BB vs SB

One area that I'm quite unsure about is when it comes down to BB vs SB, everyone else has folded, and perhaps I have something terrible like 27os

1) Is it worth investing the same amount again to equal the BB, or even raise?

2) What do you guys do if the BB then raises or re-raises?

How about if I'm the BB and I have AJos, for example, someone in early position raises, everyone else including the SB folds, and that person in early position is betting really aggressively, how do you guys play that one?

These are situations that I quite often seem to find myself in during tournies, and I'm never sure what the best course of action might be

1) No.
2) Moot.
C) Depends. Stack sizes, bet sizes, history, etc.

Technically you're getting the right price to call with pretty much any two cards. But that assumes that the big blind will just check.

Also, you need to remember that you'll be out of position for the entire hand (unlike heads up play, where you'll have position after the flop to offset the weakness of your hand). It ain't a pretty situation.

Generally it's people with large stacks, often significantly larger than mine, so I would be out of the tourney if we went all-in and I lostSo rather than a simple Pigpen02 "No" it would depend upon my assessment of whether my opponent is likely to simply check?

Like many things in poker, the answer is a resounding "Well... sort of, it depends"

I'm actually borrowing a bit from heads-up theory here. The thing about playing heads up is this situation comes up every second hand, so you can have a much better idea of your opponent's tendencies in this situation - if they're just checking when you complete say, half the time, it's a worthwhile move.

At a full table, however, the situation comes up much less often so for starters you won't have anywhere near as good an idea what to expect from your opponent (unless they're an uber-rock or something).

Also, don't discount the positional consideration - you'll be out of position for the entire hand, and that's not really a place you want to be when you've got a weak hand. If you think you can outplay your opponent on the flop, with poor cards and poor position, then the price to complete with any two cards from the small blinds is probably a good one.

Otherwise... it depends

Haha thanks, so really it's probably a no a lot of the time, but maybe not as definite a no as Pigpen02 gave

Put it this way - in this situation I definitely loosen my calling requirements, but I don't loosen them far enough to include complete garbage.

Others may play it differently, of course.

Yes well I deliberately specified the complete garbage hands, because it's those that when I dump them I wonder whether I'm missing out on a golden opportunity to make money from terrible hands...

Small blinds, dump them unless you are pretty sure you can steal the BB. Even if you get in cheap you'll be playing the rest of the hand out of position, a huge disadvantage. In HU play it's correct to call because you have position post-flop.

Of course if you're playing a really wild and aggressive player, but one that doesn't raise much preflop, I'd call and hope to hit a flop (2 pair, trips, straight, flush, or a combo draw). This gives us the implied odds since he will pay us off when we hit by betting at it hard.

A good general guideline is if its folded to you in the small blind play any pair, any ace, any king, and decent Q, J10 or J9 and fold anything else.

I'm fairly aggressive in the SB if it's folded to me. I'll raise to 3x the BB with:
Suited - Any A, K, Q, J down to J7, and suited connectors down to 87
Offsuit - any A, K down to K7, Q down to Q8, and J down to J9.

This is basically a top 40% range. Basically I figure 60% of the time I have the best hand preflop and sometimes when I don't the BB will just call and fold to my bet post-flop (almost always c-bet here). If the BB reraises and my hand is not a top 10% type hand I'll just fold.

Of course, my M will definitely factor in to what I do.

As it has been said already, as with most things in poker, the answer depends solely on the situation. If I'm going to complete the small blind with a less-than-desirable hand, I'm playing off my reads. Something like 7/2 os is something I am typically folding, unless I know that I can easily push my opponent off his hand/blinds. In this case, I'm playing the player, not the cards. But there is NO WAY I'm commiting my stack with a hand like this. Any aggression or resistance from my opponent, I'm folding.

So yeah, it really does depend (although, until you have solid reads, you should be dumping hands like 7/2os ).

Although I completely agree with post 13, posts 12 and 11 are probably more useful to me at the moment, simply to give me a rough guideline. As I become more confident in my ability to read opponents I can concentrate more on the situational side of things, but I don't think I'm at that stage yet...

Really useful thread for me so far, thanks for the input, and other opinions obviously very welcome

Well if you're not confident in your reading abilities, guidelines of hands won't help you. It's not which hands you play, it's how you play them. People use all sort of sets of hands to play. Some stick to just premiums and some play any 2 cards. You need to be able to play the cards well to play them, so a rough guideline will not apply to everyone. People (like WV did) can give their personal range, but unless you are able to play them well, that's no help to you.

I have to say that I respect your opinion very much zachvac, you're a superb poker writer, and a lot of your advice in threads here I have found very useful, but I strongly disagree with two things you just said:I've been playing about six weeks, won a few cheap tournies and some freerolls, but my skill/experience/knowledge of the game is very low. I know how I work best, and these guidelines will definitely help me...I don't have to be able to play them well for it to help me, at the moment I am winning tournaments but lacking self-confidence and in-depth knowledge, having a rough idea of how some more experienced players might play the hands is very useful for me

If you look at posts 11 and 12 there are two people giving their personal guidelines (not one), their guidelines are remarkably similar, and I can therefore reasonably deduct that quite a few other people would also use similar guidelines. Even if I try it out and it doesn't work for me, at least it gives me a starting point in an area where I currently feel totally lost

I'm not coming here as a total novice and suddenly expecting to be a brilliant poker player, I need to take it one step at a time, and I wonder whether you appreciate just how much of a novice I actually am, and can relate back to when you yourself were that inexperienced

Having said that, I am grateful for you taking the time to post...

ok sorry maybe I was a bit harsh, and I think I misunderstood your motive. From what I read I thought you basically wanted set hands to use and you could just play them like a robot and suddenly expect to be better. Apparently I assumed wrong and I apologize.

