Hey all, played this hand today and I'm wondering what folks think is the best line for getting the most value from this kind of hand.

I was playing really tight on this table (pretty card dead) at about 13/7/43. Villain was a known TAG, 23/15/70, but I only have about 100 hands on him and almost no showdowns so I just assume his range is solid from this position.

With the turn I expect I pretty much have the nuts minus running into TT and my goal is to extract value. Any suggestions/critiques are greatly appreciated!

No Limit Hold'em $0.01/$0.02
888 Poker
8 players

Stacks:
UTG - UTG ($2.23)
UTG+1 - UTG+1 ($2.37)
MP - MP ($1.27)
MP2 - Hero ($2.14)
CO - CO ($2.50)
BTN - BTN ($2.31)
SB - SB ($2.16)
BB - BB ($4.29)

Preflop: ($0.03, 8 players) Hero is MP2 with Q J
1 fold, UTG+1 raises to $0.06, 1 fold, Hero calls $0.06, 4 folds

Flop: Q 3 T ($0.15, 2 players)
UTG+1 bets $0.11, Hero raises to $0.26, UTG+1 calls $0.15

Turn: Q ($0.67, 2 players)
UTG+1 bets $0.33

Why are you raising the flop? What do you plan to do if he 3!s? The stop and go kind of looks like TT or at least AQ considering he raised from EP. I think you're beat here. AP time to fold but I think flatting the flop and turn would have been better.

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Fold pre. Qjo is just a weak hand compared to utg range. If you do play, play with caution in small pots trying to extract value from pocket pairs. Also I don't like the raise on the flop, you are inflating the pot with a mediocre hand. I don't think its worth charging them for equity when you could potentially make things much more difficult on later streets. You are also pushing a lot of worse hands out of the pot. Turn is fine, I think checking isn't terrible if you think your opponent is more likely to give you river value with Tx. There isn't really much you can get value from other than AA KK JJ Tx which aren't going to be happy about a big pot with 2 queens out there. Plus KQ and AQ and TT have you beat. So yeah, I would either check turn and 2/3 pot river or half turn half river depending on villian.

23/15 is an interesting interpretation of TAG. Im a bit confused what the 70 is? # of hands?

Fold pre, your hand is weak and easily dominated.

Call flop. Raising only accomplishes folding worse hands which you don't want. Also, raise size is pretty small which doesn't deny odds if they have AhKh for example.

Call turn. As played, Villain's range on the turn is pretty strong. Sure, AA-KK and maybe AK may still be in there but other than that, you are toast.

Call river or bet river if checked to.

Thanks for the advice all... I see now how QJo is dominated by most of his range and a pair of Queens isn't really doing very well on the flop. I raised because cbetting is often an autopilot move on these tables but I realize I could very easily been burning money against better hands.

That said... on the turn, aren't we way ahead? If I'm not miscounting there are four AQ, four KQ, and six TT hands ahead of us, six AA and six KK behind, and sixteen each of AK, AJ, and KJ that want to see a straight draw (and would have bet and maybe called a raise on the flop).

Forgetting the bad preflop and flop play, aren't we winning against 4 out of 5 (3 out of 4 if you want to exclude KJ combos) of villain's holdings and should be looking to extract value? I guess this only reinforces the play of calling the flop though, otherwise our queen is too obvious...

I guess I'm a bit loose on my definitions... is this looser than you'd expect for a TAG? Or just too much limping/calling? A lot of people play in this range on 2NL 888 and I've just taken to calling them TAGs...

70 is overall aggression... aggression factor was 1.8 if that's a more standard metric.

Average tag probably has lower VPIP and higher %PFR, yeah.

After calling pre you are probably ahead and he probably is cbetting autopilot here with everything he raises pre, yes. But by raising we fold out almost all his worse hands and we bloat the pot with a hand that's good but not great.

On turn we're likely to be winning but again think about what happens if you raise. He will likely fold a lot of hands that you easily beat and will probably not fold hands that beat you.

As an example imagine him having AA here. He may fold if you raise. If you call turn he may bet river himself, which is great cause you could still raise if you want and then folding would almost not be an option for him anymore. If he decides to check river you can still bet and get value - he's probably more likely to x/c your river bet than to bet/call a turn raise here.

But I actually think this guy likely has AQ or better and if you raise then you're in big trouble because you can't fold but you're almost dead when the money goes in.

So, only against people who you think will call you with anything or who seem to want to donate money, raising is a good option. Against standard looking players that don't make big mistakes, calling is better.

If you would have called flop, raising turn would have been ok.