This hand confuses me

[oskar]

I don't have much of a read, other than that SB he will call lightly and then starts making donk bets into the initial raiser with all kinds of hands.

Party Poker No-Limit Hold'em, $0.00 BB (10 handed) - Party-Poker Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

MP2 ($4.90)
MP3 ($1.99)
CO ($6.07)
Button ($4.90)
SB ($15.92)
BB ($6.36)
UTG ($4.54)
Hero (UTG+1) ($5.00)
UTG+2 ($5.00)
MP1 ($5.00)

Preflop: Hero is UTG+1 with 9, 8
UTG calls $0.04, Hero raises to $0.20, 6 folds, SB calls $0.18, BB calls $0.16, UTG calls $0.16

Flop: ($0.80) 8, 5, J (4 players)
SB bets $0.12, BB calls $0.12, 1 fold, Hero calls $0.12

Turn: ($1.16) 6 (3 players)
SB checks, BB checks, Hero checks

River: ($1.16) 7 (3 players)
SB bets $2.60, 1 fold, Hero calls $2.60

Total pot: $6.36

[wellrounded08]

You generally raise 890 from UTG+1? In 5NL FR? This hand confuses me too.

[Stacks]

Too loose of an open for me.. Especially at the stakes you are playing. 89s and I might consider it, but not offsuit from this early a position. If your reasoning is I don't normally do this, I'm just trying to balance my EP range, etc.. Then my response is, don't worry about balancing. Leave that for when your villians are actively trying to form hand ranges for you etc.

As far as the flop, I'm not sure if it's a call or a fold. A bet from SB into a multiway pot here should generally be given more respect than if it was HU. You'll see alot of two pair, sets, make this donk lead. And there aren't going to be too many turn cards that help you, or that you even like, therefore, your likely to be folding to a lead on the turn, you might want to just go ahead and save the money and fold on the flop having not caught much.

Easy check behind on the turn imo. And on the river, the only hand that beats you in T9 (12 combos). It's lkely he has a 9, and maybe even T9, but I'd just go ahead and shove it in here on the river. He might pay you off with hands such as sets, or two pair, that he feels he is bluffing on the river (hence his huge overbet.). At worse you lose to T9, you occasionally split, and other times you take his entire stack.

[oskar]

I won't stop raising 89 occasionally in any position, because I want to get called when I have a hand, so I like to open a lot.
Plus I can play it profitably. These tables are so passive in general that a c-bet will take it down a good percentage of times.

I'm not for a second thinking about folding on the flop. He did this a lot. He did it with pocket underpairs, with draws and with trips. This is his usual flop bet and he bets the flop alot - and he usually isn't the initial raiser.
What the hell am I talking about... I'm never folding a pair to a 12c bet into an 80c pot.
On the river I'm really confused what he would bet there - this big. In my mind I was splitting or dominated. This player - and for most players at microstakes this is the idea of a value bet. You hit your hand, and you shove in as much as you think you can get away with.
With the 4-to-a-straight on board I really do not see a set raising here.

[mrhappy333]

I dont know about this either, 89o UTG? at least if you were gonna play a hand UTG maybe suited connectors would be better

[littleogre]

I won't stop raising 89 occasionally in any position, because I want to get called when I have a hand, so I like to open a lot.
Plus I can play it profitably. These tables are so passive in general that a c-bet will take it down a good percentage of times.

I'm not for a second thinking about folding on the flop. He did this a lot. He did it with pocket underpairs, with draws and with trips. This is his usual flop bet and he bets the flop alot - and he usually isn't the initial raiser.
What the hell am I talking about... I'm never folding a pair to a 12c bet into an 80c pot.
On the river I'm really confused what he would bet there - this big. In my mind I was splitting or dominated. This player - and for most players at microstakes this is the idea of a value bet. You hit your hand, and you shove in as much as you think you can get away with.
With the 4-to-a-straight on board I really do not see a set raising here.

i don't know but the inability to fold middle pair seems like a huge leak.

