1/3/10: We have QQ in EP in a button straddled pot

Playing 8-handed 1/3. Most hands have either an UTG straddle or button straddle to $10. Stacks vary, but I have $450 and the main relevant player in this hand covers.

Players appear to be very loose preflop but seem to play *mostly* straightforward postflop. The CO here is the only real “maniac” — he called a raise preflop with Q6o, bombed flop/turn/river with nothing, then gave a whole speech on the river about how the guy *has* to call because he only bet 1/4 pot, and got a guy to fold top two pair face up.

Preflop:
There’s a button straddle for $10. (This player is also really loose-aggressive and keeps complaining about how he can’t bet enough to get people to fold).

I’m in the BB with QdQh. I decide to complete for $10, intending to raise, since at this table it’s almost certainly getting raised behind me. (BTW, I’m happy to have the limp-reraise argument for the millionth time, but it actually didn’t really make a difference for this hand, given the action behind me).

Two more completes, then folds to the HJ who sticks in his last $62.
CO calls $62.
It’s back to us. Decision #1. I assume most are raising. If so, what are you raising to? (If not, why not)? We’re about $450 deep with the CO.

$165 with the intention of shoving most flops

if my math is correct there is 155 in the pot so a shove is less than 3x pot. Your hand would love to deny equity to the two limpers and get protection vrs a bunch of dead money already in the pot but doesn't mind getting called when it does. Easy shove

Awkward tweener spot on sizing. With CO being a light calling maniac I like a callable sizing, like $175 or so but realize again that V you’re committed regardless of runout. Don’t let him make a pained fold to your shove. Maybe even $200 but I wouldn’t go over that.

There’s no such thing as a good 3 bet size here. Making it 160 gives too good of a price IMO.

I’d rather stick it all in right now. There’s enough dead $ in there, and it’s not like our jam only gets called by better either.


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Limp/raise is a fantastic line on many tables. If i would had to guess its the one single weapon thats made me the most money over the years in liveplay. Some people just doesent have a fold button, and cant resist gambling in what looks to be a big pot.

You also exploit peoples urge to play/call raises with too many hands pre, juicing up the pot before its back to you who can come over the top with a limped premium.

Thanks for the comments. I really considered just shoving, but since we’re almost certainly ahead of the CO, I decided to raise to $175 since we’d like a call, intending to shove most flops. The limpers fold, CO calls, and we go to the flop.

Flop ($433): Ks8d6h ($275 behind). We’re first to act. What’s the plan?
1) jam now
2) check/call
3) check/fold

CO is the maniac right?

Allin. I am not risking free cards to him considering how much is in the middle already. If he managed to bink
a king on us calling a gazillion pre, good for him. Reload.

I rip pre.

AP I check call, jam any non-A turn if he xb.

Ship pre, this isn't even close.

I might make it $165 if I have ace-ace, and only ace-ace.

All in pre.
As played bet 100 on flop so he can a mistake. Jamming all turns (and calling a jam on flop). Shoving flop is fine too of course, but this player is special and deserves special treatment.

Yep agree, I was thinking the same.

I think something people need to realize is that just because we have a strong hand, doesn’t mean we don’t like to take it down right now. Like these guy could have KTo and he still has 29%. Nothing wrong with just taking it


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^^

$154 for free or we get called with say ~65% vs. main villain's range - yeah not much it in at all and there's an argument that variance free money > Sklansky bucks.

It's not free since we still have to run it out with the shorty, but I don't think that makes much difference here.

For the "rip it pre" folks, does it matter to you that the pot is protected by the HJ's all in? There's really not much dead money to go after since the side pot is $0 when the action gets back to us preflop. It's great if CO folds, but not as great as it would be if HJ weren't in the hand.

Absolutely. We can be doing this with a lot of good aces or decent pocket pairs, looking to get it HU against the all in who could just be kamikaze-ing the last $62 in with a light hand. Getting someone to stick $62 in and fold, and get HU v the all in, is a great result for AJs or 88.

And when you have QQ and have a situation to get all in for just a reasonably sized 3 bet, you should basically always do it. Unless you’re against some OMC who hasn’t played a hand in 9 hours or something.


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Against maniac $150 - 200 looks good.

All-in is quite bad and its hard to imagine a professional poker player choosing that size.

Flop i think just shove since this type of player will call too light. I don't even mind if we bet smaller for meta reasons as long as we do it with the intention of never folding - like a $150 stop and go.

Thanks for the comments.

I'll post results.

I decided to check flop, and he checked behind. While I'm never folding against this player, I have trouble betting the flop, because (1) he's definitely not folding better, and (2) I doubt he's calling a shove with much worse. I totally get not wanting to give a free card, but it seems tough to bet for protection since jamming is the only size that makes sense.

The turn was a brick, the 2d (Ks8d6h2d), and I jam $275 into $433.

Results:

Smart to say when we have SABR in the thread advocating a shove, and he have been a higher stakes pro/ live reg for years.

Preflop is obviously my standard line. ETA#2: Surprise Gil and I disagree so much on preflop when we are both fond of the LRR line.

I typically like to give poor 8:1 IO with my re-raise here because it makes it really difficult for setmining against me to be profitable (even though I'm stacking off with an overpair postflop 100% of the time due to SPR). So using that logic, I would initially think of just adding another $75 or so onto the raise, so like $140ish or so. However, I'm going to see enough gross A/K flops from OOP, plus there's huge dead money relative to stacks here. So my next inclination would be to raise larger to like $200. But then that does leave some pretty lol stacks behind for the flop. So I might then just consider shoving. I'm probably rarely getting called by worse, but the players have already made enough massive mistakes by getting in this hugenormous dead money that I really am fine with taking a fairly low variance route here. Whether it prints more money than another sizing, maybe not.

ETA: I didn't realize the caller was the maniac; makes shoving preflop even more trivial, imo. As played, I think I just shove at this lol 0.5 SPR mainly cuz we're just committed at this point and giving possible hand killing free cards when committed in a big pot is meh. It's less about being called by worse / folding better and more about simply protecting our pot at this point, imo.

GcluelesssizingnoobG

this for me since im shoving flop anyway