How to play Jacks?

Red_King

In Response to Re: How to play Jacks?:

Just get it in pre, and see what happens. Had this situation twice in past few days, both times just on the bubble, shoved both times and got done by rag aces. Variance says it's my turn next, lol.
Posted by Red_King

Variance lied, 4 in a row now,

Got done again in TOT FT by AA

GREGHOGG

In Response to Re: How to play Jacks?:

In Response to Re: How to play Jacks? : why not?
Posted by grantorino

because you are committed to the hand if you call and theres not many flops you want to see.

so if you ship it in pre you dont have any more decisions.

simple way to play the game, but effective.

grantorino

In Response to Re: How to play Jacks?:

In Response to Re: How to play Jacks? : because you are committed to the hand if you call and theres not many flops you want to see. so if you ship it in pre you dont have any more decisions. simple way to play the game, but effective.
Posted by GREGHOGG

Shipping is the standard play, I'm fine with that, it doesnt necessarily mean its best against every opponent with every dynamic

Taking a line because you dont have to make tough decisions is not good in general if you are sacrificing profit to do it (not talking about this hand in particular)

The_Don90

In Response to Re: How to play Jacks?:

In Response to Re: How to play Jacks? : Shipping is the standard play, I'm fine with that, it doesnt necessarily mean its best against every opponent with every dynamic Taking a line because you dont have to make tough decisions is not good in general if you are sacrificing profit to do it (not talking about this hand in particular)
Posted by grantorino

I agree with some of your point here, ive italiced what i agree with. However ive bolded what i disagree with and i will reply below.

As a player in tournaments i try to avoid "tough" desisions and ive never once ever felt ive sacrificed profit, infact ive actually argued with people because there was a shorty guarenteed to be in a hand once and a raiser before me who had me covered that folding my AK was profitable, where many would have said to shove. Now im not saying that i was laddering there, but i felt i could wait for a better spot where i could raise myself without the raiser before me. Therefore making my desisions easier, and not risking it on the line by trying to isolate a shorty when im most likey against 4 cards, possibly a pair (flip which i would take) but if they dont have a pair and say call with QJ and shorty has 78 suited im not favorite to win the hand any more.

However in this case with the jacks, i dont feel a flat call is possible, an overcard is comming 57% of the time and we're just the right stack to justify a shove, we cant 3-bet,fold so theres that option out of the window. We already know the guys range is wider than jacks, so we dont even like a 10 high flop much. Therefore imo in the hand in question the play is to shove. why worry about our own desision remember this is for half our opponents stack which is a big injury to someone at this end of the tournament so we possibly do fold out AQ/KQ although a number of others maybe disagree with that.

iBLUFF

In Response to Re: How to play Jacks?:

In Response to Re: How to play Jacks? : I agree with some of your point here, ive italiced what i agree with. However ive bolded what i disagree with and i will reply below. As a player in tournaments i try to avoid "tough" desisions and ive never once ever felt ive sacrificed profit, infact ive actually argued with people because there was a shorty guarenteed to be in a hand once and a raiser before me who had me covered that folding my AK was profitable, where many would have said to shove. Now im not saying that i was laddering there, but i felt i could wait for a better spot where i could raise myself without the raiser before me. Therefore making my desisions easier, and not risking it on the line by trying to isolate a shorty when im most likey against 4 cards, possibly a pair (flip which i would take) but if they dont have a pair and say call with QJ and shorty has 78 suited im not favorite to win the hand any more. However in this case with the jacks, i dont feel a flat call is possible, an overcard is comming 57% of the time and we're just the right stack to justify a shove, we cant 3-bet,fold so theres that option out of the window. We already know the guys range is wider than jacks, so we dont even like a 10 high flop much. Therefore imo in the hand in question the play is to shove. why worry about our own desision remember this is for half our opponents stack which is a big injury to someone at this end of the tournament so we possibly do fold out AQ/KQ although a number of others maybe disagree with that.
Posted by The_Don90

cheers don, but this certain opponant is not folding AK,AQ,AJ,A10,KQ,KJ etcc here

Eyeman

To throw the "other side " in here. You can flat and get away from the hand post-flop - as long as you have the discipline to do that. You can raise, and fold to the re-raise.
In reality, it's a shove and hope. JJ for my tourney - I'm happy with that. Having flatted, you could have lost far fewer chips than the rest of us would!

