It is a leak. I would not consider it a major one. I exercise bet/fold like a champ and am very comfortable playing postflop. As most good players do, I believe that my postflop abilities afford me the ability to play more hands. Granted, I would love to be in position.

I think that watching Jason Somerville for a couple years has changed my thinking towards this.

As stated, it is a leak. But a small one IMO.

This is more how my thinking has evolved over the last couple of years. Especially in 1/2, players play straightforward and passive so much, it makes my life so much easier.

Fold pre.

For one, 4-high is one of the worst hands you can get in a game that delivers two playing cards to you and values the cards in order from 2 to A, low to high. For another, I don't recommend playing one of the worst hands possible in the worst position possible.

I haven't read the other posts... I just now scrolled through, and OK, I don't mean to pile on. But it's not even about pre-flop. It's about post-flop. It is a major leak. And it's easy to fix. While it happens infrequently because near-nut hands don't come along often, you will, over time, lose a ton playing this hand oop because you will make near-nut hands that lose to better near-nut and nut hands far more frequently than the reverse.

You're right about the 1000 tiny nicks, but to be honest, when I'm thinking about my long term win rate, I'm actually more concerned about those times I lose my entire stack (rare? sure. affect your win rate? you bet) because I'm in a horrible RIO spot. There are some hands (and positions) where we accept the tiny nicks because we have implied odds and an ability to generate strong positive EV. In this spot, with this hand + position + dynamic, we have those nicks, but our great pay off is... major reverse implied odd spots.

OP, like I said, I don't mean to pile on. Just sharing my honest thoughts, hope they help. Pre-flop may seem like a w/e given the odds... but it doesn't work that way. It's not about pre-flop. Pre-flop isn't really even a thing. This is about post-flop equity. Let's not think about the play from the lens of the $5 we put in free flop... let's think about how well we fare with our remaining 195 post-flop.

For the rest of the hand... yeah, on the flop, you're c/c oop with 4-high. That's not ideal. We generally won't have a plan to win this hand unimproved... and we often won't have an opportunity oop to win a ton when we do make our hand.

Turn is ditto. We don't hit our combo draw that often. We don't have the correct direct odds to call. We may not get paid when we do hit because a flush coming in is so obvious. That said, yes, I would call, and it's a fine play but certainly not a slam dunk. The good news is that villain is looking strong on this texture, he raised from UTG, his range contains very few if any better flush draws, we're around a 3:1 dog and getting a bit less than 3:1, so while our direct odds aren't quite there (and there can be some RIO), I think our implied odds do make up for it.

On to the river action... think it's a clear shove. Get the values.

A call is justified because we're not playing just to hit our hand. Villain will often check back the turn giving up with his air and we have a profitable bluff on the river when we miss both streets.

A flop x/r is also good and I prefer it with our weaker draws. Our IO is lower and floating isn't great OOP.

calling with bad hands out of position is pretty much the biggest leak there is

villain raised utg and bet the flop 4 ways. we're calling the flop to hit our hand

The described player is c-betting this flop a lot whether he hits or not. Just because you wouldn't doesn't mean he wouldn't. OP is telling us this play has a bluff component against this V and I believe and agree with him given V as described.

This is not the best river ever. 300bb deep. I hold 66 in BB. Limped pot about 6 ways. Flop comes 663. Checks around. Turn J. check-button bets pot, call. River J. V holds a J. That is the best river ever. V mutters do you have 66 as he calls the 3bet shove.

As to this hand, need to be deeper to call pre. Fold pre. Flop is a bad taste chk-call. Turn is a bad taste chk-call. Both are really marginal and have to assume your flush outs are clean. River got there, either shoving or betting 1/2 pot is fine. I think you get more calls and overshoves on the 1/2psb and fewer folds than a shove so it most likely best.

Sorry to be a ****, but straightforward and passive (which is exactly how you played this hand) made V's life much easier (assuming you shoved river).

How much talent does it take to check/call and bink the river?

This

I will definitely call pre in this situation when I am Bb, but I fold to flop bet because we have not good odds to continue. This play will cost you lots of money in long run.

ZOLTAN TO THE RESCUE

Fold pre
Fold flop
Fold turn
Shove river

What is the worst hand you would call pre in this spot?

