Losing the Minimum With Top Pair
Today I want to share a hand from a $5,000 buy-in no-limit hold'em tournament that illustrates how it is often best to be cautious with top pair in a multi-way pot, especially when out of position.
This was in fact the very first hand of the tournament, and as I didn't know any of my opponents that meant I had zero reads to guide me. The blinds started at 100/200 (with a 200 big blind ante) and everyone had 50,000 chips to begin.
Action kicked off with a player in middle position raising to 500. It folded to me in the small blind where I'd been dealt K♣J♠. I could either call or reraise here, with reraising probably the better option, although in this instance I just called.
The big blind also called, and the flop came K♥5♣2♦ to give me top pair. I checked as did the big blind, and the preflop raiser continued for 900 (a little over half-pot).
Here again I could either call or put in a raise. But with such a dry board I recognized I shouldn't be bluffing very often, which in turn lessens my raising range. So I just called, and the big blind called, too. As I discuss below, since we are playing multi-way I am best served by treading with caution.
The turn was the 2♠ and it checked to the preflop raiser again. As I mention in the video below, that turn deuce shouldn't have helped him while it could conceivably have helped the big blind. Therefore, I wouldn't expect him to bet again unless he was reasonably strong, and in fact he did bet 3,000 into the 4,400 pot.
Now what? How would you play your top pair here?
Look at what I did and what happened next, and listen to my reasoning for my decision:
Folding here might seem nitty, but it was the disciplined play and resulted in my losing only seven big blinds — likely the minimum — with top pair.
Jonathan Little is a professional poker player and author with over $7,000,000 in live tournament earnings. He writes a weekly educational blog and hosts a podcast at JonathanLittlePoker.com. Sign up to learn poker from Jonathan for free at PokerCoaching.com. You can follow him on Twitter @JonathanLittle.
