Hero: Regular at the game. Known to generally play TAG, especially past few weeks. Stack 205, down from starting stack of 300. Had taken a couple bad beats in the past hour.

Had not straddled all night, (I very rarely do), but no one at the table had and I was hoping to get some others to start to pick up the action.

V1: (UTG) Regular player, plays solid but ABC poker.
V2: (Button)Extreme LAG - Thinking player but is generally a bit over aggressive in certain spots.
V3: (SB)Also playing quite LAG - has been playing every pot with hero and check raising on coordinated low boards after limp calling almost every hand p/f.
V4: (BB): TAG. Solid.

All villains cover.

UTG Opens to 20, call, call, call.

Hero (Straddle) Looks at QQ and jams. Does anyone ever do anything different?

Raise to 70

If called by V1, shove most flops.
If called by V2, check/shove most flops
If called by V3, check/shove most flops
IF called by V4, shove most flops.

A, and K high boards are gonna make you puke if you get called. V1, and V4 will likely check it back though. So if the flop sucks, you're gonna have to make a read.

Shoving PF eliminates this potential ugly spot, but it also folds out AK, AQ, TT, and some other stuff you're crushing. It also hands a bunch of a money to a solid ABC guy who just raised to 10X from UTG .

It is 4x - this is a straddle pot. And I don't like putting 1/3 of my stack in to have to fold on A or K high boards.

Standard. When i used to play 1-3 w $200 max I was doing the same w qq+\aqs if the pot opened w multi callers.

Then why did you even post this thread?

YOu didn't mention the stakes. If this is a $1/2 game, I like my line better. If it's $2/5, I like yours.

You're line, whether it is 1/2 or 2/5, seems like it will put you in a really tough spot against multiple opponents a whole lot.

I don't see how. Tough spots only come when you don't have a plan. Here you would go to the flop with a super low SPR with what will likely be an overpair.

You sound like one of those grumpy old guys who plays KK really passively cause "an ace flops EVERY TIME!!"

I am actually a fairly young player. (29) I just think 70 is really, really poor sizing considering the amount already in the pot. We would be laying any villain 3:1 to call and play a big pot in position with us.

If you had more, you could raise to $100, and that would be better, I agree.

However, many of the hands that call are much worse than a 3 to 1 underdog. An overpair is a cooler, live with it. And AK is calling any raise, even a shove. I would like to have a way out, rather than give AK all five cards.

Agree to disagree. Thanks for the feedback though.

This is wrong, shove is super standard.

Once it gets back to us, there is almost $90 in dead money.

ok....but again this begs the question....why post??

You're asking shove, or not shove, and insisting you already know the answer. You've got plenty of support in this thread, so pat yourself on the back and enjoy your dead money.

Personally, I think there is more +EV in virtually turning everyone's hand face up and making a fairly simple commitment decision with a very low SPR with a likely overpair.

Shove pre-flop, only get called by better.
Shove post flop, TONS more calls by worse hands.

I still like to hear other arguments. Just because I think I might be right doesn't mean I don't think about alternative lines.

Got called by worse.

I think shoving here allows villain to play correctly more often, his only options become fold or call. He'll often be folding worse and calling better.
He might still call worse sometimes, but the shove makes it easier for him to play correct.

There's about 80? in the pot? So raising to 100-150 sounds about right here. Give your villains odds to call with worse, but make them pay a lot for trying to play an A or K!
I'd probably go with a big raise like 100-150, you might as well go all-in, but we'd like a call or reraise here wouldn't we? So why not try to get someone to actually call?

I think shoving is fine here, but I think I'd like a raise better. Even if we only leave 50 behind. (I would still get called, probably by all 4 of them if I shoved, but that's just my table image.)

Did you see that we're only ~$200 deep to start?

so yes

What is the point of this? You're never folding for $50 on any flop, and you're giving up a non-zero amount of FE.

You really don't want to see this go multiway, and you're rarely dominated when you get it in here because it looks like a squeeze. Raising to 150 leaving 50 behind seems bad on all accounts.

We're giving up a non-zero amount of FE? What does that mean? Yes I know it stands for fold equity, I have no idea what we're giving up though.

Why don't we want to see it go multiway? We have less chance to win, but more money in the pot, so it evens out?

We're trying to get a call here, not a fold?

You made the straddle...villain's perception of your shove will have you on a weaker range. I like the shove...

Raising to $70 will simply create a waterfall effect and now you're OOP against 3 Villains. Take the dead money or even better situation...have it heads-up when V shows up with AT+, 77-JJ.

+1....very bad to raise $150 and leave $50 behind...

Why?

I'm garbage at the math aspect, but in the simplest sense, ignoring ranges, ignoring absolute and relative hand strength, ignoring stack sizes, etc etc...


Scenario A) You raise to $150, and get 2 callers. Let's say for the sake of argument you all have an equal shot at winning the pot. Your equity in this pot is 150+150+150+90=540/3=$180

Scenario B) You raise to $205 all in, and get 1 caller. See above. Your equity in this pot is 205+205+90=500/2=$250.

Again, this is more than an oversimplification, this is just trying to explain the concept to you since you seem to be missing it.

Thx, didn't really think of that.
But do we really have more FE by betting 205 instead of 150?
And is the chance of getting called by two players really bigger if we bet less?
If one of them calls the next ones all get better odds, but if one of them re-shoves on us, it'll be even harder for the others to call.

Given your stack size and the amount of money already in the middle, I can't see how any other raise size would be remotely good. WP