2/5 PLO, $10 straddle often in play, though game has been playing somewhat passive with hardly any 3b preflop.

Stacks $1000 effective

Hero dealt AA98

$10 straddle on, 1 limp in front, hero raises to $40 in MP.
C/o, button, and EP call.

4 to flop ($160)
Flop J93

X to hero, hero bets $120. Only button calls.
Turn ($400) 5
Hero checks, button checks.
River ($400) 4

Hero checks, button bets $170.

Hero?

I feel like it is a clear call. Top wrap and other flush draws bricked. If you raise what are you getting to fold that you beat(maybe a small two pair, but that should be a very small part of his range)? Are you advocating a fold? As played I would call.

Call seems fine, especially with the check on the turn, although he could have two pair or backed into a straight. Is V the type to take a stab on the river? Does he think you can fold an over-pair? Reads are key here.

Pot the flop, fold river. You block all their missed draws, you have one of the worse bluff catchers.

I think virtually no villains will value-bet J9 here, and most will bet J9 when I check turn. Also, top wrap missed. Some villains are capable of value betting sets here, and of course, he could have somehow backed into something w/ A2 or 76. I ended up calling, will post results later.

Why are we not betting turn?

I expect villain has us beat here most of the time, but for the price calling isnt terrible. I also lean towards betting turn.

over limp pre, fold river

My reasoning for checking turn is: if we bet turn and get raised, we are usually (1) behind (2) not getting a good enough price to draw to the nuts, and (3) sacrificing considerable equity by bet/folding. We should be comfortable check/calling turn, though, because point (1) may not be true in a check/call scenario.

Also, raising pre is pretty mandatory.

Thinking about it again flop is a clear check (to check pot generally). If you do bet, I think it's better to just pot; there's just not much reason to bet a smaller amount as you're not trying to stab a lot with your range.

Disagree, I'm potting this flop all day and as played I think it is still a clear call on the river. Note, I would have potted turn as well though.

okay now you are just trolling mate

Yeah bad players love to cbet/bet too much, we all know this.

Our cbet% on this board has to be relatively small, and our check range needs to be protected by some check/raises. This combo of our hand in particular plays fairly poorly if flatted on a multitude of turns compared to other AA and NFD combos (having 3 clubs and not being able to turn significant straight blockers means we can't continue vs pot size on a bunch of turns and we'd underrealise in a bloated pot), so it would make a lot of sense to put this into a check, and instead bet hands that can continue on more turns (when called).

Which other NFD combos would you prefer to put into your x/r? I can't think of too many aside from super nuts, but a lot of the super nuts actually prefer a bet since set + NFD for instance block villain's betting frequency by too much so we'd probably want to bet anyway. If we do mix sizings at all we'd probably want to bet small with that and mix in some NFB + other future blockers, certainly not this hand.

If it's not clear, if you only bet all your NFDs and don't x/c any, then your opponent will have a really easy time betting non nut flush draws and not getting punished, so you'll need to have something here, and this hand seems like a very good combo to do it with.

I'm not even sure what you're laugh reacting to in the other comment. You realise we actually do have one of the worse bluffcatchers, or are you just entirely unfamiliar with what blockers are?

I c/pot flop sometimes but depends on co/button frequencies more then my hand. I barrel turn.. I definitely call river. Spot people over bluff because they have king high or bad one pair hands and don’t want to go to showdown and line they take with draws at a higher frequency because they usually bet value on the turn. Also small sizing is suspicious/weighted towards bluffs unles he’s going thin with like a weird two pair on river.

Pretty standard spot where a mix of call/fold is good actually.

I think very bad reasons for turn check.(3) bet/folding would be criminal.It s a 3bet pot,turn is a blank and you block mid pair and have overpair with nfd.If you re behind so be it.I would call river.

I lean towards folding. You massively block missed flush draws. You described the table as passive, which suggests they bluff less. A bet represents the backdoor straight coming in and most players don't bluff to represent backdoor draws.

It comes down to individual player tendencies. Does this player bluff a lot? How does he bet size when bluffing on the river?

It'd be funny if you call and end up chopping against the other two aces.

I'm leaning towards checking on the flop. Most of our outs are pretty clean, so we don't mind necessarily leaving other people in the pot who can show up with second best hands.

Results: