In everyones experience playing 1/2 are small river bets often for value? (I'm talking 1/4-1/3 pot bets). Here is an example:

1/2 NL 9 players.
I hold AcJc on the button

UTG straddles for 4. 3 limpers. I raise to 16. 2 limpers call. First villain is loose and second is relatively tight

flop: Kd10d4c

limpers check, i bet 35 and the tight villian calls.

he might be on a K or 10. Up to this point he has been playing relatively straight forward: bet his big hands big so I discount sets. He could have a straight/diamond draw.

turn bricks off 2h

at this point I dont think another barrel is forcing a fold. board didnt change. I figure Ill try to draw a Q and if he checks a scare card to me I can fire a bluff barrel.

villian checks and I check

river: Jh

he bets 35. Recall the pot is about $125.

I had 2 conflicting thoughts:

1. he sensed weakness when I checked the turn back and hes betting 10s, a j or maybe a busted diamond draw (Ax).

2. He might also be thinking a weak Kx is good and making a small value bet.

3. he made a good hand on the flop or turn and was hoping to c/c the turn. when that didnt happen he needs to bet into me but is scared I will fold to a bigger bet.

I call and he shows K10

I made the call thinking I was good more than a quarter of the time. The bet size was so small....

as the session wore on I realized that live 1/2 bets are much smaller proportional to the pot.

Anybody with live experience please post!

Wiki_Leaks

Welcome to the forum. This is very villain dependent. In my experience often times these are value bets with marginal hands (top pair no kicker, second pair, etc.) or bad bluffs. One common theme among bad LLSNL players is they don't really understand the concept that even if you are 99% sure you have the best hand, if the only time your bet gets called is the 1% of the time you are beat, then it's a bad bet. I've seen many players bet hands like T9 in this spot. Often times it gets them a fold, but occasionally it gets snapped off by a passively played K. In this case you now know that this guy will under-rep his hands pretty massively, so watch out. Also, someone who limps KT and then calls a raise OOP with it is not a tight player. They may be tight relative to the rest of the table, but you will be making money off of these guys.

If you're an online player transitioning to live, then yes, in general live bets are smaller in pot proportion. You'll also learn that your preflop raise was way too small. $25-$30 against a $4 straddle and 3 limpers would have been much better. This was also a marginal c-betting board as well. With a loose player in the hand, a flush draw possible, and a board that is going to somewhat connect with the limp/calling range of these guys, I probably don't fire. If it was heads up I could see it, but 3 ways I'll take my free draws and see how this plays out.

$125 pot for the 1/2 games I've seen is a good sized pot.

It probably got that big because someone really liked their hand somewhere during the course of the action.

Not likely tight villain is calling with a T.

Not likely second pair is good on the river.

Had you raise been higher as Koss suggests, and you still got called post flop, you might not think enough of your second pair to pay off a small river bet.

Some 1/2 games people play ATC in big raised pots.

I haven't found them.

good stuff, thanks guys.

Koss, i think the CB advice is solid. I found that my CB hardly worked during this session, as the table was loose and 3+ way action was very common. Even if I open raise in the CO or BUT it would often end up multiway.

Since more people are entering the pot, I should

a. raise higher given how many have entered the pot
b. be more selective about which textures i CB (avoid wetter boards) when MW


Nozsr, I see your point in that I raised higher I would have a better idea of villains hand strength. PF he was getting pretty good odds on a call given action was closing.

I should feel comfortable raising to 25 with AsJs? My stack was about 200-225 to start he hand and villain with kings up had a deep stack (400-500).

These small bets are very villain dependent. Because in addition to the things you mention above, you will run into 1/2 players who have no idea how big the pot actually is and just think $35 is a good size for a river bet with anything they think is a good hand. The bet here also might be a blocking bet with a weak KX or a good TX hand that wants to see who has the best hand cheaply.

Any of these are possible, but because you don't beat most blocking bets this is probably a hand that beats you more often then not. Paying attention to figure what this sort of small river beat means is important at 1/2 because villains are bad in so many different ways. Against an unknown, I would call with second pair sometimes against ones that seem aggressive but fold to the average tight villain.

I just read your post again, and this is me all over. I will mindlessly mash the bet button without actually thinking about which worse hands will call! I need to lose this habit, because its an expensive one.

I appreciate everybody's feedback

Wiki_Leaks