Big pocket pairs will usually be your biggest money maker…but, as you probably know all too well, they can also cost you an entire chip stack. To help you get max value and avoid costly mistakes, you’re about to learn some key tips for playing the three biggest pocket pairs in No Limit Hold’em. Let’s start at Pocket Queens and work up to Pocket Aces.
5 Quick Tips for Playing Pocket Queens
Tip #1: Don’t slow-play if you have an overpair multiway (especially when there is a weak player in the pot)
Suppose you raise with Q♠ Q♥, get 3 callers, and the flop comes J♠ 8♥ 3♣.
In this spot and ones like it, it is best to make a small bet to force out some of the other players and get some value. If you bet and face a raise, proceed very cautiously nhà cái N666.
Tip #2: Use big bets in heads-up pots when you have an overpair
Overpairs are great hands with which to bet relatively big. This is because they block only a few combinations of top pairs — and you really want your opponent to have top pair when you have an overpair.
That being said, if the board is very dry or good for your opponent, it’s still best to go with a small bet size to force your opponent to call with very weak hands (see: this article on flop texture).
Tip #3: Do not slow-play when you hit a set multiway
It might be tempting to slow-play your set of Queens in a multiway pot on a flop like Q-J-6, but that is basically gifting a lot of free equity to the other players. Imagine checking and letting a player with 98s or K9s bink their gutshot straight for free — that would be a disaster!
Unless the board has no flush draw possible and no straight draw possible, do not slow play. Just bet and thank me later in the comment section!
(Slow-playing with top set in a heads-up pot is a lot more reasonable, as I’ll cover in tip #5.)
Tip #4: If the turn makes your hand into second pair, you should usually check
When the turn is an Ace or a King, the value of your hand drops significantly. So, instead of continuing to bet, you should most often go in pot control mode by checking. Should you face a bet, you should probably bluff-catch at least one street.
But you can still bet sometimes…
When there are still a lot of worse hands in your opponent’s range that will likely call a bet, then making a small bet is probably best.
For example, suppose you 3-bet from the Button versus a Cutoff open. The Cutoff calls and the flop comes 9-5-3 with a flush draw. You c-bet when checked to, get called, and the turn is an offsuit King.
In this scenario, your Pocket Queens are often good enough to bet for thin value. Your opponent will have a lot of worse hands that can call a small bet (9x, TT, flush draws, etc) and you also deny equity (from hands like Ace-high) by doing so.
Tip #5: You can slow-play when you hit top set in a 3-bet or 4-bet pot (heads-up)
When you hold the top set, you heavily block the range with which your opponent would call a bet on the flop.
When you add the fact that the stack-to-pot ratio (SPR) is much lower in a 3-bet/4-bet pot, then increasing the size of the pot right away drops in the priority list. You can always just start betting on the next street and still get all of the money in by the river.