8 handed 2/2 game at casino. $5 button straddle in effect about half of the hands. Generally a bunch of dopes playing. I'm relatively new to PLO, but way better than most of the 'regs' at this table.

Me - lojack - about $550. Max buyin $500, I'm in for $900 as I am pretty flop dead, lost a big hand with flopped broadway plus NF draw, lose to boat on river. Image probably pretty tight compared to the dummies.

hijack - rec player known to gamble, has rebought a few times, has me covered with around $600-650

SB - weird guy who keeps buying in short and pumping up the action preflop. Has had no luck to this point.. sitting on about 90-100

BB - boring human, can't say much about him besides he wasn't very good. "liked to see flops" like all the other dudes. Had $250ish


OTTH: Goofy old guy to my right makes it $10 after a limper. I have AAK5 ... I raise pot to $36. HJ calls, then SB does dumb raise to $66, leaving him about $30 behind. BB calls. Old guy calls. I raise pot to (I think) about $335. HJ/gambler pauses but he clearly wants to see a flop and calls. SB obv calls all-in for his tiny stack, then BB also calls all-in.

**my main question, as someone who generally avoids small edge/high variance plays** - was my play standard? Or should we only be 4 or 5-betting preflop with the more valuable AA hands... suited aces or all broadway cards, etc... I was thinking that my giant raise to over $300 would push out the HJ and I'd be all-in 3 ways, but he called (I wasn't shocked, but mildly surprised)


Flop (about $1000): 456 *question 2* - while not a 'good flop' for my hand, I have to shove my remaining $200ish in correct?

Thanks

WP if you jam flop

pot sized raise is to 367. this is a disastrous flop but with just one other player with money behind and SPR of 0.2 you can go with it. Hey, you still have back door boat possibilities.

Re pot size.. thanks - my memory of the stacks, etc is a bit fuzzy, but it's fairly close.

Results: I did shove, and HJ sighed and called it off (I knew it was a bad flop, but I felt pretty good knowing I was likely going to be good for the big side pot).

LOL you called it... Turn 5 ... River K

The SB looked shell-shocked as he flipped over 7-8 for flopped nuts. The other guys didn't show, but Fives Full of Kings was winner winner hooray.


Other opinions on 5-betting this hand preflop? I was thinking it was the best way to either close out the HJ or make him pay to play against me with a very low SPR. Obviously worked out... mostly curious if some prefer to play 'bad aces' hands like this one slower preflop vs the stronger suited/broadway ones.

Definitely play it fast preflop if you can get half your stack in there. If your pot sized raise is like 1/4 of your stack or less, you can start calling when the aces aren't doublesuited or well connected. Always 5bet good aces regardless of stack sizes.

insta jam any flop yes

yes it is good to get most of your stack in pre with aces

Does the fact that there are four people in the hand change that calculation at all?

Yes. Everyone putting extra money in gives us a few more bucks ev money, but also makes it overall less likely that we win the hand.

But that does not matter.

Lets say we put 100 bigs in heads up with aces and are let's say 64% to win it, that means we are 64% in a 200b pot. meaning we show +ev of 28 bigs.

Let's say we in 100 bigs in a 5 way pot with aces and are let's say 26% to win it, that means we are 26% in a 500bb pot. meaning we show +ev of 30 bigs.


Maybe play around with propokertools and a calculator a bit and you will see that it is definitely profitable to shove aces pre almost no matter what. The multiway-er it gets, the higher the variance is obviously. but you ev is always enough to stick it in.

That makes perfect sense, thanks.

This hand is not very good preflop, so I don't see a reason to 3-bet to begin with. You are normally just getting called and it leaves you in a very awkward spot postflop with a bad SPR for the hand. Calling is better and trying to flop a set. Else, wait for someone else to raise then you can try to jam it in.

Obviously on this hand you just ship blind. However even if the SPR were a little bigger, you're still going to. Hitting the 5 helps you quite a bit by the way.

Thanks. So you would argue against my initial 3bet, but the 5 bet does makes sense sit it lowered SPRs to below 0.5, yes?

And - lol - yes I'm aware the 5 helped me 'quite a bit' (but not really until the K came on the river!)

nah **** that getting money in pre is always good.

-so you whiff and have to check fold a scary rundown board, so what.

-alternative is limp, catch a set and everyone folds

-or you catch a set on a flushed board and get no value.

-or you catch nothing, but your AA is still good but you have absolutely no idea and have to play passively.

you played the hand fine. when we do raise and connect hard we're going to stack one or multiple players, if we miss then we've put in (assuming no 4b) 18 bigs. no big deal. some boards can even be so dry, or paired that we can take them down with a standard cbet.

once the 4b comes in, fist pump and pot and then jam any flop. well played.

Would you guys play OP's hand same way if he had two red aces or no As?

If the SPR on the flop is 0.2 then I don't even look and shove.