Feb
08

Why Should Should Avoid Limping In Poker Tournaments

All players limp now and then for one reason or another in tournaments. Limping seems week, because ordinarily the act of calling waives control of the hand to someone else at the table. But is limping a viable strategy when all of the poker training you hear about online always slants to play more aggressive?

Well you’ve probably heard this one before, but the answer is of course “it depends”. There is to be sure, a strong argument to limp in certain situations. The problem with limping however, is that naive players tend to do it excessively, and from the incorrect position. Repeated limping in early position in online poker tournament is a recipe for losing.

There are two huge factors that make early position limping costly. Players that still have to act can throw a big surprise by re-raising. Oftentimes you will be forced to call a raise because you have committed yourself to a proper mathematical call, with a average strength hand. In the early stages of the tournament you should not really be paying too much attention to mathematically proper calls. You should be giving far more care to preserving your stack and identifying profitable chip up situations.

The second problem with limping is simply that most flops will not even give you a pair. In fact only around one in three flops will pair with one of your hold cards. And of course when you miss the flop, you risk your opponent taking control of the hand with a post flop raise, putting you in a tough spot.

Now you can use limping to your advantage however, and this is virtually always done in position or in an effort to set a trap. Good players in fact, will use this as a tactic with the purpose of out-playing their adversaries after the flop, while utilizing pot control and profiling. Still however, if your normal starting chips are only fifteen hundred you’ll won’t have much room for error, so strategically, limping is better in order to keep your costs low.

Often when you see players limping when the blinds are low, you can put them on small pairs, suited connectors or ace-rags. If you’re holding a decent hand like a big pair or big slick, you can often take control by reraising. A continuation bet after the flop will then likely win the pot assuming your oppont misses the flop.

Learn how to play poker, improve your strategies, and find the best online poker sites online at Best-Poker-Sites.net. Looking for the highest poker deposit bonuses and rackbacks? Check out Bonus-Code-Poker.net

Share and Enjoy:
  • Digg
  • Sphinn
  • del.icio.us
  • Facebook
  • Mixx
  • Google Bookmarks

Tags: , , , ,

Related Entries:

Leave a Reply

Recent Post

Categories

Archives

Links

Meta

Your Ad Here