1/2NL at Casino of da Sun

Stack sizes got awkward, leading to tough decisions on the turn and river.

Reads

V1: ($180) Young kid who's probably a marginal winner in this room, plays tight/abc, seems to overvalue hands in general. Got stacked twice after bricking draws (or some kind of hand, he didn't show) in multiway pots.

V2: ($500) just sat down and won a big pot, players had been talking about him before he got to the table, I suspect that he's a loose donk.

Hero (covers): has a winning image, has shown down only strong hands. I've been pretty active preflop, tight post.

The Hand

V2 limps in MP, V1 raises to $13 from CO, Hero calls otb with A5, V2 calls.

fwiw I'm not calling vs just V1, but V2 calling behind makes this a standard flat for me

Flop 345 ($42)

c, V1 bets $25, hero raises to $65

My sizing is small since I'm bet/folding if V2 4bets.

I think that V1 bets AK/AQ/AJ here and may even stack off with them, which is great (we have 76%).

He can also have AA-TT, although his flop sizing is kinda small. If he commits with these hands, we have 35%.

Overall I see this raise as both a semibluff and a thin value bet.

Thoughts on flop decision much appreciated. I'll post the turn and river after getting some responses.

I dont like the flat preflop. V taking the agression has less than 100bb. Yes we have position but this kind of hand is going to get us into trouble and lead to tough decisions postflop. I have learned to try and avoid this situations and it will just keep you out of tough spots.

What evidence do you have that V1 will lead out with AK/AQ/AJ? I dont see many oppnts cbeting A high into 2 opponents. Honestly I would fold here unless we were much deeper or I knew more about this particular Vs tendencies. If you really think V is Cbetting his entire range on this flop then we can call and see a turn.

I hate the raise. Raising folds out everything we beat and almost everything that has us beat is calling.

fold>call>raise

folding this pre.

If I was rasing this flop, I'm raising bigger to take the pot down now, without going turn and river. All you did there was give V2 "odds" to peel BDs and his SDs.

Fold pre. We don't know if V2 is coming along for the ride. If we get back-raised we have to fold and we've burned $13. If V2 folds we have position but are against a short player who will almost always have us dominated.

As played, why are we raising? We allow a worse hand to fold and play perfectly against us. Not to mention, why would V2 ever stack off here for 200BB +? That's not realistic at all.

As played, flat and evaluate the turn. But really, just fold PF.

Lol @ fold pre. Were ip with a hand that has good implied odds. V2 will most likely come along. Hate the flop raise, V1 is unlikely to fold overpairs. We have decent equity on this board.

Agree except for the first part. The TAG player is driving the action, we can't guarantee V2 is coming along and if they don't the TAG isn't deep enough to play a IO hand like A5.

Ty for the replies so far. Regarding pre, I was virtually certain that V2 would come along--he had already limp/called a few times. For me, this changed my decision from always folding to sometimes calling.

Everyone so far hates the flop raise, which is understandable. Two related questions: what's your flop raising range in this spot? And what's the weakest hand you're putting in your raising range?

To answer my own question, my value raising range looks like this (from strongest to weakest):

straights: A2 sooted (4 combos) + 67 sooted, (2 combos)
sets (9 combos)
two pair: 54sooted (2 combos)
Overpair (unlikely, but I might play AA like this rarely...one combo)

So we have 18 combos that we can raise for pure value--and I will be raising often on this flop because a number of cards (any ace, two, six, or king) will make it tougher to get value from one-pair hands.

Should we be looking to add semi-bluffing hands to our raising range? If so, what type of hands should we include?

To some extent this question has to do with balance. Should we care about balancing a pure value range with semibluffs/bluffs, or is the concept of balance a waste of time at LLSNL?

If you're up against a big enough player pool, balance is over-rated in LLSNL. If you're playing the same players every day, that's a different story.

To have a semi-bluffing range here, we have to assume we have some FE, and given stacks & descriptions, I doubt we really have much if he'll overvalue PPs and sometimes not cbet overs. Meaning, we can raise w/ a totally unbalanced pure value range and still get called really often. I'd be ok w/ including A6s/A7s in our raising range, but that's more because we usually have 11 outs that are all scare cards than for any balance reasons.

I like everything you did, including sizing.

and yes, since you said this guy is a (winning) reg in your room, I think it is important to show some balance. I especially like this because he can fold 88 as easy as he can call AQ in theory.

Raising in this spot is in my opinion not the right move, when you raise you will only have a hand that beats you calling, with all the weaker hands folding to the reraise (ak aq aj kq etc). Before you raise always ask yourself, 'what am i trying to achieve here', if its to see if your opponent has a real hand, when you flat his call, if he doesnt have a real hand he will most likely slow down on the turn as well... so theres no need to bloat the pot

The goal is basically this:

I can imagine this villain, or others, calling with worse and continuing with better hands. True, villain won't make a mistake all the time. But we only need him to fold (or call) incorrectly some of the time to make up for our equity disadvantage (like 35%) when we're behind.

I mean, just role-reverse this spot. You cbet 543 with QQ and get raised. Your opponent has only shown nutted hands. How happy are you getting this in, really?

There are some weird assumptions going on here. Your read on villain is "tight/abc, overvalues hands" but you think he will b/3b AK/AQ/AJ on this flop? He's likely to fold QQ but continue with AQ? People have to play pretty weird for a two-way bet like you're fantasizing about to be possible; we have no evidence to back that up for villain in this hand.

This play should be villain dependent, and the reads on this villain are somewhat absurd to me. How does a tight ABC player stack off with AJ here? More importantly, if this player is capable of stacking off with AJ he's also going to stack off with a ton of hands that are beating you, but marginal and there would certainly be better opportunities to go at him. This kind of strategy is not the optimal way to take advantage of someone who is overvaluing hands.

Imho, pre flop call is fine. If you ve got reads on CO might even min raise 3! to iso and play it heads up. But whatever.
OTF, I wouldnt raise here in MW pot. With a raise you are starting to build a big pot and if you get called you are continuing with a marginal hand unlikely to improve (gutshot) which might not even be a clean out and you get coolered. I might even fold here actually but flatting seems OK too.

I think with most broadways that include an ace hes going to not bet the flop for fear of being raised off an A which has showdown value and a draw. Hes prolly betting with PPs and they are ahead of your hand. Also another player being left behind you makes your FE go down.

Assuming V2 FOLDS you might try to semi bluff the turn/

I think I would call here and look for a turn card to bluff if you add equity with any diamond card higher then the flop, and also with the chance to hit your hand if the wheel comes in or you hit 2 pair.

He might bet again on the turn into a good scare card and you could possibly win more.

Your preflop call was so strongly dependent on the fish coming along, yet once you flop a pair of 5s you want to push him out of the hand. This right here should demonstrate the importance of relative position. When the fish isn't squeezed between us and the aggressor, we're always just left hoping that they do this, hoping they don't do that, etc on just about every betting street.

As played, I would just call the cbet:

1) We still have SDV and can save our semi-bluffs for when our made hand becomes useless,

2) Stringing the fish along keeps our IO odds viable with BDNFD + low-end 4-straight draw + top two draw + trips-top-kicker draw, and

3) We have a much better chance of putting pressure on the made part of villain's range with a turn raise. This plan also buys us a turn card and the benefit of seeing 3 more villain actions before we decide that we're in a good spot to commit 2 or 3 bets. A turn raise reps plenty because I'm not pushing the fish out when I have the nuts in this spot and don't mind waiting to have my equity go up on a desired turn card before shoveling all my chips in.

Flat otf
He's not folding better
fold turn unimproved