In my never ending quest to not be a nit I'm worried I might be going too far the other way and making stupid plays all in the name of not being a pussy at the table. I still think I did the right thing here, but I'd like the better players to confirm/deny:

I'm UTG+1 and open to $13 with AK and get the standard 4 callers. I have just under $300 to start the hand.

Pot ~$65

Flop: A J 10

Pretty good flop for me and probably not so much for the callers ranges. I bet out $40 and the guy to my immediate right insta shoves for like $250 more and has me covered.

Folds back to me. I'm in no mood to fold this, right? What I can tell you about the villain is had I raised to $18 or $118 preflop he's calling with a hand he likes, price doesn't matter and he's went to his pocket a couple times to rebuy already.

His range is almost certainly infinite preflop, but he's not shoving without a piece of this flop either. Yes, KQ is 100% in his range here, but is a bunch of other stuff. I don't think it's a heart draw based on what I'm holding and I obviously have that covered anyway. It's not a set as I would have been 3-bet pre if he had AA, JJ or TT

I guess I think this is a snap call/fist pump all day every day.

Am I wrong? Should I fall back to the advice that players at this level don't bluff enough and it has to be KQ?

Call?

When I get AK I have trouble enough flopping a pair.

Sent from my SM-G930F using Tapatalk

Get one of the many equity calculators that exist, plug in his range, and see what it says. You will probably have a hard time finding a range you should fold against. You are probably a behind but given the overlay of the pot and 12 outs to the nuts, youve got to call. If the place has any high hand bonuses, thats just icing on the cake.

this is a math problem
ak is probably never good here unless villain has Qxhh, 98hh specifically, sure villain can spaz out with random cards/draws, but let's assume villain is somewhat decent
his range is probably like {1010, JJ, AJ，A10, KQ, J10, Qxhh, 98hh}
you have 12 outs(Q+fd) which is roughly 44% against his value range...AK outs can possibly be added but let's assume AK doesn't really help us
so the math is like this pot =65+40+40=145
so it takes around 250 to win 145+250=390
250/690=36.2%, this is the equity you need to break even
hence this should be a profitable call

open larger pf or look to limp raise if table is agro pf; definitely not a fist pump call here you , tough spot; run the numbers like the other posters suggested

i added wrong earlier, can't edit lol
250/640=39% to break even

You're getting almost the correct odds to call if you knew he held QK or JJ.

Once you factor in that you're a 55-45 favorite against all the two pairs, which make up a good portion of his range, this is a fist pump call.

Even if you put him on exactly KQ, Equilab gives you 41.8% equity.

With the pot odds (I got 38.4% assuming OP had a $293 starting stack, so shove was for $240 effective), it is a certain call.

B/c the flop is fine, with this spr you can't fold

Your hand is also strong enough to check the flop and call or raise depending on how the action develops

Dont forget that a lot of players will take an agressive line with kx, qx: 2 hearts, and for q9, 98, of hearts raising the flop is even more correct

If $13 is getting four callers then why are you still opening to $13?

I would start with a flop check.

I'd also be checking this flop for sure. Mostly check/calling.

As played, don't fold, certainly not to this guy.

Why are we checking flop? We can get some amazing value from Ax and worse draws. Half pot or so to target that range. That same value may not happen on the turn. I'd b/c this most of the time.

Mandatory snap call.

Villain could turn over KQ and you still have the odds to call. Add in only a few combos of 2-pair + lower flush draws and you're way ahead.

You discounted sets from his range, but they're the only hands which would make this tougher. If V has JJ, you have 38% equity.

65+40+40+500=645 (pot if you call)
250/645=38%

So even against a set it's a break-even call. Add anything else and it's a slam dunk.

Never fold here. Sorry you lost.

Thanks.

Because it’s hard to make a pair, let alone top pair, let alone top pair when we hold one of the outs. We also block every conceivable draw out there as well.

Betting is +EV. It’s impossible for it not to be given our equity versus villain’s holdings. The question becomes does x yield higher EV versus their collective ranges and in my opinion the answer is yes.

When you have the board locked down this badly you’ve got to give people some rope to either make a bluffing mistake, or catch up with a second best hand. The ideal scenario would be x/r stacking off versus a non-believer that bets after you x this flop.

I dont see many hands in villains ranges that will bet but not call a bet, other than pure airballs. We can get tons of value with a bet from all the pair + kx/qx combos, some of which think they have a bdfd as well. Its wishful thinking for these hands to bet the flop.

This is a unique board in thar we both crush it, yet there are a lot of hands we can get value from. Its not AA on A83r. Im betting this about 1/2 pot.

