The SBP Archives - Your less than frequent dose of SBP!

Lately, I've been concentrating a lot on the bad beats I've been given, instead of looking at the hands where I came out ahead and won big pots, so today's entry will talk about how changing your usual style (and timing) can mean everything in poker.

Playing four handed with the blinds very low, I was on the button when I looked down at pocket Jacks after the first person to act folded. This is a particularly big hand when playing against just three other players. Normally, I'd advocate a raise. If you read my articles regularly, you know that I'm not a big fan of slow-playing, especially pre-flop. In this situation, I decided to just call the big blind and see what happened. Here was the logic for my decision:

1. If I raised, more than likely the small and big blinds would have folded, and I would have won only a very small pot. Greed was a factor.
2. Limping in with a big pair like that would be hard for the blinds to put me on. The strength of my hand is easily concealed.
3. One of the blinds could try to be clever and attempt to steal with a raise, and I could then easily re-raise or call and build a bigger pot.

The flop came Ace-Jack-Ace. I flopped a full house! I checked, the small blind checked, and the big blind tried to steal the pot with a bet. I just smooth-called it, then the small blind raised 3x the initial bet. The big blind folded, and judging from that raise I put the small blind as holding one of the two remaining aces in the deck. Perfect! That's a difficult hand to get away from. I moved all-in, and after agonizing for some time, the small blind called and showed three aces, but my boat was the bigger hand and I won a HUGE pot!

The small blind said to me, "That's not how you usually play!" That's right...I usually never limp in with a pair like Jacks. But changing up the way you play is important for making your starting hands somewhat unpredictable, especially when you play against the same people often. But also a lot of things happened in this pot that, for my hand, was perfect. I flopped a monster hand, one of the other players also held a very strong hand, and thus lots of action. If I had raised, more than likely the pot won would have been quite small and who knows how the evening would have turned out.

Limping in is usually not the best play, but in some cases, it can turn out to be the perfect play.