$1/3

V ($200) LP super drunk LAG reg lawyer. I have a lot of history with V. He’s a decent player generally but when he’s drinking he gets aggro and makes weird sizings.

H ($covers) SB V views me as weak tight.

V limps in LP which means weak holding. H makes it $15 from SB w/ AsQx. Only V calls.

Flop ($30)
Ks8c4s

H leads $22, V calls. V’s calling with any 1p hands or gutter balls.

Turn ($72)
2h
Check, check. V doesn’t have a K.

River ($72)
Ts

H checks, V bets $40, H puts V all in repping the nut flush, AA, KK or at worst AK. My flop lead, check turn line seem reasonable, but I don’t know about the river c/r. V is a reasonable player, has a fold button and even drunk should know that a river c/r shove is almost never a bluff. Thoughts?

If I'm raising preflop I make it at least $20+ in order to setup a more trivial / comfortable stackoff postflop with these stacks against the LAG. Any deeper I'd probably just see a flop with difficult him in position, but with these stacks it makes a big raise more of an option.

I probably cbet slightly less on the flop but whatever.

I'm probably also giving up on the turn. This is one of the reasons preflop can kinda be so-so, and we really want to charge a lot (and even taking it down preflop can be ok), cuz we're left with air OOP on the turn in a pot that can be stolen a lot.

Not in love with our river plan. My guess is he mostly just takes his showdown with his weak one pair hands. Which leaves nuttier hands (he's never folding a flush in a pot this big with a stack this small, right?) or airballs; but there aren't that many airballs that called the flop (and decided to not bluff the turn when checked to?). Think a check/raise is targetting very little here, no?

GcluelessNLnoobG

I would expect V to be betting all of his one pair hands here. Not saying it makes sense was great but that’s my read.

If he's betting most of his one pair hands then makes more sense.

GalthoughI'mnot100%soldonthatreadG

I think this is mostly fine as long as you also play your nut flushes like this. Check-raising this river with AA, AK, and KK as you alluded to in your post seems really bad so I think you'll want a very tight CRAI range that doesn't need a ton of bluffs.

You have possibly the nut bluffing hand here since you block his value bets (nut flush, KQ) and unblock some bluffs (67, 56). The only thing that is problematic is villain's image. I'm not sure getting too fancy vs a hammered guy is better than just taking them to value town by betting yourself.

One another note - I think you can size down on the flop a bit, maybe $12-15. The board is fairly dry and holding the As means that villain is less likely to call with a flush draw, and you also aren't very upset when a spade comes on the turn.

I think this might work on a good LAG who would realize a check raise is likely hella strong. Against someone completely drunk, I think it's a hecka lot more risky. I've never seen someone make much money getting drunks to fold.

Results: so I played like a little *****, told V ‘I guess you’re Q’s are good’ and mucked. V showed me one queen and then went into talking mode. Pretty confident he had QQ but I guess AQ is possible. Just as a population read I couldn’t find a realistic range that wasn’t almost exclusively bigger pairs. Was pleased with how I played the hand at the time but certainly thought I might have errored. Clearly based on the feedback here most would have called.

Wrong thread.

it went check check on the turn. if you had a hand you would now be forced to bet the river, so your check raise here screams desperate bluff.

he is going to call unless he was bluffing and you could just call and probably beat most of his bluffs.

I would often just bet river against a normal villain. The line is fine, as GG says it depends on how strong you think his betting range is. I probably wouldn’t try it against this villain when he is super drunk. He’s a lawyer who likes to gamble, the money probably doesn’t mean much to him, he’s drunk, I don’t expect him to have a ton of discipline and enough bet/folds.

Check/raising river with a strong flush is totally fine.

It’s a nut changing river. Just because villain didn’t bet turn doesn’t mean he couldn’t have improved on the river or represent that he did.

How many flushes can V have is the question. If he limp/calls any two suited cards then there are enough flushes in his range that your c/r is bad even if he does fold all one pair.

If he folds suited rags preflop then I like the play. You have reads and a plan and the math checks out -- only T8, maybe T4s and flushes improve on the river (but you have As which blocks a huge chunk of his flushes). You need him to fold 58% of the time and if he folds all his one pair then he does.

If you get called and he shows Kx or a lower pair then your read was wrong.