Villain is a reg, 50's white male. I'd played with him once or twice before in this game, where he had been fairly active but not a maniac. I don't think he understands position very well - saw him open K9s UTG, and flat KQo in MP to another player's large EP open. Haven't seen him showdown many hands at this point, so don't have an advanced feel for his postflop tendencies, but he's more aggro than passive.

Hero is early 30's white male, hadn't been at the table long. I've played in this game several times with some of the same players at the table - if they pay attention cross sessions, they should see me as TAG. Winning image in this session because in my 5th hand or so I won a huge 300bb pot 3ways when my AA stacked A2 and 33 on a A23 flop.

Effective stacks: ~$600

Folds to Villain in MP who opens to $15. Two LP callers, Hero in BB calls with 8 8 planning to set mine.

Flop: ($57 after rake) 9 T Q

Hero first to act checks and is planning to be done with the hand. Surprisingly, V checks and everyone checks around.

Turn: ($57) T

Hero checks again. V bets $30, other two players fold. Hero, now closing the action and heads up, has a very hard time ranging V here. He can't imagine V would check a value hand on this flop 4 way, especially because most of his value hands that don't have a Q or better in them have some kind of draw along with it. JT/J9/etc.

Does V's range have enough AK/AJ in it for Hero to call with the plan to c/c any river 2 through 7 or another T and c/f 9/J/Q/K/A? (Obviously leading or c/r a river 8)

you're in for 15 bucks, with not a lot of ways to win. Best case scenario is that you get another $80-$100 in there by showdown and hope the guy was full of it.

Fold.

I don't really love the float with 4th pair to the board OOP.

your hand is so vulnerable to the river, tons of overcards, clubs and counterfeiting outs 9/Q that are bad for us.

I would much prefer a float IP or with a stronger hand and/or if the bet was smaller. Unless you think he is a bluff monkey I would probably fold, but if hes a bluff monkey he may have also bet the flop.

If he is opening as wide as K9 he probably has alot of Ts in his range also.

Fold seems fine on this board.
More often he has JJ/JT/AT/KT type hands than he does AK/AJ.
And AK/AJ have lots of equity agaist you anyway.


Anyone else like squeezing to ~$70 here pre flop?

The squeeze to $70 sounds intriguing. I hadn't considered it, but perhaps I should have. What kind of conditions are ideal for doing that OOP?

V1 opens wide
V1 continues tight
Hero holds PP, Ax, napkins
Hero solid image

I'm cool with the hand to the turn.

I probably give up on the turn. He's still betting into 3 opponents. Maybe he was getting tricky with a monster, or even a good hand on a drawy board (i.e. planning a flop check/raise). Or perhaps he has JJ (ETA: or other weaker but better hands as mentioned elsewhere). I might be more inclined to call a bet here in position, but OOP we're just a sitting duck. We can't put in too many bets postflop setmining when we don't hit our set or else setmining becomes less and less profitable.

ETA: I probably don't squeeze as much as I should, but raisers typically don't like to fold. And being deep, all I see a squeeze resulting in a large percentage of the time is pretty much going at least HU+ to a bloated pot OOP and then seeing a terrible flop like this.

GcluelessNLnoobG

Easy fold, He could even be betting J9 to "see where he's at". I would have to have seen his cards for me to call

It appears Hero overthought this one and abandoned his initial plan, which is rarely a good thing.

Hero had such a hard time ranging villain, particularly to value hands, that he decided to c/c the turn and c/c any blank rivers.

River was indeed a blank, an offsuit 7. Hero checked, Villain bet $50, Hero called. Villain showed KTdd.

I hate the idea of squeezing to $70.

1) Hand selection. Are we squeezing for value or for a bluff? Though I think 88 is ahead of their calling range pre and therefore could squeeze for value, I will bypass this slight pre flop ev situation for the chance to setmine with odds. I see mid PP as a medium strength hand and I don't want to bloat the pot. There is no way I'm wasting a PP as a bluff in this spot versus these opponents.

2) Bet sizing. If I were to squeeze, which I wouldn't, I'd make it at least $80-105. If called, that leaves us with an SPR of ~2.3-3.25 with most likely a middle pair. Even with a bet of $70, that still leaves us with an SPR of ~3.75. Now, what hands play well with an SPR of 2ish-4? See 1. If we are bluffing, we need to have a plan as how to navigate that low of a SPR.