I think i played a spot pretty badly vs a new player that I assumed was a solid TAG, but no other reads. Only seen him play 1 hand to showdown and he made a good call with a Bluff Catcher

1/3 with a $10BTN Straddle
$1100 effective
Main Villain is UTG

I have AJss in the BB, SB folds, I raise to $30, UTG calls, and 5 others call including BTN

Flop (Pot ~ $210)

7d 8d Jc

I check , UTG bets $100, folds to BTN who calls, I raise to $400... UTG calls, BTN Folds

I'm conflicted here, i feel like I never get any good draws to fold and no hands that beat me fold, so I'm essentially bloating the pot against hands that either have good equity vs me or are crushing me. Only KJ, QJ, JT are hands that may call that i beat.

In the moment my thought was, the players in this game call too light with TP hands and if they're drawing I want to charge them to draw... I think that I'd rather play my AA-QQ + 9T hands like this though and just call AJ so i unblock AJ (except for AA obv), is that right?

Turn (~$1110)

4s

I check, he jams for $670, I tank and say that I think I'm supposed to fold here. After a while he shows me the K of Clubs...

I ended up calling, which I don't know if it's a mistake or not.

When he showed me the K he obviously can only have KK or KJ, but I didn't really understand how he could call from UTG with KK in a game that is very loose passive pre... my read based on my limited interaction with him was that he wasn't terrible, so i viewed KK as very unlikely

At the same time, i felt like KJ was really happy to check back the turn. If I raise to $400 on the flop and turn bricks, I think he would expect me to Jam all my strong missed draws, so when i check i think he should think I have some type of value or weak draw. If it's value he's probably behind, if it's a weak draw, I can't call, but I can bluff river, so my gut is that he wouldn't want to Jam KJ on the turn unless he's turning it into a bluff. At the same time, in game he maybe just saw, this board is really draw heavy and I want to protect my KJ and didn't think about what hands i would call with.

Honestly not sure I'm a little lost in this spot once i raised flop i feel like i didn't know what to do vs a call.

Few questions

1. I'm not used to playing vs. Btn straddle, I know I'm supposed to tighten up, but is AJ suited an open from the BB?
2. Am i correct that check raising flop is bad?
3. On the turn once i chk raise, is check deciding correct? or am i supposed to Jam, so that i can jam my bluffs too?
4. Once he jams is it just a clear fold?

Just call the flop, now you're pretty much committed so call.

It's probably a fold pre in most games but it depends on a lot of factors.

Check raising is just over playing it and turning your hand into a bluff. We don't have a monster on that flop with 7 players in the hand.

PF I think you're supposed to limp everything here.

Flop raise is pretty bad, what are you looking to do here?

I think you can call once.

I didn't know we were suited bc it just said AJ, so limping the straddle UTG is fine, and it can also be used as a l/sqeeze in some opportunities as well so I would limp instead of folding it but still raising if it's a weak game.

Once you decide to check-raise the flop you HAVE TO jam the Turn, but I would never check-raise the flop. Just c-bet small and dump it if someone raises. With 6 callers and deep-stacked, TPTK is not a hand you want to inflate a pot with.

I hate button straddles.

Don't raise pre. As much as we should all hate open-limps, I think AJs in the BB when there's a BTN straddle is fine to open-limp.

I'm expecting someone behind us to open for a raise. We can defend the BB with AJs to a single raise. If someone opens, and there's a 3B, we can probably pitch it in the muck, unless we have strong reads on the opponents. We don't want to raise to $30 in a 1/3 game, $1100 effective, and have to play the rest of the hand OOP with a bloated pot, and probably multi-way.

If we open-limp, and no one raises, it's fine. We could actually lead out on this flop with a small bet in that scenario.

Don't x/r flop on this board that smacks the $hlt out of every opponent's range. You're losing to 2P, sets, and straights. You raised pre. When you check, and UTG bets into 6 opponents, he has a hand. When the BTN calls, he DEFINITELY has a hand. More than likely, one or the other can beat TPTK.

I could actually see making a nitty fold here, based on the action so far. But if we want to continue, just call, and see what UTG does when we check to him on this brick turn. It's unlikely that UTG is going to continue barrelling into both you and the BTN with a worse hand. So, if we just called flop, check turn, and UTG bets again, we can comfortably fold, especially if BTN calls.

He's not leading into 6 opponents and calling your x/r with a worse hand than TPTK. As played, just check-fold turn. No need to tank when he jams. He's not showing you the K because the other card is a J. He's got KK, and wants you to call.

The reason he didn't 3B pre is that you basically 3B for him when you opened to $30. He probably wasn't expecting to get 5 more callers behind, but also figured 3B'ing next to act over your EP open would look super-strong, and fold out a lot of your hands he'd want to keep in.

