Hi there, so I played this hand last night at my local casino.
I haven't discussed hands/played with any serious players in a long time, so I feel this kind of thread is really needed for me to sharpen my game.
I won't go into all the details in OP, just want to get discussion on all streets rolling.

5 handed 2/4 game. Hero is on button. Stacks are almost identical (440)

Preflop

Limp, Limp, Hero (stack 440) raises to 18 with 22. SB folds, all else call.

Flop (pot=74)

772

Everyone checks .

Turn (pot=74)

3

Checks to hero, who bets 40

BB calls, UTG folds, CO calls. 3 players to the river.

River (pot=194)

A

CO bets 60, Hero (382 left) flats...

I've played 100s of hours against 3 of the 4 players in the hand.
UTG is very passive and straightforward.
CO learned the rules 2 weeks ago and is therefore is fairly unpredictable. He overvalues his hands a lot and thinks I bluff all the time.
SB is usually pretty passive/straightforward, but very drunk at this point in the night. I expect him to spew at some point, but he has just sat down and hasn't blown up yet.
BB can be fairly dangerous. He is aggressive, and varies his lines quite a bit. Not afraid to play big pots, whether he is the aggressor or the "aggressee". Likes to slowplay. Can overvalue some hands.
None of these players really play or care for money.

Preflop, I often tend to limp behind with my small pocket pairs in this spot, but table dynamics felt right for a raise here. I'm expecting to see the flop multiway 90 percent of the time, but felt that I could take down most of them IP with a cbet, and some with a double barrel (specifically versus SB and UTG, because I think CO and BB would call me down a lot).

You played this hand extremely poorly.

Edit: so Hero has a nitty image?

Sometimes I'd bet otf, stack 7x or get 55/66/88/99 to call. If guys will give you no credit and c/c AK definitely bet.

The river's an interesting spot. Most will say you need to raise but if CO won't call a raise and a flat might induce to BB to call or raise, the optimal river move is a flat.

Against 3 opponents you have to bet the flop. Any pocket pair will call and some hands with overcards just won't believe you hit the flop. I think low limit players make a critical mistake playing their monster hands way too slowly because they're afraid someone will fold. If they fold, there was no money to be made.

How would you play the hand if you had AK or 88? Wouldn't you cbet? If so, then you should bet when you hit big.

Thank you for your constructive criticism!

My nickname at the table, roughly translated, is "dirty luckbox". So I have the image of a winning/lucky player. These players view me as aggressive and bluffy, even though I'm actually just exploiting their passiveness. And they don't really tend to do much about it; meaning that I actually checked the flop because although none of the players might actually give me credit for a hand, I think I would very very rarely get bluffraised or floated, and Ax would fold because they expect a double barrel from me.

Good point but if the Villains are level 0 thinkers then the more important question is "Will these guys c/f AK/AQ/66?"

If the Villains are level 1 then definitely do what you'd do with AK and 88.

But we need to be EXACTLY 1 level above our opponents.

If...

A raise OTR woulda look absolutely FOS.

But without stronger V reads the argument is silly.

Yeah, I actually posted the hand because I feel like I played most streets fairly well, or at least that I managed to adapt my thinking to my opponents pretty well, but am also more than ready to accept improvement on my thought process.

Of course, it felt pretty transparent to me, a player with reasonable theoretical baggage, to check back a flop I would bet all my bluffs on, all my small-medium pairs, most of my AK/AQ, basically all my non-monsters...

But at the same time, I was expecting a lot of folds on this board. Felt better to let them hit some kind of pair/draw and get 2 streets of value.

Or get BB to represent the 7 or try to make me fold my hand (BB is the only player in the hand imo that can try to steal the pot).

Also, players are super loose passive at this table, so I'm expecting a lot of unpaired trash here.

If these guys are truly consistently level zero then forget about taking the time to write this HH. By all means continue playing so that you can open and double barrel all hands. Print that money, Sir.

Thank you for chiming in, I did instinctively go for the river raise, before reevaluating based on reads/history with BB.

I felt that the A was an absolutely marvelous card for me for a number of reasons.
Villains could think I was representing an Ace, and call me down light.
Villains could have Ax and bluffctach me.
BB could put me on Ax and try to bluff me or overplay a 7x.

BB has a history of overplaying hands and slowplaying, as well as bluff raising vs weak ranges, hence my flat river...

It's true that this is a very peculiar setup and that maybe some of the advice I receive here won't be immediately applicable due to the lack of initial info in the OP.

Yes, UTG and CO are pretty much level 0 thinkers, whatever that means. BB can be more elaborate, but not much more.

