Had been pretty card dead all night, and was whiffing when I finally had a hand. The game was fairly tame, no one really out of line, but it was a deep game. I have only won one hand all night and I over bet check raised all in when a straight came in on the river but didn't show.

The two players to my right have massive stacks and I'm looking to play hands in position against these two when possible.

Villian 1 (BB) - $2800
Villian (UTG) - $2500
Hero (UTG +1) - $2200
Bunch of other stacks ranging for 1-1.5K

UTG opens to $35, I call with K10, 3 callers behind me and the BB comes along (6 players to the flop). ($212t)

Flop AJ10

Checked to me, I bet $135, 2 callers behind, BB raises to $435 total. ($1052t) Hero ???

Trivial call ? No sense in raising because I actually want other crappy flush draws to come along and I highly doubt BB is ever folding when check raising into 6 people on a flop like that ? Does this make sense ?

Meh.

I want to rip it in given sizing which shouldn't be value too much. But calling can't be too bad.

Check flop. AP i just flat. You want weaker FDs in to get a better price on your call. Plus BB shows up with KQ here a lot, and shoving doesn't make too much sense

And fold pre. Flat here is literally torching money on fire. It's okay OTB or maybe CO, but you're begging to get squeezed and getting destroyed by IP players

I disagree with Min, in order to check flop we are gonna need some much better reads.

Flat is fine after the raise with 2 active behind us that we would like to keep in. Never folding, of course.

Preflop is spewy considering we have no reads presented to us about UTG and BB other than "we want to get in pots with them". This hand is gonna need a lot of IO to play. I'm ok with discounting the RIO in order to play pots with these guys, but we need to know we will get paid with our (rare) nutted hands.

Would much rather 3! this pre than call it given positions.

AP call flop raise.

Just GII. You're almost never gonna fold to any action on the turn anyhow, and we don't want to hit our straight & V somehow hero fold on the river, etc. I understand calling though w/ players behind hoping they'll call & hedge our investment further.

You will need to improve to win this hand, and knocking out other players is unlikely to increase your equity here, so there's no point in gii.

Even if you are never folding on a blank turn, it's still preferable to keep more players in to have the pot be bigger since your hand will beat 3 players just as well as 1 if it hits.

^Yup.

limp pre is ok if the game is passive and loose. otherwise raise.

i would check flop. as played, call. we have a strong drawing hand and someone has a big hand here. as others have mentioned, we're looking to improve.

Calling a 7x UTG raise pre when you're UTG+1 with KTs here on a table that you said isn't getting out of line just seems to be burning money. You didn't say either of the big stacks were loose whales so I don't really think you can play this hand at all without a good read and a 3b pre.

Fold pre.

As played, I don't think you can really go wrong either way here, even against a set (which from a passive bb I suppose is possible with JJ or TT given the UTG open that didn't seem to faze you at all) you have decent enough equity that you're in pretty good shape. It feels more like weighing high variance vs low variance more than anything.

Let's acknowledge I'm an idiot. There, thanks. Now, I often will raise in a similar spot with a combination of the following 2 points 1) unimproved I have a pair of 10's and taking down $500+ with a pair of 10's is a good result and while FE is low, FE is almost never zero & 2) if I don't raise now and the front door Q or the club comes in I'm going to have a harder time getting V to commit stacks. When I go down this path it's a b/b/b ride on the variance train but the turn bet takes it down a large % of the time. Obviously this is a very generic comment but can a few of you help me think this through in a more logical way? Thanks.

Look at the action to date. How much fold equity do you really have?

Fold pre. Flatting KTs in UTG+1 is really bad. You end up in situations like this six ways with a mediocre hand in a huge pot by flatting. Granted you flopped well but usually you're just playing a weak hand multiway OOP.

Check flop. Given you have 12 nut outs it's important to keep in worse draws, and you have the added bonus of underrepping your hand. AP...can't go too wrong shipping or flatting, but I prefer flatting to keep the pot as multiway as possible. I don't think you have much FE anyway except against hands you already are beating like 87 or hands you have a ton of outs against like JX and weak AX. If we were HU it's very different, but six ways having 12 nut outs gives you excellent EV in the scenario you get several players to continue.

Also I can't see many scenarios where you would fold the turn.

K10s looked like the nutz after 2 hours of trash, but I hear what you are saying.

I ended up calling, the other two players behind me folded and now we are heads up. ($1352t)

Turn J

BB bets $725.......

