Looking for advice/comments/feedback on two of the hands in this pot. One of the villains was a very good friend of mine and we spoke about the hand afterwards and he tells me he thinks he has played it badly where I beg to differ. I'll give a little background on the four players in the pot:

Villain 1 - VG friend of mine, we both playing TAG and respect each others raises, I know he won't get out of line, especially against me. Has played a straight forward game upto this point and it wont change this early in a tournament.

Villain 2 - Think of a maniac, then think 100 times worse. From a 15k stack at 25/50 (20 min clock), he got upto 75k in the first level stacking off 2 players with 53o to a 12x raise (467 flop). He plays any two, he will float with any two, no draws, just thinks he can bluff any turn and river etc, he rarely ever folds.

Villain 3 - First time i've played with him but he's absolutely awful. Lost 15 of his 23k a couple of hands before this where he called a bet and a raise and then a re-raise after him with QJo on a A34r board only to stack off the rest when a Q came on the turn. He has no idea what he is doing.

Stacks:

Hero - 14k
Villain 1 - 14k
Villain 2 - 70k
Villain 3 - 8k

Blinds 100/200

Dealt to hero [Ts,Tc]
Dealt to Villain 1 [Qc,Qh]

Villain 3 limps UTG, 1 fold, Hero is about to raise when Villain 1 raises to 600 out of turn. After clarifying the rules, Hero raises to 1200. Villain 1 calls, 3 folds, Villain 2 calls, Villain 3 calls.

*1200 is a standard raise otherwise I would get 8 callers*

Pot 4,900

Flop [2c,3h,4s]

Villain 2 bets 1300, Villain 3 calls, Hero raises to 3,000, Villain 1 folds, Villain 2 calls, Villain 3 calls.

Pot 16,900

Turn [7d]

Villain 2 checks, Villain 3 checks, Hero shoves 9800, Villain 2 calls, Villain 3 calls and is all in.

River [2d]

Hero shows TT for 2 pair
Villain 2 shows 74 for 2 pair
Villain 3 shows AJ for 1 pair.

Hero wins the pot.

---

Obviously I got lucky on the river, but it's hard to give Villain 2 a specific hand because he plays any two cards. No extra draws are completed or made by the turn so I felt safe to shove considering the other players reputations. Villain 1 told me how he thinks he has played it badly, but he gave me credit for AA or KK considering the way I played the hand. My response was that he had no way of knowing if he was ahead or behind because of my flop raise which commits him to the pot if he wants to find out where he is (as he needs to 3 bet the flop imo - although if he flats I think i'm behind, but there are two others in the pot).

I contemplated shoving the flop after the donk lead and call, but I obviously knew that Villain 1 had a strong range considering he raised out of turn and called my raise pre (88+ AJs+ AQo+). I explained that raising the flop got me all the information I needed from him because I felt he couldn't flat me on the flop. Neither of us knew where we were at against each other, but I had the position to act first.

He thinks that he's given me too much credit, but I said that vs the other 2 villains, TT plays the same as AA purely because i'm not worried about 2 overs with my tens (although hindsight shows I should have been).

Back to me, I was unsure on whether I played the hand badly or not. It's a rainbow board, but I can never be confident due to Villain 2 having a 432 flop well within his range. Once the turn comes and he checks first to act, i'm actually quite confident i'm winning and he has a hand such as 4x/3x or a gutshot of some description. It's hard to find a spot against someone who is constantly building up pots so big that the game loses its skill and I felt that even though I had one pair, I was infront a lot of the time. Looking for feedback on this though.

So, has Villain 1 made a bad fold considering his lack of information on me?
Have I made a bad shove on that board?

Sorry that it's long.

Against a maniac and a total fish who both build pots with nothing over and over just find a good hand, and play it decisively to punish them. The only real worry is your friend who pretty obviously started out with at least a good hand.

