Playing junk hands seems to be the way to win big ....

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RickAversion

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I think this is the way people win large MTT's. No, I am not saying this is the right way to play, and most of the time, it won't work. I am saying that when it DOES work, it works big if there is a decoy card (or cards) that lure others to bet heavy against your sleeper hand.

2003 Moneymaker won the final hand with 45.
2005 Hachem won with 73.

What happens in these hands is a decoy card like an A or K comes up, and the other guy bites, and bets heavy. But, the junk hand has made a straight or something totally unexpected. Most of the times, you will lose this hand, but when it works, you clean up.

Playing tight will do you good, but it seems to really knock it out of the park, and gut someone, you have to catch him off guard. When you bet heavy with top pair, it's kind of obvious. But, when someone else goes heavy on top pair, and you have a weird straight, that's when you get their shove and knock them out.
 
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onemorechance

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Beanfacekilla

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I think this is the way people win large MTT's. No, I am not saying this is the right way to play, and most of the time, it won't work. I am saying that when it DOES work, it works big if there is a decoy card (or cards) that lure others to bet heavy against your sleeper hand.

2003 Moneymaker won the final hand with 45.
2005 Hachem won with 73.

What happens in these hands is a decoy card like an A or K comes up, and the other guy bites, and bets heavy. But, the junk hand has made a straight or something totally unexpected. Most of the times, you will lose this hand, but when it works, you clean up.

Playing tight will do you good, but it seems to really knock it out of the park, and gut someone, you have to catch him off guard. When you bet heavy with top pair, it's kind of obvious. But, when someone else goes heavy on top pair, and you have a weird straight, that's when you get their shove and knock them out.

I see what you are saying.

However, Moneymaker and Hachem were both HU. Being HU is totally different than jumping in mutilway pots on a full table with junk.

Play 20 MTTs, jump in there with junk hands, and let us know how it works out for ya. I am not going to waste my chips trying this.

Moneymaker played a pretty tight game leading up to the final table. He did play some marginal hands, but not too many. MTTs are a marathon, and if you just jump in with junk, you will lose valuable chips chasing down straights and flushes, when you should have folded to begin with.

This is all just my opinion. I play super tight, and that seems to suit me just fine.

Peace.
 
ScottieDuncan

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I generally play pretty tight, but, occasionally I will play a junk hand. Sometimes you are right a junk hand wins and it is big when the hand hits. Play one occasionally and see what happens.
 
Aleksei

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Playing junk hands is mostly bad, because they hit hard so rarely; you only really wanna play them if you're confident you can steal the pot.

Actual good "junk" hands to play are low speculative hands like baby PPs, SCs and SGs as well as stuff like Ax or K/Qxs sometimes.
 
SicKBeATz

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You're not giving the whole story on those hands. You're also assuming that they just played crap the entire game. Moneymaker for instance called a raise from the bb when it was headsup with 45 and flopped two pair vs Farhas top pair. You're also failing to mention that they were both fairly deepstacked and Moneymaker had atleast a 2-1 chiplead over Farha.

Doyle Brunson has also won a couple bracelets with 10-2, yet he rarely plays it in cash games. Why do you think that is?
 
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We are not playing HU for bracelet. We are playing mostly early stages of low buy-in (under 20$) MTTs. So regardless of those pros, I would call anything with such junk hands.

If you want to loose up your image a bit, to win some big pots, then use better hands for that. Some suited connectors like 89, or 9T suited.
 
Aleksei

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Oh, and there's also the fact that the starting hand quality just goes WAAAAAAY down on HU compared to a ring game. You're getting blinded every time, so your concern when opening the button is no longer whether you can beat X range of hands, but whether Villain will allow you to open without 3betting and forcing you to fold. The standard button-raise in HU is something like 80%.
 
Kenzie 96

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Doyle won twice with 10-2. Ask him if he plays that hand much.
 
SicKBeATz

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Doyle won twice with 10-2. Ask him if he plays that hand much.

Lol not anymore, he's claimed to have lost a few 100k with that hand.

Didn't realize but just youtubed it and he won his last bracelet with 10-3. He said "I thought it was tha ten deuce" luckily it wasn't since he spiked the 3 :D
 
Chronical23

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playing tight and only premium hands 99% of the time is the best strategy that way maybe once you have a solid table image you could play weak hands for a surprise attack
 
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Wow, all the advanced members seem to disagree so give what they say more weight but consider this. You play a tight style, I know you play a tight style. You raise out of position. I put you on AA,KK,QQ.AK. I can afford to call you PLUS if I hit 2 pair or a set or whatever I will be taking a lot of your chips because it is hard to lay down those premium hands. On the other hand if I miss, it's easy for me to lay down my hand. So long as I win a big pot for every 4 or 5 I lose I am good to go. Also, if I give action and seem weak by call folding that sets me up to make more when I do get a premium hand. I am talking about mtts here. Again, I hate to send someone bad advice but it works for me. Good luck.
 
aa88wildbill

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I think playing junk some of the times is a necessary evil. It gives you an air of unpredictability. It makes it hard for people to read you. I'm not saying play a lot of junk and hands, but you have to play a few. Sometimes when you play them few, you will hit it big.
 
bbyfce85

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i do agree keeps people guessing but if you do it to much or to late in mtt you find yourself chasing to much
 
masondub

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When I am in an MTT and I am super card dead and decide whatever im going to play this junk hand, it usually does not turn out well.. Ill flop two pair then karma will get me and theyll runner runner something. Heads up is really different and you can have a wider range of hands to play.. Now it does seem sometime that the worst hand wins alot.. But no hand is made until the cards have all been flipped over. Anything can happen.
 
