair amount of pressure on and make him give up every time he misses as well as pay off anytime he makes second-best. If he is limping moderate strength hands that should be raising, I usually feel out the player for a while and then try to take advantage of his tendencies. So yes, I like regularly check/folding in situations like you describe to begin with, to see how often he will stab at the pot when checked to and how often he will give free cards. I also like to check/raise with my better hands and get a sense of how he reacts there as well.

How you adjust after that depends on how aggressively he stabs at pot and how stubborn he gets in releasing hands.

I think raising junk preflop OOP -- other than an occassional raise for deception -- is a pretty big error unless the opponent is very weak. The hands you should be raising with are a combination of your premium hands and hands capable of making strong hands (e.g. T9s); this balance gives you a chance to get value out of your strong hands and still take down a lot of pots uncontested (with or without a strong hand).

[APXG]

[ QUOTE ]
this situation happens a billion times a day for me

opponent completes sb
i have 94o or some other typical hu crap hand

flop is JQ2 or TK6 or whatever (point is that it has one or two medium cards and everyone loves limping with Q4, J8, K2, etc)

so as usual i check and fold to the inevitable flop bet

are you guys leading, c/r'ing here a decent amount, check-folding, or raising pf?

[/ QUOTE ]

HU cash or SNG?

In either case, when you are dealing with this, you need to probe for weaknesses in his general limping theory. Does he have a plan after his initial limp?

The play with least potential exposure in general (it does depend on stack depth / structure) is raising 4.5bb OOP and leading 100% of flops for 7bb. If done at a decent frequency, villain almost never floats flops and many times folds the button preflop. Even if you NEVER hit a flop with your rag hand, you are winning 2bb vs. a preflop fold, and 5.5bb vs. a flop fold. Lets say villain's preflop call frequency is 50% (this varies wildly from opponent to opponent, so you have to adjust) -- he hits flop 1/3 of the time, but will also likely fold Q2 type hands on AK2 type boards. Even disregarding that, lets take 6 trials. 3 of them of win 2bb preflop, 2 of them you win 5.5bb, and in 1 you bet-fold flop / check-fold turn and lose 11.5bb --> Net = +3.5bb. Note this is pure fold equity - doesn't take into account when you hit a flop, or when villain folds 3rd pair / 2nd pair if hes bad, and most importantly provides value equity for premium hands that hit the flop when played the same way from BB. The #/10 hands this defense can be implemented is a factor of villains PF call frequency and to a lesser extent flop floating, which you can defend against with 2barrels.

Otherwise, check-folding completely missed flops is fine as long as you check-call, check turn, bet scary / or sometimes any river at random times when you have 3-6 outs on the flop.

Check-raising depends on the size of your opponents c-bets and the effectiveness of the previous line. If villain is potsize 2 barreling your flop and turn checks, then he is paying too high a price for fold equity and will provide value to your made hands. Check-raising pot sized bets w/ air overexposes your stack almost always b.c now your are dealing with a inflated pot out of position, and a good opponent will hammer this overexposure by outplaying you on the turn / river.

Randomized leading 1.5 or 2bb at the 2bb pots is fine, and can be tailored to flop texture / villain's propensity to call the specific textures.

Everything I said attempts to extract as much as EV as possible while out of position. These specific plays as a package can be countered and successfully rendered -EV by a good opponent, but their purpose is a. to encourage more button folds preflop and flop checks and b. provide value equity for your big hands that can be played identically. Some of the aggression / playing back will translate into more value out of the button position as well, which is really where the money is made.

This is the first time I've attempted to detail one of my approaches to HU, so there are probably some errors / poorly worded sections, but an approach based on this general theory and tailored slightly is very, very profitable.