How many callers does there have to be for you to call 34s in this spot? (Generally speaking, you are readless in most of the table and the avg stack is 100 bb)

shove

+1 ez game

You could squeeze to 35 pre if you're bored. When he 4bets, tell him you had to see where you're at.

You could x/shove turn if you have a read that you can get AK to lay it down (good luck with that)

That's the beauty in poker - everyone has the right to play the hands they want to play as they see fit. That's why there are long-term winners, long-term crushing winners, long-term losers & long-term losers that you see losing their temper & getting everyone's attention in the room when they lose a $100 pot & long-term mediocre winners.

We've had a professional [squid face], who has been winning for decades recommended folding pre. Other veteran [long-term winners] recommend folding.

You're approx ~20:1 to flop 2pr or better. If you flop a flush draw, you're OOP. You win less money OOP than you do IP.

Others recommend playing the hand. I don't know them. I do, however, wish them the best in 2016.

Side note: I saw a guy within the last month @ MDL, win a ~$1200 pot with 34o when he turned a boat. He was in mid-position. You can win with any hand. Just gotta' gamble & hope it works out in your favor in the long run. T2o has not worked out over the years for Doyle.

this is a really tough question to answer. I am literally almost never readless. Like sooo much of poker it really depends. How much of a monkey the preflop aggressor is?. Are there shorties that are going to hamstring my ability to do anything post flop? Are there morons that I want to be in a big pot with that have called?etc etc

Position is so key to profitability in NLH it is not even funny. Players that have not played extensively on line and studied databases have a really tough time understanding that. Mpethy bridge is the grand master on the subject of Dbase analysis and he can confirm this. He can most likely confirm that its really tough for someone with mediocre post flop skillz to turn a profit with 34suited from the bb facing a raise

QFT. When I look at my online database, my BB/100 is painted in big fat red and all the struggle is how to contain that red monster. And this is truly the toughest task in NL.

But to what extent are live and online different enough that you can't really compare results effectively? My experience is that your implied odds are much bigger live than online. There are a lot more calling stations, and players that will never fold a set or a baby flush even when it's completely obvious they are beat. Online people are multitabling which makes it easier to be patient and fold a good hand to an opponent who has the nuts.

Live 1/2 is a completely different world. You get someone who gets dealt AA for the first time in two weeks, and come hell or high water they're not going to fold it ever. So I think it's fine to invest $5 with 34. Any hand that can make a straight involving an A is A-OK with me, because lots of my opponents can never get away from top pair aces.

funny we should be having this discussion...someone pointed out to me they were having a similar discussion on mhsfr


http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/11...oesfd-1574337/

I also asked the Db master hisself to weigh in...so hopefully he does as well

I think facing a 3.5bb raise and only 100bb deep you'd have to be a big crusher and have a lot of experience at 1/2 to have a good read on player tendencies and bet sizing reads to profitably defend 43s here.

As far as river goes, since you deem him a good player the proper play is to check and let him barrel bluffs and go for value with AK/AQ.

I appreciate your opinion and others that disagree with the way that I played the hand.

Please let me know which errors I make.

1. Hero calling pre-flop getting 4.6 to 1.


2. Hero calling flop getting 2.4 to 1.
If Villain has AK (for example) we are a 60/40 dog.

3. Hero calling turn getting 2.7 to 1.
Narrowing Villains range a bit, we can conclude 65/35 dog at this point


I agree that there are some marginal direct odds errors but I think it is apparent by his actions that he has a very strong holding. Considering this, the implied odds IMO justifies a marginal call on 1 street for the opp to get Villain's stack. I thought I read that once in a poker book (sarcasm).

I admit there are some RIO involved but considering the Ac is on the flop, this is less likely.

A year ago, I would have blown through a post like this and blown someone up like Zoltan did and I am not saying he is wrong.

I am just looking at poker a little differently than I have in the past (mainly because of Runitup and JCarver) and presenting a differing LAG and sometimes Loose passive approach.

The problem with SC's OOP generally is your draw is not always going to be hidden. So when your draw comes in, you won't always get paid off. And unless you flop trips you'll never have SDV. So like Squid said, it's a slow leak that becomes a bigger problem over time.

You have more than adequate opportunities to play ****ty SC's in the CO/BTN that there is really no need to play them OOP. Your big blind is a sunk cost and your skill advantage is not as great as you think it is (if it even exists). Just fold, observe the hand and move on.