At this flop u might be up against the nuts already but its way more likely you are ahead against some weird draw so just go for it. Idiots will often stack of here with Ax, 63 and so on, and of course with 55-99. I think against this opposition you gotta take your chances and raise the flop, but bigger, 5K ill say. If your TAG friend shows interest you are in a tough spot tho... Stacking of right there is not that bad an idea also. As played push that turn for sure, you got overpair, only fish left, 10K to win 17K. You will get called by better but also by worse and if behind you often got a few outs. Most important, more often then not you are ahead but they got outs against you and you got to defend that big pot out there.

Then to your friend. Weird spot. Raise out of turn and still get raised by a TAG, then bet, call, raise on the flop. I still think he should expect you to be on to a overpair and rarely something else here. You would limp a small pair in this spot and never play some AX like this. The question is, what overpair? AA, KK possible, JJ down through what. I guess its a lot about what range he puts you on, and the fact that there is two other players in there to makes it a hard spot. He cannot test you with a raise cause it leaves him comitted anyway . Really tough spot now but i still think he should go for it. RR pre would had made things easier, but risky in this spot when you just raised anyway knowing he would raise... The hand turnes into a chicken race actually, and having position is now bad really! He sure must hate to fold QQ on a 4 high bord lol. But one thing is suspicious, if u had AA, KK and knew he would raise behind with sickos out there, would you not go for the limp and raise then? I think it should look to him like he can rule them monsters out anyway. He got 13K left and there is 10,5K out there and AA, KK does not seem to fit so go for it, Arrrinnnnn!

His raise out of turn is binding if it's possible for him to do that, right? In that case it should be obvious you don't have AA or KK because if you did, you'd flat, allow him to raise, wait for him to get a zillion callers, then reraise. Accordingly I wouldn't be folding to you on the flop.

As for your play, it all looks fine, obv you need to get it in postflop vs villains as described. I'd raise a bit bigger on the flop. The other way to play the hand is to go passive with it. Given your friend is making a relatively small raise preflop on a table full of spazzes, he's likely to have a pretty strong hand. TT may well not be the best hand. So it might be better to just limp and then call his raise, playing the hand mostly for its set potential.

Thanks for the replies, i've probably left a vital bit of information out that Villain 1 couldn't actually make any action preflop and that's where the problem occurred that neither of us knew where each other was at on the flop (or preflop).

Knulf, our thinking is pretty similar for my hand and although the turn can easily give someone 2 pair or a set, it's one of those spots where I was never not shoving because the chances are I was winning. Like you said, he's committed after he re-raises me on the flop and I think that he was thinking I must have been massive because obviously I knew he wanted to raise pre and I still went ahead and made a big raise, so I don't mind his fold from his perspective, but i've played it to rep AA/KK/QQ and he knows that's well within my range, so I think for him to shove the flop is very very risky.

Chris, sorry for not being clearer. After clarifying the rules with the TD, Villain 1 couldn't re-raise me, so I just opted to raise and have him call (which was probably not the best option). As for my play, I thought by only raising that much on the flop, it saves me money for when Villain 1 decides to shove, because we're unsure of his holding upto this point and he's yet to act. I felt I left myself enough behind to fold without taking a serious dent to my stack.

Not sure if the fact that he can't make any action pre changes either of your views, thought it may be a universal rule with the raise out of turn (don't play at many live venues).

The only friend game I play at the poker table is politely re-raising my friends to let them know I have the winner. So with that being said, I'd have RRAI'd you on the flop if I was your buddy.

Lol we've played with each other far too long (and talked too much strategy) to know either of us is ever going to spazz it off on that flop with worse than a hand like 99/TT. He probably does give me too much credit by putting me on AA/KK, but then again, if he shoves and I call with AA, he'd be kicking himself.

It's so hard to put someone on AA or KK. I guess this might be one of the very rare spots it might happen, but even then, I'd still get it in. The pot is way too big on the flop to not.