$1000 eff. My image young white TAG grinder. Villain............... same Played with each other before and respect each other's game. He's generally pretty tight, I really haven't seen him make moves. Tight table.

Folds to me in HJ with JcJs and I make it $40. He calls OTB. HU.

Flop: Qh8d4c Pot ~ $100 I bet $60, he calls.
Turn: 5c Pot ~ $220 I check, he bets $110.

I'm questioning everything about my play in this hand. Bet on the flop, maybe check better? Check on the turn, maybe bet better? AP this spot sucks. Even though I haven't seen moves from him I'm pretty sure he's capable and now not only I possibly have the best hand but also possibly drawing super slim if he has a Q and bloating the pot if I call

If you check flop, do you x/f turn? Are you x/c'ing 3 streets?

How does that interact with his ranges as opposed to if you bet flop & x/c turn, x/decide river?

While you get action from more of his air if you check flop, if he barrels his air ott and some otr, you can't realize your equity. I think betting flop, x/c turn & x/deciding river lets you get to showdown as profitably as possible. Unless it's actually -EV vs his flop continuing range if he is just top pair+ and you should fold turn.

dont bet flop and narrow his range to a range that has u in bad shape. as played, fold. you do block qj but kq seems likely or even sets 88 44. not many draws either and i don't see him betting anything weaker than you. if he is bluffing, he's not giving up on river so unless u call both streets u can't call here

Do you c/f or c/c flop? BTW you do know that if you always check a flop with an overcard you will be super-exploitable (raped) by a good opponent, right? I'm not saying most $5/$10 Vs are good enough to do that but... just throwing this out as a consideration.

Don't ****ing throw the word raped around and play better when you check.

Poster wishes to have this post deleted and apologizes for his comment.

-venice10

This hand isn't worth agonizing over. It's true that it's a very close, difficult decision what to do, but that's because there isn't much equity difference between continuing and giving up. Sometimes you'll win, sometimes you'll lose. If you lose your last buyin on this hand, well, you can live on ketchup from the condiments bar until you find someone to stake you.

This is the sort of flop where you have lots of options but none of them are good because your EV is close to 0 no matter what way you go. It's hard to get better to fold, hard to get worse to call and you have no idea where you are. At every step your action is going to be some combination of bet/fold, check/fold and check/call. The right mix depends on your villain.

Given the sort of villain your facing bet flop most of the time since you should be ahead here more often then not. On turn, make some judgement call on how often he will bet here with air/worse when you check and call about the same percent of the time. Give up most of the time if he bets river.

If your playing this guy on a regular basis, this sort of hand is one of the reasons you need to check/call turn when you do have QX some of the time. It's too easy for villain to bluff you off better hands here if you never have top pair.

That's not true. A "good" opponent isnt going to barrel off just because there is one high card on the board and you checked.

And I would also check back the flop because there isnt much to protect your hand from on the flop. A queen is never folding, and betting the flop can make subsequent streets messy.

I like betting flop especially if V will float a street. If he fits into this category I thing your bet size was good. I would bet the turn about the same size as he did $110-$125. If he calls turn bet I check fold river unless V has shown he will play aggressive enough to float 2 streets. Betting turn defines the hand more clearly but only if he will float one bet. If he is truly a straight up player I would check fold turn. I actually think this hand has discussion value as it is a situation that is very v dependent and we run into it regularly. I would like to read discussion on how people play this out based on various V types.

Removed quoted comment, other poster agrees with you.

-venice10

OP,

I'd start with a flop check/call here. Giving up a free card isn't too concerning, as there are no strong draws to charge, and the only hand with 2 overs would almost definitelty have 3-bet pre. I also think there's a lot of 22-TT in his floating range, and folding any of those hands out would be a shame. He just doesn't make nearly as many mistakes later in the hand when you bet flop IMO.

You're right, sorry.

You can't check back flop because you're not IP.

Heresy, a thread by me can't possibly have any discussion value! Hi jcldog.

Yup i meant just checking. Extra word in there.

I'd sigh x/f but it's a close one, c-bet/give up on this board HU with late pos vs late pos is normally kinda weak but if you haven't seen him make any moves, he's not making any moves (until we see otherwise). Better to assume the safe side for now buddy and sit to his left if he starts to get on your nerves. If he's got some 89 or 55/66, 99/TT type hand he's prob gonna check back the turn more often than bet

Against a good player im never betting this flop. If he calls your only option becomes to turn your hand into a bluff and stack off hoping to get him to fold a Q. Much prefer a check/eval. Most Tagfish will barrel once and give up. A good player wont let you off that easy, just check/fold flop.

Grunch

What is his image of your blind attacking range first in late? I will guess it is...
AX
22+
any 2 broadway
maybe most K's
89o+
68s+

Dry flop. When he calls it should be a strong ace or better most of the time.

My first instinct is to keep betting turn but as flop is so dry I guess check calling is right but I hate getting checked behind on river but that's poker. I think he'll bet at your weakness with any pair and very strong Ace's so you can't fold.

