so my image is kind of LAGy preflop - so far I re-raised preflop 3 times and only 1 one pot (i had a8s in position and bet a 8TJ flop and villian c/f a8 and showed lol) the other 2 pots were me reraising huge out of the BB vs a cutoff raise with 1 limper (i had aqo) and co shoved and I folded. other hand I repopped same cutoff villian from AQ hand when i was on the button and he opened in hijack - i had ato and he had qq - flop was kxx check check - turn another k and he check-calls a small bet and river check check i muck - so yea my image is a bit spewy preflop with reraises which is kinda good for this spot

villian from the A8 hand (who is basically the main fish at this table, i have jesus seat on him, he used to limp a lot pre and just do silly things occasionallly postflop but hes gettin a lil more solid since he has built a bit of a stack now) anyways he raises to $8 UTG and i Look down at AA UTG+1

i read an article from 2p2s finest, Ed Miller, who explained a situation where he trapped with KK or AA in this exact spot (it was an online hand i think he was talking about and for some reason it was a cap game with like 40bb max buyin or somethin i think and someone in cutoff or button made a huge re-raise with AQ and ed miller just trap called and checked to villian on flpo who jamed with a straightdraw and hit) and claimed that him reraising here is pretty much making his hand face up and allows opponents to play perfectly because an UTG is already very strong so to repop big in UTG+1 with 8 other players to act so I considered calling here and hoping a situation like ed millers hand would arise and someone would squeeze from LP but this is 1-2nl at foxwoods and everyone is pretty straightforward preflop so i felt that me flatting here will put me in a baddddd spot preflop because its likely there can be as many as 6 or 7 more callers behind me fishing for a twopair or better type of hand and since I am OOP it will be very tough to know where I am at if flop comes coordinated and I get called on a flop bet in mutliple spots



so yeah i decided to re-raise fairly big since villians stack was about 200bb and i covered and didnt want him set mining at the right price but now that i look back at this spot i kind of like ed millers thinking here because since calling is how i would play all my small PP so therefore i should also play my monsters like that but i think that type of reasoning applies more for the higher stake games where people actually think before making decisions whereas at 1-2nl people tend to be very passive preflop and will call with just about any two suited (sometimes nonsuited as well lol)

jus wanted to hear some opinions of this particular spot because it occurs pretty often

You're 200 BB deep and you want to allow the price to play this hand to be 4BB? Are you crazy? Are you set-mining with AA?

The only one you are slowplaying is yourself. I'm 3-betting to $25 here.

Always reraise and make it big since you are deep.

This deep you need to approach the situation the other way around. Always raise your value hands and mix in some bluff raises and lighter raises so opponents can't assume your raises are always straight value. In a short stacked game you can make a case for flatting here. Even if you flat everybody is close to pot committed on the flop and raising is going to force villains to fold or shove, limiting their ranges. When deep that isn't the case and you need to charge villains who want to set mine or play suited connectors. If you play them passively, you will mostly end up winning small pots and losing the big pots with your pairs.

The main reason Ed Miller can flat and trap in the spot you describe isn't stack sizes. It is because online calling ranges are tighter than online squeezing ranges. The same hands that live players are happy to overcall with and see a flop are the trash hands that online players will turn into a bluff squeeze.

Ed could flat to trap expecting to be in position most of the time in a 2 or 3 way pot, or to face a squeeze he could 3 bet. In a live game, you're basically forced to 3 bet here to prevent the fish from schooling behind you resulting in you playing a 4 or 5 way pot OOP.

What do you guys think about making it 40?

I'm not generally a fan of colossal raises, but villain looks really strong and I think we will get a call. Should price out set miners and could set up a river shove. Or is that too much?

$30-$40 is a good number here, because hero is second to act and going smaller would invite too many coming in behind, but it isn't actually big enough to block set mining. To prevent set mining when somebody might come in behind and force you to play OOP, you want something over 10% of your stack. With effective stacks at 200BB hero would have to go to $100-$125 to totally price out set mining and that is just vs villain, if there are other deeper stacks at the table it would take even more.

At 100BB the 3 bet can usually be sized to prevent set mining without being too big, but once you get above that you will start running into situations where a 3 bet to that prevents set mining entirely is simply too big. Deep stacked you simply have to risk set mining some of the time, and that means you have to be able to get away from over pairs some of the time.

One of the problems I encounter when talking to players about spots like these is that players do not think about their overall game, but rather, they try to focus on this one particular specific instance and then ask, "Hey, how do I play this spot perfectly?"

