10-25 late at night, 4 handed. Villain sat down about an hour ago, has been pretty active, and has been bemoaning his bad luck as he's played fairly fit or fold, and so far he hasn't found any hands in the "fit" category post flop. Hero is playing fairly taggish for 4 handed, hasn't gotten out of line at all, not even sure I've shown down anything since he's sat down.

Hero has 3K, villain covers by a lot

Preflop, hero raises UTG to $75 (standard preflop) with AK, Villain calls from SB, BB calls as well (young TAG player).

Pot is $225
Flop is AJJ.

Checked to hero, I bet $125, villain c/r to $300, BB folds, hero calls


Pot is 825
Turn is 4. Villain bets $670, hero calls

Pot is 2165
River is 2, villain shoves

Should we be 3 betting, and if so, how do we respond to a 4 bet? Should we be folding the turn here, and if we are calling turn, are we calling river on all blanks? Thanks in advance

Flop call is good because he could have a weird AK; 3 betting is spew. It might actually be a fold but I am too lazy atm to do the math.
Turn is a fold because he is not sizing that with AK and he has at most 3 combo draws to go with 5 boats and who knows how many jacks.
River is probably pretty marginal either way.

If you can't bet/fold or bet/call confidently, you should check back flop. Sounds like against this dude though you can just bet/turn your cards up and fold and make him cry even more...

Fit or fold means he has JJJ here, no?

Well said, and though it is obvious logic, sometimes it needs to be spelled out just like that so we can internalize what it entails. Ridding the attachment of the dynamic, and progressing from a subjective point of view to an objective perspective, where outside the box thinking now becomes possible...and leaks spotted.

I don't think I'd be so quick to make that assumption given the game's shorthanded, he's been pretty active, noticeably irritated bemoaning his bad luck, and sitting on a healthy stack (at least relative to his competition). Seems like a ripe opportunity to watch him misstep/overvalue/spew.

I'd just be weary of investing too much into, "he's played fairly fit or fold, and so far he hasn't found any hands in the "fit" category post flop", given the collection of variables in play, and not be bound to such a strict interpretation of his recent play (sample size: about an hour ago). Not to mention, we are/perceived to be playing fairly tight given the conditions, and combined with him being active it could/will create clashes, which creates both opportunity, and temptation. The game being shorthanded often elevates many of the variables in play to hyper levels, creating 'out of character' plays, if not out of necessity, desperation.

Ace of hearts eliminates a bunch of flush draw possibilities. Then again' not sure how many jacks he has in his range either. I probably puke fold

No it's actually awful logic. It's perfectly reasonable for bet/fold to be close to bet/call while checking back is by far the worst play. I'm not saying that in this hand checking back is bad, I'm saying that just because bet/fold and bet/call are close in terms of ev, concluding that we should check back is just absolutely horrendous logic.

I would check back flop a lot by default unless I had a reason not to.

As played I fold river, Turn is close but I might peel turn.

Your interpretation of that quote or understanding of mine seems to conveniently leave out or dismiss a key adjective. "If you can't bet/fold or bet/call confidently, you should check back flop". If the only options at our disposal are to b/x or c/x (not even broaching what x needs to be in this instance for the moment), and we can't b/x with enough confidence** to know we are making the correct EV play, aren't we left with c/x as our options? This is all I was simply saying, and why I also stated that the logic was obvious.

**I interpreted the use of this word to mean that in the moment, we could not calculate accurately enough what our EV for b/c'ng and b/f'ng were, and ultimately making the incorrect decision between those two options would be worse than checking...even if checking is inferior to the "correct option".....which we don't know what it is. What it doesn't imply, is that if we don't know the EV of b/c vs b/f then c/x must therefore be superior.

I am not nor did not conclude that c/x has a greater EV than b/x on the merits of, not doing the latter ultimately means the former must have greater value. I was simply saying that verbalizing our options often times makes us think more critically about what those options mean and what we can/should expect moving forward. "sometimes it needs to be spelled out just like that so we can internalize what it entails" doesn't say anything about its EV here, or in general. It simply refers to giving thought to an option that may at first glance not seem to warrant one, or just be quickly dismissed because of it's foreign nature (see: non-standard).

And who's to say that after thinking about our checking options we may not come to the realization that b/x was after all our most profitable play? The reason I made a comment was because too often we neglect to think about our entire realm of possibilities, assuming we must take a specific action, since it's usually the most common/profitable one to take in similar situations. If we extend that logic out, we may find that we never even broach thinking about checking the flop (and what becomes of that line) here and now because it is not the norm. We falsely categorize EV to spots without fully thinking them through.