Terrible card. Fold. You have 12 possible outs left but only 1 guaranteed to not be drawing dead to. You said this table wasn't getting OOL and bb can't even be semi-bluffing a Kc flush draw. His range has you absolutely crushed at this point.

Yeesh. This is pretty much a worst case scenario, HU with the BB on a turn that kills most of your outs. You need to be good like 35%. BB is pretty much repping a boat or maybe the flopped straight, something like these hands: {JJ-TT,AJs,KQs,JTs,AJo,KQo,JTo}

You have 17% equity against this. I don't know what you beat at this point. Would he play AT like this? Maybe...but even if we throw in AT your equity only improves to 19%. And I'm not seeing many bluffs granted you block all the combo draws. Sucks but I think you have to lay this down.

If you had a huge BBJ that might make this a call (hopefully you could convince villain to show you his cards first lol) but otherwise man, J might be the worst card in the deck.

K10 suited may look pretty after being card dead
so you get a little out of line by flatting pre and take a flop 6 ways.
you get what looks to be a great flop but with 5 V's out there lurking
checking flop plays out better.

instead of trying to get V1 all-in heads-up
what's wrong with some equity coming from the other 4 players?

I'm fine with pre but barring multiple simultaneous deaths at the table you're never winning this pot on the flop and you're never winning it thereafter without improving your hand. With this many players, I'm just check calling. On that turn I'm turbofolding.

I concur with the PF assessment: you're very well likely dominated (is UTG raising worse hands here?) and yeah, you're definitely vulnerable to those behind you and also require hitting the flop that much more.

But, since we can't undo that part, lets move on. The concurrent weaker flush draws are good and bad: you're more likely to get paid off, but you're FD odds are reduced and how does BB or UTG get their money into pot if flush hits turn? Even if you elect to check-trap, hard for one or both to call with others left to act behind them.

I think I'm just flatting BB's x/r because of the extra straight outs and re-evaluating the turn. If it's a blank and BB bombs or shoves, I hate to say that I'm inclined to fold regardless of my draw because I can't be certain FD#2 will also come along - once again pointing why the PF play puts you in a bad spot.

What part of calling a 7x UTG raise pre with KTs are you OK with? Just curious for a different opinion since I can't come up with a good argument for it on my own (I'm surprised how anyone can) based on Hero's succinct description of the table.

The table's deep but doesn't get out of line, and we want to flop exactly what? A royal draw? This is about the best flop Hero could ask for when he flatted the UTG raise pre, and yet he's still in a pretty awful spot all of a sudden.

We don't want to play RIO hands against UTG openers with deep stacks. This is the opposite of when a hand like KTs is playable.

easy fold. his range is very two-pair and broadway heavy here.

lolll

i've played in a lot of low-stakes games where flatting pre here is optimal. the game doesn't necessarily have to get out of line. it's more about pre-flop behavior. i've been in this spot many times where based on stack sizes and game flow, i glance to my left and basically know/feel there's a 90% if i flat here it's staying single-raised and going multi-way to the flop, in which case seeing a flop deep with KTs is good. now i'm not sure if those conditions were there for OP's actual spot.

sensitivity to game flow and looking left with your peripheral vision can sometimes allow you to make these types of calls profitably and the alternatives less optimal.

that said, folding is often right.

1. I flat call here as I don't feel a need to get it all-in here. I don't see raising as getting any better hand to then fold and if V1 (BB) then shoves, I think you're finding yourself all-in a lone pair of 10s for showdown if UI.

2. Even if turn is a blank and V1 (BB) somehow checks, what hand do you think he's folding after the flop XR? I don't put him on many combos. So I don't know that betting the turn accomplishes much - another 10 on the river might be the only non-five card hand that I can consider betting and just take it on the chin if I wind up in second place.

3. Any of the other three Qs on the turn is your gin-card: sure you may wind up chopping the pot, but meanwhile you get a free roll and a lessor FD is obviously DD but probably doesn't fully suspect it - an 8 or 9 high FD on that board will be tough to fold.

4. But with the info about the J on the turn, my hand is then a ballistic missile for the muck.

I don't want to speak for Minatorr but...speaking for Minatorr, he actually said AP flat the flop bet, so I'm not sure where you disagree.

Apologies - I don't disagree with Min; Playing from the flop on I agree, but for some other reasons beyond what was mentioned.

The point raised by others of flatting vs. 3B! PF given all dynamics is whole other thread topic.