Small pocket pairs in early mtt stage

alex5207 · Nov 27, 2013

How big a raise can you justify to call with say 22-88? I find myself getting very easily shortstacked by calling with those hands. Is it better to push than to call?

RamdeeBen · Nov 28, 2013

Well; that depends on the villain in questions stack size and of course yours.

The shorter you get, the better it is to 3B shove the hands as opposed to calling.

PrayForSpades · Nov 28, 2013

If it's early on in the tournament why are you so short that you are considering shoving, I play small pairs early on as trap has, try to limp in with them and catch a set, and then take peoples entire stacks who think 1 pair is the nuts, don't call too big of a raise though if you are set peddling, you want to get in as cheap as possible, 5x and below.

alex5207 · Nov 28, 2013

I play the low stakes tournaments like the big 4,4$ on pokerstars (It might be why) but i i find it every time i limp or raise with xx cards SOMEONE always goes all-in, and i find it very hard not to call them once in a while - otherwise my stack just keep going down till I'm shortstack and forced to go all-in with a wider range

abzdolc · Nov 28, 2013

call it's usually bad kind of game, raise if u think it's good chance to take chips, or fold if u are not

houtlijm · Nov 29, 2013

early in mtt i pay 1 big blind at max in late position. min raise is instafold

midgetfactory · Nov 29, 2013

Set mining is the optimum way to play small pp in these tourneys. but you have to be aware of your stack size and postion and be prepared more often than not to throw it away if you dont hit.

ravpl · Nov 29, 2013

https://www.cardschat.com/forum/tournament-poker-59/calling-raises-pre-small-pairs-235157/

This could help.

spiderman637 · Nov 29, 2013

With low pocket pairs at early stages of the game i generally call upto 4x bet...this is very early in the tournament....
Once the blinds reaches 100/50 i generally call 2x raises only...

Jacki Burkhart · Nov 29, 2013

there are only 2 valid reasons to play small pocket pairs at a full table, IMO

#1 Set mining: get in cheap and fold on the flop if you don't flop a set. You should not be paying more than 5-10% of your total stack preflop. I'll opt for 10% if I'm in position and think the opening raiser will overvalue his overpair. I'll pay only 5% if I'll be out of position (blinds) or if I think the opening raiser is a good player who won't pay off my set.

#2 stealing the blinds...(like raising from mid position with 55) this is not usually important in the early stages of a tournament, and you would never do this by just flat calling a raise anyways.

on a side note a 3rd reason to play small pocket pairs is when you're really short and nobody has entered the pot you can shove all in with them, but hopefully that has not happened to us early in a MTT.

Frankie6636 · Nov 30, 2013

We really need more context. The answer of this question depends on chip stacks, tourney size, and posistion.

mariocep · Nov 30, 2013

position and stack at start of the tournament, PP late position only call 5% stack without 2BB raise no limpers. only the late positions

rhombus · Nov 30, 2013

Usually need about 20* effective stacks, so if you have 20000 chips only call up to 1K

If the players who raise are aggressive or multiway pot and you are last to act then you can call abit more as you will have better implied odds

Salvete777 · Nov 30, 2013

With cards like that - 100% just call in preflop, no raise!. If I had 77 or highest pair, maybe raised 3bb's, but not more.

alex5207 · Dec 5, 2013

mariocep said:
position and stack at start of the tournament, PP late position only call 5% stack without 2BB raise no limpers. only the late positions

Frankie6636 said:
We really need more context. The answer of this question depends on chip stacks, tourney size, and posistion.

My situation was like the following:
Playing the 4,4$ at pokerstars. Starting chips: 3000
about 4000 players attended the tourney with about 2500-3000 left and avg stack size of 4500 or so. So i found myself in a very common positition (atleast for me). I got blinded down, and played hands like AJ,AQ etc. which didn't hit, so i'm down to about 1800-2200 chips, with blinds like 100/200 or 150/300 (Don't remember exactly) but anyway i was down to around 8-10 bbs. As I really don't like being at that, i felt that my 66 dealt in late position was my option to try and double up, so i shoved after villain with around 3500 chips raised 3xbb. Ended up with getting beat by a pair of aces (he had AJo). A part of the reason i did that also lays in that in tournaments as big as these you need a fairly big stack to even have a chance to last in deep.

Conclusion: I concluded that the odds were on my side since i read him to have something around AJ,AQ,KQ,KJ etc, so that's why i did what i did.

Jacki Burkhart · Dec 5, 2013

I think you played it ok. You don't have a lot of fold equity with 8-10 bb vs. 3bb raiser, but they might fold the bottom end of their range, plus you are likely ahead and very likely to be in a heads up pot with a chance to double up.

alex5207 · Dec 5, 2013

missjacki said:
I think you played it ok. You don't have a lot of fold equity with 8-10 bb vs. 3bb raiser, but they might fold the bottom end of their range, plus you are likely ahead and very likely to be in a heads up pot with a chance to double up.

It was the only option I could think of, especially because I had <10 bb's left. And taken in to consideration that I had about 55% equity (knowing that from the beginning, because of my read (Axo).

But I very often find my self in positions where i feel the need to make that kind of coinflip (almost a 50/50), and chances are if you do that twice, you'll only win one of them. So if you're all in a couple of times during an mtt, chances are you'll go broke before making the money.

So even though you know it's +ev to push (even with no fold equity), you actually shouldn't push on coinflip actions, even though the odds are working in your favor - Because you actually don't get $ out of every coinflip - Am I right?

aa88wildbill · Dec 5, 2013

small pocket pairs should be folded, when faced with early aggressive betting. You can call or raise, but no more than one 6th of your stack.

alex5207 · Dec 6, 2013

aa88wildbill said:
small pocket pairs should be folded, when faced with early aggressive betting. You can call or raise, but no more than one 6th of your stack.

If you're shortstack in a tourney and you have a chance to double up, even with the odds working slightly in your favor, I don't see why they're wrong to shove with?

skipizzle · Dec 7, 2013

I never find these smaller pairs to be a very comfortable position. Is it really worth it to search for an occasional set? Seems like you could easily spend more on the BB or 3xBB raises than what the potential profit would be in the long run.

Small pocket pairs in early mtt stage

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