1/2 fairly Wild table.

Hero: MP $550 - Viewed as mostly TAG (playing tighter than usual).

Villain 1 C/O $1300 - pretty much a maniac. Opening Any 2, blind raising, capable of showing the nuts or a bluff in monster pots. I have picked up that his bluffing and value betting bet sizes seem quite transparent. I have called him down very light on a couple of occasions. He has been running over the table but is being played back at a little now. His stack was recently as high as $1700 but he seems to be entering the realm of "winners tilt".

Villain 2 UTG $600 - young Asian kid. Loose calling preflop but plays pretty straightforward postflop. Hasn't open raised much at all but has seen a LOT of flops.

V2 limps Hero opens for $15 with AA
V1 Calls
folds to V2 who Calls

Flop ($45) T 5 8

V2 checks
Hero bets $35
V1 Calls
V2 min c/r $70

My read on V2 is that he likely has 2 pair. Maybe a set but he has been showing up with a lot of strange 2 pair hands and has check raised them a few times. A lesser possiblility is a hand like AT thinking I missed and V1 has a flush draw a straight draw or is just floating to make a move on the turn. All of which are entirely possible.

V2s check raise though has me feeling like I may well be beat. FWIW I have been opening to $15 as my standard for all opens so there is no reason for Villains to put me on an overpair.

I decide that although I may be beaten, there are also some table dynamics that could have my hand under-repped and V2 possibly over-repped. I want to see a turn card and re-evaluate.

After the hand another player commented that I should have been coming over the top here to protect my hand and all that. Opinions?

So even though the maniac is behind me and could pull anything I decide to flat the $35 raise.

V1 (maniac) now bets $300 into $210.

V2 tanks. I have already decided I crush V1's range here (back raise looks even more suspicious) and am insta-shipping if V2 folds.

After about a minute or so V2 ships.

I muck my Aces but whine like a schoolgirl and show a friend at the table before mucking.

Was flatting the min c/r bad here?

Like your line and thought process.

agreed, nh.

This game sounds like a blast to play in. Super sick spot, but you gotta let it go.I totally agree you're absolutely wiping the floor with V1's range, but I can't ever in a million years see V2 showing up with less than 55. Maybe, just maybe you beat AsKs or AsQs once in a very rare time, but probably not. Could you give results in a spoiler? I'm super interested to see how this one turned out.

Yeah I am pretty sure I am behind V2 after his min raise and certain after he shoves on V1 of course. There was a time when I might have spewed here.

V2 turned over T-5 for 2 pair and V1 announced he had J high (I assume a combo draw but he never showed)

Of course the Turn was an A and river bricked.

The results oriented part of me was listening to this guy next to me yammer on about protecting my hand and wondering if there was any way I could have seen the turn in this spot but I'm convinced putting anymore money in this pot was spew even before V1's big bet.

Double agreed.

Good hand. Would've been a nice PAHWM, imo. I like the way you played it, I would like a raise sometimes if we're less sure v2 has us beat and we still have decent equity against his 2 pair hands (I think in the 30% area). Also, if we think we're beat and that v2 has a draw, and he won't raise with it like he did, it's probably close to a fold.

Never, never, never, ever do that! You rightly decided that the maniac had you beat with at least two pair. Laying down AA, though it's a hard thing to do, was correct. You should have slipped out of that pot as quietly and inconspicuously as possible. Letting these maniacs know you can lay down a big hand is just asking to get played with in situations where AA is good. It may not be enough for you to have to adjust your strategy, but now that whacko is stealing a pot or two he otherwise would have either lost on a showdown, or conceded.

You are correct. Particularly since reading Tommy Angelo's stuff I have been convinced to adopt the "mum poker" view to significant extent. In this case my friend being at the table contributed to my disclosing information in this and a couple other hands which l agree is a mistake.

FWIW it was not the maniac who had me beat I was getting it in with him.

nh, couldn't have played it much differently. As an aside does anyone have any comments on V2s preflop call here? It seems absolutely putrid to l/c T5 here UTG, even with V1 at the table. Personally I'd take a note: I couldn't care less if he won the hand, just based on his play in this hand I'd label him as a massive fish.

Yeah had already noted his calling range PF was very wide. He was pretty straight forward post flop. He and I both were moved from a table that broke to this table and he seemed to have widened his calling range significantly. I presume to get into pots and hope to flop big with one of the 2 villains at the table who were throwing 200 big blind bets around like they were nothing. I certainly can think of better hands than T5 to do this with but w/e. The point was I was aware that he was very capable of showing up with strange 2p hands in this spot and only sometimes a naked T.

Nh, good commentary. Not sure how people feel about this but depending on how often V1 is raising preflop you have the god seat and can limp with AA here, and trap the field.

Looks good.

Looks good, and tbh I muck to the minraise. Seeing the turn is gonna be tough because you can't continue on like 60% of turns and I doubt someone's gonna minraise like KT here or something for fear of being reshipped on.

he showed. it was J 8

IMO why are you not limp/reraising AA pre if V1 is literally opening atc most of the time? Don't really know the positions at the table, but if you're in EP with a maniac behind you can put everyone in between and set up SPR's to easily stack despite being 250+bb deep.

Obviously we don't have to do this, but you're going to set up tough spots raising to $15 that deep vs absolute maniacs.

Not a play I am very fond of truthfully. I feel it turns our hand face up (unless we are merging a limp re-raising range with other hands - questionable strat at 1/2 IMO). Now I am taking down a preflop pot (OK if we get tons of dead money) or providing maniac (and other villain) with fairly perfect info regarding my hand. I tend to limp r/r only if I am short stacking which I don't do very often.

I'm not saying it isn't a legit strat but I don't care for it.

I didn't realize he had shown. I guess I had the suits switched in OP then it wasn't 8s on board.

+1, but it's the only criticism in a well played hand. there's an argument to fold to the min raise, but $35 seems cheap to peel a turn card and re-eval.

meh, it seems weak, but against a straightforward 1/2 opponent, I am folding to his flop min raise...most villains at 1/2 aren't c/raising their OESD or FD so you are essentially drawing to two outs...If you had the A I would call and reevaluate...IMO the b/3b line is best against more aggro opponents who will c/rai the flop with the flush or str8 draws or AT and will use their newly gained initiative to see cheap turns/ showdowns

I mostly agree with this. However given V1 (maniac) every pot has the potential to be a monster. I strongly felt I was well ahead of V1s range and would be willing to get it in with him.

For $35 more I felt it was a reasonable investment given possible implied odds in this hand (mistakenly thinking some board pairing cards might give me the best hand again). But also for example if V2 had say bottom 2 pair and got cold feet facing V1s massive bet and folded I was shipping against V1. I also may have out leveled myself by making hands such as AT a part of V2s flop reraising range thinking "he knows that I know" V2 is very wide, has put me on AK and feels he is in very good shape with this flop.

And yeah maybe I was a little stuck to my Aces.

What is kind of interesting is that there is a chance If I had bet/3bet the flop (spewey in this spot IMO) and the maniac still made his move V2 might well have actually folded 2P to that action.

*Grunch*

Tough spot, with the maniac behind you. 3-betting V2's raise is not going to get called by worse hands in his range, and folding to avoid the maniac's raise is pretty weak when you have aces. Call/fold may have been the best you could've done here.

I like your line and your reasoning here. Shipping over the nut is probably ok. It's very hard to think of two hands which you were ahead of here... that would back raise and then ship over same.

I can get on board with flat/eval with reads.

Glad you mucked after what happened. all in all it looks pretty std.