So I've been sitting on this hand for a couple weeks now. I wanted to give myself some time for analysis and perspective. I'd love to hear your feedback on how this went down. I kind feel like this is almost a trivial spot, but nonetheless appreciate the feedback.

Game is 1/3 NL with all the usual loose passive suspects at the table.

The Villains:

V1: Middle aged Asian lady, been playing loose and calling a ton of hands. Running bad and has punted two stacks in the last hour or so. She knows how to find the fold button, but loves to play a lot of hands. Stack of $350.

V2: MAWG. Recently moved to table and has been raising 30% of unraised pots, and playing ATC with abandon. Has stacked V1 twice in last hour, and clearly has some history with her as well from conversations. Stack of $1200

V3: Older Asian gentlemen. The definition of loose-passive. Hero has moderate history over a number of sessions, and know he will limp everything but JJ+. Stack of $80.

OTTH:

V1 UTG limps, V2 UTG +1 limps, CO limps, V3 in SB limps.

Hero ($550) is BB with AA raises to $20.

V1 calls, V2 calls, CO folds, V3 calls.

Villain 3 is clearly unhappy about being 'forced' to call, and turns his back on the table before flop comes out and checks dark.

Flop: ($80) 5 3 2

V3 checks dark. Hero bets $40. V1 raises to $120, and V2 flats the $120.

Here is where things start getting screwy. V3 still hasn't looked at the flop and asks the dealer if these is a '2' on the board. Dealers says yes there is. And V3 gleefully calls for his remaining $60.

Hero?

K... thoughts appreciated. Personally, I don't think that this needs to get sidetracked too much on the etiquette of V3, who is pretty much turning his hand face up as '22' IMO. At this point I'm pretty sure that I'm way behind V3 given our history and his obvious pleasure on the flop. However, we are deep with the remaining Villains and have a $120 side pot going already.

I'd never raise less than 25 preflop. that being said...

hard to imagine you're ahead of both of them. I'd just fold, this hand has gone very far awry, and there are way better spots esp. at 1/3.

only way you win this hand is if both players have 1 pair hands, the turn somehow kills the action, and you hero call a large bluff from mawg on the river.

all that being said she might be overplaying 99 ie and he might have a straight draw. but that's a slim poasibilty compared to 2 combos of A4s, 4 of 46s, 4 of 23s, 4 of 53s, 3 55 and 3 33, all hands these type of ppl are never folding. 24 combos u are behind. versus 3 each of 56, 45, 34, 24. May be 2 of 47s. 15 you're ahead of. if you think they're calling as light as 56o then maybe... they both might have a smaller pp but after she raises its unlikely he calls with 77 for instance.

even if there were a flush draw I think it's thin after a re raise and a cold call.

usually these types of players only raise 2p+ so folding is usually right.

More pre and flop is pretty thin to get it in and too much going on to call/call turn all in. Probably just sigh fold to exploit them as our equity isnt great multiway.

At these stack depths, at this table, and in this position, preflop is probably a lot tougher than your realize. Since we have AA and are last to act in a limped pot, we obviously feel obliged to raise it. But if we raise to any "normalish" amount, we know exactly what is going to happen: we're going to get 3 or 4 calls and create a difficult to play multiway SPR pots of 5-7 where stacks can go in trivially (even just check/calling OOP), and yet is that the situation we want given that we only got in lol 3% of our stack, possibly with a face-upish hand (we just raised out-of-the-blinds after 4 limpers, gee, I wonder what we have)? It's not an easy spot, imo. One idea is to raise stupid large (i.e. $60) so that if we get called we can comfortably stack off postflop knowing that even if we do so every time we get outflopped we'll be profitable (since we won't be outflopped enough for this price), although that often just takes down 4.5 bbs preflop (which ain't exactly a killing). Another idea is to limp and play a small pot deepstacked OOP to possibly a tricky player. Just things to consider. Another really tricky idea (which has both pros and cons) is to lol minraise to $6 and see if anyone reraises (which might backfire a lot against passive players although it ain't necessarily the end of the world if no one does as it will create an easier to play high SPR pot). In the end, we raised to $20, basically for no other reason that "I haz AA"; this is not a good reason in these conditions and alternatives should at least be considered, imo.