[oskar]

Jesus, are you guys serious?
You fold middle pair to somebody who always bets into the initial raiser with position - and you're getting 9 to 1 on a call. This is a huge leak? Seriously? Huge? Leak?

[wellrounded08]

I don't know anything about where you play or anything, but at 5NL I can wait a 1/2 hour Not raise Single hand, and still get a caller when I do finally raise.(I don't do that, just example)
When I pull a Blind Steal from UTG, I have to assume it was the cards, not my image or EP Range.

Anyway, you're a better player than I am, I know and admit that. Just an observation from nit-fish.

[Squeaky_Midget1]

i don't know but the inability to fold middle pair seems like a huge leak.

ocassionally
but...

Flop: ($0.80) 8, 5, J (4 players)
SB bets $0.12,

Folding here getting 10:1 on a donk bet is a leak!

[kmind]

Does this hand deal with balance? Can you, oskar, explain it to me, I don't think I understand the term well? Thanks in advance.

[oskar]

I have no idea what you mean by balance, so I guess you should explain it.
If it's about the 89o raise UTG... Can we just leave it at: you think it's a mistake, and I don't, and move on to the rest of the hand.

[kmind]

I won't stop raising 89 occasionally in any position, because I want to get called when I have a hand, so I like to open a lot.

what does this have to do with anything?

[settecba]

I have no idea what you mean by balance, so I guess you should explain it.
If it's about the 89o raise UTG... Can we just leave it at: you think it's a mistake, and I don't, and move on to the rest of the hand.

By balance he means youre raising 89o UTG+1, but yore doing that also with monsters. This way you make it difficult for ops to read your hand, and you will be getting action with your good hands.

Moving on to the rest of the hand, i think the flop call is ok(not always, but yes from this villain). River call is fine IMO, maybe shoving is ok too as suggested by Stacks.

I know you said to move on to the rest of the hand, but i cant resist temptation of adressing the PFR. As everyone said, DONT DO IT. If you insist, then i suggest you check with poker tracker or similar how this is working out for you over a large sample of hands.

[djbruxism]

If it's about the 89o raise UTG... Can we just leave it at: EVERYBODY WHO PLAYS POKER PROFITABLY thinks it's a mistake, and I don't, and move on to the rest of the hand.

When you come to FTR and post hand histories , i can only assume it's because you want to play better. Listen, and learn.

[bjsaust]

This thread is such a train wreck I should avoid posting, but I wont.

Its 5nl FR. Nutcamp and get all in. Profit.

[oskar]

Can I rate my own thread 0?
I won't nutcamp because this is not my idea of poker. This thread is only about how I should not raise 89 UTG, but you won't stop me, so this is pretty futile.
I'm at the verge of moving up again... maybe I'll make a little "5NL - play like a monkey on crack -> profit" video that will get 0 stars, and lots of lol's, but at least then I can point there everytime I post a hand.

[Stacks]

lul... Okay, so you beat 2nl, and 5nl, and are about to move up to 10nl... And your a professional how?? Seriously, I've been there and done that. I don't claim to be good, but honestly nearly anyone with a semblance of poker skills can beat those stakes.

Although, the microstakes have improved in recent time from what I've heard, it still doesn't take a pro to rack up a massive winrate. And no, you do not need to balance.. Your concern should be to make the most +ev play for every decision you are given. You shouldn't give up on any ev now, because you expect it to make you more ev in the future, because quite frankly most of the players you are against either (A) don't consider your image..(B) will go busto soon enough... (C) will still pay you off later.. or (D) are completely braindead.

The average 5nl villian isn't assigning hand ranges. They aren't positional aware. They don't adjust to your exploiting. They just look at their cards, check their watch, realize they haven't played/shoved a hand in the past 3 minutes, and "mix it up".

You should not!! Here you are building a pot against people who do not like to fold out of position, with a hand with very marginal potential. And you will continue to get in spots as you did in this hand, and you won't get as lucky everytime.

[oskar]

I only started loosening up like that recently. I used to play a very tight PF range, and it kind of worked out.
I currently have the PokerTracker trial running, but I haven't really figured it out. If someone can tell me how I can look up what I won or lost by raising low ranking hands in EP, that would be nice.

