V1- on the nitty side. Has about $650 in front of him. Loves limping and and tries to see pots cheaply. I saw him limp $2 with JJ and then min re raise pre to $25 after btn made it $12 to go. I have seen him raise preflop once and as he mucked I saw 1 ace.

Overall table is relatively passive and weak hero has been crushing all night and has about $900 in front of him.
1/2 Game

V1- limps $2

Hero(CO)- makes it $12 97

V2(BTN)- calls $12

V3(SB)- calls $12

V4(BB)- calls $12

V1- re raises and makes its $25

I know this villain isn't calling unless he has AA/KK and with the dead money out there I think its a great spot to pull in this pot now and we are deep enough to go postflop. This villain will be easy to range. ABC postflop player if he does decide to call

Hero- 4 bets 97 $85

folds to V1 who goes deeeeeeeep into the tank
THOUGHTS ??????????

I'm a fan. Unless villain is an idiot, that "raise" isn't a raise. You started action, so why not use that range advantage? Your hand plays well against a calling range postflop so you've got my support for the raise

spew

I like the concept, particularly when already crushing a session. Only part i don't Like is the sizing. V needs to call $60 more into ~$148. He should call here most of the time. I would have liked it sized up to $110 or so better.

V1's l/rr range is premium pocket pairs so we try to 4bet bluff him with 9 high after he limp/3bets over 5 players?

If he folded JJ face up congratulations, this is just gonna be a brag post but the 4bet is still lighting money on fire. In poker we should 4bet bluff a light very wide range not a nutted range.

You'll get better advice if you don't tell us what happened -- stop the action when you raise.

Nitpicking: the other money isn't actually dead until they fold. Every once in a while, someone will have done something odd (or will do something odd). Eggs, hatching, etc.

Anyway, let's math.

You're putting in 73 to win 73, so you have to get everyone to fold 50% of the time, neglecting the chance you'll get called and flop big.

First problem, as pointed out above, is that your raise sizing is small. V1 has to call 60 for a 146, so he's getting better than 2:1. We don't actually know he'll fold JJ for that, especially starting with 650 back. Similarly, even though button has to call 73 to win 146, he's still getting 2:1 and he's in position. What's his stack size? (On the bright side, he has to consider the possible RR from V1, which should keep his range super tight.)

If V1 is doing this limp minraise thing with JJ+, then he's 50/50 to call. It's probably reasonable to assume he's more likely to do this with JJ than with AA. So, if he'll fold JJ and QQ, and continue with KK+, and he's more likely to have JJ than AA, you're probably OK.

But you don't know he'll fold any of that range, so you're mostly just guessing.

The other money isn't actually dead. Even if each other V is 99% likely to fold, cumulatively they're taking a few percent off your chances to get away with the bluff.

Your hand doesn't have any removal effects. Imagine if you'd done with with a suited A-small. Now he has only three combos of AA with six of JJ. (Or, conversely, it would be really bad to do this with a J in your hand.)

You could raise larger -- something like 100, which would offer OR 2:1, but then you have to get him and everyone else to fold more (100 / 173 = 58%).

You do have some equity when called, and if V1 is passive you might get well get a free turn card, so you can adjust your required fold percentage down a bit.

I don't think it's terrible, but I don't love it either.

I'd like it more if...
* We'd seen V 4b/fold (which is admittedly going to be unlikely unless we try ourselves)
* Everyone between him and us had folded to his raise so we had to get through only him (or, slightly less good, only the blinds and him)
* We had an A or K to reduce his combos of those

I have no clue what the results of this hand were, but I think it's good that this forum get more balance from hands that went well and hands that didn't go well, as opposed to the current balance that skews heavily toward hands where OP lost. So not sure why we need to pejoratively label a post a "brag post" simply because OP may have won. Good players should be particularly open to feedback on hands that went well for them because it is so easy to just assume you made a good play.

When you have posts that skew so heavily towards ones where OP lost, I think the responses we get start to be more MUBSy than optimal.

Cant agree with this part at all. He did it once with JJ, but it has to be more likely he has AA here than JJ. Especially when hes doing this with 4 people already in the pot.

4 bet bluff looks cool with 97s and I love playing these type hands but I hate it here. Just take the incredible odds hes giving and see a flop.

@MikeStarr, you might be right. Maybe he uses a trivial 3b size every time he does this. Or maybe he goes small with JJ and big with KK+. We don't know and can't deduce it from information given, so we're just guessing.

Some comments on the thought process:

I mean, congrats, but that doesn't help much with understanding Hero's image. Have we been opening (3b/4b) a lot? Nitty and shown down only strong hands? Picked off huge bluffs? etc. etc. I'm a little concerned that you're debating a 4b w/ 97hh and have told us nothing about any of this.

How? How could we possibly KNOW that V will only call a 4b with AA/KK when this is the 2nd time ever that we've seen him l/rr? Weighting his range toward AA/KK when he continues is fine. Assuming he always folds QQ is just wish-ranging.

Of course he'll be easy to range, but SPR will be <3, meaning we have a lot less room to float, get overpairs to fold scary runouts, realize implied odds, or whatever we'd like to do with 97hh. We can occasionally cbet air profitably after he checks, and we can easily fold/give up most of the times he puts chips in. That's pretty much it.

In my games, that 4! sizing would get folds approximately 0% of the time.
If your intent was to take the pot away pre, going less than $125 here is criminal.

But against V1's description this just seems like lighting money on fire in general.

