I want to go over a hand I played in Tunica back in April from the prespective of the villain. I took a line I rarely do based on some specific reads which I would like to discuss later in the thread, which will hopefully lead to me getting some answers to how some of you interpret certain bet sizes.

Only two key players in the hand:
Hero: middle position, $400, image to any paying attention is TAG, no history with villain.
Villain: On the button, $340. Comes across as nitty old man.

One limper to hero, who opens for $20.
Villain looks down at AA and min raises from button to $40.
Hero calls.

Pot of $80.
Flop:
Q
10
10

Hero checks.
Villain bets $50.
Hero min raises to $100.

--If you are the villain, what are you putting the hero on at this point?

Villain calls.
Pot is at $280, villain has $200 remaining.

Turn:
6

Hero bets $200.

Villain...?

What I want to get into here is the purpose of the min raising and the bet sizing I used as the hero. ( I believe I have min raised exactly 2 times in my life, once here and once by accident a couple of years back.)

I am guessing most here as the villain fold on the min raise, and I assume raise more pre. Putting yourself as the nitty old man who loves his aces, what hands are you putting the hero on?

Nitty old man ignores the Tens and puts you on AQ, because if you had QQ he is beat.

AQ, KQ, jj qq kk.

as for tens, maybe not a ton in the range based on preflop action. maybe A10s, i think j10s might be better off limping but small chance of that too. no air in range.

villain wont consider 1010 or AA, and probably wont think of 8 10, 9 10

Assuming nitty old man plays beyond level 1 and isn't married to AA, he probably has you on a range of AQ, KQ, Q/J, Q/10, K/J, K/10, 99+. A/10 is also possible but less likely given the lack of Aces left in the deck and the kicker issues. The flop min-raise then should eliminate 99 and JJ, and the draws, leaving KQ, K/10, Q/10, QQ and KK as most likely holdings.

The turn bet should effectively tell the nit that AA can only beat KK here and that it's not worth stacking off. Then again... people hate folding AA.

(also, if there is a limper before hero makes it $20 pre-flop, shouldn't the pot be $85 and not $80? Minor detail, I know...)

Hero should have QQ or Tx on the flop.

Without history with either hero villain, it appears you both minraised for the same reason: they've got the nuts.

Minraises are usually huge hands because one side of the brain is shouting "you have the NUTS raise that sh** up!" and the other side is screaming, "No, no, don't lose your customers!" And the hands can't decide which to listen to and raises the minimum lol.

Put another way, if you have anything other than QQ or Tx you misplayed the hand horribly. Old nitty guy minraising preflop should be AA face up, so if you can't beat AA its spew.

I took out the $5 ($4 = $1 BBJP) for the rake.

I put him squarely on AA preflop. I wasn't getting quite 20-1 to set mine, but I figured 18-1 was close enough, as I was fairly certain I could get his stack if I hit.



I brought this up because to me, a min raise does scream "I've got the nuts!" but for some reason, I seem to run into a lot of live players who don't read it that way. They seem to use it when they have the nuts, but justify their own calls whenever they run into it.

in a vacuum if you say "minraise = nuts" then you are only part of the way there.
suppose for example, you limped KQ and villain raised preflop, you called and saw the flop of Q-T-T. Now your minraise could be a cheap way of getting information and/or forcing your opponent to make a tough decision with a hand that could have outs or could be drawing dead...

In the hand you posted, villain has shown significant strength, since he is an old man re-raising before the flop, so your minraise is more likely to be QQ or Tx. (Maybe not from his POV if he is unaware of his own image!) But then again, it could also be KK/JJ looking for information on whether or not to commit any more chips.

Either way, I think with AA he has to call the flop raise and go from there.

I think you hit a key point there - the villain not being aware of his own image. Part of my thinking when I played the hand is that although I am suspicious of min raises, the villain might not be as nearly as much. In his shoes, he would check/call a boat on the flop, and would never raise it. The same with a 10 (he even vocalized that). I think he finally decided I wouldn't have called preflop if I thought he had aces, and therefore I likely could not beat aces.

i couldn't have said it better myself

Villain looks down at AA and min raises from button to $40.
Hero calls.

Flop:
Q
10
10

Hero checks.
Villain bets $50.
Hero min raises to $100.

I assume when you speak of "a lot of live players" you are referring to yourself as well?

Not really, considering that was the first min raise I have ever used. To me, it looks like I played my hand face up, but to the villain it didn't. I had my reasons for that raise, and I wanted to get into a discussion about how some of the players here would see this from the villain's viewpoint.

And my point is that even if this is the 1st time you used it, you did so with the nuts, and in the same hand you called a minraise preflop from an old nit where you knew he had the nuts...so it shouldn't be too hard to understand how/why players get caught in that deadly circle.

As far as minraises go, hopefully you will start to understand their full scope so as to be able to utilize them more frequently and with a much broader understanding of your motives and priorities as well as your opponents reactions to them.

The difference is preflop I knew where my opponent was and played my hand accordingly. I wouldn't put my call and his in the same category.


Which is why I posted this hand. I have to say that in my last 50 hours live, I think I have faced exactly one min-raise after the flop, my experience lately has been mostly observational. I have 3 broad categories for min raises based on some basic player profiles, and overall I do have a handle on why *most* players use them. I like getting the feedback from others though to reinforce what I think I am seeing.