IntenseHeat

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Yes, I would agree that you could potentially win a big pot with weak holdings due to the fact that your hand will probably be well camouflaged on a non threatening board. But here's the rub, to play those types of hands against me, you're going to have to be willing to call a 3, 4, or 5x raise with it. If you are willing to do this and are fortunate enough to flop something like two pair against top pair/kicker, you probably will get paid off, because I'm likely to assume you're not foolish enough to be calling raises from a tight player like me with hands like 9-3 off. If you are lucky enough to hit that type of hand on me, you better have plan B on stand by. Nothing satisfies me more, as one player found out about an hour ago, than getting my chips back from people who play hands like that when they step into dragon trap that I will set for their ass once I find out that those are the kind of hands they are playing.

However, if you are allowed to limp with a hand like 5-2 from the big blind, as I was. And the flop flop comes 5-A-2, as it did for me. And one of your two opponents decides to ship his stack with A-8 and the other decided to call with A-K. And you are fortunate enough to catch another 5 on the turn and even more fotunate to have the remaining opponent ship his stack after catching a K on the river. If all these things were to happen, as they did for me, then a weak hand like 5-2 could be very lucrative indeed. However if either one of my opponents had so much as min raised pre-flop I would have folded and not been the slightest bit upset to see that I would have made a full house on the turn. After all, it was 5-2.
 
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taaron

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It really all depends villain, table image, etc.

For instance, whenever i want to use my super strength reach around unicorn trap, I will often do so with hands that are used only for playing oop while trying to balance a perceived range.
 
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On the other hand if I miss, it's easy for me to lay down my hand. So long as I win a big pot for every 4 or 5 I lose I am good to go. .

This. You can have a bunch of losing blinds made up in 1 hand where you blindside someone who thinks they have high pair, etc. While you have a straight, or 2 pair of junk.
 
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Sorry but I don't know all the latest terminology. What in the world is a

"super strength reach around unicorn trap"?

I might not really want to know.

oldog
 
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However, if you are allowed to limp with a hand like 5-2 from the big blind, as I was. And the flop flop comes 5-A-2, as it did for me. And one of your two opponents decides to ship his stack with A-8 and the other decided to call with A-K. And you are fortunate enough to catch another 5 on the turn and even more fotunate to have the remaining opponent ship his stack after catching a K on the river. If all these things were to happen, as they did for me, then a weak hand like 5-2 could be very lucrative indeed. However if either one of my opponents had so much as min raised pre-flop I would have folded and not been the slightest bit upset to see that I would have made a full house on the turn. After all, it was 5-2.

Great example, and yea, only worth doing if you can get in cheap. BB makes it easier. Might be worth it from SB as well, sometimes.
 
coyotegal

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^^^ agreed and again, you do have to play less than premium hands and get caught with them once in a while, win or lose so that you aren't seen as a supertight player or it is hard to get a call when you do have the nuts.... but once in a while is enough... and depending on the people at your table you may not even need to do this. Over all, I play them mostly when in late position and mostly only, if I can limp in with them, that is unless I just want to get caught with them to fool the other players. I'll play em any position as cheap as I can and fold, showing them so they think I am a total donk. Though of course a bluff is a bluff and if I think I can push a player out of the pot with a large raise in late position, I am not shy of trying to do so from time to time....
 
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onemorechance

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Sorry but I don't know all the latest terminology. What in the world is a

"super strength reach around unicorn trap"?

I might not really want to know.

oldog

It's one up from the dragon trap, however it is below both the chimera trap and indeed the manticore trap

I'm putting together a strat thread on the various traps involving mythical creatures, please stay tuned
 
kidkvno1

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Wow, all the advanced members seem to disagree so give what they say more weight but consider this. You play a tight style, I know you play a tight style. You raise out of position. I put you on AA,KK,QQ.AK. I can afford to call you PLUS if I hit 2 pair or a set or whatever I will be taking a lot of your chips because it is hard to lay down those premium hands. On the other hand if I miss, it's easy for me to lay down my hand. So long as I win a big pot for every 4 or 5 I lose I am good to go. Also, if I give action and seem weak by call folding that sets me up to make more when I do get a premium hand. I am talking about mtts here. Again, I hate to send someone bad advice but it works for me. Good luck.
The thing is if you miss, and i hit big time how much are you going to stack off with crap?? Or lets put it this way, lets say you've got Ax and i got AK, we both hit 2 pair, who is going to win the pot!
I've made it deep into CC games with only playing TT>AA, just to show that you can play way tight and still make it in the money!
 
Beanfacekilla

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^^^ agreed and again, you do have to play less than premium hands and get caught with them once in a while, win or lose so that you aren't seen as a supertight player or it is hard to get a call when you do have the nuts.... but once in a while is enough... and depending on the people at your table you may not even need to do this. Over all, I play them mostly when in late position and mostly only, if I can limp in with them, that is unless I just want to get caught with them to fool the other players. I'll play em any position as cheap as I can and fold, showing them so they think I am a total donk. Though of course a bluff is a bluff and if I think I can push a player out of the pot with a large raise in late position, I am not shy of trying to do so from time to time....

Paaaaaa-lease....

I am an ultra-tight player, and there is always some dipstick that doesn't believe me. I have no problem whatsoever getting action at Bovada, no matter how tight I play. I can flop a boat, and some idiot will call his entire stack on a 6 high FD. The players are soooooo bad, they don't even pay attention to who is tight/loose/etc.

Just my $0.02
 
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