I've been at this table for a few hours, and I've got a strong, aggressive image. People are showing and expressing some apprehension about raising because I might 3bet, and people were starting to stop straddling for absurd $10 bets because I was going after them a lot of the time. That said, people were starting to take more chances against me, thinking I was getting over-aggressive. I don't think I had the image of a maniac, but I think they felt I was being too loose with my raises. In truth I was just getting a lot of decent hands, and I started opening up my 3betting range when I started noticing how often these guys were folding to 3bets, or folding to flop cbets. Though when I say "opening my range" I just mean to medium pocket pairs and hands like KQo. hands that still might have some decent value post-flop.

Anyway, I'm in the small blind with AC. Villain is in late position, and seems entirely decent, tight and aggressive and not making any stupid plays that I can see. He's got me slightly covered, and I'm sitting on $500.

Villain raises to $17, and the button calls. Button has $64. I re-raise to $50. I'm not sure if I think this is small or not. It might be, but I was sort of discounting the button caller as mattering all that much due to her tiny stack size, so I mostly ignored her.

Villain looks over at me, and asks how much I have left in my stack. He says: "$300?" and then looks like he's about to muck his hand. I say: "No, I've got a black chip, so it's more like $450." And he thinks for a minute and then calls.

Button shoves for $64, and we both call.

$194 in the pot.

Flop is: 9TJ, giving me a gutshot straight draw, two overcards, and a flush draw.

I'm first to act. I could lead at this pot, but if I do and he shoves I think my decision is going to kind of suck, even with all my outs. This player has shown himself to make a ton of flop bets, however, and I feel somewhat confident that if I check to him, he will bet.

So, the question is, should I bet? If so, and he shoves, should I snapcall?

Should I check? If I do and he bets, should I call or shove?

Did button have 64 left behind after calling the 17 or start the hand with 64? If the former, you needed to raise to 49 so if button shoves, you can iso.

check/shove or bet/call are probably close to the same. bet/call is probably better, since if you plan to check/shove, he might screw the plan up with a player all in and check behind, which sucks for our holding.

Check/Jam, imo.

AC of clubs is a monster here.

Button had 64 total.

Bet the monster. We LOVE this flop.

Yeah check/jam is best. If we're putting money in we wanna get it all in on the flop when we have the most equity against his stackoff range, rather than putting in like $150 on the flop, getting flatted, and bricking the turn and not knowing what to do OOP. That would suck. C/shove works best with the stacksize and may induce some stupid b/f's from him to earn you extra dead money against BTN.

I checked, he bet $105 into $194. I have ~$436 left.

At this point, we pretty much have to shove, yes?

Yes. Any raise by u commits u so just shove and obviously flatting is lolbad since u miss turn often or don't get paid off when obvious draw comes in. U are never far behind no matter what he has

Open shoving is also fine as well

I would have raised to 65 pre to iso the short stack being OOP. As played I shove flop after his bet. He can really only call with a set, straight, or maybe TJ, and even if he calls you are doing pretty well against anything other than a flopped straight but still have the equity to call regardless of his holding.

I'd raise 40$ pre, so I can 5-bet if the shorty ships.

Pre there are 2 lines of play you can take I think that are both better than the one you chose.

You can either bet small to 40 and then make a large 5 bet over the buttons imminent shove, or raise to 75 to iso a small pot against the button. Going in the middle put you in this spot, which admittedly isn't a terrible spot, just one with some variance.

As played, any Q or club is an out most likely. His range here is heavily weighted to trips or QQ+, with a small chance of a lower pocket pair that is trying to bet you off.

Shove over the raise now, give yourself some fold equity, and if he calls, you still have outs.

Yeah, that's what I wound up doing. Checkraise shoved and he spent well over a minute seriously thinking about folding. He even flipped up his pocket 99's, showing me his set, trying to get a read off of me. Eventually he decided to call, because how is he going to fold a set ever, but it was still somewhat gratifying to know that he actually considered throwing bottom set away.

You see people tanking in spots like this all the time. IMO, 99% of them are

1. girding their loins for the big call, not actually considering mucking their set.
2. Engaging in histrionics to make themselves look less foolish(in their minds) when they call the AI against the higher set or flopped straight... I.e this way when you flip over KK they can say "I thought i might be beat there because im so mcawesome but i couldnt fold"

If you have a tight image and are playing against TP or LP opponents, its going to come closer to sucking than it does now, but its still not going to suck. With a maniac image, I bet this then call off my stack all night long.

If we know our opponent is going to bet if we check, i am fine with check/ship here.

I might take some heat for this, but im also cool with check/call. Especially if i think our opponent plays very poorly. Frankly, my hand is strong enough so that I am willing to play a turn here.


"most likely"?

Also, idk where you came up with this range, but if we are working within the scope of the OPs assumption (that V is going to bet any hand if checked to) then this range is way off.

I suspected he was set mining as soon as he asked me my stack size. In my experience, most 1/2 players contemplating a preflop call based on how much you have in your stack are trying to do the odds with cracking aces. And the fact he raised preflop made me think he had a decent pair, probably 88+.

I remember thinking when I saw the flop that it probably hit him, but obviously I couldn't know for sure, and felt my best chance was to check raise all in. I think you're definitely right though, and it's unlikely he would have ever really mucked bottom set there. Hindsight being 20/20 I think I prefer the check/call and reevaluating on the turn, but I just remember thinking at the time that if he didn't have a set, and the turn blanked out for me, he might shove the turn. So I dunno.

this is a monster flop with 13 outs to the absolute nuts and probably the best hand if an A or a K hits. I don't like to open jam here because its multiway and fold equity is non existent due to the sidepot. im either check shoving, or betting half the pot.