But here, playing shorthanded, with the beginnings of a dynamic laid out, we may find that checking has more merit than first glance, and dare I say mayyy carry the most EV of all the options? Sometimes our winning hands are capped (and sometimes we'd like to cap our losing hands). If we can't/won't get 3 streets of value from an inferior holding than maybe flipping the script, relinquishing initiative, inducing, or just giving a small leash before tightening it again (think checking flop, raising a turn bet) may be the ticket to maximum extraction here.

jlocdog. you're not always right about this. what if betting is +EV and villains will only ch/r 1% of the time. we don't know whether calling or folding to the ch/r is better, but it only happens 1% of the time so the +EV bet outweighs the -EV ch/r situation that happens 1% of the time.

This is a fairly wa/wb spot. I don't bet flops in wa/wb spots when my perceived range is narrow and slanted towards bluffcatcher (due to the UTG open) unless I have a very good reason/grasp on the situation...

If I'm against someone very likely to bluff the paired board (for a variety of reasons), I will bet this hand, knowing I'll call or reraise his raise before I do it. The dynamics just make it correct IMO to stack off the bluff-catcher 120 bbs deep.

If I'm against someone who will c/r wide but give up on the turn as a general rule, I'll obv bet/call and then just fold to a turn barrel. And so on.

If I'm against someone I'm pretty sure will only c/r with trips+ on the paired board but will read a lack of Cbet as pot controlling Ax (and will think if I do Cbet it's polarized and therefore will call me down light), I will bet/fold like I had air no prob.

But in all these situations, I have a pretty big edge in the hand (knowing my opponent's likely reaction before I make my move) and a very good reason to bet (to extract much greater than face value by inducing bluffs or light calls). Absent of these reads or dynamics though and my perceived range from utg is just too narrow and face up to bet IMO. I don't really cooler any of villain's range (he's never going to raise and barrel off worse for value), and more importantly, I have hardly any bluffs in my range. Because of this, I would be highly unlikely to get 3 streets of value (or even 2 if I bet flop).

Also, as mentioned at the beginning of this post, I believe my range is too slanted towards bluff-catcher to bet. My opponent inherently (due to his position, image and pf line) has enough trips combos in his range to c/r and barrel off as a bluff pretty profitably if he thinks I might be decent and not in the habit of stacking off 120 bbs with bluff-catchers for no good reason. Then again, I wouldn't know if he's prone to being this aggro or not- maybe he just "has it" if he c/r's this flop.

The whole point is that without proper reads or dynamics, betting flop becomes too thin and exploitable (and really just a guessing game) and my edge in the hand is gone. At which point I prefer checking back the flop to keep the pot small and my hand underrepped, in hopes of getting thinner value on later streets.

---

Op said villain was fit or fold, so that's my read in this spot. Op also said his own image is tight and solid. And yes villain is verbalizing his frustration about not making hands, but since he hasn't gotten out of line yet, I will only slightly raise his bluffing frequency in this spot- which was very low to begin with. I will however raise his light calling frequency a considerable amount, as that is typically the first adjustment made by frustrated fit or fold players ime.

Those are the reads and dynamics. I also personally really like to balance my cbets in short-handed games. Therefore in this particular spot, I'm bet/folding this flop and never looking back.

bamboo, Are you sure you're accurately reading/defining what I wrote?

I was not implying that checking is right because it offers a greater return than betting nor am I saying that "just because bet/fold and bet/call are close in terms of ev, concluding that we should check back". The word confidently has meaning and context. In your example you offer 1% of the time we may face a c/r to instill your point. Well, if that is an accurate % we deem our opponent to make this play in this situation (and for simplicity, ignoring/discrediting factoring in the calculations of our EV of checking the flop on the merits of deception/inducement/etc..), than I think we would be fairly confident in our play, wouldn't we?

Change the c/r to a greater/more impactful % or even evolve the hand past the flop and try and calculate his % of getting tricky on the turn/river (either by leading into us on turn and barreling river, c/r'ng the turn, calling turn and shoving river, or c/r'ng the river) and we can now see our nice neat % we ascribe for fear of being played back at on the flop is just the tip of the iceberg. Vs some opponents and/or in some circumstances we can in fact narrow these simulations down to a % that allows for us to confidently make a play based on our assumptions. And when we are wrong and we do get played back at, we don't begrudge the results, but rather commend our educated, evaluated risk and stand by our convictions. But you can't hold convictions without confidence, as they then cease to be convictions.

And again, I'm not even inferring we can't narrow these simulations here and determine our most EV play. All I said was that in the times we can't, i.e we have gone through the progressions and still come to no clear consensus, than checking is the play...because it's the only play if we don't bet. I then tried to further explain why such an obvious point was well said with, "It simply refers to giving thought to an option that may at first glance not seem to warrant one, or just be quickly dismissed because of it's foreign nature (see: non-standard)."

If we find ourselves lacking confidence in our decision making on a regular basis than that is a whole new conversation that should be emphasizing stepping down a level or taking a break and evaluating ones play more deeply, so we can be more confident in our decision making. But we all invariably find ourselves in spots where we do in fact lack the confidence to know what the right play/progressions may be and those times often end up on this forum for critique and analyzation.

edit to add- very nice post itisnice.

Thanks for the replies guys.

