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AlamedaMike
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Joined: 29 Jun 2005
Posts: 2042
Location: Alameda, CA
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 Posted: Wed Jan 16, 2008 3:55 pm Post subject: Do you like JTs? |
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Nice hand but is it overrated? I read an article that moved the hand from S&M Group 3 (EP) to Group 4 (MP).
In a tight game do not play it in the first seats and do not cold call a good player unless there is lots of volume?
The same article moved KTs from Group 4 to Group 3.
I seem to win more with KTs than JTs and I have dropped JTs off my Core hands - I will limp LP. |
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AlamedaMike
2K Club
Joined: 29 Jun 2005
Posts: 2042
Location: Alameda, CA
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| Posted: Mon Jun 16, 2008 12:31 pm Post subject: |
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I guess that starting hands for LHE is pas se? No one seems interested in this topic - JTs - is it a 3 or a 4 - does it matter?
The article that I referenced has an interesting simulation imo, BWDIK?
According to his study Sklansky got a lot of the non-premium hands in the wrong order. But, as I have said post-flop is way more important but preflop is easy to discuss.
I think the ITH starting hands chart and what he has to say are very close - the ITH chart gives a lot more information and guidance.
As far as JTs goes both the ITH and the analysis have it MP (S&M 4). A lot of new players overvalue this hand and play it EP and will raise with it.
I have only 1,122 hands played EP on PS micro limit. But, my A9s, A8s, ATo, AJo have lost money EP. But, they are rated at the end of the Group 3 hands to be played EP.
It could be the way that I play them.
The same goes for FT $1/$2 games. My ATo, A9s and A8s have lost EP but here I have only 298 hands played.
I need to review the way that I have played these hands to see if I am playing them wrong or just unlucky (small sample).
How are other players doing with Ace suited/offsuit with J,T,9 and 8 kickers EP?
My ATs is winning.
Thanks
edit - the ITH does not specify loose or tight games but does indicate the number of players ahead of you in a lot of case. Hold'em Poker by Carson goes into painful detail depending on the game texture.
Mistakes preflop are small but can lead to large post flop errors so it is imperative to get them both right.
On a live 3/6 table yesterday one player was playing 100% of this hands. I guess he likes to see flops. In fact about 3 were seeing more than 70% of their hands. I was playing 30-40% of my hands and would go 20-30 deals without one playable hand - then I had to resort to Q2s on the button and hit my flush.
I played for 4 hours and won $40. Not easy. I try to stick to the top 51 hands depending on postition.
| Quote: | Table 10 - The 5 Play List Strategies
Personality| Play | Threshold
Starving | 11.3% | Top 24 hands
Tight Expert | 20.0% | Top 42 hands
Professional | 24.0% |Top 51 hands
Savvy Gambler | 32.9% |Top 68 hands
Good Gambler |43.9% |Top 84 hands |
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blah730235
Joined: 02 May 2008
Posts: 168
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| Posted: Mon Jun 16, 2008 7:26 pm Post subject: |
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It depends...haha
First off I'm going to say this is a tricky hand,
1. When you get a straight with J10 you have a much better chance of it being the nut straight that you do with other hands. This is because AKQ gives you the nut straight as well as 987. This is not true for alot of the other suited connectors.
2. You have a flush draw that is srong but can be decieving. In my head there is a huge difference between a K high flush and a J high flush depending on the opponent
3. You can get TP a decent amount of the time
4. You have the same chance of getting set & fullhouse as you do with any two unpaired hole cards
That being said this is a hand I'd really like to see the flop with a limped pot with 4+ players going to the and let the bets get big postflop when I get a good hand. I do not want to raise because it would scare away any crap hands & leave better hands then mine. If a good player raises preflop with the right stats I am worried because he could have AJo, AKs with the suited AK being the same suit as my J10 hand. He also could have QQ+ which could get us in a TP v.s. overpair situation. Running the risk of getting into a barely beat situation easily is costly and not worth it.
I think you should be willing to play this hand from Mid-Position depending on the players to your left & number of limpers in front of you. Idealy if I'm limping in MP with J10 I'd likesome limpers in front of me and passive preflop players to my left. As for EP... I want decent reads on 80%+ of my opponents as we are playing out of position for the rest of the hand and I want to be able to somewhat predict my opponents moves. I also want the table to generally be pretty loose-passive preflop as well for EP.