But this doesn't mean that I shouldn't be thinking these spots through and trying to finding the absolute best way to play these guys...

More reason to bet the flop. Build that pot to get it all in by the turn or river.

This happened on the river, which also poses some interesting questions :

River (pot=194)

A

CO bets 60, Hero (382 left) flats, BB pretty quickly raises to 120, CO thinks for about 3 seconds and calls....
Call or shove? What if the stacks were deeper?

I think it's less of a reason to c bet than if they were tight passive, or loose/tight aggressive.
If their range is big cards and pocket pairs, we can build a pot more easily than if they have called preflop with T8o and the likes...
If they check raise their T8o some percentage of the time, then yeah c bet for sure...

I could get behind a minute c bet though, because a QTo hand might float to hit a pair, and BB could get some ideas, sensing "weakness"

Exactly. But if you have to think about these spots then that means these players are adjusting to you in some sense. Which is the point I was trying to make.

I think I'd raise river, maybe I'm wrong but this is a trivial argument. I think the most important question to ask is why not bet flop? This seems like a very serious leak in your game unless you can tell me these players are folding 99 to you OTF.

The HH is a bit hard to read especially as OTR in OP, you omitted that BB first checked, then CO bet, then you called and then BB min raised to 120. Think this flow is important for assessment as BB appears to have a more decent holding then CO? Think flatting the first time to induce other callers OTR is fine for those reasons. AP: I think I'd flat. If the stacks were deeper, depending on how much, I'd probably make it $240/fold.

What hand/range did you put CO OTR on his bet, and what range BB on his check/min-raise OTR?
To me BB looks fairly strong here to do this, 33 or A7?

I'd also probably C-bet this flop, then check turn then raise CO OTR, and if all fold, call his shove.

Flop is a mandatory cbet 4-handed. First, one of our opponents has 7x a non-trivial proportion of the time, and cbetting drastically increases our chances of stacking them. If a Villain has something like 76 and is passive and/or MUBSy, we leave a ton of money on the table checking the flop. Second, we can get lots of value from pocket pairs. The Villains described are simply not folding pairs to a cbet on this flop.

My apologies for the badly typed HH...
Otr COs range is tricky to define because he is a beginner. I would say value of course because he is making the biggest bet of the hand albeit a small one compared to the pot size. I think he would consider Ax worthy of a b/c in this spot.
I ended up shoving into both players because I figured BB was putting me on Ax due to flat, putting CO on any two value cards including 3x, and could be raising light with 7x

Maybe flop decision will end up being the most valuable discussion point to me.
What do you think about preflop?

Preflop play was fine, but then again maybe you could've raised a bit more if you know they are calling with crap that way you get paid more when you do hit a set.

The big issue that's already been stated is not c-betting this flop. These are players likely thinking about quantitative money value and not your bet in relation to the pot. You could easily have bet 1/3-1/2 the pot just to inflate the pot as you have the best hand and are likely to get more callers this way. If the BB would take a small bet as a sign of weakness and try to raise you here as a bluff then that would make this play even better.

The turn play is fine, but should've been done on the flop.

The river should've been a raise all in after the CO first bet. You are getting tons of value from all Ax hands here and flatting just seems weak as the BB could've easily just flatted or folded here and you would've missed tons of potential value from the CO, who was likely holding an Ax and betting small just hoping to get calls.

Imho, pre-flop IP is fine. Maybe a raise to $25 or some other "bigger hand" standard raise, unless this is your standard pre-flop raise size.

This:
is why you should raise the river in my opinion. He probably has an A and he thinks you bluff so he'll call a raise to about $180 - $200.

As played, BB probably has a 7 (hopefully not A7), CO probably has an A or maybe a weak 7. Shove. They both overvalue their hands so it's likely that you'll get a call from any 7 out there.

I'm starting to agree that I should probably have raised the COs first bet, as he would never fold Ax to me, and the risk of BB flatting, even with a 7x, is fairly high. I made him fold a top pair last week and he has probably vowed to never do so again after he saw my bluff.
In any case, here it worked out beautifully as after my shove BB sigh-called off with T7o and CO called as well with the 54o straight.

I'm still not convinced about the cbet (although I would cbet a fair percentage of the time in this spot, isn't there merit to checking sometimes?). Sure, I want to inflate the pot, but now that you've seen villains hands you get that in this game the ranges on the flop are pretty close to ATC, so a cbet would get a lot of folds (giving the passive hit or miss nature of UTG and CO. BB can be a little feisty but usually needs some equity or position to do so).