This hand happened at a poker club that I play at a couple times a month.

(No Rake) Open from MP, who is a good young player, to $8. Call from guy to his left, very active middle aged man who has been caught bluffing a couple times. Both players have right around $225.

On Button, I look down at QsQd eff stack $175. I 3B to $30. Both call, $93 in pot headed to flop.

Flop: 9 8 3 r.
Note: I have been playing for about 2 hours, playing kind of on the tight side.
Good young player leads into pot for $25, then main villain raises to $150. I found the sizing of the open from first villain very peculiar, thinking maybe he was trying to milk the Main Villain into a raise. At this point I'm putting the opener on maybe 98 suited?? and putting the Main Villain on something like J10 or nothing. I am pretty sure he doesn't have a made hand. Should I put in the rest of my stack with QQ? Let me know what you think, the small milky $25 bet on flop is what tripped me up. Thanks!

Yes I'm very happy to get all our chips in here would have though we are ahead of both of them

Would put them both on something like mid pair/top pair and like getting all in here

If young guy is a good player then this small donk seems weighted towards 2 pair+, trying to induce one of you guys to raise. I'm thinking ranges are somewhere around:

Young guy (YG): 99-88,33,A9s,JTs,76s
Main Villain (MV): 88+,A9s,JTs,T9s,98s,76s,JTo (I took one of the sets out of this range as it seems like a terrible play to make if he's got one)

Your equity isn't great against these ranges (25%). I don't think a fold is out of the question here. If you'd seen YG make this sort of donk before with a weak hand then I really like a shove, as MV's raise seems FOS. But if he really is good, I can't imagine him leading small here with a weak hand.

This is a particularly interesting hand as it's not often that you're gonna 3-bet preflop and then get bet-raised into on the flop without having a chance to act. I'm going to GII on the flop, although a bit reluctantly, and live with the results. In my experience in Club games, your hand is the best more often than not.

The absolute strongest the YG could be is two pair, he's not leading out with a set, he's much more likely to check raise. Main Villain could easily have TT or JJ here also.

On another note, is the Card club you played at either the Ruggles in Dayton or The Shark Tank in Columbus?

Totally disagree with this. 99 and 88 are firmly in his range here. In fact I'd be shocked to see anything other than those, 98 or maybe JT. Combine that with the big raise and I'm quietly folding and not telling anyone about it.

Bigger pre. $40+ have to go bigger since BTN 3! generally don't look too strong.

With 85BB & QQ, I'm trying to shovel chips in preflop without letting anyone else improve.

If this hand was 4+ players, I'd agree with you. But with only 3 players in the hand, I generally don't see much donk betting with "nutted" hands, even from good players that know when it's appropriate to donk bet. Even most bad players would be setting up the check/raise with a flopped set.

If yg has a history of making blocking bets I think we need to consider getting it in here. Also we have an spr of @1.5 and a strong overpair so getting it in isn't horrible anyway. Sometimes it's just your time to die and rebuy.

I have to agree with jimmycornerstone in this spot.
You have to consider, there are three players in this pot.
It's not heads up, and still pretty big action.
If heads up, I'd, and depending on my feel for opponent, consider calling.
I can't see how our hand is the best hand here.
And, if we need to improve, we only have 2 outs.
It's very rarely a bluff in these stakes.
If one of the villains is so sophisticated that he would raise a donk bet, that amount, into two players, let's say, to get the better hand to fold, he's probably a pro who's maybe re-building his bankroll or something.
Correction. Heads up the proper play would be re raising all in of course, not call.

With 145 in our stack, I think this is probably a call. If we had 280 preflop it would be harder to call because we could give MP more credit for set-mining and even the active player's range becomes scarier.

Do we think the good player in mp would raise to 8 preflop with a premium hand? I don't think stacks are deep enough for him to set mine profitably but would he have the same view?

I don't see MP calling the preflop raise with 98s. The bigger question is whether he takes this line with TT/JJ or with AA/KK.

The small bet looks like TT/JJ which decided to call and take down any flop without an A or K.

If villain has a set we have two outs. If villain has top two we have five. We have lol backdoor straight outs and runner runner counterfeit outs. If we're folding overpairs on dry flops with 1.5 Spr against anyone but nit royalty were so exploitable it's pathetic. We have a quarter pot donk which is very likely a blocking bet and a shove from an aggressive bluffy guy in a 3! 1.5 spr pot and were advocating a fold with QQ? Sometimes if your beat oh well but your calling.

Do good players really call a raise to 17% of effective stacks out of position hoping to set mine?

Definitely not.

Well, I guess I would consider it if there's a bunch of callers. Like 4+ and I close the action.

This is all true for sure. But we 3! pre (albeit smaller than I would have) and are now facing a lead and effectively a shove for our remaining chips. How often do you really think our hand is good here?

Sometimes SPR is a useful tool to decide when to commit (especially when HU). Other times, other factors should be more important IMHO (in this case player actions and reactions to what we have done already). Frankly, it wouldn't shock me that much if we were in 3rd place right now.

I reluctantly fold and hope to see both hands.

They don't most of the time, but sometimes we all spew for whatever reason so you cannot eliminate sets from their range IMO.