I also don't like the idea of grouping hands, each of the 169 starting hands is slightly differnt and as such should be played slightly different. |
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AlamedaMike
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Joined: 29 Jun 2005
Posts: 2042
Location: Alameda, CA
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| Posted: Tue Jun 17, 2008 11:10 am Post subject: |
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Thanks - yes, it depends. The basic question was about the recommendation of S&M to play this hand EP? The authors of the referenced page like KTs better.
I like JTs but I have moved it down in my list of hands depending more on position and on the number of players up front. Also, game conditions.
A lot of players play JTs like it was AA - the holy grail of starting 2-card hands. They are making a mistake.
The biggest problem that I see with the hand is when you flop just top pair - your kicker sucks. Two pair is great but that puts a straight on the board more often than not.
You do not like to group the hands? Well, a few authors agree with you. I think that you will agree that all the 169 are not playable or do you?
I folded 72 off EP and turned a full house. Does that mean that 72o is playable in some circumstances other than a forced blind?
Some post flop hands have a match up AA is better than KK preflop but AKo vs JTs - who knows - it depends.
But, you need to start somewhere.
I have always contended that playing too tight or too loose does not maximize you wins. |
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blah730235
Joined: 02 May 2008
Posts: 168
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| Posted: Tue Jun 17, 2008 3:07 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: | | A lot of players play JTs like it was AA - the holy grail of starting 2-card hands. They are making a mistake. |
Players who do overvalue this hand are probably doing so without knowing what the numbers are.
| Quote: | | The biggest problem that I see with the hand is when you flop just top pair - your kicker sucks. Two pair is great but that puts a straight on the board more often than not. |
Correct, TP without a good kicker is not great to have against a TAG player who could very easily have AJ, A10 or an overpair. This is one of the few reasons I suggested folding preflop if certain players raised.
| Quote: | | I think that you will agree that all the 169 are not playable or do you? |
No i believe there are spots where you can play any of the 169 hands although spots for hands like 72o are few and far between. Here's an example
Suppose I hold 72o on the button and it folds around to me. The sb and bb are both nits who fold to preflop raises 90% of the time. If i raise 4xbb and check/fold the hand if I am called or raised then I am going to pick up 1.5bb 90% of the time and lose 4bb 10% of the time. That means i'll make 1.1bb in the longrun in this spot. I know a hand like this sounds far fetched and all to perfect, but spots like this do happen not often for sure though.
| Quote: | | I folded 72 off EP and turned a full house. Does that mean that 72o is playable in some circumstances other than a forced blind? |
0.09% of the time 72o will flop you a full house and even when you flop a full house you have no gurantee your going to get all your chips in. So paying 1bb for a .09% to get a full house that isn't even guranteed to double you up is unprofitable. However refer to the above for a circumstance where playing 72o is profitable
| Quote: | | Some post flop hands have a match up AA is better than KK preflop but AKo vs JTs - who knows - it depends. |
AKo is much better to have preflop only 2 hands dominate AKo (AA,KK) JTs has alot of hands that dominate it. Also AKo v.s. J10s is ~ 60 to 40
| Quote: | | I have always contended that playing too tight or too loose does not maximize you wins. |
Very true. Playing extra tight can allow for less variance though. |
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jeffnc
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Joined: 13 Jan 2004
Posts: 7222
Location: NC, USA
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| Posted: Wed Jun 18, 2008 12:45 pm Post subject: |
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JTs is overrated by most amateurs on most situations. I saw one cash game player with 50BB reraise with it, all-in. He was called and was nervous he might be against an overpair. The original raiser turned over AK and he breathed a sigh of relief as he said "Oh good, it's a coin flip."
| Quote: | | 1. When you get a straight with J10 you have a much better chance of it being the nut straight that you do with other hands. |
Since every straight you make with JT will be the nut straight, I'd say this is true, ha ha  (Obviously if the flop is 987 and the turn is a T and you lose to QJ, this doesn't count.)
| Quote: | | 2. You have a flush draw that is srong but can be decieving. In my head there is a huge difference between a K high flush and a J high flush depending on the opponent |
Yes, depending on if the opponent actually has the K high flush A Q high flush beats you out of the pot just as much as a K high flush, regardless of the opponent.
