What is your goal when playing Top Pair early in a tournament?

I know this is a vague question. I'm not looking for specific advice on a specific situation...but looking to just start a dialog and see what other tourney players are thinking about when they flop top pair.

For me, I think top pair is the hardest hand to play. An over pair is slightly easier but not by much, TPTK is a little easier than TPGK...but IMO, 2nd pair, bottom pair, underpair, draws and pure air are all WAAAAY easier to play.

I want to get better at playing top pair. Obviously, some top pairs are easier than others; like top pair of Kings is easier to play than top pair of 7s. Obviously, some boards are less scary than others. Obviously, position matters and your opponents matter. I know all that.

But in general...what are you trying to accomplish?

Lately, I think I should shift my focus with top pair hands to: take it down on the flop...and if I can't do that, then get to the river as cheaply as possible.

I feel like I lose too much and extract too little when I hold top pair. I feel like it's really a horrible tournament hand to have to play in the early levels, and yet it's the most common "value" hand that we're likely to play.

Later, when average M is 12 or so I'm happy to have top pair...but in the early levels I'm worried the whole time. Worried I'll fail to extract...Worried I'll get sucked out on.....Worried i'm already beat and betting into the best hand...

so....tell me what you're thinking about when you flop top pair early in a tournament.

I will play More hands early try to make flush straight or top two pair i wont put too much money with only top pair because its mostly beat.

right. I totally agree..and that is probably the same advice I would give in response to my very vague original post!

but...let's say now here we are, and we've flopped top pair. Sure, we know we don't want to lose half our stack with just 1 pair.

But we can't MAKE ourselves flop 2 pair or better any more often than is statistically meant to happen....so usually we'll find ourselves wishing we had 2 pair or better, but we'll in fact have just top pair. We know we don't want to lose a big pot....but we're not just gonna muck it. We're basically forced to play the hand.

so HOW do we play it? with what goals in mind?

At what point do we decide we're beat and muck it? should we give free cards in an effort to pot control? should we set a budget for the hand? "No more than 25% of my stack is going in on this hand unless I improve"

We all set mine early on. You know what flop you're hoping for when you hold 66, right? you want A62 rainbow....right? Why is that? we want to stack the guy with AK or AQ. and because all poker players are greedy ba$tards....we wouldn't mind if pocket deuces was in the hand with us too!

So, how do we manage to have our cake and eat it to? How do we manage to stack AK when we have the set, but not get stacked when we have the AK? Surely the strategy must be more complex than to "play more pots when you hold sets than top pairs"

Will depend on the number of players and position in the hand.

Out of position in a multiway pot I will lead into the pot if let's say the board come Q82 rainbow and I have KQ about 70%. So then I would adjust to my opponent/s and lets say my opponent can call with an eight and a weak queen, I would tend to try to bet smaller on the turn maybe 60-65% and if I sense I can get called with worse bet about the same percent of the pot or slightly smaller of the pot. I don't want to inflate the pot that much with just a hand like KQ especially out of position.

However in position I would bet slightly more on the turn and river. I also have the option of checking behind on the turn and river if I feel like that my opponent is strong, so trying to get more value in position is much easier than out of position.

Deeper the stacks, the wider your range.

I guess with top pair though and top kicker you need to be paying attention with who's calling you. You'll know just by sitting at ur table for 30mins who's bad and who's good.

When your infront you bet it, i guess when people re-raise you think why are they reraising? Do they reraise with open enders or flush draws? How many pots have they played, this can also widen their range and we can justify attacking this pot.

I believe top pair is best when you control the hand, when everyone checks to you and you raise... People will call you down when beat especially weaker players. If more than 2 people are in the pot normally your beat though especially if they call your turn unless it's a brick.A lot safer to play these hands headsup... We want to isolate preflop.

Remember we want to get our chips off the weaker players before the other tough players take it from them... Because later in a tourney it gets harder

This is such a hard question to answer because like everything in poker it depends.
But very generally I want to have top pair beaten before I put a substantial part of my stack in the middle.

So on the other hand I do not want to invest a lot of my stack having TP .

Just play small ball poker , Keep the bets small and often pot control.

This ofcorse depends on the villain and situation. This is for an average opponent.

Against a tough opponent im keeping it small and pot controlling more often.
Against a fish im extracting just a bit more value, but still not going ballistic with one pair.


The bigger the stacks the less value TP has the shorter the stacks the stronger it becomes.

missjacki said:

so....tell me what you're thinking about when you flop top pair early in a tournament.

Click to expand...

