Again, the proposed line was not declared to be optimal. I'm not arguing that at all. I am suggesting that you can play this line and be profitable.

Again, you're arguing against some point that I'm not making.

I would suggest that you don't learn that much by playing the obvious straight-forward situations.

Why are you only winning 7 SB when you hit your pair outs? There's already more than that in the pot. (Edit -- See below!)

I emphasized the check-through frequency already. I think it happens quite a bit (20-25%) and is important. I also think that I threw in some gutshots as check-calls that maybe shouldn't have been there.

Even with that error, we're looking at a loss of only 1/3 SB for playing a line that's barely even trying to win money. I think the full and correct analysis should show this to be a winning call.

It takes a little bit of practice, but it's a skill that can be learned. A good starting point is to practice identifying the best and worst cards that can come on the turn/river. Then you can start thinking about the board texture and adding in categories of hands (cards that complete draws, cards that hit your opponent's range, etc.).

Whoops. I didn't see this when I was skimming before my previous post.

This is where some hand-reading stuff comes in. What is his range? The exercise that nobody has done yet (give villain a range and compute your equity, not change the board and compute the equity again) was designed to point this out.

If you bias villain's hand range so much that you think you're mostly facing overpairs, then when you change the board so that you flop top pair, your equity should still be weak. It will be stronger because you now have 5 outs to two pair/trips, but that's pretty much your only added equity. But I'm not sure that the same people advocating a fold here would advocate check-call, check-fold with top pair.

So I think there's a bit of a hand-reading mismatch happening. If you like top pair enough to try to get some extra bets in the pot with it against this opponent, then peeling has to be right. And if you think you're in such bad shape on the actual board that folding is obvious, you should be advocating a very weak line when you flop top pair against this villain. (And maybe you might actually do that. I don't know. But I'm pretty sure that most people here would be screaming for a check-raise attempt if you flop 9xx.)

This is basically what I've tried to say several times in the thread but never came up those exact words.

I'm peeling this flop with the villains, as described, but I already know which turns I'm donking before I peel. Besides just already having a plan, since you're first to act you need to be able to bet in rhythm.

Actually I'm not. I'm peeling this flop but I'm going to donk a J in the turn. You're not, so you should fold the flop. It's already very close and if you're not going to collect when you hit, then Calli has pretty much covered it better than I ever could

It should be pointed out that this is the kind of hand/board where you can probably get whatever flop decision you want just by doing a little fiddling.

Even bland Straightforward players sometimes realize this isn't a good flop for KJo and don't bet the flop. Does the OP matter to the Co? He may play tighter against players he thinks are better/worse than him.

What range does a generic blag have when he calls two pf and doesn't raise this flop? How often does he have to lolplay?

This isn't just an easy peel because 'we have the equity.' We often have less. It's a very close probably break even peel. If you're good, and can formulate a plan on the flop for the whole hand, it's a call. If you're bad and likely to not get full value or screw up the hand later, fold.

Which is why you need to be donking a ton of the cards that improve you on the turn. To turn in to an easy flop call you have to able to get max value when you win to make up for the times you end up peeling bad

What did we determine our hot/cold equity to be on the flop? 17%
Let's take that and round it down for the times we would have made a pair on the river but folded because the turn sucked. Let's go with 10%.
So take the -.31 BB and add 0.8 (8:1@10%j, and we end up with an easy peel at +.49 SB.

Actually, it's not that close. callipygian admitted that he did the calculation wrong on the first run. It's an easy peel with a pretty generic/simple line (worst case approach).

I still fundamentally disagree that you should fold if you don't know what you're doing. I think that logic doesn't inspire better thinking and better playing. It fosters weak-tight play.

Going to have to go with ZOMG on this one, as I think your PF range assumptions can pretty easily make this a better/worse spot. I think you can craft a CO range that is both reasonable and hurts your low board equity. The SF opener having a tighter cbetting range can beat you up. I probably made some contrarian assumptions vs the consensus of "snap fold" in my easy call reply. Once it is close, it is fair to point out that your assumptions about villain ranges can lead you to the answer you want.

