Villain is a solid middle-aged recreational LAG. His major leak is playing too many hands and trying too hard to win, even when his range is substantially weaker than his opponent's. He's as good at hand reading as most pros. I don't think the money matters at all to him, but his pride would be hurt a lot if he made a bad call or a bad laydown.

My image is opening a lot of pots but not playing many big pots. Our last 3bet pot was a few hours earlier, when I flatted a 3bet with AK and called 3 streets on a K-high board (he had air).

Villain's 3bet range in this spot is unbalanced towards bluffs; I think he 3bets about 20% here and only QQ+/AK for value -- in particular I've seen him flat TT in a very similar spot without thinking much about it. The sizing is standard for him and def large enough for a bluff because I fold to small 3bets a lot and everyone knows this. He's cbetting the flop 100% except maybe with some midpair/ak that he decides check/calling 3 streets with.

Button is a passive player with vpip=20% in this spot who rarely 3bets and never backraises.

Hero (7k) raises to 60 in cutoff with JcTc, button (5k) calls, villain (7k) makes it 240 from SB, nit BB tank-folds, hero calls (in hindsight I'd 4bet, but all three options are close), button folds.

Flop(560): 9c2s3d. Villain bets 300. Hero?

Seems like every single paragraph in yr op is trying to convince us to fold, but yet u try to find reasons to continue?

If deciding to float the flop, what turn cards you are NOT raising on?
Also, is your flop raise range empty in this spot?

expand on this please?

My raising range is definitely not empty - actually, I'm raising sets and KK-AA here more often than not. Unfortunately, my perceived raising range may be empty. On the other hand, I don't think I'm seen as terribly reckless, and so Villain might think I can't have too many bluffs -- after all, I'd probably want some equity and it's hard to have bluffs with equity on this flop.

If I flat: I will probably give up on 9 turns, because I think I'd be perceived to be flatting a lot with the few 9x that I have (double floating with a tiny range is probably too much fps). I might give up on A/K turns (whether villain bets or checks) but that is not clear. My gut feeling is that villain is more likely to fold an overpair on empty boards than AK when he hits the turn, although there might need to be a river shove following a turn raise. Also A's/K's are annoying because I am almost always drawing dead if villain bets, and sometimes drawing dead if villain checks.

If I raise flop and get called, I probably have the same turn barreling range.

You and villain are 7k deep and you are not putting a 4th bet in pre with KK-AA. I don't think so. Also, I am not an advocate of floating this type of board when our villain is already indicating strength. Seems like a bad spot to get creative. Flop is 923r, pretty dry. If you raise you are repping exactly what? If you call and are behind, decide to raise on bd flush draw, etc. is villain really going to fold JJ-AA? Fold flop imo there are better flops to raise/float, this not being one of them.

if you don't have a 4B bluff range I guess you're not. pretty sure it's GTO to put in that 4th Bet.

Meh, probably just muck. I prefer 4bet to call against a guy like this, especially with the third player behind us. Villain will flat with a lot of bad hands and we are likely to win the pot with position and initiative (not to mention a sneaky hand that can flop/turn/river huge).

I think raising is better then floating, unless you plan to raise the turn because of the previous hand where he barreled 3 streets it seems that he likes to barrel and will probably be betting the turn a high % of the time.


Overall I rather fold or 4b Pre

what hands would we logically raise the flop for value with. sets would most likely smooth call the flop on such a dry board. but idk if villain would be thinking about that

This stake is above my level but hope to partake in the discussion because I respect your posts alot on here.

What type of "air" did he have in the previous hand and what position was he in for the 3!? Was it also a squeeze?

What I mean is what is his sb 3! squeeze range and what is his double barrel range with your recent history and what range is he giving you on raised turns?

What is the perception of btn (is he perceived as a station)

Also is he capable of 3! bluffing post if he thinks you are repping thin?

whut? why would 4 betting be better? we have position and 350bb's against a lag who hates to fold with one of the best hands to have against a strong polarized range. The guy behind us is passive and according to op doesn't ever backraise. This means we'll prolly get better immediate odds by calling pre.

I don't like raising better than floating. that's for sure, but I don't really like floating against this particular player. if he hates to give up and is real sticky, we can make money by betting larger amounts and value betting wider both pre and post.

I agree we don't have much value here, But I'm counting on villian not to know this, and or to not do anything about it.

I think villian barrels the turn a lot so that's why I don't like floating, I think raising > floating but Fold might just be best

This is pretty close IMO between fold and flat. The problem is the flop is a bit too low/uncordinated to rep anything now. I think float/eval is ok although I think I would just fold. How often does he double/triple barrell or check/not fold? I used to love floating in spots like this but pretty much every good player induces with over pairs so now I have to play a bit more weak/passive or do something extra special. That being said you probably don't have this problem and float/float/stuff and then showing bluff makes for some phenomenal metagame.

Some small offsuit ace, reraise from BB when I opened and no one called. His double barrel range is pretty wide.

I don't know what his 3b squeeze range is other than it's wide and polarized. My perceived value range on raised flops or turns is mostly sets. My perceived bluff range is who knows. I guess he might think I'd turn AK into a bluff here.

Btn is not a station, just a passive nit.

I think a flop 3b bluff is very unlikely.

The reason to 4bet pre is because villain would be folding exploitably often. I agree it's GTO to have a value 4betting range, but sometimes I am very exploitable and this might be a good candidate: villain is likely to fold to a 4bet and KK-AA have a lot of bluff catching value.

I'd prefer if villain bets the turn because I think his b/f% is way higher than his c/f%.

