hand 2: I do lay this one down because of the raise (more on that issue in a second), but I like your subsequent play.
I haven't made it through the rest of them, but I really have a question back at you here: Perhaps as background, I should note that I've started limping in LP with almost anything and with a lot in MP (depends mainly on how the table is playing--specifically whether I'm likely going to face a raise, in which case I tighten up a lot on the limps). But I can get pretty picky about hands for calling raises, although it depends on several factors, which I'll try to discuss, in the hope of seeing whether my thinking is going in the right direction.
Anyhow, as I see it, on this hand pretty much all you've got is your AXs, although there's a little bit of bonus there with some straight possibilities. But what I've been doing here is just counting about what percentage of the time I'm going to hit the flop hard. With AXs it's around 12% of the time. Hence, I feel like I'm bleeding away too much before hitting the hand if I do more than limp (and I'll routinely limp with any single-suited ace).
So, basically, I'd rather have what I've started thinking of as a "25% hand," such as a big pair with a suited A (12% or so for set, 12% for flush draw, and overpair also interesting particularly if it's AA or KK). Also, short-handed, as is the case here, any ds hand is also a 25%-er--if you're willing to play a non-nut flush pretty hard, as I think is acceptable with only 2 or 3 players seeing the flop.
Then I guess there's one other dimension: Is the player going to pay me off big when I hit? If not, then I can at least see some rationale in calling the raise with your hand here--with the intention of betting pretty much any pair, although there's a little bit of a problem in that your A may be dead. If they WILL overplay their AA or whatever, then I think big pairs become a lot more attractive, even if they have effectively no side cards, simply because of the implied odds on setting.
Anyhow, that's my current view with regard to limping (where I seriously don't think it's a mistake to limp with almost any 4--perhaps excluding trips or quads, which I don't limp with under any circumstances) and calling raises (where I really do think one needs to get much more picky). I'd be interested in hearing your reasoning, though, on calling the raise with this particular hand. For me it would be a clear limp but not a hand where I'd call a raise--unless I was maybe in LP and the entire table had called the raise to me, giving phenomenal odds on hitting the flush draw.Statistics: Posted by Aisthesis — Sun Apr 16, 2006 11:51 pm
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