There's plenty of random Q9, 89, JQ, QT, worse flush draws, worse Ax that can call a bet. Those hands will never bet the flop, so we give them a good ~10% chance to suck out on us for free by checking. But if we do check and they miss turn they aren't going to put money in with those hands that they wouldn't otherwise to a flop bet. If the board does worsen for those hands on the turn then we missed value on a flop bet.

Blocking the draws or not doesn't really matter since they aren't going to bet the draws on AJT and on the off chance they do have such a draw they're drawing to the worst hand. If they have a draw it's better to build a pot for when we both hit.

I guess I disagree on having this board locked down, there's a lot of players on the flop that have 4 or 5 outs that will call a bet. Locked down to me is having the mortal nuts and redraw, and most of the range is drawing to 0 outs, like AA on A83.

Seems rather presumptuous to say nobody is ever betting the flop after the PFR checks. When we raise pre and c-bet this board 5-way we are literally never bluffing. The worst hand we’d ever be betting the flop with is 98 which is a monster in its own right.

I don’t think you are going to get called very light, especially when someone has to worry about 2-3 players behind them that could come in for a raise afterwards. When you c-bet this board 5-way you are isolating yourself against very strong ranges.

If I have black KQ of course I am betting this flop, but holding AK is very very different.

What do we gain by checking though? Does a worse hand bet on AJT flop 5 ways, or would we get a call from a worse hand on the turn we wouldn't have gotten on the flop?

We don't have a lock on this board lol. Let's not pretend we're happy that we got raised, with all the two pair, set and straight possibilities out there. I don't see us getting three streets of value here by cbetting, with four callers on this board. Hell, when we open in EP and start blasting away into four callers on the flop, we might even be overrepping our hand. This seems like a good hand to protect our checking range and mask the strength of our hand. I wanna check and see if anyone has got any plans.

I can be wrong of course, I don't deal in absolutes and I'm really just making this **** up as I go... Bet/folding is obviously out of the question, but bet/calling or bet/shoving just doesn't feel right either in this spot. I admit, I'm something of a feel player... :-) I would appreciate if someone could explain the benefits of betting the flop vs betting the turn instead.

^ well I'm solidly betting flop with my reasoning in other posts. I was surprised you and Johnny chose to check flop, I think there's too much value here to not bet. If we into a better hand oh well we have nut outs. I think a more likely outcome is we get called by something we have completely crushed equity-wise.

In this particular hand I am 100% sure the villain was not checking behind. He had the current nuts on a draw heavy board and while he's not the best player in the room he not the kind that's gonna get tricky here and give a free card that beats him. He may not be shoving, but he's betting big enough that if called all the money goes in on the turn.

I don't think I'm (I know I wasn't) folding even if he bets $100 after I check.

After reading this thread (which is why I posted it) I can see it's much closer of a decision than I thought it was. I still feel like the money goes in if the same situation arrises.

I honestly would not have thought I was only 38% to win and 45% to win/split. At the table, at the time, I thought I was a solid favorite against his range even if KQ made up most of that range.

It's OK (and expensive) to be wrong.

You need to have some value hands in your checking range.

Our PFR value range that is going to bet this flop is something like KQs (4), AA (3), JJ (3), TT (3), AJs (2), ATs (2). That's already 17 combos we have BETTER THAN AK.

We lose to more combos than that because the field callers are going to show up with most of the offsuit combos we are folding in EP, so now AK is losing to KQ (12), JJ (3), TT (3), AJ (6), AT (6) for a total of 30 combos.

If you want to find more combos to value bet than you can bet your AK/AQ no- combos and x/eval with the combos that have a . Given AK and AQ block so much of the board it skews continuing ranges to hands primarily better than AK. That is why they make for the nut x/eval combos.

I don't think it's particularly likely a caller shows up with a hand that beats us due to card removal. Of course it is possible though.

You haven't listed the combos in your analysis that can call that we have crushed. For me that is the deciding factor when it comes to betting. The ones listed that beat us we have solid outs against. it feels MUBSY to me to list only combos that have us beat and exclude the ones that we have completely dominated.

I appreciate the idea of checking some value hands in a HU or 3 way pot but in a 5 way pot we should play more straightforward.

There are boatloads of hands that connect with this board in a small way. KJ/QJ/KT/QT/Ax. Lots of hands with 1 heart in them and some piece as well, like gutshots with a heart. Those hands are all likely to peel one for a 1/2 pot bet, but would be just as happily checking it through if we let it. The only hands that bet this for us that wouldn't call, like i said earlier, are just pure airball bluffs. It's wishful thinking to hope that 22 takes a stab here.

There are a lot of scary turn cards for those other hands. Yeah, getting raised kind of sucks, but our hand is strong enough we could call it off on a flip anyways. I just think there is too much value to be had on this flop.