I agree with this. In particular, when I was thinking on the flop I thought that it'd be nice to have a bluff range in this hand, and that my cards are as good as any for a bluff. But I think the spot is sufficiently unbalanced already -- villain has too many bluffs -- such that it's most profitable to just have value hands as the hand goes on.

Am I reading your description of villain wrong?

This guy has a 20% 3 bet. value range of QQ+, AK+. He never has a AJ, AQ, KQs, KJs, QJs type of 3 bet hand for value. Right? the other 18% of his 20% 3 bet range is full of bluffs like 75s.

This is what I'm assuming from your description. JTs is actually waaaaaayyyyy ahead of this type of range and you are in position with 350bbs deep. I dunno why 4 bet is anywhere near a better option. It might be +EV, but so is 4 betting 72o in this example.

As played, after thinking about it. I think floating is not bad if he doesn't 2/3 barrel 100% of the time. Raising can be an option if he is capable of folding to polarized bets, but you describe him as hating to be the guy that makes a bad laydown. That type of guy usually doesn't like to fold on dry boards like these. Either he's reverse floating or calling you down with A high cuz you look FOS.

The most credible story is usually to float flop and call turn raise river or bet/raise turn and bet river. depending on the cards that come.

I think you're off on that. Here's the first 20% range I tried stoving.

Hand 0: 49.557% 48.52% 01.03% 864104680 18412978.00 { JTs }
Hand 1: 50.443% 49.41% 01.03% 879865524 18412978.00 { QQ+, 55-22, AKs, A5s-A2s, K9s-K8s, J9s-JTs, T8s-9Ts, 97s-98s, 86s-78s, 75s-67s, 65s, AKo, A9o-A2o, KTo-K9o, T9o, 98o }

It'd be pretty hard to think of a 20% range that JTs is "way ahead" of. (Stove is not actually that great for this, but the flop graph isn't that much more favorable. We have basically no flops we can safely give up on and still hope to realize our overall 50% equity.)

If villain is 3betting 20% and only QQ+/AK for value, this isn't a 'strong polarized range'. This is a very weak range.

I'm not worried about the guy behind backraising. Him simply seeing a flop with us makes it a lot harder for us to both bluff and value bet.

you're right. i mispoke with that term. I meant the value portion is super strong and the rest we are even money or ahead of and there are not a ton of hands that have us dominated.

I understand your argument, but I'm thinking that would probably apply more to a villain who is good and aggressive behind us. If the guy behind us is passive and not good at pokers I'd prolly be indifferent to have him come along cuz he can improve our implied odds when we actually do hit a hand or we can use him to rep a more credible bluff in certain situations.

Interesting. I wasn't really considering the villain to have a ton of rag aces and rag kings. but it is def closer than I imagined it to be.

My counter argument to this is that only takes into account 5 card all in equity, where in the real world examples I'm pretty sure people would take JTs with position over K8s oop even though the K8s is ahead in an all-in equity calculation. especially when we're playing 300+bbs deep.

you've guys have changed my hard stance on 4 bet being worse than calling. I personally would rather 4 bet bluff with worse hands. and keep JTs in the calling range.

also, I think I mispoke again. I meant that we are ahead of the bluff portion of his range. The stove you ran has QQ+ and AK. these hands are probably not folding to a 4 bet. We definitely wouldn't say that 4 betting against those hands is better than flatting the 3 bet. If he does fold AK and QQ pre than you could be right about 4 betting being better, but his description is hates to fold the best hand.

We would need to do a simulation with those out however to discuss why flatting is better in position against his bluff range. Probably doesn't change the equity more than a few percent because they make up such a small part of the range.

I thought your 3 bet range would consist of a lot more rag suited gappers. having every single offsuit combo of Axo seems little excessive. It makes your point stronger, but I don't know it's that realistic. some really good suited connectors he might flat with like JTs and T9s, 89s as well.

I might be making too many assumptions about what's in his bluff range, but I don't think yours is super spot on as well. maybe it's a mixture of what both of us are thinking.

I also think that the flop equity graph can be very misleading on whether we should call or not.

there will be ton's of flops where we have 50% equity, but we will win the actual hand like 75% of the time.

or we have less than 50% flop equity and we will win more than 50% of the time when the hand plays out.

let's say the flop is 9c7d2h and we have JThh against AXo. We are a dog to AXo in flop equity, but I think you'd agree that we are winning this hand more often than the AXo hand is even when they pair up with there kicker on the flop OOP.

Or we have JTs v QXs on a KQ2 flop. We are 2 to 1 dogs, but we will win this hand more than 33% of the time.

Having position gives us more equity that can't be calculated through these simulations.

4b pre seems correct against a polarized 3b range.

Interesting thing is that you may make more money by flatting pre, and allowing him to barrel post flop before laying the hammer on him.

So in this case, if he is double barreling an extremely wide, unbalanced range, flatting otf is +ev sine you gain another street of value ott before you raise.

Extremely high variant, but looks to be the correct play vs described opponent.

And in regards to 4b your value range, I think that is terrible vs this opponent. You should pretty much be flatting your entire value range vs his polarized 3b, and 4b only as a bluff . JTs falls under this category I'm assuming since he is going to have a lot of Ax Kx hands in his light 3b range.

Only once he starts adjusting by either calling your 4b wider or 5b bluffing should you ever really be 4b for value against this opponent.

Kinda skimmed, but flat or 4b are both fine pre depending on game flow, images, 5b tendencies and all that good stuff IMO.

If he's a polarized pot controller, yeah, I'm calling pretty quickly on the flop.

Edit: plus you are practically open ended!