And no, I completely disagree that people at 5NL play blind. If you don't play a hand for 5 orbits, you are definitely less likely to get called. If you raise about 25% of the hands you get dealt - which I do consistently, then other players will start to make hopeless plays against you. It comes with more variance. But I've played more profitably like that than with any other strategy.

[bjsaust]

Its a poorly played hand that lucked (or unluckily) backed into the 2nd nut straight. Unfortunately the nut straight fits into our opps range fairly well and we need to call 2xpot in order to find out how bad he is.

But, feel free to keep posting hands and ignoring the advice from people who smashed 5nl ages ago.

[oskar]

When you say it's a poorly played hand, then I guess you're not just refering to the PF raise? So what would you do differently on flop, turn, river?

I don't ignore the advice, but I think it's pretty bad to just make a blanket statement that you should just fold 89 in no matter what. I have tried many different strategies, and my play varies a lot depending on what table I play. It might not be the right play always, but I don't think you can say: Never ever raise that hand PF - full stop.
At least give a reason.

[oskar]

I just checked PT.
I've played 89o 13 times UTG and 8 times UTG+1 in 12000 hands
Small sample size, includes short-handed play, but there's a pattern:

+16c
-30c
-30c
+2$
+16c

And so on. It's really hard to loose a big pot with 89.
In addition to that I'm much more likely to get called down when I get a hand.
It's not that I don't respect your opinion, but I tried to figure this game out from scratch, and I won't just throw everything out the window because some guy on a forum sais: you don't do it... why? BECAUSE!
I'll keep doing it until the stats suggest otherwise, is that a deal?

[bjsaust]

Theres been lots of reasons by others that sum it up, but here you go:

1. If you want to balance your EP raising range with a polarised range, at least use sooted connectors which give you additional chances to hit the flop, and gives you a chance at the coveted OESD+FD.

2. Balanced ranges are WAY overrated at micros. Few if any people are paying enough attention for it to matter, so all you're doing is making a -EV play in isolation that has very little chance of adding +EV to your overall game.

3. You should play hands like 89 with a plan to only proceed beyond the flop with a hand of at least two pair, yet here you cant even let go of 2nd pair.


I fold flop almost always. Price doesnt matter, we're still putting extra money into a pot with a very weak hand with very little chance to improve and no idea where we stand. The fact theres one caller ahead of us, while offering better odds, just increases the likelyhood that we're behind.

River I probably call also, but we've managed to back into a nasty spot that can very easily have made our speculative hand very expensive.

[oskar]

1. If you want to balance your EP raising range with a polarised range, at least use sooted connectors which give you additional chances to hit the flop, and gives you a chance at the coveted OESD+FD.

But it's really marginal - the difference between suited and offsuit I mean. - But I'd much rather play 89 than 56, so I'd probably fold 56s, but play 89o instead. I'd also rather play 89 than A7. So if I'm going to play a wide range aggressively, than 89 looks better to me than some hands that are techincally higher on the Sklansky chart.

[djbruxism]

This is something i read when starting out too, that the difference in hand strength between suited and unsuited connectors is only something like 2%.

While technically it might be true, suited connectors are better than unsuited because...

1. When you play suited connectors, you're really playing two hands at once, one for flushes and one for straights.

2. If you do happen to hit that OESD + FD it's christmas time. You can't hit that if you're playing unsuited connectors.

The real thing you're not grasping in playing this hand is the importance of position. I know, because i donked around in low stakes raising any hand from any position.

Play 89 unsuited from late position if you want. In late position you have all the information from other players. And in a game of incomplete and misinformation the person with the most information is the king.

If you don't have a clear idea of what hands you'll play and from what position (and the hands you'll play should change as your position does) then that's a leak. Maybe you don't feel it at 5NL, but as you move up, you're going to get punished.

[oskar]

I am very aware of position. You don't want to know what my range is on the button.