I called and he showed me J7o

You totally misplayed and overplayed your hand IMO.
Check back flop as people said it (even if it sucks because we will somehow be face up if we bet turn vs the good player).

Vilain was a huge fish if he wasn't scared of value cutting himself against AA or JT+. (but yeah when you play J7o from the sb calling one already knows you're a huge fish )

Also the 3 way pot (and BB hasn't folded yet obviously) factor makes me think he won't bluffraise a lot (maybe raise with a fd or combo draw but no complete spew) + a guy who was been whining about not making hands will (but maybe im totally wrong) not suddenly decide to bluff after check folding his way to this hand (one could argue he may have gotten impatient and forcing his way but i think it will be more often that not a J)

I think this is wrong. It is very easy to envision a situation such that you can determine that betting is superior to checking but still not know what to do when raised. In fact I'd say they're rather common.

By all means, please offer an example.

Seriously? There are tons of them.

E.g. If you expect Villain will c/c twenty times more often than he will c/r. If you know your bet is very profitable whenever he c/c's, then betting >> checking even in the absence of a plan for when he raises, because that instance is so rare.

Specific example: AA vs. huge nit on 7 2 2 flop. Let's suppose every time he check raises he has sevens full or quads, and suppose also that I know for a fact that I don't have the discipline to avoid losing my stack when he c/r's. It's still more profitable to bet than to check back, even though by hypothesis I'm going to play my hand 100% wrong when he raises.

I open KQs UTG, nit who I don't know very well calls in the BB. Flop Q84r, I cbet, he raises. Now, my standard would be to call. But there are nits who are never bluffing here so this may very well be incorrect. I'm not sure. That doesn't stop a bet from clearly being superior to a check here. Any 8, any worse Q, 99-JJ and potentially some floats are all calling. Just because I'm not quite sure what to do on the rare occasion that he does raise doesn't mean that I shouldn't bet.

Imaginary- Umm, ok, please offer one then. And please keep in mind the sentence I quoted..

OfCourse- In your example you are giving a situation where you are fairly confident in the % of time you will face with, "If you expect Villain will c/c twenty times more often than he will c/r", and "AA vs. huge nit on 7 2 2 flop. Let's suppose every time he check raises he has sevens full or quads"

Again, I think people are either misinterpreting what I wrote or just ignoring a key aspect of the sentence quoted. Again here is what I quoted: "If you can't bet/fold or bet/call confidently, you should check back flop".

I went into detail how I interpret the word confidently in this context in my post to bamboo (post #11).

RosaParks- In your example, I don't see how anyone would interpret that situation to not be a confident bet on the flop, regardless of the results. I speak of that here:

"Vs some opponents and/or in some circumstances we can in fact narrow these simulations down to a % that allows for us to confidently make a play based on our assumptions. And when we are wrong and we do get played back at, we don't begrudge the results, but rather commend our educated, evaluated risk and stand by our convictions. But you can't hold convictions without confidence, as they then cease to be convictions."

Open QQ pre MP, a bit stationary player pre and post but otherwise decent calls from sb. Not out of line by any means (still obv losing). Own image tight/reggish.

Flop J85r/J83ss/T54s or something, I c-bet, turn 6d without filling the flush, I barrel for value. I might have absolutely no clue what to do against a raise when I bet (probably not even on the flop in some cases) but I know for sure that betting is correct to get value out of 30+ top pair combos.

I tend to have at least one of that kind situation in every session (online poker 6-max mostly lol though). Sometimes I figure it out after session after I identify it and go into what-if mode, which leads me either figuring out or facing that I would have winged it and I still have no clue. Most of the time I probably miss the whole situation.

Ok, well I guess its safe to say that I have no idea what distinction you're trying to make. I am betting confidently but I am neither b/fing or b/cing confidently.

Our range is not face up strong if we bet here, we are 4 handed and are opening in the CO. If it was me playing, I would have all kinds of suited Ax, all kinds of suited Jx and some offsuit, my preflop opening range would depend mostly on how much I expect to get 3bet, tons of gutshots and flushdraws. AK is pretty near the top of my cbetting range here.

OP you say villain's been fairly active but fit or fold postflop, so he's opening lots and plays 100% straightforward postflop?

Because if he truly is playing as straightforward as you think he is(I somewhat doubt it esp. given it's 4handed...) then I probably like a check back on the flop. Usually I'd just bet and then decide.

Of course there are times when you should bet instead of check for sure, and then it's super close between call (or raise) and fold when you get raised. I didn't think op was trying to create a flop betting rule though. I thought he was wondering what to do as pfr with a nitty image vs a super wide pf range on AJJhh.

I'm reading this as "I cannot confidently bet AND confidently call, and I cannot confidently bet AND confidently fold, therefore checking is superior."

People have given examples where they can confidently bet (and we all know this bet is correct), but since they cannot confidently make their next action, checking is superior based on your theorem.

But since we know the bet is correct, either your theorem is wrong or we are all misunderstanding something.