In MTT early stages, my goal with TPTK or even TPGK is to bet big enough to screw the odds for the drawing hands, and then go from there. If I'm HU vs. a calling station, I'll take him to the river with me and watch him sweat. If I'm multiway and people are chasing on a wet board, I'm gonna get off the ship

As a general answer, my aim is to play a pot that's appropriate to the situation. This can involve quite a few factors including but not limited to what my TP is, my kicker, the board texture, the action so far, the opponent(s) in the hand, the stack depth, etc.

Really good question, i think the answer depends on many things. The most important is information that i have about my opponents, next thing is my possition and i will definitely be the aggresor here it will help me to know where i am in the hand.

Early on in the tournament, there are so many calling stations that I wud just call the BB or call a raise pre flop and then aggressive if its a dry flop or just stay prepared to fold on a wet flop

Easy! get maximum value!

I want to get as much in as I need to get good information from it while keeping the risk level as low as possible lol. A lot of it depends on who I'm sitting with, and exactly like you said some pairs are easier to do this with than others.

Assuming this isn't a short-stack tournament, I bet hard when I flop top pair early in the tourney. It forces people to play drawing hands out of their odds, it maximizes return on the hand if you hold up, and it clears all the noise off a loose, limpy, early-game table. I find this to be especially necessary in turbos, where you're playing anything you can while the blinds are low.
Early in the game, when everything's cheap, I expect people to hold on a street for a drawing hand or an overpair. Chances are, at this point, there could be 4 or 5 players in the hand in the early game. Betting full pot will most likely get you heads-up or 3-handed if not close the hand out entirely. Considering implied odds, 3-handed, the flush/straight draw may be into his odds, and heads-up they'll be out of their odds if they call. Then, on the turn if nothing hits, you can punish the board and close the hand out or (if you're feeling a little frisky and donkish (it's okay, we all get greedy)) v-bet to egg your opponent on. If something does come on the turn to scare you, or you think you just got smooth-called, you can check-fold without feeling like you've lost a whole lot. I tend to check the turn in the early game if someone calls aggression, mostly to feel the opponent out and see what he does when I give up my lead, plus I love to check-raise in the early game just to see if I can put someone on tilt.
Basically, early in the game bet hard on the flop if you hit top pair. You'll gain a lot of information about your opponent and the hand at play, and the turn will mean a lot more when it comes out, all for a good price.

i always play several tourny together and run with the

one i win

Not good enough for a big raise, good enough to call a min bet. Hoping to catch something more

win the hand?

the general goal is going allin PF)

Without knowing what board we are playing or all the other things you mention in the OP like position ect. Here is my attempt at answering the question.

For me it would depend on the buy in level. If freeroll I am trying to get it all in on the flop with top pair and good kicker. If small buy in .. if my top pair is a face card.. again I am trying to get it all in as long as I don't have a weak kicker. If I get busted .. no sweat it was a freeroll or cost peanuts to get in. On to the next game.

As the buy ins get bigger the players get better. So would be a little more cautious as the buy in level increases. In games that aren't micro buy ins, I would continuation bet / call a continuation bet and re-evaluate on the turn.

Edit --- I just notice this post is months old .. came up in a search and I didn't notice the date at first. I will leave my reply since I already posted it.

I wont put too much money with only top pair because its mostly beat.For me it would depend on the buy in level.

double up or get maximum value

is something as simple as saying that if you have the pair and play well going strong depending on the ever sucrase situation better results not understand why so many people seek him so much to the game play just one that does not try to think so much so out of place

Top pair early in a tournament

I understand your dilemma. It is a tough hand to play. My goal is typically pot control. I don't want to let you go, but I don't want to over-inflate the pot either. That just makes the decisions on later streets that much harder. Like you said there are a lot of factors at play, but in a general sense pot control is a good mind set to have.

I also spend a lot of time trying to narrow the range of my opponent(s).

my goal is to win the hand )

Like almost everybody said, it depends. But the main goal early in tournament is to get the most chips you can without taking huge risks. So pot control is important unless the board opens dangerous draws, then you have to choose to raise your bet to scare other opponents or give up the hand and try to make to the showdown as cheap as you can.

the goal is the same in any hand, the circumstances determine how many chips we can go for. But the goal is to make as many chips as possible while also keeping your tournament life afloat. So if we think of it like a math equation, we're trying to maximise the + side or the times we win, and lower the damage in the other part of the equation when we lose.

So yeah, basically it depends. Against some players i'm quite happy to go broke and stack off, vs others i'm way more happy taking a smaller pot as i think the - part of the equation is bigger (they are playing a stronger range)