How Strong is Your Limit Hold’em?

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Limit Texas Hold’em is a game you primarily only see in low stakes cash games or in mixed games? If you play Limit Hold’em, do you think your Limit game is strong? Check out a few of the scenarios and think about how you would play them. I will then give you a proper play.

A Few Common Scenario

In the scenarios below, we will cover both low to medium stake cash games and poker tournaments.

Scenario 1 – $3-$6 Limit Hold’em – You are on the button with Kh-Jh and two players limp in ahead of you. You limp, the small blind limps, and the big blind checks. The flop falls 2h-Ad-6h. The big blind bets $3 and the other two players ahead of you call. What do you do?

Scenario 2 – $5-$10 Limit Hold’em – You are in the big blind with Ac-3c and two players and the small blind limps. The flop falls Ad-10d-Jh. The small blind checks to you. What do you do?

Scenario 3 – Limit Hold’em Tournament – Blinds 5k-10k. You are on the button and look down at Ac-Jd. The small stack of the tournament raises and is all-in for 8,600 (less than a full raise.) The player to his right, the tightest player at the table, re-raises to 13,600. What do you do and why?

A-J looks pretty, but against an uber-rock?

Scenario 4 – $2-$4 Limit Hold’em. You are on the button with Qc-6c. All players limp in ahead of you. What do you do?

Scenario 5 – $2-$4 Limit Hold’em. You are in the big blind with Ah-7h against two players and the flop falls 7-7-K. You bet out and get called by one player. The turn falls another king and again you bet out again. You get called again and the river falls a 2. What do you do?

Scenario 6 – $3-$6 Limit – You have pocket aces and raise. Two players call the flop falls A-6-6. You bet out, one player folds, and the other raises. You re-raise and they call. The turn falls a K and again you bet out. This time the player just calls. The river falls another six and you bet out. Your opponent then raises. What do you do?

How I Would Play It

Now that you’ve had a chance to run these scenarios in your mind, let’s look at how I would personally react.

Scenario 1 – This is a classic flush draw scenario. Since you have a bet and multiple calls ahead of you, odds are you are presently behind. Often, I am going to call in this spot to try and hit my flush. Sometimes, I may put in a raise in the hopes of getting a free card on the turn.

Scenario 2 – In this spot, I am going to bet my aces to see where I am at in the hand. In this spot, I am sitting with a weak pair of aces and could be against players with flush draws, straight draws, or better. Betting will help me get a better idea of where my opponents are at in hands.

Gotta bet that weak ace to see where I am at in a hand.

Scenario 3 – I’ve been in this exact spot in the past. This is an easy fold. The reason is that the rock of the table just raised to isolate the short stack. Rocks don’t do that without a good hand. A-J is solid but against a rock that is probably raising with a likely pair, I will pass and wait for a better spot.

Personal History Comes into Play

Two of the remaining scenarios I have personally played in the past. Let’s take a look at how I played them.

Scenario 4 – I pulled this scenario from personal history. I made the call in this spot 8-1 on your money is always good odds for speculating. In this case, I got super lucky and hit a flush. It went four-way to the river for a nice pot. Of course, I got multiple complaints for playing Q-6.

Scenario 5 – I’m going to bet here and hope my opponent doesn’t have a king. If they raise, I will have to call. If I lose an extra bet, I will lose an extra bet. You have to bet your strong hands unless you have a good reason to believe you’re behind.

Scenario 6 – I’m going to be pumping the pot here obviously. There is only one hand that beats me in this scenario. If they have pocket sixes, then bless them. Of course, this is another scenario from my personal career – and they had the sixes. A day later, I had the exact same scenario and I took down a big pot when a player pumped the pot with an inferior full house.