The 2% you mentioned is pre-flop all-in. That doesn't apply here. They're slightly more valuable because you are like 4% to hit a flushdraw.

[djbruxism]

actually, i'd like to know what your open raising range is from each position.

[oskar]

That is so dependent on the table. If they are voluntarily raising it up frequently, then I'll just lean back and it's QK+ from EP. If it folds to the BB twice at full-ring then J8o starts to look really attractive.

[djbruxism]

If J8o was a woman and you met her in a bar, you'd say that she has "A Zachary Disease" (that is, her face is a zachary a same as her arse)

The only way J8o could be remotely attractive is if it you'd been on a deserted island with only monkeys to fuck for the last 5 years and a you'd skulled a bottle of whiskey.

J8o is never attractive.

[Stacks]

If J8o was a woman and you met her in a bar, you'd say that she has "A Zachary Disease" (that is, her face is a zachary a same as her arse)

The only way J8o could be remotely attractive is if it you'd been on a deserted island with only monkeys to fuck for the last 5 years and a you'd skulled a bottle of whiskey.

J8o is never attractive.

Coming from the man who called preflop with, what was it?? 73o because he figured if he hit he would stack me... And he fucking did!!!

Anyways....

Oskar: We are only trying to help you. I understand you need to "learn from the ground up", because you don't want to blindlessly follow another's path. Instead, you want to pave your own. That's totally understandable. However, this isn't just one player saying that it isn't +ev to be opening this particular hand from this particular position, it is a few players, and at this time, all have more experience than you.

You claim to understand position etc, however you said "that you should just fold 89 in no matter what". That isn't what we are saying. None of us have suggested that you should NEVER play 89o. That's not the case. We've merely suggested that you playing 89o from this early of a position isn't a very solid play. You are going to be put into a situation that isn't easy to deal with a very high percentage of the time, so just fold and save yourself the trouble.

And as said, the average player at 2nl/5nl/10nl/etc just isn't going to be noticing what you are doing enough to make this a good play. Yes, they might label players as tight/loose, but few know how to adjust (I bet most are under the mantra that you need to tighten up against loose players). Instead, they will play back at you when either they have a hand or they feel like it. I may seem like they have you pegged as a nit when you raise AA and everyone folds, but most likely they don't have anything they like. It happens.

You are sacrificing ev, that you won't get back in part to your "image". Just play straight up ABC poker and you will crush it.
'
And fwiw, I just pokerstoved 56s and 89o against the top 15% of hands (according to Pokerstove) and 56s faired better. As Dj said you have alot more combinations with suited connectors than without, therefore if you wish to play looser preflop (which I don't advise because 25% as you stated is absurd at 5nl!!!!), then open those type of hands. But even more importantly than the cards, is what position, and doing plays like this from EP is gonna hurt your winrate.

[djbruxism]

stacking FTR members (especially stacks) is the whole reason i play poker!

But seriously, don't play like a laggtard at microstakes, it's just not clever.

[wellrounded08]

I'm a nit, I'm aware. I will say this however, There is one position only that I'm playing 89o, and that is the BB, and that is if it's limped to me. At which point, I will make the highly advanced move of "Checking." Few pro's can show this kind of dicipline with a preflop moster such as this.

But seriously, don't play like a laggtard at microstakes, it's just not clever.

I'm very interested to know, at what stakes does "laggtarding" become profitable?

[Stacks]

To me, it not so much the stakes, as the experience level, and lack of position. I wouldn't have any regrets if this was opened on the BU or even in the CO if a blind or two was rather nitty, which you would have a good chance of taking it down or stealing the BU.

[kmind]

Maybe people will explain their because when you answer their questions. Balancing your range is almost always "lol" at 5nl.

[vaks]

Oskar! dont listen to these dumbasses in this thread! your doing everything okay! I do think I have realized one problem however...

you probably need to move up to where they will respect your raises...

[vaks]

and raise whatever the hell you want preflop, its probably a leak but w/e.
flop id say call or give a pot sized raise.
check on turn is fine
you pretty much have to call riv because of reads given