The Value in Pocket Pairs

[batgirl218]

Greetings one and all!

I was listening to the Thursday night radio broadcast I thought something interesting had come up in conversation that would make for an interesting thread. I don't remember everything about the hand but it wasn't really that important as to what happened after. I believe Nicci had 3 bet an early position player from the button and as the early position limper tanked Nynus and Jen talked about what they think Nicci was holding. Nynus' claim was JJ and I don't recall what Jen's was, however when the early position raiser folded Nicci showed two tens. A very proud Nynus simply said 'well I was right, jacks or tens are pretty much the same'. Jen and myself immediately replied no it's not.

So the thread question is: 'What is your "dropping off" point with pocket pairs?'. What I mean by that is where do the big pairs end in your mind/game. I think Nynus (and feel free to jump in and tell me this is inaccurate) said QQ-JJ is the biggest drop in pocket pairs. Jen and I seem to be on the same page that JJ-TT is the biggest drop.

Honestly, I think there are two drop points. AA, KK, QQ, JJ would be one group, TT, 99, 88 are another and 77-22 are the third. This all really depends on what you are playing (cash games or tournaments, limit or no limit). Since the majority of the people on here play mostly NL tournaments, I'll stick to that.

When it comes to tournaments, I don't really have a rigid system of tier 1 tier 2 etc. for any hands pocket pairs or otherwise. Against a rock there are several situations I could think of where folding QQ is perfectably acceptable. Against a maniac I might three bet 66 or 55, it depends on a lot of factors. I think the smaller pocket pairs (77-22) are good against maniacs when you are short stacked or have position. Say you have 5 M and the maniac goes 3x for the 7th time in 10 hands...if I have position and it's folded to me i'm likely to shove and take a coin flip, that's the kinda action I look for short stacked. Small pairs are a very read specific situation and the bigger they get the less read specific they get and the more value based they get. AA, KK are obviously hands that you are going to want to get all the money in with pre if it can be done.

So that leaves us with QQ-88. Unless I have a monster stack (say 50 M or higher) I will usually play these hands based on stack size. With a large stack in early position, I might fold 88 99 TT depending on who's at my table and how I feel about my stack size. The smaller my stack size the more inclined I am to open raise or if short enough open shove with any of these pairs.

So to kinda wrap up my view (as I said this is only my view on tournaments) I don't have a solid A B C ranking of pocket pairs, I play them a lot based on stack size and player profiling. However if we are talking about just speaking broadly and non-specifically I would say my drop ranges are

AA KK QQ JJ
TT 99 88
77 66 55 44 33 22.

Thoughts, comments, suggestions, ideas? Go.

[RoadBob]

I'm putting AA and KK together, QQ would be in thier own group, then JJ, TT and probably 99 in a group, and then the rest of the lower pairs would play pretty similarly.

I do agree with you about playing small pairs being a situational thing. If you are playing small pocket pairs for set value then position isn't as important. However if you want to play them more aggressively then position becomes much more important. For instance, I might muck a samll pocket pair in early position if stacks aren't right for set mining, but I might raise that same pair in late position if the pot hasn't been opened yet. In that case I'm not really raising for value, just to steal blinds.

I also think stage of a tournament makes a huge difference in how you play small to medium pockets. Early on, I'm not playing them nearly as aggresively as I will in the late stages. On the final table, pairs I would fold early on have great 3 bet potential given your reads on other villians.


And short stacked pairs, are great for shoving and trying to double up.

Good disscussion topic!

[Delta50]

interesting read,