limp and re-raise all in

[Foxxyroxxy]

I think that live vs online plays differently with respect to limping. In an online 6-max game, it is pretty much always a mistake to limp. You have no chance of stealing the blinds, and you will not make a strong enough hand often enough to make the play profitable with most of the holdings you might want to limp.

Another related reason is that players in these games will virtually automatically raise you with such a wide range of hands that you don't have the implied odds you would need to limp small pocket pairs, for example.

In live games -- and to a lesser extent full-ring online games -- limping can be a profitable strategy. This is because (in live games) the players are much weaker, and don't automatically raise limpers; so you can often actually get to a flop with your one big blind. You will also find some players who only raise with big pairs, so you can set-mine profitably. In full-ring online games it is so difficult to play even big pairs profitably from early position that limping a balanced range is arguably a decent strategy, though one difficult to employ well

 

[Foxxyroxxy]

When you only limp with small pairs and drawing hands your hand becomes transparent. As far as your example with 22 utg, you are limping a speculative hand with too many players to act after you. Also one major reason limping isn't good is you aren't contending for the pot. Its a loose passive approach.

 

[Ambushed]

This happened to me often as well. Just be careful when people limp EP, especially if they dont limp often. People who limp-raise are usually very strong, most of the time holding JJ+. I would've just limped with 88 and tried to setmine.

 

[Mr Sandbag]

Limping into a pot can be a moneymaker, especially in low stakes. Yeah, your opponent may be able to eliminate premium hands from your range, but he won't know whether you are holding 75s, KJo, or a pair. Many of these speculative hands are quite profitable in multi-way pots because of the potentially huge payoff when they hit and how easy they are to drop when they don't. It also gives you the ability to bluff better preflop (for instance, I 3-bet preflop the other day with 65s because of the read I had on the raiser and he dropped). If you are raising every time you enter a pot, opponents will lose respect for you entirely and call with a wide range of hands. This does not bode well for hand reading postflop and you'll start to get calls from hands that are limping in otherwise. Raising every pot you play will just add a few more premium hands to your range and will build big pots when you may be holding a weaker hand.

Every once in awhile I'll have a player at my table that never limps, and he almost never leaves the table with profit (I play $1/$2 NL). Why? Because he eventually loses respect, and what is a raise without a bit of respect?