I would limp here and play this multi-way.

Seems to me like the 4bet is potentially a huge mistake whereas calling the min-raise is not a mistake at all. If I get two choices and one of them is expensive and not clearly best and the other is cheap and correct, I take the cheap one.

As to why it's not great, villain's range is presumably JJ+, which is a tough range to fold out with a 4bet especially when deep. I like this kind of move against light 3betters who try to run over tables but can find a fold when OOP to 4 betters. I don't like it to a move which screams premiums.

let me give more details I can be lazy sometimes when I post

I have been playing with villain for almost 6 hours now. I have seen him raise preflop once. As he mucked I saw 1 Ace. I'm no mathematician, but one hand in 6 hours and it was an ace I'm going with the other one was an ace as well.

I have seen villain fold on a big river bet with AQ

on a AKQ 8 9 runout the villain he was against showed j10 so he was right

also have seen him fold KJ

on a KJ10 5 7

so I can give him credit for being able to fold decent strength hands...he is not a calling station

Like I said earlier I saw him make this same play with JJ

If he had AA/KK is he really going to minraise oop againt 5 villains...I don't think so

my image is aggressive however this is my first 4 bet at the table in 6 hours

IT WAS THE FIRST 4 BET AT THE TABLE PERIOD

also key note when he had the Ace hand someone opened to 10 and he made it 35 to go

Hope these details help

This is not true. We need to get 50% folds to profit from FE alone, but we are being offered a profitable call. We need to have at least as much EV for a 4-bet as for a call getting great odds against a narrow range in position.

Call the 3-bet. Don’t try to get someone to fold a hand after they finally found something to play back at you with.

These are all reasons why not to turn your hand into a bluff. He raised pre once in 6 hours? That's an ultra tight nit and those hands he folded all had other hands that can easily beat him.

he didn't open he limped

he did the same play with JJ

when he had what I assume is AA his 3 bet sizing was normal $35 after a 10$ open and that was a HU pot

he has shown that he can lay hands down

this is multiway he's not min raising AA here like this

villain has shown that he does not continue unless he is nutted

this is the first 4 bet of the game

he contributes bet size to hand strength

I do agree it should have been bigger

also this is not a "brag post" I beat 1/2 players profitably on a consistent basis who gives a sh*t its 1/2

I'm building a bankroll I will move to 1/3 within a month

based on one hand you saw?

no I've seen 3 or 4 hands where he mentions the size of the bet

this isn't a spew

I damn well understood the table dynamic

I knew he wasn't nutted so I was confident I wasn't getting 5 bet here

I am in position if he does call

I understand spr will be low but I wouldn't be surprised if villain didn't even know what SPR is its 1/2

if he does call he will have roughly 560 infront of him and the POT will be roughly 210 220

I don't think we need to cbet bluff here super large to get are point across if he does call

Maybe I'm missing something. A tight nit recreational player who hasn't played a hand in 6 hours just l/rr'd. If someone decides to 4bet him with 9 high, it's pretty much the definition of spew.
If he does call you may as well check-out otf.

Don't try to bluff nits who l/rr in 1/2 (or anyone who l/rr's in 1/2 without any solid reads).

no I never said he played 1 hand in 6 hours ive seen him make 1 standard 3 bet in 6 hours

utg opened 10 he 3 bet to 35

I saw him limp min 3 bet with JJ the same exact thing he just did in this hand

do you see the difference

hes nitty in the sense he doesn't put large amounts of money in unless he is nutted

this betting pattern in this situation screams I am not nutted

he has a bet sizing tell

villain is not making this play with AA or KK

that was my thought process during hand

once again villain has shown he is not a calling station and can lay hands down

so since I know he doesn't have AA or KK I'm going to tell him with this 4 bet that I have AA/KK

if he limped and then made it 45+(then I believe he has AA or KK) to go then I just flat(ill go postflop deepstack against this v all day) but since he only makes it 25 which is a minraise in a multiway pot

you seem somewhat competent my brotha you really going to take this as nutted strength ??

I'm not saying he doesn't have QQ JJ 1010 or AK hes just not nutted even in the moment I am certain

like I said this player can fold strong holdings he has shown that

so since he seems somewhat of a thinking player and this is the first 4 bet of the table in 6-7 hours I'm screaming I'm nutted

anyway here you go

but this is just a brag post

I don't think this is a nit pick at all. I assume we have all squeezed against a weak open only to have a middle caller spring to life with QQ.

People cold call raises with JJ, QQ and AK all the time. Some do it with KK. A few with AA.

Many of those people will now decide to go with those hands. Some people might have called with hands like AQ or TT and now decide to go with them. SOME people might decide to go with hands like AJs and 88 here. Shorter stacks especially.

I agree with you and OP that this is usually more of a JJ type hand, and less often AA or KK, as those hands would be too afraid to suffer a bad beat from the lineup behind, wheras QQ and JJ are more afraid of being behind pre.

I think this move works pretty often, but it is hard to say if it works often enough. I'd much rather have a suited ace to block and to have good equity against the hands we are giving V if he decides to call.

Not a fan of showing the bluff. You know what makes him tick. He thinks he knows what makes you tick. You know what he thinks makes you tick. That's just what we want.

I also think embarrassing and/or intimidating players is generally bad for the games.

he's not limp minraising JJ because he's tight, he's doing it because he's trapping. If he was tight he'd just flat call any raise/iso with JJ, not reopen the pot and make it even bigger.