Southpoint 1/2

Typical 1/2 game but this one has been particularly tight and not many big pots. $200 effective, hero covers.

Hero opens UTG $12 with JJ
Only BB calls

Flop 1044dd.

Check
Hero bets 10
Call

Turn 5s
Check
Hero bets 25
Call

River Kc
Villian leads $50 and splashes it out there.

1. How do I know if villian leads Kx of diamonds here, if this is missed diamonds, or a slow played monster?

I would think Kxdd check calls the river more than leads, but who knows.
Bluffs are also rare in 1/2 but they do happen and usually in spots like this.
However, some people never seem to bluff, and its just hard to know who is capable and under what conditions, so calculating their bluffing frequency seems nearly impossible.

2. Do we ever check back this turn and why?

3. Even thought their range should not be that wide to my UTG open, what kind of range does the BB have here? I feel like many people call to wide in these spots but constructing any kind of a range beyond the norm, just seems like a guess. Like I don't know if he defends something like J4hh here for example. (thats not what he had)

It all depends on V. Is he a big bluffer or is he honest with his chips? That's about as far as I would look into it. Here I would just fold, a bad/loose V's range does have the weird suited/unsuited 4x's and some suited/unsuited Kx, don't think V has Tx here. Turn there's an argument to check for pot control IMO.

if V is a bad/loose player than his UTG open flatting range can be literally anything, if V is a good/tight player than his flatting range will tighten up a ton to something like all PPs below QQ and a few suited/unsuited broadways.

Generally, you won't.

If they are bluffing optimally, you won't know this either. If they are bluffing a lot, tend to call more. You can find when folks are bluffing by a) seeing they always bet big on a scare card or bet big when a draw misses or b) seeing what gets shown down in other hands.

The only reason I can think of checking this turn is if you are actually worried about V having a 4, but that should be a small (but not impossible) part of his entire range.

Their range can be really wide here to be honest. Any range you construct for an opponent is always a guess, unless you know for certain they are playing GTO (which most players, particularly at 1-2, won't be playing). Some guesses are better than others, and sometimes you can narrow the range, but sometimes players show up with really weird hands, especially from the BB.

You can narrow his range based on action. The most likely hands he has based on action would be TT, 54, A4, KT, AK, or a busted diamond draw. I think any 4 besides A4 or 54 would be less likely (thought not impossible) for V to call with pre. And KQ or KJ would generally not be as sticky as AK tends to be unless it's specifically the diamond draws. However, due to card removal its harder (but not impossible) for him to have a 4

Some better reads on V would be helpful. How tight has he been? Has he been so tight he seems frustrated now and will dump money with a busted draw? Or is he loose enough to call with 84o from the BB? Has he check raised? Under what conditions? Has he lead any flops/turns/rivers? Under what conditions?

What is your image? Are your bets respected? Have you been playing super tight making V sense he can steal this pot from your "obvious" pocket JJ?

In the end it comes down to two points:

1) How many busted flush draws does he have vs. how many value hands that beat you?

2) The old poker adage "If you aren't getting bluffed sometimes you're calling too much." Sometimes you have to concede.

Assuming an average 1/2 rec villain, river bets are raaaaaaaarely true bluffs. I recommend folding (though based on my reality, real-life me would drunkenly tilt-call).

Bet turn bigger; our goal in this hand when we have JJ is to get as much money as we can from a T and try to get away when villain has a 4 or better. (on the flop it's less important for a variety of complicated reasons but really we should be betting the flop bigger as well)

River is close... normally we could say if you had the jack of diamonds you could fold cause you block some flush draws that could maybe bluff but the jack of diamonds also blocks KJdd which is one of the value hands he's repping lol.

In my experience this line is rarely ever a bluff so it's likely a fold; however if you called and were wrong don't feel bad about it! (This isn't a spot you need to study or worry about because he's not "supposed" to be donking this river ever)

I think you played it so well that you can afford to pay & see. He can have a boat or maybe KT sometimes, but with that pot size I cant let it go. I feel maybe 10% of the time it's just a spaz lead with like AT which is enough justification in my deluded mind to talk myself into calling.

c/c, c/c, lead on this texture readless in a tight game = snap fold with underpair

I'd pay this one off occasionally w/out a diamond though because why not.

villain's line doesn't make sense. call.