I'm still happy with calling, but the spot is closer than I first said. Want to say thanks to ZOMG and calli for in depth analysis on the hand.

I agree with the line that you've quoted. However, this challenge still stands:

I'm moderately convinced (and can still be proven wrong) that if we flop top pair, that check-raising would be considered the appropriate flop line. But if that's the case, then a consistent range would tip this towards a call in the actual hand.

Good debate is good for everyone. I'm glad that there are people making the case for the other side because this is an interesting spot.

Here's my non-rushed analysis.

HJ is given 66+ A8o+ A6s+ KT+ QT+ JT+ (from OP)
CO is given top 30% minus top 10% from OP, which i'm putting in as 66- A7s- A4o-A9o K9s- K9o-KJo Q7s-QTs Q9o+ J7s+ T7s+ JT-87 based on lists of top 30%

The most important part here is that HJ and CO have JT Q9 K9 in their ranges. This is an assumption that will need sensitivity analysis later.

If we assume all outs are good and we get full IO, the sum of all combos is +1.23 SB.

AKQhigh flush draws comprise 23% of HJ's range and 25% of CO's range. Our 8 flush outs are discounted by 42% and the sum is now +1.05.

Better 9s (including 98) and hands that already beat 9 comprise 25% of HJ's range and 21% of CO's range. Our three 9 outs are discounted by 40% and the sum is now +0.59.

Better Js and hands that already beat J comprise 40% of HJs range and 19% of CO's range. Our three J outs are discounted by 51% and the sum is now -0.03.

Admittedly, this is a LOT closer than I thought it was.

I still think this is a losing play (we've assumed one player will call to showdown, which won't be true for their whole ranges; and also that we always see the river for 1 bet when we need to, which is not always true), but the fact that the sensitivity analysis (below) shows maybe like a +/- .05 on the major issues suggests that this is going to be within error of 0.

Taking out 66 from CO's range gives -0.01.

Taking out Q9o from CO's range gives +0.01.

Taking out Q9o and K9o from CO's range gives +0.06.

Taking out JTo from HJ's range (which I think should be done) gives +0.01.

Adding 44 to HJ's range gives -0.06.

Take a common scenario and fully analyze it away from the table. Use that as a benchmark when you're at the table.

Like for this you may take away that 1-card J-high flush draws are good 70-80% against one player and 40-60% against two. Non-ace overcards are worth about half their nominal outs.

At game speed you can think of it this way: three overcard outs, plus half for the BFD and half for the BSDs. You have 4 outs (which is about 16% equity) and are getting 8:1.

So you guys saying it is an easy call are counting your total equity for seeing two cards, but you only get to see one more card for the price of your call.

Some of the times you will fold turn but would have hit a winning pair on the river. I don't think Callipygian's conservative break-even analysis accounts for that possibility, though I might have missed something.

My analysis takes that into account but the preflop AI equity does not.

Thanks for doing this. It looks pretty good. The only thing I would nit away at is that it's still not considering the value of the turn checking through, which is really important when considering backdoor draws.

It ended up being a lot closer than my intuition was suggesting. (But I still think it's a winning play.)

This argument cuts both ways: if you have equity to call PF, that equity % does not reflect the assumption that you will fold an 8 high flop with 2 weak backdoors.

That is true. I think it's a pretty thin call preflop as well, and I would tell a beginner playing in a smaller game to just fold preflop, as I did when I started playing and for quite awhile afterward.

Preaching to the choir buddy. This specific hand and board though, even I am willing to give people a pass if they want to fold the flop.

Folding pf is awful

In a 40/80 game, yes. In a 3/6 game with high rake where most people only raise with their big pairs, no.

Preflop is a solid call. This is the type of advice pushes people more towards weak-tight play. (If you don't call J9o, what do you call with?)

In a 3/6 game, you're never in this situation. Maybe if you're playing the Tuesday morning octogenarian game at 10 AM. Maybe.

Grunch to say:

PF call is fine. On the flop it's a bet and a call I'd be thinking 'Hmmm....I have nothing except some maybe, maybe, everything has to work out ok, bleh, just fold.'

Too much overthinking itt, iyam.

Too much under-thinking you mean