Villain is this hand is a young Russian kid at a home game. Had I known he was Russian before the hand I probably would have played it differently. On to the hand. We have been playing for about 2 hrs at this point. Russian has not gotten out of line but is opening a lot of hands and folded when I 3b him pre once when he opened to 20 and I made it 65. I hve Russian barely covered by maybe $50 and he bought in deep for$500. I have only shown down premium hands thus far and hand prior to this call down a big river bet with 2p with 4 card straight against huge Aggro fish and was good. Russian probably perceives me a TAG.

Folds around to Russian in co who opens to 15. I look down at 99s and flat. Thought about 3b but decided against it to try and allow the huge fish in. He folds and we are heads up.

Flop is jh 53ss. Russian leads for 20. I bump it up to 60. Russian sighs and calls. At this point I put him on a one pair hand, kj, aj etc. turn brings an offsuit 7. Russian checks and I make it 95. Again he calls so I feel as though my read is right and he has jx with a flush draw but is more often than not reraising me with these type of hands. Also could have two overs with flush draw.

River is a offsuit 7. And again Russian checks. I think for maybe 15-20 seconds and go all in.

Thoughts and comments on all streets appreciated and criticism as well.

Te river is an offsuit

I don't know why it wrote the river is an offsuit twice. Lol

I don't really understand your thought process here. I'm not sure you'll get great responses unless you add a little more... your read, reasons for raising the flop, betting turn when checked to and shoving the river? If we're turning 99 into a bluff to get villain to fold top pair, I think it's just incredibly read specific, and I can't add that much. On a "standard" basis, I'd say... don't do that. Maybe you had a good reason to do so.

For each street:

- I'm surprised you didn't 3-bet pre. You have a strong pair facing a very wide open given your read and position. I do think calling is OK though.

- Why did you raise the flop? You said it yourself - when villain called, you put him on a top pair hand. So your raise here is never for value because villain is generally calling with better, not worse. And it's not a bluff. And don't tell us it's for information. It looks pretty spewy.

- The 7 is not a good card to barrel on the turn. He's not folding top pair. You could maybe barrel a Q, K or A. It sounds like we're now determined to bluff him off top pair? That doesn't make much sense to me.

- On the river, I guess you're continuing to try to bluff him off top pair. Doesn't seem like a great idea generally. It doesn't seem like you have any sort of read that suggests you could get him off top pair... and unless you have an incredibly special read, you should never try to bluff villains off top pair in low limit hold them. I'm not sure you really planned the hand.

You probably felt you were ahead pre-flop a ton (though decided to flat), whiffed your set, the flop was an over card, and you decided to bluff because you realized you couldn't win the hand otherwise.

Hope that doesn't come off as harsh... that's just my assessment as someone who wasn't at the table with you.

Also, just to comment on this thought process... yes, you want to play against fish. But you have 99. Unless you're playing solely for set value, which would be OK, it's not really a hand that you want to encourage others to play against, even the fish.

Fish holding hands like KT, JT, QJ, etc., will play pretty well against you. With just one over card, fish are likely to play fit or fold, as well, and when they "fit," they are beating you and not folding.

Again if you're purely set mining because the fish won't fold, that works.

No that's exactly the type of response I was looking for. I wanted it to be harsh because I thought I misplayed it on multiple streets. Ill gve a more detailed thought process soon because right now I am at work. It was villain specific but got the image of him very wrong.

By the river the pot is big already because you got in your your head that you must win this hand just because you got a little pair or 99. That's wrong.
You rarely bluff—and you do not bluff in big pots. You might not accept this approach right away because you may be used to playing a lot of pots and constantly working to outthink and outdo your opponents.

Cool, look forward to your thinking. That'll be great. Biggest problem with forum hands, especially and primarily live hands, is that you might do something very read specific. But the responses you get will generally be more ABC poker type responses. So tell us more... though I have to admit I'm not sure what read would make this hand work. Villain is probably capped here, but I don't know if I've ever tried to bluff someone off the board's top pair hand in live low stakes.

Your flop raise doesn't make sense. When you raise 99 you're only getting called by better.

Call and reevaluate the turn. It's probably a safe assumption Villian cbetting a healthy %. Your hand has showdown value, no need to turn it into a multistreet bluff to try to get someone off tp.

You've never tried bluffing a solid player off top pair if the solid player views you a TAG and solid? (Not saying that's what's going on here) You are missing a lot of opportunity. However in this hand , you do not bluff Russians off top pair, ever. (Partly being funny and partly serious.) just try and get to showdown cheap here. Save your bluffs for capped ranges on players you know can fold. This board vs this player we shouldn't be raising for value. I would of called flop and reevaluated turn and probably folded to another bet until I have a better read of this player. Lets not get all crazy at what sounds like a juicy home game, you will find better spots.