And here's the result we should totally expect: 4ways to SPR < 7. With these stacks, they could easily go in by the turn with just one raise. Are we ahead and should we protect our hand? Or did someone outflop us and will they be nice enough to let us know by raising us? Or will they slowplay us to death, which would probably be best since it will be so easy to setup a play for stacks by the river? Or will they overvalue 99 and should we make sure to get it in? All for 3% of our stack preflop. All because "I haz AA".

I probably check the flop and see what happens.

As played, this is probably enough action to fold here, especially given V3's weird play.

GcluelessNLnoobG

terrible situation for aces with these goofballs, i agree 25 with aces in 1/3. Here i'd fold, the one clown could have a set and who knows what the others are still doing in that pot. Straight draws or who knows what.

Great post, especially the first paragraph. Thought provoking.

AP, I think this is an easy fold as we are multiway versus the side potters, both of which I cant believe we are ahead of.

Surprising. I would have thought that a little more consideration might lean toward continuing this hand. Seems like the consensus is to simply *sigh/fold* and look for a better spot.

gobbledygeek: Thanks for your thoughts. I admittedly have not been considering the SPR as much as I should. And your suggestion of a silly large 3x pot raise has some merit in that we will likely fold out everything and make things simple. I appreciate your remarks which focus on trying to make post-flop play easy. However, I'm curious if you think that is in fact the most profitable play?

If we raise to $60 (but why stop there, why not $100, or AI?) we can comfortably count on winning the $15 or so in the pot, plus a lot of extra $$ on the very small chance we actually get called, almost never in my game.

However, if we raise $20 (or $25 --- whatever....) and get called 3 ways as in the above situation. We are about 60% to win the pot preflop, or about an EV of +$36. Assuming of course that we can make +EV postflop decisions.

This is the key point. How good are we multiway, OOP, with two loose players with wide ranges behind us, in a pot with this SPR? That gets very difficult to play well very quickly.

In this spot, we block some of the made straights, and we also block 2/3 of the nut backdoor flush draws. It looks and smells an awful lot like 55 from one of the villains. Very value heavy lines from them. We hold AA, we repped JJ+, and neither villain seems too concerned. Time to bail.

On the other hand, V2 may feel he can outplay V1 and has some sort of 4x holding, while V2 might be putting you on an AK type of hand and is bluffing. I don't think this happens often enough to warrant a call.

As the poster said above, this is key. It isn't nearly as easy multiway and OOP in a smallish SPR pot with a hand that is likely to remain as simply one pair as you think it might be. Obviously the more Phil Ivey you are, the more you welcome this situation. I ain't no Phil Ivey. There is a real argument here that taking down $15 preflop, as much as a real "loss" that might be considered, might be a more profitable result. Turns out the lol OMC "I raz my AA to $100 cuz I dont want nobody to crack em" actually has some merit in some spots, and this might be one of them.

To be fair, I'm not sure I've every limped AA in this spot (one of the options I think should seriously be considered). But also to be fair, I'm not sure how many times I've actually been in this spot in my ~3700 hours. This probably speaks more about the true lifetime variance one can encounter in this game more than anything.

GjustspitballinG

Thanks for the thoughts. Here is how the hand played out.

Hero goes AI ?!

V1 Calls, V2 Calls ?!

Pot ($1500ish)

Hand Review:

V3 tables 2 2

Hero A A

V1 5 2

V2 6 8

Turn: 5 3 2 ** 4 **

River: 5

Hero takes a break

My thinking was that I was almost certainly behind V3, and felt V1 was a range of small 2p + mid pp against which my hand had reasonable equity in what was likely going to be a huge pot if V2 came along as well. I though V2 (the big stack) was likely drawing or with small pp as well. Turns out it was about as bad a spot to be as possible, which just reinforces the good insight you guys provided.

Well, actually we had huge equity in the side pot with V2, but who can count on that craziness?!

Agreed with others that a little bigger pre would be better.

I'd actually just check this hand a lot on the flop. This is not a good flop for aces. Check and see what happens behind you.

As played fold. You're never good here against three players.

without the set of 2s face up, a clear gii spot imo. it's a lot closer given the main pot situation, but I think gii against this motley crew was fine. 25 probably better pre, but 20 was ok. bad luck.

$25-30 pre.

x/eval flop

What´s your stack? if you cover V2, I wonder if GG would advice to open to 120 to deny "lol-setmining odds"

I've already noted above that making a ridiculous OMC "I raz $100 cuz I dont want no one to crack my AA" isn't nearly as bad a play as you might think.