Instead, try to think about how this hand relates to your overall game.

Speaking for myself, I raise fairly often throughout my session when one of the following conditions or combinations of conditions exists:
- I sense weakness
- I read a lot of players as weak/tight post flop
- I have a perceived strong image (i.e. just showed down some monsters)
- I perceive/observe certain players fear me or are scared money
- I perceive that certain players read my preflop raising range as JJ+, AK
- I have a great handle on the table dynamics especially post flop
- I have a strong hand
- I have a hand that plays well post flop
- I observe that players are autofolding to my raises
- I observe a situation where there is a lot of potential dead money and a great situation for squeezing

The above translates into me raising an average of 1-2 times per orbit from a variety of positions. Over the course of a session, I will often have squeezed once or twice and shown down a less than stellar hand during a squeeze that ends up winning a nice sized pot. I would have also 3-bet a few times such that a 3-bet from doesn't illicit an autofold...

Now, given the above, lets now put your question into perspective. I have been active as stated above, and now I pick up AA UTG+1, what "can" I do.

Notice I highlighted "can". Because I'm so active, I can now 3-bet UTG+1 and get called by a much wider range or even get 4-betted by a hand like 99 - QQ, AK/AQ which would normally just flat (depending on villain type of course)...

On the surface, the above sounds like I'm advocated that you should LAG it up and splash around...

that is not my intent. My intent is to try to get you to think beyond this one specific spot and to look at the overall texture of your game and THEN think how this spot relates to your overall game... That is how you determine the optimal way to play a spot.

With all that being said, you have to raise AA here. 3-bet around 3.5x to 4x the opening raise, so if V made it $8, then 3-bet to about $30.

As far as set mining is concerned... Denying set mining odds isn't my primarily reason for raising pre. My primary reason is to get hands I dominate to call so that I can play them post flop in an inflated pot when my hand is ahead of their range.

GL hope this helps

Grunching

Raise to 30. With your image maybe he pops you back esp if a couple other deep stacks call and he doesn't want to play JJ/QQ multiway. Don't play for stacks post flop unless the board comes out 222 or something else where you're nutted.

ETA: Above post is good. Especially on the set-mining thing. Don't worry about giving odds to little pairs. Most of the time you're not going to win a huge pot with AA against little pairs. You bet the flop, tid, and collect a small pot. That's ok.

To start off with, Ed Miller parted ways with 2+2 a while back.

That said, mpethy and dgiharris pretty much nail the difference between what Miller advocates and live play. I'll just add that people in LLSNL tend to play their absolute hand holdings. They'll ignore pot odds pf for the chance to crack AA. They'll let you know that AA is beat, if you'll listen. Your goal is to get as much as possible in the pot pf.

Play aces like deuces.

Or an Arag that flopped an A with no kicker.

ok thanks for the advice and yes i see the difference between live and online squeezing ranges

i figured that, like the post above stated, since i have a less than stellar image in terms of my 3bet range since I showed an A8 vs same villian in a reraised pot (and he called with A8 also OOP to c/f bottom pair, so he is loose enough to look me up light pre) this seemed like a great spot to 3bet for thick value

So now, ask yourself, "why did everyone fold quickly?"

Serious question. How often had you or anyone at the table been raising or 3-betting to $45???

If I had to guess, I would guess that the table had rarely if ever seen any preflop bets or 3-bets to $45 more than once per hour...

I often talk about understanding the "table thresholds". Every table/game will have certain thresholds that become the norm, a certain raise that gets a bunch of callers vs a certain raise that narrows the field to 1 or 2 callers. Same with 3-bets. As thinking players, we need to be cognizant of these thresholds and ID them as soon as possible. At some tables, a $45 3-bet could get called but at most 1/2nl tables, a $45 3-bet is going to be too much.

So the only thing you get called by is KK and maybe QQ and you blasted villain off of his AK, AQ, AJ, KQ, QJ bs hands that could have paid you off post flop.

When we have AA we don't want our villains to fold, we want them to call. So we have to figure out the most we can bet and still get them to call. And this needs to be done in the overall context of our game.

This is why I would have raised to $30. They can call $30, but $45 will chase out pretty much everything except KK/QQ.

Lastly, we need to be comfortable enough with our postflop game so that we can fold AA post flop without heart ache.

We raise to $30, get two callers and the flop hits

Flop: T 9 8
we should be prepared to fold post flop if action pushes us out or the board gets even chittier.

anyways, my thoughts on the matter...