Uber maniac (UM) who plays 90 percent of his hands opens, I three bet black 88, decent button caps, spot in small blind calls, good lag in bb calls.

Flop is T42 all spades.

UM donks, I call, button surprisingly folds, blinds call

Turn 2x. Same action

River Qx. It checks through

Raise the flop.

Well played. My goal in this hand is to try to get to showdown and you did it.

I think this is OK, but a lot of hands are going to take two to the face here, and often UM will then 3! after that happens, and all of the sudden we are in a pot even more bloated than it already is and kind of stuck getting to showdown with a hand that is severely devalued given that action. In other words, our relative position sucks.

I'd much rather call the flop bet and evaluate what happens behind. Here, where it just goes call call, my plan is to raise safe turn cards, like this meaningless 2x. We are still ahead of UM's range and our turn raise has a much better chance of folding out some hands that should probably call and charging draws the max. When the flush doesn't come in we frequently have the best hand, and when it does come in, sometimes we forced a better flush out of the pot and we end up scooping with the 8s.

Call the flop, raise the turn. This is almost the example in small stakes Hold’em if memory serves.

+1

If I’m not raising the flop it’s because I’m waiting to raise a blank turn like this one.

Is this turn raise a fsdr?

No. It really depends on the action after you raise, and what the river card is, but I'd be betting a lot of rivers for value, especially where it's heads up vs. the UM at the end.

Raising the flop is bad. You still have the capper and two players with uncapped ranges behind you. Just call and see how the action goes. Your raise isn't gonna adequately protect your hand in this huge pot.

Not raising the turn is horrible. You have a maniac betting into you with presumably a wide range. You still have two players behind you and your hand is extremely vulnerable. The pot is huge, you must be optimistic here. Now is the time to protect your hand.

+1

Vs described Uber Maniac, I typically cbet river if heads up when playing vs Uber Maniac even on the run out as played by ninefingershuffle.


Resulted in optimistic river raise with straight air by Uber Maniac when 9 handed, 3-6 handed based on small samples of 1-3 sessions I've had chance to play vs Uber Maniac in Heads Up pots.

-Info on Uber Maniac-
Uber Maniac typically loses around 8k-5k per session per regs & pros in 20/40 half kill game I play in.

NOTE: Uber Maniac also has tendencies to fast play air on flop (ex: 85 suited with 2 backdoor draws on flop on Kxx on flop then keep betting & raising turn & river unimproved).

Uber Maniac noticed when 3 handed vs another LAGTAG 4-6am was being induced to bet when checked to, started to comment but did not switch way played of raising postflop 99% and open raising 99% preflop.

I still think way Ninefingershuffle played reduces variance the best vs Uber Maniac type players that were common in Commerce in my experience.

However, I still would rather push equity edges if I think Uber Maniac willing to call down light and/or bluff raise light on flop, turn, or river.

Tldn think delay raising until blank turn best & value betting river 99% of rivers vs Uber Maniac described by OP / Ninefingershuffle.

Agree. Raising the turn puts a lot of pressure on the blinds so if we can get it HU vs the maniac I’m betting tons of rivers for value.

+1

Uber Maniac will check/ call river 9x, Jx, Kx, Ax.

Uber Maniac may raise above on river & 8x, 7x, 6x, 5x (ex: 53o).