too scared of my opponents cards?

[eGene 0]

Hello guys!I'm pretty new to this forum and really find it interesting and answers a lot of questions for me.I just got a question regarding being scared of your opponents cards way too much. I do poker pretty good at the moment with a decent profit every week, but there are a lot of situations which has costed me a lot of chips in tournaments around the bubble.I will give you an example.20$ NL HE tournament, 180 players. 25 players left and blinds is about 600 / 300. My chip stack is around 14.000Im UTG and calls with JQ. Everybody folds up till BB which raises to 1800. I call and flop is J64 rainbow. At this point I find my hand to be pretty strong, he then fires out 2000 and I just called because I suspected maybe a KJ or an AJ. Turn card is a deuce which didnt help either of us. He then fired out another 2000 and I just called once again. Rivercard is a 4 and he then bet out 4000 and I called. He flipped over A4, which gave him 3 of a kind. His chipstack was about 18.000.Now this is where i got pretty annoyed about my play if it was right or wrong. I might beeing to scared of his cards and should have raised him on the flop and the turn, but due to being scared I just kept calling which gave him a nice pot.- Do you have any advice for this? All comments are apreaciated. Please don't mind my english gramme! :)Thanks!

[telescop 0]

I guess the easy answer is if you put him on AJ or KJ you should have folded to his 2000 bet. if you knew you were gonna call his flop, turn, and river bet without your hand improving, you should have got that money in when you hit the flop.

[eGene 0]

I guess the easy answer is if you put him on AJ or KJ you should have folded to his 2000 bet. if you knew you were gonna call his flop, turn, and river bet without your hand improving, you should have got that money in when you hit the flop.

I suspected him to MAYBE have one of those cards but still can't lay that hand down and just kept calling because nothing seemed to improve for both of us except on the river.But still, it's more a question in general. To be scared of your opponents cards. Thats what im looking an answer for!Thanks for the answer anyway!

[telescop 0]

I think it all depends on the number of people in the hand. If your heads up, and only worried about a couple of possibilities, you should raise to see where your at. There is no way he can call you in this example, AJ and KJ will prob come back at you and you can make a decision then, maybe fold. The point is I feel you dont have enough information to be ariad of anything yet, in this example. You limped and just called his raise so he bet into you when he got a piece of the flop.

[....Ian.... 0]

at that point in the tourney dont limp with QJ UTG...thats jsut bad. in fact dont limp with anything, raise or fold.played fine until the turn, when your opponent bet 2K (the same amount) that seems REALLY weak. you should have come over the top there,. probly for all your chips. just imo.but that turn play is moot compared to limping with QJ

[blakheart 3]

I think the key is to take control of the hand. You need to either raise or laydown your hand at some point. Just calling gives you no information. The only real reason to call is if you do not care what your opponent has, such as flopping top set or a nut flush. In an example like this, you do care what your opponent has. If you raise, he now must make a decision. If he reraises you than he is strong. If he calls, maybe not as a strong. As long as you are flat calling you aare not in control of the hand. And you can not accuratelly tell what your opponent is holding.

[Fat Tye 0]

I'm not much for tournament play, but I think others will agree that limping with QJ UTG is what got you in trouble. At a table that is not short handed QJ early is inviting trouble. Assuming we elect to play it, J64 is a pretty ragged board so rather than calling the whole way, come back with a raise on the flop to define your hand & see where you are at. If you are heads up with this guy, it is unlikely the J hit both of you (but it does happen). If you are re-raised you'll have to go with your read. If not, he'll probably slow down unless he hits another card.

[iggymcfly 0]

I think the key is to take control of the hand. You need to either raise or laydown your hand at some point. Just calling gives you no information.

Actually, that's not true in this case. The fact that he only bet 2000 on the turn gives on tons of information. Basically, that bet says, "I'm not bluffing, but I think I might be behind and I'm really hesitant to put more money in the pot. Please don't raise me, I might have to fold."I think at this point, we can feel confident that we're in good shape with Q-J, and go ahead and fire a decent-sized reraise. Make sure that if he calls, he's getting bad odds to do so, and if we make him fold, then we don't have to worry about dodging five outs on the river.

