Thanks for opinions I use to grind sng online a long time ago just getting back into poker and live cash games.


Hand 1 1/3 NL
A10 folded to me on button I bet to 8 bb and sb call pot 24

flop 1039 sb(check)bb(bets 20) I call and sb folds pot 64

Turn 1039Q bb(bets 40) I call pot 144

River 1039Q10 bb(bets 75) I raise to 150 total bb(calls) pot 294

We both started the hand with about 600. How good or bad did I play this hand?
I will post what bb had after a few replies.

Hand 2 1/3 NL
33 I am the puck 4 callers and guy sitting to my right who is an old tight guy who has folded for the last 1.5 hours bets 10 I call and so does the 4 callers. Old guy mutters first time he has raised all night and he gets 5 callers. pot 60

flop 345 checks to the original better who bets 15 I raise to 45 total all fold except the old guy original better who calls. pot 150

Turn 3457 He checks I bet 75 he calls pot 300

river 34579 he checks I bet 100 he calls. pot 500

How poorly did I butcher this hand or did I play it alright? I'll post results again after a few replies.

Please look at a few other hand histories and copy the format with pot size included on each street. The way you list the suits is very hard on the eyes. Also, its confusing when you say someone is raising when they are really betting. The less confusing your post, the more responses you will get.

#1) In live poker you need to make you preflop raises bigger. Even OTB I would open to $12 or so in a live 1/3 game. Live players will call wider than online so you want more value from AT here. Other than that, well played.

#2) This looks pretty well played to me.

Alright thanks I tried to tidy up my post does this format look better? I usually do make it 12-15 in 1/3 live but with just the blinds left I made it 8 instead not sure if this is correct thinking or not with A10.

Format is infinitely better. Thx.

Hand 1: Preflop sizing is small, live the standard would be $12-$15. Flop and turn are fine though folding turn against some villains may be better. Not folding river without a strong read when you hit trips but raise is questionable without a good read on villain. At that point villain folds a lot of hands that you beat and calls with hands that beat you.

Hand 2: Villain raised to 10 over several limpers and expected folds? Not likely. Flop raise is mandatory after villain's small probing bet. Turn is fine. River is odd and depends on villain. For some villains the small bet on the flop and calling turn is a sign he was price setting with a 56/66 type hand to begin with and I might check behind. Not always though because villain can have two pair. If villain is the sort that won't give up a high pair then I might bet even more.

H1:

An $8 raise is pretty small in live 1/3 NL, although this hand just folded to the Button (I am not familiar with that phrase). I actually like the small raise (although I probably make it $10 but whatever). We're just looking to mostly either take down the blinds now or juice the pot a little HU / 3ways at most and take it down with a cbet (or possibly even win a little more postflop with the best hand). ETA: I'm all about raising large to thin the field, but in this case when it is folded to the Button we know the field is going to end up 3ways at worst, therefore (unlike others above) I'm totally fine with the small raise.

Reads are fairly important postflop. Against some players, I just muck the flop. Otherwise, I typically call here and evaluate the turn card/action.

I think I fold the turn. J8/QJ/KJ just got there and he may have even been ahead on the flop. Typically most opponents give up betting a smaller pair when a larger card comes on the turn (especially one that looks to hit our preflop raising range). Again, reads are important here, but I would lean to exiting now.

The river actually didn't change much. We're still behind straights, flopped sets and all reasonable flopped two pairs (which are now fullhouses). The only hands we moved ahead of are hands like QJ and a slowplayed overpair preflop (a little unlikely). The only real hand we make value off of is another Tx, but of course those are now rare combo-wise, plus they may have slowed down on the turn. I would not be raising this river.

GcluelessNLnoobG

H2:

Assuming reasonable stacks (you should note effective stacks preflop), I'm also calling the raise. $10 is a very small raise in live 1/3 NL, and with 4 limpers in front and us calling we can basically guarantee this pot going 6+ ways, and so we're already getting 5+:1 to setmine and just have to make a 1/2 PSB on the flop to be profitable. Easy peasy.

Thanks to the lol cbet size, our raise of 3x is actually fairly small. However, I'm totally cool with that as we're just looking to start miking the old guy. Also, an OESD behind us chasing an obvious 4-to-a-straight won't have the IO they need to come along, so I'm cool with this sizing. The only thing we're slightly worried about is an action killing card (of which there are 16), but we don't want to raise this guy out of the pot yet either.

Unfortunate turn card. Our goal is to get more bets out of the guy's overpair, so I think we can perhaps check this turn behind to attempt to get one more. If we bet here, there's too much risk the guy folds now due to fearing another bet on the river.