| Quote: | | 4. You have the same chance of getting set & fullhouse as you do with any two unpaired hole cards |
Usually a "set" means 3 of a kind with a pocket pair, but if you mean what most people call trips, that's true. (However if you flop a set with a pocket pair, you have a much higher chance of making a full house after the flop than if you flopped 2 pair with unpaired pocket cards.) There is one rank you left off - 2 pair. When you have connectors like JT and flop 2 pair, it's
a) more vulnerable to straights than disconnected 2 pairs
b) it's more obvious that you might have 2 pair (2 pair is far more likely on a board of JT2 than a board of J62, assuming players paid to see the flop.)
| Quote: | | I do not want to raise because it would scare away any crap hands & leave better hands then mine. |
That's true to an extent, raising any good hand should scare away crap hands worse than yours. But you are going to get called by hands that are "better than yours" preflop only, such as big pocket pairs and big aces. These are hands that you can make a lot of money from if you make a straight or flush. It also adds some deception value. It also might give you the option, if raised from late position, to see a free turn card.
| Quote: | | If a good player raises preflop with the right stats I am worried because he could have ... AKs with the suited AK being the same suit as my J10 hand. |
That's pretty unlikely, and even more unlikely that you'd actually make a flush and lose a lot of money in that situation.
| Quote: | | Idealy if I'm limping in MP with J10 I'd likesome limpers in front of me and passive preflop players to my left. |
Having a raised pot isn't really bad for this hand when there are multiple opponents (especially when you're in position) because it just builds a bigger pot for hitting a bigger hand (you're not looking for one pair in this situation - if you were KTo would clearly be a better hand than JTs.)
| Quote: | | I also don't like the idea of grouping hands, each of the 169 starting hands is slightly differnt and as such should be played slightly different. |
Agreed. Some hands obviously make sense, like grouping 22/33/44/55 together, or 65s/76s/87s, but otherwise groupings aren't very helpful.
Last edited by jeffnc on Wed Jun 18, 2008 12:57 pm; edited 2 times in total |
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jeffnc
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Location: NC, USA
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| Posted: Wed Jun 18, 2008 12:53 pm Post subject: |
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| blah730235 wrote: | No i believe there are spots where you can play any of the 169 hands although spots for hands like 72o are few and far between. Here's an example
Suppose I hold 72o on the button and it folds around to me. The sb and bb are both nits who fold to preflop raises 90% of the time. If i raise 4xbb |
He's talking about Limit Holdem, cash games specifically (I assume). Hand values can change dramatically in NL and especially in NL tournament/SNG/satellite/bubble situations.
Even in NL cash games, I like JTs more than in limit and will often call raises with it. You don't do this to flop top pair against AJ, you do this to get involved in a big pot where you can make a big hand against a preflop favorite who is going to pay you handsome implied odds. Especially true if the pot will have 3 or more players. And again, it's also a hand that can be used in other ways, for example put in a good-sized raise with JTs on the button after several limpers. You might pick up the pot right there, steal it after the flop, or flop a good draw and have everyone check to you where you can reassess. Alternatively you could raise from any position for some deception value. But that's going off on a tangent about NL.
In a tournament situation, if I have to go all-in, and I'm either going to get folds or calls by very strong hands, then I'd rather have JTs than AJ or some pairs. If I knew my opponent was calling with AA, then I'd definitely rather have JTs than KK, for example. |
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AlamedaMike
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Joined: 29 Jun 2005
Posts: 2042
Location: Alameda, CA
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| Posted: Wed Jun 18, 2008 5:02 pm Post subject: |
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This is general strategy forum and I should have stated that I was talking more about limit than no limit. Big different on the strategies. I have not played NL for 3 years and have forgotten more than I knew 
The study was LHE and comparing the starting hands with S&M starting hand recommendations - what struck me the most was the downgrade of JTs and the upgrade of KTs - ITH starting hands has JTs more MP.
That is why I posted my first comment.
Once you have playing experience you need to consider much more than your starting 2/7 of a hold'em hand. 7 Stud you get 3/7 to start plus you can see more up cards. Hold'em you see 2/7 and no up cards.
Thanks |
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