[eGene 0]

Thanks for those answers guys. I really apreaciate it!!Now Im pretty sure what to do next time and can see by now it was not a good thing just to call his bet.This is a truly great forum..

[flyingmoose 0]

I think you misplayed pretty much every street. That's okay, we all start somewhere. I'll explain why I think your line was bad, and I hope you learn something from the experience.The first thing I would say is don't limp QJ late in a tournament. You should pretty much never open-limp with 25 big blinds, being under the gun with a marginal hand is no exception. This is a pretty easy fold. The fact that you did not feel comfortable raising the flop tells you exactly why you shouldn't limp with marginal hands. You don't know if you're dominated. It is CRUCIAL to avoid trap hands with 20-ish big blind stacks in tournaments. Since we can't take back your limp, you need to fold when the big blind raises. Your limp either means a marginal hand like KJ/QJ/88, or a big pair. He raised to find out what you had, and a call tells him you have a marginal hand. He's going to feel comfortable firing on the flop and you will give away the pot on the 70% of flops you miss (and some where you hit), because your passive line has given you no information about your opponent's hand, but he knows a lot about yours. Now we go to the flop. You really need to raise. He's firing any flop. If you're going to insist on playing QJ , you have to be willing to take the lead on a flop like this. The pot is already more than 6000, and you have 12000 left behind. I would shove this flop.

[LPY2005 0]

I think you misplayed pretty much every street.  That's okay, we all start somewhere.   I'll explain why I think your line was bad, and I hope you learn something from the experience.The first thing I would say is don't limp QJ late in a tournament.   You should pretty much never open-limp with 25 big blinds, being under the gun with a marginal hand is no exception.   This is a pretty easy fold.  The fact that you did not feel comfortable raising the flop tells you exactly why you shouldn't limp with marginal hands.  You don't know if you're dominated.  It is CRUCIAL to avoid trap hands with 20-ish big blind stacks in tournaments.  Since we can't take back your limp, you need to fold when the big blind raises.  Your limp either means a marginal hand like KJ/QJ/88, or a big pair.  He raised to find out what you had, and a call tells him you have a marginal hand.  He's going to feel comfortable firing on the flop and you will give away the pot on the 70% of flops you miss (and some where you hit), because your passive line has given you no information about your opponent's hand, but he knows a lot about yours.  Now we go to the flop.  You really need to raise.  He's firing any flop.  If you're going to insist on playing QJ , you have to be willing to take the lead on a flop like this.   The pot is already more than 6000, and you have 12000 left behind.  I would shove this flop.

yeah, what he said!

[Herr Baader 0]

I would just like to add: If you are going to play QJ, then what better flop could you be hoping for (outside of a flopped straight)? So come over the top of his continuation bet. In other words: what everybody else just said...

[therrinn 0]

Also, be careful about stack sizes. When you're under the gun and limp, someone with a smallish stack might just push all in, hoping to pick up the blinds/your bet or figuring he has a better hand than whatever you limped with. If its only a small amount over your bet, then you're pretty much priced in to call. This harms you in that you shouldn't be wasting a thousand or two chips on a hand like QJ. It also limits your opportunities for stealing pots, since now people see that you're playing QJ (the fact that you limped will soon be forgotten). If you have to show your hand, expect a reraise the next time you raise. I play those 180 man $20 tourneys all the time, and when you get down to 3 tables and the blinds are high, there is absolutely nothing that comes close in terms of importance to position. In early position at that stage, I'll only play AK/QQ/KK/AA. From late position I'll play any two cards, hoping to pick up the blinds and antes. If you raise from early position, the chances really are pretty good that someone will reraise all in, and with QJ your best hope is to be up against 9s or 10s, but more than likely you're an underdog. Even AQ, how much do you want to call an all-in? You can easily build your stack up by attacking the right people's blinds, there's no need to put money in when you can't protect it against a likely reraise.As for the hand in question, besides limping with JQ in the first place, you have a couple options. You can fold to the raise (dangerous in this situation because people aren't going to take you seriously the next time you enter a pot, but you can use that to your advantage if you get a premium hand). If you've got a good read that the player is weak and is just defending their blind, you could reraise all in, representing aces. You can call (though I don't like it because if you hit something on the flop but they have, say, an overpair, you could lose a lot of money). Honestly, don't open limp in this situation is the real lesson.