Your last paragraph makes it sound like you play in a game where first-in late position players don't attack and thus drastically undervalue their hands and position just like in my 1/2 game, so my range at the top is way wrong.

I think there is some merit to hero leading turn half pot, this way possibly folding out some Q9/Q10/QJ if villain is tight/perceives you as very tight, and also making it almost certainly correct for us to give up on river if V calls? May not be super optimal but I find this way better than x/c'ing turn because x/c'ing turn is a leak if we are folding to another bet on the river, and x/c'ing both streets makes it very unlikely for or hand to be good unless we somehow spike a J.

So overall I think the only 2 options are b/f ott and give up otr or x/f ott.

This seems right to me. I would actually check Qx OTT semi-frequently in this spot, where as this would almost always be a barrel in the 2/5 game I usually play in since the players will call so much lighter.

If you've played before and he's a tight player that doesn't make any moves, then you bet the flop and shut down. There are no draws to worry about. We're not extracting value, we're just trying to get people to fold their remaining equity. Turn is an easy x/f. I'll note that someone who is tight and doesn't make any moves isn't a good player.

With 99-TT or 8x I would anticipate V to check behind almost always. So we’ll likely be faced with a river bet as well in the form of either a bluff or value for Q+.

That being said, from a GTO perspective, check/folding the turn blows, but less so than having to follow that up with a check/fold OTR.

On such a dry board, without a specific read or prior evidence of V getting out of line, I’m folding OTT mainly due to the leverage of an anticipated river bet.

I like the way you played this hand Olaff. Time to not be a station and check/fold the turn, just much better spots to win money off a decent player than this. Agreed that sometimes we need to get sticky and call down here, but I wouldn't be making a habit of it against good regs who will just exploit us in position over time.

Yes! ....Let me ramble a bit, talk about some stuff I've been chewing on, to see if I can needle you into a discussion, I'd like to hear more.

----------------

Question: why do we raise JJ UTG?

"For value" is a correct answer, but it's not the only correct answer, and I wonder if it's even the most important correct answer.

Consider. We believe in the "positional gradient." Meaning, the better your position, the stronger you are, and the more you can play a broader (weaker) range.

Without getting into nauseating detail, let me submit a different idea. That there's no positional gradient: you're either in position, or you're out of position. If you're out of position, you can't always be the aggressor, and you might not always want to be the aggressor, because of the information asymmetry.

So, let's say instead of having 9 or 10 different opening ranges based on position, we have basically two opening ranges: a betting range, which I will use IP, and a calling range, which I will use OOP. Recognizing that there has to be a lot of overlap, because the betting initiative can change.

I call these my "betting" or "calling" ranges, but to be clear, I have a lot of choices with either. With my calling range, I can definitely check/call some of my hands. But I can also lead out, or can check/raise to take the initiative. Just depends on who is in the hand, and what the board texture is.

JJ fits into either range. We love JJ from late position, it's a great hand to have in your betting range, shoot it's kind of hard to lose with this hand from late position.

Depending on the villain, we are also delighted to have JJ in our calling range. We just, in general, hate not being the aggressor in no-limit.

My "calling range" is way smaller than my "betting range," but it might not be as small or narrow as one might think. If you're a TAG, people assume you're only playing premium hands from UTG, but I'll bet not one person out of a dozen on this forum actually does that. I try to sneak in UTG with any pocket pair if I can get away with it. 22, 33, absolutely. If I can get away with it. Against a table of weak passive players who don't know how to size their flop bets, I'll try to sneak in with KQs or even JTs sometimes. These are good hands to have in my calling range. As are AA, JJ, and certain others.

These are not static ranges, you adjust them depending on table conditions. And we all have different ranges, yours is probably different from mine, and because of that, what I say may have no application to you whatsoever.

That said... I think the real question in this hand is whether to be the aggressor or not, and that decision can and should be made on the flop, because now you do know what the board texture is, and who you are up against.

As far as board texture is concerned, if you think about what my "OOP" or "calling" range looks like, and how I would play it if I flipped it over into a betting range (limited though it may be), I'm actually liking this board a lot. However, JJ wouldn't normally be in my betting range here. AA and 44, definitely. JJ... meh. You can't bet everything (really... you can't) and I don't think JJ would make the cut.

Against this villain? Generally, when up against a tight player, I like to know how much they like their hand before I act. So I'm leaning toward playing this hand passively. That said, against a TAG player, JJ is way in my calling range, definitely.

In my twisted way of looking at things, that's two votes for checking the flop.

This is a really complicated way of looking at it, but the reality is, your game plan -- and by that, I mean your game plan all the way to the river -- should be built on a solid foundation, and that foundation is your starting range. I think this hand is a perfect illustration of how your starting range is going to dictate a certain strategy with certain board textures, against certain villains.


tl/dr:

I liked raising pre, I would only limp if some aggro was bum-hunting me. Once the flop rolls around, I would be inclined to check/call the flop, and go from there.

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