It makes sense if he's trapping with an absolute monster like quads and knows there's no way he can induce because he's got the board locked up.

Can you explain? Should it be a check-raise against pair getting 3 streets of value?

^ The Kc on the river doesn't interact with the likely range of hands Villain gets to the river with well enough to make donking the best play in this spot at equilibrium.

Without specific history with this villain you can't. Without any information on villain you need to look at what a generic 1/2 villain is doing, any live read and what sort of pot odds you are looking at.

Without a very good read no. Most likely villain hands for most villains are TX and flush draws.

Range for villain here is very villain specific. The only thing I would say generically is that it is too wide and has too many pocket pairs. After that it is all over the place. You will run into nitty/passive villains who play a narrow range and flat everything because they want to see a flop with AK and want to trap with AA. You will run into loose/aggressive ones that will call with random garbage because they plan to steal the pot heads up. You will run into a bunch that will call with way too many bad hands that can flop flush draws/straight draws but exactly what type they like varies.

Pot looks like $95 on the river so $50 is around half the pot. Tempting size but not something you need to call even when you expect to lose.

The random splashy bet leans towards a blocking bet. It's not a good situation for a raise though because villain does have a few monsters that might do the same thing and villain has some KX that call after making a blocking bet. You loose to some blocking bets and beat others.

I would call this sometimes and fold sometimes against an unknown. Make a read and go with it.

This fits the line of hands that flopped something then somehow improved with the river though, KT or Kxdd and fears a check-back.

Also a weirdly played 4x, maybe 45.

Yeah I agree. In practice this probably means they somehow improved, or already had us beat, which is why folding is definitely reasonable.

But no good player would donk this river, partially because of the above reason. We’re going to hit the K far more often than they will.

Unimproved? Yeah.

Its been my experience at low stakes in these types of games that this isn't a bluff and without any other info on V we need to make a tough fold, wouldn't blame you if you called it off though.

Without a read in V I shrug call probably. V very easily could be thinking you have a T and the K is a scare card with really thinking or or understanding range assignment. Obviously don’t love the spot but just not going to fold it. V’s going to have to show me his hand to scoop this pot.

Is it crazy to think, maybe K4o here? I mean I've seen much worse hands call from BB for bigger opens in 1/2. Maybe he was trapping with trips or just calling, not wanting to get too much in the pot in case you were on the diamond draw and it hit. Once he boats up on the river he doesn't want you to check back so he leads out.

I dunno maybe I'm way off here. But at 1/2 nothing surprises me.

1. This is where, in live poker, you need to get a sense of this from paying attention to other hands. Some people will bet AT for straight value on the end, though this is a little chunky to hope to get called by 66-99 or worse T's. People will also consciously think of K's as outs with Kxd, and be prepared to bet for value as opposed to check for showdown. I tend to sigh-call due to missed diamonds. Without Jd in my hand its a little tougher - maybe not as you unblock other hands, not just KJ

2. I hate checking back the turn. There's a lot of bad rivers for your hand. T's, broadway, diamonds other than Jd. Conversely, if opponent has a T, the flush completing would see you miss value.

3. Players VPIP varies widely in LLSNL. There are guys that will just randomly decide to defend all sorts of unadvisable stuff vs opens. There are other guys that keep to a coherent set of hands. You see lots of weird stuff, and this is why we pay attention to hands, even inconsequential ones, where there is showdown. You need to run back what the preflop action was, and how people showed up later with whatever. It's not a total 'guess' but there are surprises.

As played, it does feel like you'll see the Kd a lot. But I might call vs certain player types and live with it.

I don't really think 44 has the board 'locked up' like AA on AA6 or whatever. Villain has to go bigger or raise the turn with quads or a full house.