When you x/r flop, you're basically repping a set, because you're probably not opening pre with a hand that makes 2P or a straight on this board. When he calls, and you don't jam turn, he knows you don't have a set. As soon as you start to tank, he KNOWS it. He's probably putting you on exactly AJ, so he shows you the K, hoping you'll putting him on KJ, and call.

Taking a limp or fold strategy from the SB in a BU straddle game is reasonable. Should have a pretty wide l/rr range, especially vs late position raises.

I think raising is fine tho to. You're not always going a gazillion ways to the flop.

Prob c-betting this vlop like 70 bucks to thin the field.

I'd also raise pre. $30 seems fine, however sizing depends on game dynamic.

I'd X/C flop, X/evaluate turn.

AP, there are 6 combos of KK and 8 combos of KJ, so math might indicate a call.

I agree with basically everyone telling me not to chk/raise, i was very mad at myself for that play in the moment and i was pretty sure it was terrible

The only thing I'm not sure is true is this part and maybe I'm not thinking about the situation correctly.

Button Straddled preflop and had to call $20 into $210, while closing the action. So his range is about as wide as possible i would think here.

When he calls on the flop facing just under 1/2 pot the only person I think he's worried about is UTG, since everyone else folded in front of him and my guess is that he thinks my checking range is weak (I think i basically check almost everything on this board, so not sure that's true, but I think the players in this game generally assume people C-Bet their strong hands as the PFR all the time). So while, UTG looks pretty strong betting into 6 ppl, I'm not fully convinced that BTN has to be very strong here, esp. given the amount of draws on the board...

In game I was much much more worried about UTG than i was BTN, but maybe I'm wrong. Curious to see if I have a leak in my thinking here

Without even looking at the cards, just the action...

You opened pre from EP. UTG called, some other folks called, and the BTN straddle called. Yes, at this point, BTN could have any 2 cards.

You check flop, UTG bets, it folds to the BTN, and he calls. At this point, BTN actually needs to have some kind of hand, even if it's one that he can plausibly turn into a bluff if he doesn't improve, meaning he's got blockers to the nuts or future nuts.

Just because you checked doesn't mean you don't have a hand. You could be checking your entire range when you get called by 6 opponents pre-flop. But now that 4 of them fold following UTG's bet, you might like to put in a big check-raise, to punish these fools for not respecting your pre-flop raising range enough, and for calling with any two cards.

Because you're still in the hand, as the PFR, BTN can't call UTG's flop bet with total air, just thinking he can steal the pot on a later street. Even if BTN thinks UTG is full of $hlt, it's a terrible play. UTG will never be full of $hlt often enough when he leads out into 6 opponents, from EP, just because the PFR happens to check. No one is bluffing into 6 opponents on this insanely wet flop.

You should be more worried about UTG, because UTG bet, and BTN just called. UTG has the stronger range here. But BTN also has a hand, you can be sure. If he didn't, he might try to raise as a bluff re-steal. Odds are one or the other has you beat, and whichever one might not surely has enough equity to continue, and will often improve to a better hand.

UTG is almost certainly betting for value and protection, often because he now regrets not 3B'ing pre, leading to a 6-way pot going to the flop. Now he's fast-playing his hand. His play comports with his having KK.

BTN probably had AdXd, AdJx, a pair + draw, some weak top pair, maybe even 2P fearing T9 or a set once you x-raise. Just because he folded doesn't mean he didn't have a hand.

Sorry, yes he obviously has something with value that can call and not total air, when you said “he DEFINITELY has a hand “ I misread your meaning to be a very strong hand and a stronger hand than utg

I think I just misread your post. I was saying I thought UTGs range was far stronger and I thought you were saying differently.

One thing nobody has mentioned is that when he shows you the Kc he can't have KJs because the Jc is on the flop ... So if your read is that he's folding KJo pre. and so has KJs or KK ... then you know what his hand is.


Also, in general, when people intentionally show a "blank" card in this kind of spot they just aren't bluffing. Like if he showed a J it's more likely he has JTs/J9s because it's plausible he also has JJ/J8/J7. But when he shows Kc then the absolute best hand he can have is KK, so almost everyone is not showing if they have KcTc.

I had no strong reads on villain, I thought he might be tag, but it was an hour in and I hadn’t played with him prior and he only had 1 hand get to showdown so I was just pure guessing based off the small amount of hands played in that hour.

I’m not used to ppl showing me a card, I think it’s happened to me less than 3 times lifetime, so I basically didn’t make any assumptions outside of he can really only have KK and KJ and then trying to figure out how to discount combos

Your logic definitely makes sense though. I’ll keep it in mind in the future

I would limp intending to back raise vs some. I don’t get the flop check raise.