Especially for OP, as this HH proves. (no offense OP, but even though preflop did put us in an ugly spot we didn't help ourselves out none by our postflop play)

For Phil Ivey, it would probably be a pretty bad raise sizing.

GcluessNLnoobG

no, actually, it is just as bad as I think it is

Really, for this OP?

Preflop he got in $20 as a *slight* favourite multiway. Value value value, awesome, fistpump! Print the monies!

Postflop he got in $530 as a massive dog.

Of course, in this spot most of us here were able to figure out we were way behind thanks to action. But then again, this was a pretty easy spot to get away from too; most times we are behind we won't be facing an easy peasy raise / coldcall / shove spot.

Gprintthemonies!oh,wait...G

+1. Players who raise this small pre and "ZOMG I have AA, I must play for stax!" too often will go broke very quickly, especially if they do it vs more than one player. It is just too difficult to play 4 streets profitably unimproved OOP for all but the most talented players.

Hand really goes to show just how important position is. You put Hero OTB and this plays out incredibly differently.

Wow. This thread is gonna be epic.
Hint: Mathematically, open shoving AA will always be +EV.

His preflop was fine, his cbet was entirely reasonable, his shovelling in $490 after the cbet was EV +54 against their actual holdings.

While that is proof of nothing, in the end, I don't even know what your point is, other than you like to peddle awful AA advice.

If you're playing against Villains will call 100 pre with 8s6d, then sure, bump it up to 100. In the real world, some semblance of balance will go a long way preflop.

We've talked a lot about pre and a little about the flop bet, but we haven't talked about the flop jam, since that is pretty much at the results stage.

We know that V3 has 22. If v1 and V2 have ranges of 2p+, we have only one remaining 2 that can help us to counterfeit 53 (I know V1 has 52 but we would expect 53 to turn up more often). We have to believe that draws are in their range, which means we have fewer 4's to improve our hand to a straight. Even if we improve to a straight, there is a ton of 6x in V's range that beats us anyway. Even if we are only against 2p, our equity is greatly diminished because there are so many 2's and 4's that can't help us (we believe a 5 or 3 gives a villain a boat). Even if we had improved to a set of AAA, it completes 4x straight draws.

My opinion is that op had a strong hand, felt (correctly) that he at least had some equity, but didn't know how to play the turn or river because of the problems described above and decided to "WTH, all in I guess." Calling the flop raise gives us no real way to improve on the turn and river, other than runners for a full house. Folding the flop sucks because our hand is strong. Jamming takes away anxiety of playing later streets and emotionally feels better than giving up. I understand why OP jammed, and in a live setting I might do the same thing. Sharing this HH helps me think about spots like this in the future and might help me get away from it, so thanks for sharing.

Not sure how good my equity calculator is, but I had V3 at 64.7%, V1 at 9.5% and V3 at 16.4% with our equity at 9.4%

I don't think the cbet was bad, but I do think the jam was bad considering the flop raise and call behind by V2.

The point I'm making is the exact same point I'm making in the Limping thread: raising preflop simply because "we haz a big pear" is far too simplistic an approach in a lot of situations (for example, this one here).

GcluelessNLnoobG

calculating EV against ranges with this many sidepots would be tedious. V2 was a massive fish and so shovelling in $490 when the HU side pot against the fish was $400 - was probably never gonna be terrible.

yes, we have 9.4% equity in the main pot.

the EV of the $490 shove assuming the calls and the actual holdings was:

400*.7817 + 810*.2488 + 320*.0939 - 490 = 54

If you want to duplicate that result, make sure to put the other villains holdings into the dead cards pile when evaluating side pot equity.

GG. I think you are a really smart guy. even though I often disagree with your preflop decisions.

But, checking AA in the big blind to avoid difficult post flop spots? well, that's... something. It seems like your preflop strategy has evolved (devolved?) into "how can I avoid the absolute worst case scenario"


While I would have raised more preflop (probably 28-30), getting in "only 3%" of stacks pre is not really a disaster here since we are not robots who are going to automatically stack off with AA unimproved after the flop, and our opponents are typically not good enough to just fold every flop which does not outflop AA. We can play profitable poker even giving our opponents theoretically very good implied odds. Checking AA preflop in this spot would be a complete disaster and not something we should even be considering.