CKrumm nailed a lot of what I was thinking. Like I said originally I did not know he was Russian because he did not really talk at this point. On the flop I raise because a lot of the time vs this opponent my hand is the best hand. He has been cbetting his opening raises a healthy 70%+ times and probably about 100% when it was HU. Now, I know I said when he calls I put him on JX but was also thinking he could have had flush draw, but was leaning more towards J because of his "sigh" call.
So on the turn I barrel again, to try and get him off his hand and if he calls my plan was to shove river if called because I didn't think he could call a big river bet with a one pair type hand. I had this read based off a hand earlier in the night where pretty much the same situation arose but from a more bad Laggy player betting into him on 3 streets. I was sitting next to him and saw him fold top pair to this player on the river. I could not see his other hole card though. ALso, I had been playing pretty snug at this point opening a decent amount but showing the goods when called. I perceived my image to him was that I had a made hand. Set, overpair, because yes vs this opponent I would play an over-pair almost the exact same except for river.
Again, I think I could have played it differently and there were definitely better spots to be found. I think I did get that mentality in my head that, "I need to win this pot" so shoving river was the only option.
The mistake I made was not having enough information about this player to make that play. I think vs other opponents it could and would have been a good line to take. After the hand was over, my other neighbor, "goes why did you try to bluff the mad Russian, hes a donkey and can never fold". FWIW he played his hand horribly I think. He had .

Just because you have the best hand a lot on the flop, doesn't mean you should raise. Are you raising to see where you're at? It's obviously not a value raise, you have to think about worse hands that can CALL the raise. And this is not a spot you should be raising for protection.

Do you see why calling is better?

I understand why calling can be good but why cant he be calling with his draws sometimes as well? and Also when i call what is the plan on the turn?

This is pretty much a call-down situation. It would help to know he was like REALLY aggro which would make calling 3 streets easier, but you seem to think he's at least somewhat aggro. Just call him down unless the turn and river are all overcards. Probably fold the river if he bets again.

haha, no. sorry buddy, you played this hand pretty poorly, he played it pretty much like a lot of people would play AJ

look at it this way:

fold around...
Hero (CO):AJ : opens to $15
Villain (BT): flats

Flop ($33)
J53

Hero: $20, V raises $60, Hero calls

Turn ($153)
7

Hero checks, V bets $95, Hero calls

River ($343)
7

Hero checks, V bets $280ish, Hero calls


my initial read here from looking at it this way is that V didnt 3bet on the button. so when V raises on the flop, why is AA-QQ in my range? it's there, but i'm not giving V that automatically. JJ is very unlikely. but most of Vs range is locked up in random Jxs, which Hero dominates, AJ, which Hero has the gin AJ, 55, 33. thats about it.

flop: Hero cbets and gets raised, 40 to call into 113 pot, just under 3:1 for TPTK+nut flush draw. brain dead player could call that

turn: hero checks and V barrels. how does that 7 help V? it probably doesnt. stick with read

river: hero checks and V shoves. if the first 7 didnt help, why would the 2nd? call...

fact is, you should have 3bet pre if you are going to bet like this.
you havent shown anyone any reason to think you would flat in LP with AA-QQ.

if you flat, you get an over out there, why raise? flat the flop.
he'll bet the turn, you can flat that, or more likely fold. you know you're beat and drawing to 2 (maybe 1 if you didnt have the 9) outs.

and just to generalize a little...
if he played like a true Russian, he would have shoved with his Russian Set on the flop: top pair, nut flush draw

that is not to be confused with the Asian Set flop shove: 2 overs, nut flush draw

Yea makes sense. Thanks for the input I know I misplayed it. Just wanted to hear other people's opinion. I was unhappy with my play after and kind of tried to justify it but really was spewy in retrospect.

I'm not sure why we're not including overpairs in his range.

I don't like the river bet. The river card now moves his overpairs ahead of funky two pairs that we may have flopped, and he's simply more likely to look us up. As well, the flop is a little drawy and they've all busted; he might put us on a busted draw enough with TP/overpair hands. If he has two whiffed overs + flush draw, he's not calling a bet, so we might as well showdown for free here.

GcluelessNLnoobG

lol nice
I like the Asian set flop shove. I have the yellow fever. I'm a white asian supremacist.

I wrote that hand wrong the board never paired on the river but regardless I know I played it badly and got some good feedback. Thanks everyone. Either way should have checked river in retrospect