I’m in Vegas for the weekend so hopefully I’ll have a few interesting hands to post.

Here’s one from 6-handed 1/3 at the Bellagio. We’re $300 deep with CO and about $150 with UTG.

Preflop:
UTG opens to $6 (several players have been doing this for all their opens, not sure why).
I make it $25 with AKo from +1.
CO calls, UTG calls.

Flop ($75): KQ6r, $120 behind with UTG, about $275 with CO.
I bet $40, both call.

Turn ($195): KQ6Tr, completing the rainbow.
UTG jams $83
Is this a sigh call or a sigh fold? Does the other player matter? I guess KT, QT, TT, AJ and J9 improved, though I can only really see KT and maybe a non-believing QT calling the flop.

Thoughts?

Yuck! I initially gave him a range of KQ, KTs and 66, which you have about 15% equity against. Then I thought of KJ and how many combos of that to give him. If we just give him the two available suited combos it takes our equity all the way up to 26% and enough to call (if we weren't worried about V2).

Any reads on Vs? How many (if any) combos of KJ to giveV1 is very important here. I probably sigh/call in game if we were HU and probably sigh/fold with the deeper V having position on us in the actual situation, though its close enough that reads matter a ton here, IMO.

I guess I shrug call? Not sure it’s +EV, but for $83 at ~3.5:1 I look him up. Hoping for V to roll KJ or AQ.

UTG is a straightforward MAWG who (just based on personality) I don’t think is ever bluffing here with something like AQ. It’s just not clear whether he’d overvalue something like KJ (which is my main hope for what he has as well).

Also, to Garick’s point, I think he can have any KJs or even KJo here based on preflop looseness.

Also a good chance you’re chopping w/ V.

Well, if he has all the KJ combos, we have 45% equity and a clear call.

Reads on CO?

At a full table preflop would be a nice spot to flat and then hope to jam over a steal raise with a bunch of dead money. Shorthanded it ain't as great an option but still not horrible, imo. I'm fine with our raise sizing if we're going the 3betting route.

Easily committed against the shortstack on the flop but thinks get a little more gross is the bigger stack continues. So I think I'm fine with our ~smallish bet just to see who we get action from.

Stoopid spot on the turn, imo. Even committing against the shortstack has to be rethought slightly since this move is so much stronger into two opponents and we're ahead of so few Ks. But with the other guy still in the mix I might lean to a sigh fold here.

GcluelessNLnoobG

I actually don’t remember my read of CO’s play style other than that he fell into the “mid-20s scumbag” player cluster. For some reason at the time I didn’t think he would call, but I don’t know if I had any specific reason to think that. Maybe just how he called on the flop, but honestly I don’t remember.

Anyway, result: I decided on a sigh call rather than a sigh fold, and he had J9o for the straight.

Well, if J9 was in his range, so were likely all the pair +J combos down to JT, so I think it's still a call against his range. If he's bad enough to open and call a raise with J9o, even short-handed, as a half-stack, you're likely getting those chips back if he stays.

V showing up w/ J9o after the 2 preflop actions, the flop action and then donk jamming the turn prove:
A) poker is easy
B) you played this hand extremely well
C) V is... um... not good at poker.

Tell V genuinely ‘nice hand, you got me’.

yeah based on everything i think its an easy call getting those odds. KJ definitely possible so you have to call

i bet bigger on the flop -- 55 maybe - not sure if that would have gotten him out tho, prob should

Calling this is a bad idea. It’s inviting players behind into the pot with a hand that plays great HU in a bloated pot and badly MW with more stack depth. Plus, exploitatively, this is 1/3. People play too many hands (sometimes for limps, sometimes for raises), and people aren’t 3 bet happy. Put the 3 bet in yourself. If a guy cold calls the raise to 25 behind, well, that’s frustrating. But he’d have called the 6 too, so at least we charged him.

Edit: and to be results oriented, the dude opened from BTN -3 and called a 4x 3 bet with J9o. We are going to crush this dude in the long run if he plays like this, and it’ll be much faster if we take our clear edge spots to the max.

Edit 2: so that you don’t think I’m picking on you GG, it’s not to say this strategy is never a good idea. Like 9h 5/10 game, pro opens UTG to 3 bb and you have AKo +1 on 100 bb with some aggressive fish left to act. With a reasonable expectation of someone doing something stupid behind, it can be a fine game flow exploit.

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Btw, what’s up with open raise sizes at low stakes games in Vegas? Every 1/2 and 1/3 game I’ve played in the last three days, people have been opening to a “normal” size like 2.5-3ish BB, while in Boston there is never an open smaller than 4-6 BB. Just a coincidence?

Not a coincidence. Vegas is always like that. Likely due to how many online players flocked there.

Yeah, it’s totally a thing that different card houses tend to pick up gameplay tendencies together. Especially preflop. “Everyone else raises to 15 at 1/2, so I will too”. It’s why I just started referring to it as the price to see a flop since so many people are just doing it mindlessly


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Seems close but the price is way too good for us to even consider folding this imo

we’re always live too

Grunching ...

I might x this flop more than not. Really dependent on the opponent images.

Blocking AQ/KX hands that might call, giving a free card to JT, but likely folding a large of their calling ranges. Maybe smaller, like $30?

AP - nasty, but calling it off.