Playing Small Pocket Pairs in tournaments when blinds are high

Himanshu

Himanshu

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I mostly limp with pocket pairs less then jacks and if someone does 4 bet or 6 bet i fold i know that have a strong starting hand but with high blinds is it right to just fold them preflop and even if you hit your set most times you got beat with a straight a flush a better full house and stuff like that i lost a lot of money because of these small pocket pairs so:
What is the correct way to play them ?
 
alext9000

alext9000

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if you feel inspired and if you have loose players at your table..go for it..sometimes the third card will come on turn or river..i shove it all-in with 3 3 once and i was against QQ and 10 10.. and i won..3 on the flop..so when you have a small pair..usually some opponent has also a pair or ace something..so don t call or bet if u don t hit the card
 
warturtle7

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You need odds of about 20/25 to 1 to be set mining so unless you have that, just fold 22-66.
77-JJ it's a different story. You will most times have 1 or 2 overcards on board and against an aggressive opponent it will be difficult to call more than one street of betting.

even if you hit your set most times you got beat with a straight a flush a better full house and stuff like that

Also this, is not true... Unless it is a very scary board you will have the best hand quite often
 
dino

dino

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I would suggest to open up more and play more aggressively and try to build your stack up with small pairs
 
Himanshu

Himanshu

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You need odds of about 20/25 to 1 to be set mining so unless you have that, just fold 22-66.
77-JJ it's a different story. You will most times have 1 or 2 overcards on board and against an aggressive opponent it will be difficult to call more than one street of betting.



Also this, is not true... Unless it is a very scary board you will have the best hand quite often

well it might not be true for early stages of tournaments but in later stages of the tournament if u hit a set and get called or raised you are mostly beat it had happened to me a lot of times i don't know about other sites but fulltilt i have seen it happen to a lot of people
 
jazzaxe

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You are 7.5 to 1 against hitting one of your two set outs on the flop. For a cash game, if you are in late position and the raise is less than ten percent of the raiser's stack and not more than half of your stack, it is worth calling a raise. I would not open for much with them in early position. I like to limp in early position in hopes of a cheap flop. If you bet too much in EP you may have to fold to someone behind you betting big. In most cases, if you don't hit your out on the flop, check fold and wait for a better hand. You are most likely way behind a big pair or better.
 
jazzaxe

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My apologies, this was a tourney post. It is a lot more situational in the tourney.
 
taban13

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When the blinds are high and I have a small pair of Ollin/I'm going. If you limp with them in most cases, you lose.
 
rwdeets23

rwdeets23

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depends on your stack, but I agree with warturtle . if your at a tight table though 2-7s should hit he muck easily if u try a limp utg and get raised unless your >15BB. just depends on your stack the blinds your opp. stack. there range ect ;)
 
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leandr0s

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depends on your stack. if you have a shove-or-fold hand any pair is great as long as you are in the right position. your image also plays an important role. if you are deemed to be tight no one is calling a 10bb+ from middle position with KQo... if you shove 20% of hands then you might even get called by QJ or even worse by some small pocket pair that has you dominated... pairs are great stealing hands but it all comes down to balance
 
ribaric

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I mostly limp with pocket pairs less then jacks and if someone does 4 bet or 6 bet i fold i know that have a strong starting hand but with high blinds is it right to just fold them preflop and even if you hit your set most times you got beat with a straight a flush a better full house and stuff like that i lost a lot of money because of these small pocket pairs so:
What is the correct way to play them ?
i think the hands like 10 10 and 99 you can play in late stage of tournament. But you can play all pairs if you feel that you can hit a monster. But i ussually fold them. If you are in LP you can limp or raise to 2bbs. maybe you can steal the blinds and mybe you can flop a set.
 
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hffjd2000

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It depends on stacks and table.

If table is tight, go for it. If table is so loose, Ill be defensive since I know many would call.
 
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