Posts Tagged ‘early position’

Limping into an Unraised Pot

Monday, December 5th, 2011

One thing that many online poker players preach against is limping into an unraised pot – especially from early position. The reason why limping (calling the big blind) is highly frowned upon is because you are not only showing total weakness in your hand, but you’re most likely going to be raised by at least one other player. So if you’re limping with A-T from under the gun, just don’t bother.

Back to the original point, many online poker players wonder if there is ever a situation where it’s okay to limp into an unraised pot from early position. And the answer is ‘yes’, there are some rare instances where limping into an unraised pot can be profitable. But before we continue with the reasoning behind this thought, keep in mind that, as a beginning player, you should stick to raising or folding from early position until you’re more experienced.

One situation where profitable open limping arises is on tables full of calling stations who build great pot odds for suited connectors and other drawing hands. For example, let’s say that you’re holding QsJs under the gun, which is a fold for most players in this spot. However, you’re on a micro stakes table where everybody’s calling preflop just to see some cards; in this instance, you can open limp and hope that the table dynamic continues. Even if somebody does raise, there would be enough calling stations who’ll stay in the hand and give you solid pot odds on future streets.

One more scenario where open limping could work is if you’re holding a premium hand, and there’s a very aggressive player to your left who might shove just to steal the blinds and your open limp bet. Obviously this is a very specific scenario, but it’s another instance where open limping could work.

Looking at things from an overall perspective, it’s very rare that open limping is a good idea, and only experienced players will be able to spot these situations with consistency.

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Playing QQ, JJ and TT in Early Position

Friday, April 29th, 2011

It’s always great to look down at your hole cards and see TT, JJ or QQ preflop. Unfortunately, these hands don’t make you invincible – especially in early position. After all, these three hands aren’t like AA or KK, where you can be fairly confident that you’re the favorite when heavy preflop raising and re-raising takes place. All of this being said, you definitely have to put more consideration into playing these hands.

And a lot of this consideration will depend on the stakes you’re playing at, and the opponents you are up against. For example, in the micro stakes you will often run into players who treat 99 like the nuts preflop. So if you know another player is capable of over-playing hands like 99, AT, KQ, you should strongly consider 3-betting and 4-betting these players – although you should be careful in tournament situations where you’re dealing with a finite stack.

When you increase in stakes, most players are less likely to play marginal hands over-aggresively, so you really need to be careful from early position. A good idea is to open with a raise worth 3X or 4X the big blind, and see what kind of action you get from this move. With QQ, you might even consider playing this like the nuts in most situations because there’s only a 1 in 11 chance that somebody else will have AA or KK; of course, if you’re re-raised by an overly-tight player in early-middle or middle position, you need to think about if they have one of the aforementioned two hands.

With JJ and TT, you’re more vulnerable from early position and should proceed with caution. In most cases, you will be looking to hit a set with these hands, but you also have top set potential on a weak board as a fallback. And if you’re in a desperate tournament situation, you can always over-bet with these hands to steal the blinds or a small pot.

 

 

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How To Play The Middle Position In Poker

Friday, April 16th, 2010

When it comes to poker strategy you’ll find that most of the information you’ll find about table position focuses on early position strategy and late position strategy. Middle position strategy sort of gets left by the wayside, with players assuming that the best strategy is to play somewhere in between loose and tight. However, the fact is that the best middle position strategy is to play even more conservatively than you would if you were playing from the early position.

When you play from the early position you have the advantage of being first to bet and when you play from the late position you have the advantage of being last. When you sit in the middle you have neither of those advantages, at least until a number of other payers fold. Therefore, it is important to take a conservative approach.

However, it is important to note that if all of the players before you fold then you will become the early position player. The same goes for if all the players after you fold, you will become the late position player. When either of these things happen you should change your strategy respectively, playing early or late strategy, rather than middle strategy.

The more you practice and player poker the more familiar you will become with table position strategies. Playing free poker online can be a great way to practice. If you have the option to choose your seat then practice sitting in all different parts of the table. This is a great way to maximize your skills.

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