Hi guys! I always try to play with all my pocket pairs. With my smallest pairs I try to limp and just call a small raise preflop. Sometimes the raise is so big that I feel forced to fold. I usually play 1/2 $. I’m wondering how many blinds would you call with the following pocket pairs:
22, 33, 44, 55, 66, 77, 88, 99.
I’m asking because few times I regretted having called a 20 dollars raise preflop with hands like pocket 3 or pocket 4.
Avoid limping. Either raise or fold'em. Avoid to play small pairs from EP and try to play more small pocket pairs from LP. We are calling from the blinds when the
odds are too good that we cannot refuse, for exemplo 3:1, 4:1, 5:1 are pretty good odds and we can call almost always. On the flip side, when the odds are 1.32:1, 1.76:1 or either 2:1 is not so profitable to be calling with small pocket pairs from the blinds.
For example, we are sitting in the big blind with 66. Villain on the button raises to 4x. We fold. Simple as that.
We are in the big blind with 33. Villain on the CO raises to 2x. We call. Simple as that.
We are calling raises at maximum of 3 blinds in a situation like this where both hero and villain are deep stacked. If villain has only 30 blinds and raises 2x, it doesn't compensate, it's better to fold.
Medium pocket pairs is a little bit tricky. 77, 88 and 99 are not so good to 3-bet and not so good to fold. So we are going to 3-bet when our opponent folds a lot to 3-bet and continue calling when we have proper odds such as the case of small pocket pairs.