Playing Pocket 10's UTG?

[Rex Hornby]

This hand I seem to struggle the most with. Pocket 10's UTG.

I am playing on 6 seated, 25NL cash tables with a full stack of $25 and the other 5 players all have $15 to $30.

Here is my statement as to why I find them tough to play.

Pocket 10's are dealt to me UTG. I choose to raise around the standard 3X or 4X BB or sometimes I decided X5 or X6 BB if the table is loose and are calling raises but whatever I do I am still not sure about my hand when I get on a regular basis 1, 2 or 3 callers that always seem to end up with position on me. Then the flop comes down with at least one over card. Aarrghhh, this is so annoying as the pot now can be up to a few dollars. I am first to act, so since I've shown strength pre-flop I decide to continuation bet and make the bet anywhere from 60% to 75% the pot. You get called by one opponent. The Turn card comes and it is no help to you at all.

What do you do in this situation, even if you make a Turn bet around half pot that is going to be around $5, you would have then already put about $9 into this hand which is about 40% of your starting stack and you could be drawing small if not virtually dead. If you check the Turn & your opponent bets the bet you were going to do, it is very difficult to call it and even tougher to re-raise him, so you probably fold the hand and he takes the pot without showing the hand.

The other way I have tried the hand is by limping in from UTG and trying to see a flop, hoping I can catch a set and if there is any heavy action before the flop I can get away from the hand easy, but I find this a tricky play too because you potentially let in 5 other limpers who all see the flop and when the flop comes down 9-5-2 rainbow you can lose your stack because someone flopped 5-2 off suit who checked from the BB.

I hope you found the statement interesting. Please don't take into account the accuracy of the amounts as these are more a guideline to allow the full picture of a real life situation I am sure we all have been in.

Any comments as to how you find best to play the hand I would be most grateful.

PS – I have used Pocket 10’s as an example but I suppose A-J suited could also be considered in the same situation as both hands UTG, 6 seated cash tables are just too good to be mucked straight away.

Cheers Guys.

[loltrickedu]

A lot of your problems could be prevented by not cbetting bad flops, especially with an over card. Pot control it

Don't limp tt or AJ pf thats really bad.

[R8tme]

totally agree with LolTrickedU. No reason to cbet bad board against several limpers.
with TT you have showdown value, so try to get their cheap or if anyone is really passive and weak with blank turn fire delayed bet.

[mahhddgtp]

If you have several callers, I wouldn't worry about Cbetting an overcard flop. It's just spewy...

Assuming you get heads up, I'd say Cbet and try take to take it down. If he calls and he either has it or is able to bluff you, then nice hand.... But some newbies look to CR when they flop hard in situations like that. You may get lucky and he may check behind unless he hits pretty hard.

[no eff eks]

Flops with just one overcard are generally pretty good ones to c-bet into multiple opponents... We can check and turn our hand into a bluff catcher -- or we can bet and turn our hand into a bluff.

Turning the TT into a bluff is a lot better imo since we're going to be calling a bet then folding later too often if we check. Obviously there are some flops that are just horrible and we should c/f, but there are plenty of boards with an overcard (maybe two) that are definitely worth betting.

As for your raise size... you should really be making your UTG raises larger than raises from any other position. Make them as large as you want but not too large that you're narrowing any callers' range down to just premium hands. 4x is what I use, but 4.5x or even 5x isn't horrible at all.

[Billy]

with 1 opponent I almost cbet every flop, if called c/f on turn