Talon

   JJ is a very difficult hand to play. Simple facts are in a raised pot you have a good chance of being up against an overpair or  at least 1 overcard. There is then a 50% chance of an over card coming on the flop which you naturally dont want to see. With this hand of yours if it were cash or early levels in a tourny i might make a call and see what happens but at the stage you are at then it is a simple shove or fold scenario and i think the shove is the best of those options.

The_Don90

In Response to Re: How to play Jacks?:

In Response to Re: How to play Jacks? : cheers don, but this certain opponant is not folding AK,AQ,AJ,A10,KQ,KJ etcc here
Posted by iBLUFF

Ah, i didnt have time to read every single responce i may have picked it up if i did.

Again im happy to take a flip at this stage. If he has KJ, AJ, AT or a pair lower we're in even better shape.

DeucesLive

jacks are very much dependent on stack sizes- with the sizes as they are, with you on ~15bbs against a 3x raise, shoving is definitely my favourite option- in fact, it's what I'd be praying for. What ISN'T easy is when you have 15bbs and jacks in an unopened pot- you're now in that horrible grey area where opening and getting shoved on is a nasty spot, but open shoving 15bbs is too much. That spot I really dislike and hate playing. When it's already been opened, you have a big hand and 15bbs, the decision is simple. You're in good shape against most hands that look you up, and have a reasonable chance of increasing your stack by more than 30% for no risk.

As Talon said, in early stages I'll call with intent to evaluate flop/set mine. You have enough chips to make this play. In cash, I may 3bet with the intention of calling/folding to a 4bet, depending on how deep we are (if we're extremely deep, calling a 4 bet with any pair becomes profitable for implied odds- if you're only 100/150bbs deep it's probably best to just fold). Alternatively, you can flat the raise like you would in early tourney stages and re-evaluate flop.

grantorino

In Response to Re: How to play Jacks?:

In Response to Re: How to play Jacks? : I agree with some of your point here, ive italiced what i agree with. However ive bolded what i disagree with and i will reply below. As a player in tournaments i try to avoid "tough" desisions and ive never once ever felt ive sacrificed profit, infact ive actually argued with people because there was a shorty guarenteed to be in a hand once and a raiser before me who had me covered that folding my AK was profitable, where many would have said to shove. Now im not saying that i was laddering there, but i felt i could wait for a better spot where i could raise myself without the raiser before me. Therefore making my desisions easier, and not risking it on the line by trying to isolate a shorty when im most likey against 4 cards, possibly a pair (flip which i would take) but if they dont have a pair and say call with QJ and shorty has 78 suited im not favorite to win the hand any more. However in this case with the jacks, i dont feel a flat call is possible, an overcard is comming 57% of the time and we're just the right stack to justify a shove, we cant 3-bet,fold so theres that option out of the window. We already know the guys range is wider than jacks, so we dont even like a 10 high flop much. Therefore imo in the hand in question the play is to shove. why worry about our own desision remember this is for half our opponents stack which is a big injury to someone at this end of the tournament so we possibly do fold out AQ/KQ although a number of others maybe disagree with that.
Posted by The_Don90

Don, avoiding making tough decisions is fine, but not if it effects your profit. To take an extreme example if I openshove AA 100BB deep that makes the hand easy to play,its +EV but is it the most +EV move? Rarely, and you are normally making a big mistake if you do this. I know thats a kind of silly example, but the point stands dont sacrifice $ in order to avoid tough decisions.

