Hero: Early 20's white male ($300)

Villain: Mid 50's Asian male ($800)

Hero (Cutoff) opens 8s8c for 20$ ahead of 4 limpers Villain calls in SB for 20, everyone else folds

Flop: 10 5 3 rainbow pot: 50

Vilain checks, Hero bets 20, Villain check-raises to 40, Hero calls for another 20

Turn 10s

Villain bets 40 Hero calls 40

River 4c

Villain bet 60 Hero calls 60

My Thoughts

I think I could have folded to the flop check-raise, is that too weak? What kind of hands is he check-raising (weak 10x, overpairs, A4)? Not many straight or flush draws he can be bluffing with.

On the turn, I figured the ten was a good card for me, makes it less likely that he has a ten. (I'm guessing its important to consider that he has a lot of tens in his SB calling range)

Overall I think I played this pretty poorly and didn't really think why I was calling (as in "what am I beating?"). Could have folded at any point during the hand.

Pretty new to poker just wanted to know your thoughts. Feel free to rip me apart.

Just fold to the flopraise, problem solved.

People dont raise very wide in livepoker,and with an overcard to your 88 (a hand that likes very few turns/rivers and doesent improve very easily on later streets) its an easy flop fold.

check the flop

Hi, welcome to the forum.

Just a quick couple of tips. First, don't put the results of your hand in your first post. No matter how much everyone tries, people will give answers that match the actual results. Second, the more reads you can give us about the villains, your table, and how others may be perceiving you helps us give better results.

As played, I'd fold to the raise on the flop. You have second pair on the driest flop in just about history. Other than a pure bluff, you beat nothing. Since you'd play this the same way with AA, he's not bluffing often enough to call.

In another scenario, if I check the flop, he likely bets turn. Do I call all three streets with the same exact runout?

I can probably fold on the river in the above scenario????

What is the purpose of this raise sizing preflop with 88?

Hey thanks for the tips and appreciate your input. Will post with better quality in the future.

Standard preflop raise at the table was 15. Was hoping to go to the flop less than 5 handed. (Is the correct term here isolate?)

Nothing wrong with preflop. If anything, it's a little small because of 4 limpers already in the pot. Standard set mining situation.

I check this flop, but after the turn T hits, I'm ok with taking a stab at the pot.

Regardless, I'm not aiming to play for stacks with 2nd pair (you can call this level 0 thinking, but at MGM, where most low stakes play pretty conservative, it's not a bad line to take against old Asian players)

I think you can just fold to the flop raise when you didn't hit your set (esp. on a rainbow board)

These 2 sentences together make absolutely no sense. If you consider yourself to be set mining, why wouldn't you want to raise smaller or else just limp? We're effectively 300 deep, not 800, and our large raise has forced people out of the pot who might have paid off our set.

$20 is not a big raise after 4 limpers. Sizing down specifically to set mine is a sizing tell, so I feel like there's a bigger benefit of keeping our raise sizing consistent as long as we're still getting set mining odds (15:1 or better), which we are in this case.

Specifically aimed at MGM games - I know people there are calling stations and there are definitely many tables where $20 doesn't force anyone out.

Yet one more advantage of raising is that if we do get multiple callers, it makes it much easier to get stacks in (to get paid off on our set) than in a limped pot. How likely is someone to pay us off on a bet/bet/shove line in a limped pot, unless they specifically hit the second nuts?

I really don't want to get into the token monthly limp vs raise middle pairs debate again. It's been discussed at length in multiple threads over the last few months.

Standard flop raise. Might go larger ~$25.

I don’t like the same bet cbet with your hand. It looks weak and may induce, which is bad when you don’t know what to do facing a raise. Make it a notch higher. Like $22-25.

Once he check/raises, I’m putting him on an overpair or ATs almost everytime (tight guy called $20 in the blinds) so it’s an easy fold.


P.S. I don’t like checking back flop and giving his overs a free turn, but I might check back against the tightest of players who have an overpair here a lot.

Steal the pot. The fact he got the 4 limpers to fold is a good indication that he had a handle on this particular table. There are times at a table where everyone is tired and aren't challenging anybody. A tight player can get away with this at those moments. The cbet was too small though.

There is no rake there if there is no flop, so winning $16 the vast majority of the time, is better than set-mining for $3 when your Vs are limping in with drawing hands that may give at least one of them something when you flop your set?

Folding to the flop check raise. If behind you have 2 outs, and those check min raises are indicative of top pair plus. If ahead you have no idea what's good or bad for your hand. Too marginal a spot without better reads on villain, so fold.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G925A using Tapatalk

Is this a joke?

Bet the flop. You want to deny equity to a lot of villains broadway range. You don't want to give a free card to hands like QJ, KQ. Also second pairs and hands like 77, 66 are not folding to a single bet so you get value from those as well.

Unless you have a read that villain will try and make a play at you or cr bad pairs thinking you have AK, I would just fold flop.

Your table plays a lot different than mine if a $20 raise after 4 limpers gets this HU. I would have just overlimped but know your table I guess.

I actually like the small bet, with the only exception perhaps being if it is likely to encourage someone to play back at you. However, I just don't think enough players do play back in these spots, so without reads telling me that, I fold to the check/raise.

In general, if you simply folded one pair (including overpairs) to every single check/raise you faced when you didn't feel you were committed for your stack, you'd probably do just fine; you'll fold the best hand some of the time for sure, but likely not enough for it to matter much.

GcluelessNLnoobG

Excellent raise size pre, should win the pot often. Post sizing depends, I'd usually go slightly bigger. Generally, give up to the checkraise readless. I'm calling down that runnout if I had a good reason to call the checkraise.

No - checking is fine - you can still bet the turn. You have a hand with decent showdown value and you don't want to get blown off your hand.

If your going to bet go $35 - $40

I'd rather bet a hand like AQ or AJ than 88 or 77 as if you get called you have more equity.

Just because you check the flop doesn't mean you give up the hand.

There's plenty of worse hands we can get called by while simultaneously folding out random over card equity.

We certainly don't need to be betting $40 here. If he wants to reverse float with QJs with BDFD be my guest but there's no need to give a free card here.

If we don't feel comfortable folding to a check/raise then I'm ok with checking this back. But I feel fairly comfortable folding to a check/raise with such a mediocre hand on this board that I'd lean to bet/fold.

GcluelessNLnoobG

put it in a solver and see what it says - maybe i'm wrong

Sure, if you wanna pay my subscription fee.

Solver still requires your range and an estimate of villain's range.