1/3 NLH, match the stack, 9 handed
1800 effective.




Preflop:
Action: UTG straddle. Folds to Hj raises to 15. Folds to us in the sb we have AhKs , We 3 bet 65. The bb (mid to late 20s unknown ) cold 4 bets To 180. UTG straddle folds. HJ folds. We call.

Flop (pot 375):
Action: Qh Js 9c. We check. Villain bets 75. We call.

Turn (pot 525): Td, completing rainbow.
Action: We check. Villain bets 325. We Call.

Should we have raised this turn?

River (pot 1,175): Ts
Action: We check. Villain bets 900.
Us??

I never play this deep but this looks well played to me.

Nice hand.

You should wait at least 24 hours before posting the reveal, to keep the discussion going.

I could argue for a 5B pre, when OOP against a V who is likely too aggro. Flat calling worked out here, but it won't always, and we'll be guessing about what to do on every street.

Surprising V just kept barrelling after you called the whole way. God bless those aggro-fish.

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Thank you. I was just torn on the turn between flatting and raising. I know I would have raised 100% if the turn brought in a bdfd.

Thanks Doc.
I usually don’t have a 5! Range pre. Usually only v absolute whales, and generally it’s never a balanced 5 bet. Always pure value.
Also didn’t want to bloat the pot oop w AKo. I don’t mind navigating post. But I agree, having to play guessing game every street is pretty crappy. And sometimes we can be in the blender.

Going forward I’ll wait to post reveal. I just like having it up as a spoiler, in case ppl get impatient. But for conversation purposes will hold off on future posts.

**TAKE OUT THE RESULTS THEYRE NOT ALLOWED FOR 24HRS** press the edit button quick

Based on certain villains I usually wouldn't flat the 4bet (either jam or fold, if he's unknown and I think his range is what a normal cold 4bet range is from the blinds (AA/KK) I would just fold.

As played it's a horrible river, we're calling hoping to chop which usually never ends up too well. I wouldn't be in this spot because I'm either raising or folding pre, but the river looks like a fold, we're usually beat here since they don't usually do this with AA.

I'd probably x/r flop a lot. Q-J-9r is our board not his. Although I guess we unblock QQ JJ so maybe a bad idea. Idk. Just thinking out loud. Not sure if I'm barrelling turn 4x brick-type cards. Barrelling Q, J, T, 9, 8 for sure.

Played fine. I probably raise the turn, but I'm OK with the call. Sucks that the river pairs, but I'm not folding -- it's a sigh call.

I think we are too deep to jam here. Generally, I don’t do a lot of 5 betting, only against massive fish and usually only w KK/AA (never balanced v fish). I totally understand why folding would be an option. Playing super deep oop w AKo is never appealing.

And the river did suck… wasn’t too thrilled about it.

I do play in this game and it does get pretty deep, like 700 to 1,000 BB"s deep, and it's true we do get to a point where we're too deep to jam so I would lean towards folding since an unknown's cold 4bet range usually crushes us, it's rarely AQ unless there was a dynamic going on or he had reads on you for 3betting too wide.

I don't really like raising the flop either, bc we do have equity and he's giving us good odds to call. If he re-raises, we're ******.

I also wouldn't mind a raise on the turn, before a bad river. I'd be raising more often if there was a flush draw or two on board.

Yes, we'd only be repping AK, our actual hand, and V's will likely over-fold, but we can balance by raising with some bluffs and worse value hands.

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I considered raising turn and 100% would have had it brought the back door flush draw.
If we raise, his QQ, JJ never folding. His AA/KK peeling turn for sure, we fold out slither of bluffs he has.
Then on board pairing river… puke a little and check and evaluate I guess.

If we took x/r line on the turn and river pairs board, what’s our line small bet/fold? Check call? Check fold?
Would def be in a difficult spot for sure.

Good points.

Raising turn is almost mandatory if the turn adds a BDFD.

Even without it, I wouldn't mind a turn raise here, to get value from V's 2P/sets and to fold out his draws before a river chop. I'm not sure 2P and sets are never folding, simply because we have so much AK in our range.

When we're OOP with thick value, I tend to favor the more aggressive action.

The downside of raising turn is that it mostly folds everything that isn't decently strong value. I think everything worse than 2P folds, and some of the worse 2P probably folds at some frequency. Some TT might actually find a nitty fold occasionally.

But assume 2P and sets always call. I would probably block-bet 40% pot OTR and rage-fold to a raise.

This somewhat goes back to pre flop. When we don't have any 5B range pre, we could also have some flopped sets or TT here. If we block bet river, V can't necessarily blast off with all his value, when we could have some better boats or quads.

Is he going to turn QJ, AQ, or KQ into a bluff? Doubtful. I'd expect him to fold all his 1P/2P when we block bet, and just call a lot with most of his value range. When he does call, we almost certainly lose, or chop. If he raises, I don't see how it could be a bluff, unless he's just a complete maniac.

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I agree w/o a 5! Bet range pre, this board also favors us as well.
And also agree, majority of players at 1/2-2/5 aren’t turning two pair and top pair into bluffs, so over folding in huge river raised pots, generally the correct play, especially at these stakes.
Thanks for the feed back. I appreciate it.

Looks good, now hero calls

When I was playing 1/3, it was very unusual to see 5B's, because most opens were 4x or 5x, most 3B's were 3x or more, and so 4B's were just jams for 100-150bb's. It would be open to $15, call, call, 3B to $75-$100, and a fold or 4B jam for $300-$500.