The hand you have posted is nothing like this situation, and I think its a horrible fold (assuming you are not in some really unusual bubble situation) you would have to be really good to pass up that kind of edge, I also doubt a better spot will materialise that often. It also fails to illustrate you point, you havent avoided a decision, you just folded instead of shoving

I have no idea why you are not happy on a T hi flop with JJ this shallow. I also have no idea what you mean earlier in thread when you say we cant call because we dont have control in the hand

People seem to be misinterpreting my posts somewhat, I think shoving is best, esp given ibluffs reads. I was just saying that you could call with a plan to get it in on nearly all flops with good reads (I am not flatting because I'm afraid of getting it in). These reads might include stuff like -
raises very wide
has a very tight range for calling 3bets
cbets close to 100%

 It will certainly be higher variance, it may show a higher profit also. Very few people have given good reasons as to why shoving is best (I'll post my own in a bit). Saying oh but what if an overcard comes isnt good enough imo, if it does you should decide pre what way you are going to play on certain flops, overcards wont hit him that often if he's a wide opening range

DeucesLive

tbh, I know what you're getting at- but I think jacks just aren't strong enough to trap with, which seems to be what you're suggesting- they're extremely vulnerable postflop. With those reads, I know exactly what you're getting at, but I think you need QQ+ to be more confident in trapping, and then I'd agree wholeheartedly- in that spot, you want a full double up so I'm happy to flat preflop, check basically any flop and wait for the c-bet to fully commit my opponent before shoving on them. If I've then let them hit a set or 2 pair or something so be it, I'd still be happy to make the same move again in the future.

I think tens and jacks play so much better preflop than post though that you're much better off getting the decisions out of the way- I like the shove because I think enough hands will call us (raiser has 6k invested with 100k back, it'll cost him ~24k to call. Is he really folding A10/AJ/TT/99/KJ/KQ/AK/AQ there- all hands that we are either a slight favourite against or crushing? Set against that we have QQ/KK/AA that call and crush us. That's a massive range in our favour. Not only that, if he does have a dirty little hand like 67 or some such, we fold it out straight away and add 30% to our stack- that's never a bad thing with a hand like jacks.

If the board comes down AK3, can you really find a bet out of position with jacks? In position he probably can with 67, and can you really call that with jacks- knowing that any ace, any king and you're drawing virtually dead?

Those are my main reasons for just shoving and getting it over with- I think it's definitely a profitable move with what I'd perceive as his calling range. He may even call a fraction lighter than that and call with smaller pairs, which is even better.

grantorino

deuces while I agree with most of what you say there, we are only 56% against that range, most villains prob call some smaller pairs though

Also 67 folding is a really bad thing imo when we are this shallow. AKx is prob the only flop I dont get it in on, but I definitely get it in on nearly every flop IF I decided to flat pre

I basically shove always here though, as I have no flatting range, he calls with worse, he may fold with KQ sometimes and we add a nice % to our stack if he folds. Also he goes broke pre with hands that fold on lots of flops. I'm more thinking aloud could it be more profitable to flat pre with intention of c/r nearly all flops

DOHHHHHHH

Just read the whole thread.

Flatting is fine against this villain. 

Like most I prefer a shove though, just to balance as I'll be shoving wide here so gotta shove my monsters (JJ is massive here)

If I haven't 3b shoved yet, I wouldn't rule out  making it 13,921.89 to go then jamming almost every flop, especially if button is agro and capable of going bonkers.

He's probably really bad as I dnt recognise the name and he plays on sky, so you can get away with making plays which a decent player would see right through. He will flat rly rly rly wide, which wud make u feel sick if ur bluffing, but as we're so strong, we don't mind.

Shove pre though.

iBLUFF

In Response to Re: How to play Jacks?:

Just read the whole thread. Flatting is fine against this villain.  Like most I prefer a shove though, just to balance as I'll be shoving wide here so gotta shove my monsters (JJ is massive here) If I haven't 3b shoved yet, I wouldn't rule out  making it 13,921.89 to go then jamming almost every flop, especially if button is agro and capable of going bonkers. He's probably really bad as I dnt recognise the name and he plays on sky, so you can get away with making plays which a decent player would see right through. He will flat rly rly rly wide, which wud make u feel sick if ur bluffing, but as we're so strong, we don't mind. Shove pre though.
Posted by DOHHHHHHH

thanks for the responce jj, as you all know im not the best (really bad) player so i dont really have that much experiance with late stage tourneys so didnt really know what line to take here, i think i was playing it as i would at the start of a tourney.