Hi guys,

Villain opens 80-85% - cbets 80-90%

Flop is AQ6 rb

1. We have K9o , are you ever calling or cr with this hand?
2. Do you rather use a semibluff hand like JTo for a cr?
3. Are there any other hands you would bluff with here?

I guess most of you guys would answer with "it depends" , villain dependent . Does he second barrels alot, how does he reacts on an A high flop, does he go to war with you if you cr him, does he become weak after cr in big pot or not etc.

The truth is , I was Villain and my opponent cr with K9o , I opend with JJ he called. He checkraised the board above , I called. Turn was 8. He bets , I called again. The river was a K. He checks and won pot. He was pretty decent in my eyes, in my eyes decent was that he put me in akward spots a lot of times, instead of me controlling the match.

Same way I would have played it. You just got unlucky. Your opp missed bet on river. Hard to figure what he has you on(or setting up kr???). Ax i guess, but turn action should discount this imo. Per your last comment, maybe you should have tightened up your game, or left all together. Skilled loose players are very tough to beat.

Absolutely true, but sometimes I want to know if my game has gotten better. But the rake on the stakes I am playing , always wake me up fast and leaving the game with lightning speed.

On the other hand, if I don't know if his play was good, I maybe miss some valuable bluffing spots. I hope this make sense.

I think you outplayed him and he got lucky. Maybe the best play would have been to 3bet flop, but I dont have the nerve vs this board.

Bluffing not enough > bluffing too much.

Study hand histories to see if your game is improving. Very boring but very helpful.

If I think about all the hands I will not continue with, then his bluff with K9o looks good, not sure about it either. Anyway thanks for your help herbert.

I think villain played it poorly on all streets. Check raising the flop with king high doesn't make a whole lot of sense imo because i'm assuming you will never be folding a better hand but will continue with all your hands that are ahead of k hi. I would much rather peel in villains spot and make a decision on the turn based on my opponents barreling tendencies, opting to usually call down unless my opponent will often shut down after the flop c-bet if I peel on a dry board such as this. I would rather check raise with a hand that can't profitably peel. With a hand like jt (which actually does have some showdown value), I would still just check call the flop, and possibly the turn too if villain is known to double barrel light but often gives up on the river.

Spots like this are interesting, and imo the correct way to play them depends on how you play other hands in similar spots. If you are 3-betting most of your aces preflop, you don't have a lot of room to make bluffs on boards like this, since there aren't a lot of hands in your range that you can check raise for value. For my playing style, I call with a lot of my aces preflop and will check raise a flop like this with any ace or queen. This gives me the opportunity to throw in more bluffs with hands that completely whiff, since I do have a lot of value hands that won't be folding.

All of this is from villains perspective, the way you played the JJ was completely standard.

But what do I know, I never get to play this game anymore.

What he said. Unless the villain limps a very narrow range, and limped pf here, you're turning a showdownable hand into a bluff, one that's going to be difficult to get out of if it goes against you. 45% equity vs standard raiser on the flop with little chance to improve isn't the spot to balance your checkraising imo. It's too strong to fold and too weak to raise for value. And folding decent call-down hands here to a rebluff is hugely exploitable. There's other (lower) points in the range continuum to throw in balance.

Another point I think would be throwing middle value hands into your xr range could actually give a sharp opponent more information about your hand.

For example if you only xr weak draws and MP+ (including strong draws) type hands here your opponent won't be able to comfortably 3 bet you or turn raise you except with their strongest holdings. However if you start throwing in weaker showdownable hands with decent but not great equity, they can exploit that by reraising or raising you on the turn lighter knowing you'll be more disposed to call down with a worse hand and less likely to reraise.

I fold K9o here on the flop and it cannot be a big mistake IMO unless villain has super low second barrel frequency which is very rare.

Really? It seems to me folding the flop in this spot is pretty bad. Even if he 3 street barrels 100% you're getting 4.5 to 2.5 making your equity right. If the villain knows you're showdown bound in this spot and can adjust well that could be an argument against calling I guess but I doubt if its ever right to fold here although I would concede against good opponents it might be sorta close. But then again, why are you playing a good opponent at hu sslhe?

Because I don't play a good player, his opening range will be often tighter and hence my equity lower. I do not have at least two over cards to the second pair, so I fold. Ez game.

Yeah, opening range def matters particularly if he's a habitual limper and is only open raising 30% or something. But OP said he has an 85% PFR I think, would you call in that case?

no, I still fold. I find this "at least six outs to the second pair" criterion very useful and simple. So now this is too weak to call. Check raising doesn't make sense because we have some SD value. So fold.