Common Prefllop Situation

[Cobretti]

A weak player open limps 50+% of the time from some position prior to you. If is folded to you in the CO or Button and you have a marginal hand like Q9s, K10o, etc. What is your play here if:

1) 50% chance blinds fold if you raise (20% chance of being reraised)
2) 25% chance blinds fold if you raise (20% chance of being reraised)
3) Almost no chance blinds fold if you raise (20% chance of being reraised)

[Oink]

1) raise Q9s and KTo and then some
2) raise Q9s and KTo and maybe not that much more
3) overlimp Q9s and KTo and a bunch of other mediocre hands like JTo, 98s etc.

Btw. A 20% chance of a 3-bet sounds rather high. Most peoples 3-betting ranges are less than 10%.


I just wanna add that creating dead money from the blinds is huge. Say you raise and the blinds fold. Then the pot is 5.5SB of which you contributed 2. You only need 2/5.5 ~ 44% eq to have an edge on the money going in.

Now add the fact that you have position which increases you implied odds and that a raise gives you folding equity.

If you have 2 tight players behind you, you can really isolate an openlimper with a LOT!


One final comment. You cant make this analysis without considering the rake structure. The difference in playable hands in a no rake game and, say, AP 1/2 is HUUUUGE!

[anti1k]

I almost always raise with these hands. Even if the blinds fold rarely. Because even if they call your equity is still good with these hand + you have postions + you probably play better postflop than they do.

If you are sure that blinds will never fold then you might just call and let them do bigger mistake by calling you whit week hands when you hit the flop

[frenchpignouf]

[ QUOTE ]


You only need 2/5.5 ~ 44% eq to have an edge on the money going in.


[/ QUOTE ]

It is not 2/4.5, it is 2/5.5 ~36%.

@ anti1k

I'm not sure the postion is a good argument for raising. The edge ot the position doesn't increase our equity. The edge of the position is the fact we have positive implied odds. It is not obvious we have more implied odds when we raise than when we don't.

But it is true when we raise pf and it is 4 way, we can often take a free card, which can be very profitable with a GS (more than 1 sb).

[Tryptamean]

If Hero is CO or button it makes a really big difference too. I'm much much more inclined to get involved on the button, especially if I'm going to limp along.

[Oink]

[ QUOTE ]
It is not 2/4.5, it is 2/5.5 ~36%.

[/ QUOTE ]

Oh yeah! Even better.

Thanx for picking that one up