Now from my standpoint in terms of hands. Although I in general play relatively loose preflop, I play loose with position and thus hate getting into marginal spots when no matter who I'm playing against I'm out of position. So I will fold most hands from the SB unless I'm sitting next to an extremely tight player and it's folded around to me. I'm raising with pocket pairs, A9+, KJ+, and suited connectors. This is certainly not a strict range. If there's an extremely loose aggressive player who will re-raise with a wide range of hands, I'll fold KQ and if there's a player I think will fold to a cbet if they miss the flop I'll loosen up further, possibly playing any ace or even K-rag. It depends on the image of the opponent and your image in this situation.

I think you're fine. Just the fact that you're here asking questions puts you miles ahead of a ton of players.

You asked initially what you should do with hands like 27 or similar. Everyone basically said the same thing; fold. What Zach is saying is no matter what hands you decide to play, it will be how you play them that will determine whether you are ultimately successful. What juiceeQ said was that the better you know how the BB plays, the better off you'll be. All very true and very good advice. If the BB is some calling station I may fold Ax because unless I hit my Ace, I know post flop he may call me to the river with bottom pair. Similarly if he is very weak I may raise with 45os because more often than not he'll fold preflop and if he doesn't I'll know I'm crushed without a miracle flop.

Thanks zachvac, it's really useful to have another player's guidelines to bear in mind

Anyone feel like sharing a bit more advice about the second part of my OP, please:

How about if I'm the BB and I have AJos, for example, someone in early position raises, everyone else including the SB folds, and that person in early position is betting really aggressively, how do you guys play that one (in a tournament)?

and I agree with that 100%, a medium-term aim of mine is definitely to improve my reading of other players, and I already have a database I created of people I have played against, which I refer to during tournies. I am also busily reading posts here about TAG, and LAG, and how to play various types of hands - but it's a lot to take in all at once

However, in the short term I can use the rough guidelines posted here and try some of them out, and see how they pan out for me. Then at least I can feel a little more confident that I'm not completely screwing it up, or missing golden opportunities for low-risk profit...

Again, this depends. Personally if I'm playing someone very aggressive, I'll come over the top here. If he raises I can fold knowing that I'm probably dominated. If he flat calls, reads come into play again. Will the opponent fold to a cbet if he missed the flop? Also since you mentioned tournaments it depends on where you're at in a tournament. If you're playing early on and there are still a lot of loose donks, I fold this. You're out of position, you can't put your opponent on a hand, wait for a better spot where you know you're ahead when you get your money in. If you've got a short enough stack you may have to raise all-in here. If a big hike in money's coming up and you're close to the bubble but not below the cutoff for the money hike this is an easy fold.

I tend to play tight for the first hour (unless it's some kind of super-turbo), or the first two hours if it's the Bodog thousand dollar freeroll, but I have heard that aggression is very important later in a tournament, and I'm looking for places I can introduce aggression without taking unnecessary risks - if that's actually possible!

I missed the discussion, but it seems that almost everybody agrees that garbage hands in the small blind need to be folded. The question is where hands start to become worth calling or raising. That is a personal choice and my requirements are different than WVHillbilly's, but close.

My requirements for betting against an initial raise preclude playing AJo from the big blind. I would vie with a pair 77 or better, AK or AQs.

In my mind I tend to think of 77/AK/AQs as being quite a bit better than AJo - is there a table somewhere that actually lists the relative values of different starting hands? I use the link on this page quite a lot, but I'm not sure how kosher their betting advice isSadly I'm such a n00b that I haven't yet worked out what "the bubble" means

I have never understood why people are so aggressive on the sb vs the bb. In a full ring usually 1 person has a good hand, therefore if it folds around to you in the small blind, the big blind will have a hand as often as he wont. So i only want to be comnig into the pot first to act with j,t+ and with a raise, i never limp in blind vs blind

is this in tournament play or cash game?

if in tourny, it all depends on how big the blinds are getting and how big stack sizes are.

in a cash game i would fold 90% of the time unless i had knew i could out play this particular opponent with garbage.

This is bad logic. It's like saying well you should get AA 1 in 221 times and since the last 220 times I haven't gotten it I'll most likely have it this time. Slightly different logic, because you're right the odds increase because garbage hands are being folded, but they don't increase as much as you seem to be implying. I'd say he gains maybe a few percentage points when everyone else folds (well he doesn't gain, I'm saying his odds from your POV go up of him having a good hand).

Tournament play

This is the cut-off to the money spots. Let's say the tournament you are in pays to 20 places, and you bust out in 21st place, you "bubbled".

Also presumably if what matters is how you play the hand, and what your opponent THINKS you have in your hand, then the BB could be thinking along the same lines, that you may well have a great hand?Thanks It's also quite frustrating when the poker site gives you a pop-up saying "Well done, you've defnitely won a prize!", you continue playing for another hour or so before you're finally knocked out, and then you find out you've actually only won about 12 cents

Said it well:
it depends

Whilst that is undoubtedly true, it's not necessarily the sort of detailed and constructive advice that I need right now