When he calls the turn, we actually have to start asking ourselves how ******ed this guy is. He just raised preflop to $10 after 4 limpers, which is very lol if he has a big overpair (and he should know that if he's a reg). In fact, his preflop speech is actually starting to look like a little indirection (one that is attempting to convince players he has an overpair when he doesn't). And then he called a flop raise. And now he's called a turn bet on this pretty terrible board. Is this guy ******ed? Cuz if he isn't, there's a very good chance our original assumption of him having a big overpair is incorrect, and he instead juiced the pot preflop and flopped a bigger set. Anyways, the more ******ed he is the more I also make another value bet here, but most OMC regs find a fold of their overpair by the river here pretty easy.

GcluelessNLnoobG

Results OP?

Hand 1

villain had K10

Hand 2

villain had 56

An old guy who has folded for 1.5 hrs raised 56s preflop? How does he just check/call the river? WOW is all I can say.

Hand 1: I agree that you should go bigger preflop. Live, you will get action. Here you have a good hand and position, so you should start building a pot. I think you played the flop and turn correctly. There is no need to raise here. On the river, I like a slightly larger raise. He has a lot of worse tens that can call you.

Hand 2: I think you played it well. I like the smaller bet sizing, since you're specifically targeting overpairs and one-pair hands on a scary board. Well played.

I thought I lost value on hand 1 and I thought I played hand 2 horrible esp on the river bet. You know you're bad when you post hands trying to learn how to play them better yet you played them fine lol

Hand 1: Call river. There are worse Tx in the deck, but its unlikely he bets two streets with them. Even if he does, this raise is a bit too thin.
Hand 2: Check turn. The majority of his range is Pair+SD, which makes that an unfortunate turn. If you want block bet turn, and check river is a good option against weak players, but I really prefer check turn and evaluate river against any savvy opponent

edit: I misread hand 2 action. I think raise, bet turn, and check river is okay even against good V's.

Logic is ok for the most part, don't like the river raise on the first hand, but for the most part your making the right plays at the right times, just sort your sizing out..... Live pkay usually works out as bigger than online pre-flop and then similar or slightly smaller post flop....
Playing 1-3 I'm never making it 8, absolute min raise has to be ten, 12 is better, and 15 would be my standard...might even take it to 20 at some tables

At least four posters don't seem to be cool with the small preflop raise size in hand 1. I'd be interested in why they think a bigger one is necessary?

Is it for more immediate value? More FE? Build a bigger pot?

I'm actually pretty cool with it. We know it's going to go 3ways at most, so whatever raise size we pick we've already thinned the field. We're deep ($600), so it's not as if we're ever going to be able to raise to a size that enables us to setup a good SPR to stack off to with TP (not that we'd particularly want to with this hand anyways).

I'm guessing the only thing you could argue is that the smaller raise is missing out on some value when we cbet and take it down. But on the other hand, you could also argue we should risk as little as possible to win the blinds.

Or do others think that the small raise is missing too much value? Or perhaps the small raise will create a 3way pot instead of HU pot and thus we'll have much less FE postflop?

GsortacoolwiththesmallraisehereG

Need reads in the first hand.

Second hand need effective stack sizes and bet bigger OTT. Take a good read from this one, in the future 33 is a 3 bet versus this guy.

Generally missing too much value

I guess just missing too much value in the cbet-and-take-it-down case?

Cuz otherwise we'll have 3 postflop streets in position to get as much value as we want.

GwishywashyonpreflopsizingG

I like a bigger raise for this simple reason: AT is ahead of the range that will call a somewhat bigger raise. Because we have position and are ahead of their calling range (and are likely more skilled as well), we are therefore significantly more likely than our opponents to win the pot. So let's make it a bigger pot.

In short, it's for value.

GG, I really like your posts. But I notice that you focus a lot on "thinning the field." That concept seems overrated to me. Certainly it's way behind other goals, like maximizing value.

Well, I'm always conflicted with it in this spot.

For example, what do we do when it's folded to us on the Button with 75s? Clearly not a hand that's going to get called by hands we're ahead of, but I'm guessing most of us are raising (or maybe not, I might be making too big of an assumption here?). If we are raising, are we raising the same amount as we are with ATo? Seems to me we could end up making the same raise with different hands for two completely different reasons, and yet I'm not convinced ATo is actually all that much >>> than 75s, especially if many bets start going in postflop.

But, yeah, overall the idea of building a pot in position with initiative and skill advantage certainly can't be a bad idea.

GcluelesspreflopnoobG

With a few exceptions, I basically never limp. And I raise the same size regardless of my cards (though my raise sizing varies based on number of limpers, stack sizes, and villain types). In my experience, even bad players pick up on bet-sizing tells preflop. I know I absolutely punish players who size their preflop openings based on their cards.

As for playing 75s in this scenario, I would raise that too. I think I have an edge over an average villain playing deep in position with a suited one gapper. And just as with AT, if I have an edge, then I'd rather play for more money than less money.