Because of all the loose action and multi-way pots, I had a limp-3B range from EP, which included AA, KK, AK, and A5s, especially when there were more aggro / squeeze-happy players in LP or the blinds. I wanted to induce more limps behind, then a big open from some aggro V, which I could then 3B, putting all the pressure back on them with their weaker range.

But most 1/3 players aren't 600bb deep, as you are here. With the stack depth here, I think we can have a 5B range, with some hands we might fold to a 6B, just like my limp-3B range had some hands I'd fold to a 4B jam (A5s). Here, AKo, AQs, KQs, and A5s might be the hands in that range that we 5B-fold, whereas QQ-AA and AKs are hands we're just going to go with.

Having a 5B range means we have to have a 3B range that just calls a 4B, rather than raising. Maybe 99-JJ is in that range.

If we have a 5B range at this depth, which includes AK and QQ, but not 99-JJ, because those are just 3B-calls, then I'd think our range is even stronger on this board, where we could have some flopped or turned sets that become boats or quads on the river, but fewer straights, because our AK would have 5B pre.

Even if we have a 5B range pre, V might not know that. If we don't know what V's 4B range from the BB is, then we're sort of hand-cuffed on this run-out. An overly aggro V might think we're playing 3B or fold from the SB with a wider range, allowing him to get spicy with QJs, JTs, T9s, and 99, in addition to justifiably 4B'ing with TT-QQ in the BB.

Our hand seems too strong to fold, but when we gave up control of the betting when we just flat called pre, we allow an aggro V to get here with thick value (boats) as well as bluffs. That's why I said it was somewhat surprising V continued to barrel off after we called the whole way. I would expect our straights to lose here a lot when the board pairs on the river.

I might actually prefer to donk lead this turn rather than go for the check-raise, whether we have a 5B range pre or not, to avoid letting V check back and see a free river card. My thinking is he's not always folding his 2P and rarely folding his sets, and it's going to be entirely face up if we donk-lead the river on a brick. I'd rather take back control of the betting, so we can make sure we get bets in on both the turn and the river.

He wasn't described as aggro though, just an unknown in his 20's but if he was I would lean more towards calling the river.

Understood that V wasn't explicitly described that way. I was imputing that V is aggro based on his age and the fact that he played his hand the way he did.

But even without the aggro description, I think my logic is sound - IF the V happens to be aggro, we let him take control of the betting pre, allowing him to continue with both his bluffs and his value hands that boat up on the river. All we can do is check-call, as played.

If we 5B pre, V is likely folding out all his weaker aces and some hands that would have flopped or turned sets here. He's most likely folding 99 and TT, and occasionally JJ and QQ. He might even fold out AKo. His 5B-calling range really has no bluffs on this board, because it's just AA, KK, AKs, plus maybe also AKo and / or QQ, and possibly JJ.

Assuming he 6B jams AA/KK and AKs, then he only has AKo or QQ, and maybe sometimes JJ. Against a range that's just JJ+/AK, we can just check flop and jam turn, instead of check-calling the whole way and playing this guessing game when the board pairs on the river.

At this stack depth, I prefer a 5B with AKo, to deny equity and better define V's range. It can't be bad to take the pot down pre-flop, without having to make a pair. If we're not going to 5B pre, fine, but then I think we need to raise the turn, Because what worse hands does V have that are going to continue value-betting or bluffing on a river brick?

Why take a chance of V catching up and chopping, or worse, making a boat, or just giving him a free card so he can check back of fold if we donk-bet on a brick? If V has $1500 behind going to the turn, we should be thinking about how we can get all of it.

Reveal:

I thought for a minute I got time traveled back in time bc I remembered seeing the results but then I saw you posted them too soon originally and deleted it..
You're always the best source to read him and narrow down whether or not they would do that with an inferior hand because you were the one right there, it really comes down to their reads but I think in general we're usually beat in these types of spots since players don't usually bluff on the river after the board pairs in a big 4bet pot.

I want to raise turn to get value from Kx and assume QQ/JJ is never folding ... but I'd probably call KK and I can't think of a hand I'd bluff raise on this turn, so call it is.

On the river sometimes he has QQ, I guess, but even JJ would be very weird. Looks a lot like KK/KQ who assumes it has the nuts and is betting too much, but I'm not sure I find the raise because he'd have to believe we are bad or we are bluffing.


Looked at the soiler and well ... that's worth keeping in mind for future hands.

You have 320 left behind if you call. Just ship it. You can get called by worse. There are more combos of AA and KK than boats here and they never fold for 320 more. I think calling turn is fine.

I think preflop all the options are on the table, 5betting, folding, or calling.

Flop calling or raising are on the table.

Turn raising or calling both seem fine. This may sound weird, but your bluffs are probably actually sets here that should make KK indifferent to calling and folding.

I think your hand shows why it is okay to just call with the nuts sometimes to keep bluffs in range.

Didn’t read the OP or any discussion but IMO without some major history basically every 1/2 or 1/3 table live I’ve ever played at a cold 4 bet is 99.99% KK/AA so I feel AKo would be a turbo muck almost always unless the 4bet is all in and significantly less than a full raise and puts 4 better all in so we’ll see all 5 cards and were closing action with no chance of getting squeezed out somehow from someone in the middle especially a 3bettor who may have chance to still somehow 5 bet if there’s ever any scenario where that’s even possible. Or if the 4 better made a tiny 4 bet and is like 2,000+ BB deep and has shown they get married to their hand for outrageous implied odds when they almost certain KK/AA on a TJQ kind flop or monotone flop (if were suited) or a 4 flush board. But these are super rare hypothetical scenarios that maybe come up once or twice in your life.