Table is mostly MAWGs. Villain is MP3 at 9 handed table. Hero is on the button.

Table dynamics have been mostly fairly passive and loose. Rarely seeing 3b pots and plenty of MW pots going around. Hero has tighter image, but no extensive hand history with rest of the table. Villain tends to do a lot of calling and x/f in MW pots.

Villain is the effective stack at ~$180.

Action begins with six limps before it gets to me. I look at AJo and raise it to $21. MP3 is the only caller.

Flop comes AA5r. Villain checks. I check back.

Turn is a 6, completing the rainbow board texture. Villain leads for $45. Hero calls behind.

River is an 8. Villain thinks, then jams his remaining $110.

Hero ???



I think my biggest misplay here is the small raise, given the six limps. Would a more appropriate size be $30-37 here? I'm fortunate that this didn't go MW given my sizing mistake.

As far as flop goes, I think I am far ahead of Villain's range after the check. I know live people do tons of weird things, like limping or overcalling AK/AQ, but I have removal and I assume villain will raise AK at least. I think about betting 33% pot here as a range bet, but decide on checking back. FAFB situation.

I think turn and river ap were fine in retrospect. Our hand is not vulnerable to be outdrawn, and by mixing my checking range with my stronger Ax hands I can bluff catch here. Villain will likely overplay his smaller Ax or not give me credit here given the flop checkback.

Let me know your thoughts.

$21 is in the reasonable range but how good it is depends on how sticky the table is. Going more then $30 ends up being counter productive because it's so much more then the pot. You become vulnerable to people limp/raising.

Effective SPR on the flop is small enough that you committed with AJ. Trapping is good with trips and a very dry board. If villain has an ace all the money will go in at some point, if he doesn't you need to not frighten him off. With a good read on villain you can vary this up, there are a lot of ways of playing this sort of situation. Against an unknown your line is fine.

Worrying about balancing your range in this specific of a situation is over kill though. You would have to be playing the same opponents all the time before balancing top trips matters. This is entirely about how to get some money out of villains that are crushed and have to suspect they are crushed.

Your preflop raise should be around the size of the pot adding your call. I count $24 in the pot, plus your call is $27, and adding that on top of your call brings you to $30. Going a bit smaller can be fine too, maybe $25. I think $21 is a bit too small.

It is fairly unlikely villain has trips here because you hold one of the aces.

It is way more likely he has hands like a medium to small pocket pair, so 66-TT. Of course he could have 55/AK/AQ but that’s fairly unlikely given preflop and combo math.

I would structure the thought process around how to get max value from pocket pairs rather than thinking about what if V has Ax. If he has Ax all the money is going in if you take a bet/bet/bet line.

If you check flop, you’ll need to size up more on turn to get stacks in, and he might fold then and there with his medium pocket pairs, especially if a scare card like T-K falls.

If you size appropriately OTF and OTT, I think you can get two bets out of his pocket pairs and max value from his Ax. I would go small, $20 on flop, $40 on turn, and jam river for $100.

PreFlop: raise to $30+ with 6 limpers (normal raise (4x I'm assuming for 1/3) + 1BB for every limper)

Everything else looks good and your post flop reasoning is sound.

I agree with everything you said except I like his flop check. He smashes the flop and it’s really hard for his opponent to have anything worth calling outside a pocket pair which as it plays out is his most likely holding. But on the flop you have to give him a chance to catch up or it’s more likely than not you get no value. You have to play a bit different at lower stakes. Balancing as isn’t important, especially in this spot.

At loose passive tables with smallish stacks, I've been leaning to just overlimping AJo in LP now and playing postflop multiway high SPR poker in position. A raise basically sets up very small SPRs where we'll mostly be facing commitment decisions ASAP with TP, but a raise often limits continuing Aces to dominating ones (although admittedly our Jacks will be dominating). On the plus side a mere $21 raise after 6 limpers somehow managed to get this HU in position with initiative, and if that is the expected result then I can't hate. But I would need to be going to $35 at my table and that is simply too much of my stack to commit with this meh hand, imo.

Postflop in this hand kinda illustrates the problem that occurs with our preflop raise. The SPR is 3 so stacks are going to be committed with virtually any bet. And yet the Aces this guy is going to continue with preflop all beat ours (or, what, he's calling with Axsoooted when no one else called preflop? No, he's folding it and saying "if anyone else called I woulda called").

So I'm fine with the checkback on the flop to potentially induce bluffs / overvalues.

And I'm fine with the call on the turn to continue the flop plan.

And now everything we've done has just setup an easy river call. I wish I hadn't have read the spoiler, but I think in the end against most this is going to be a closer high variance situation than most think (especially at your typical loose/passive MAWG table), although obviously we smell like roses this time.

I'll be outvoted by a large margin regarding preflop. But I'm fine with how we played it postflop.

GcluelessNLnoobG

NH

Pre can raise OR overlimp
Post is a very reasonable line that also won you the max this time.

Grunching ... didn't read spoiler ....

As played through the flop, I'd just gii OTT. $110 behind, pot is $95-100. If he has a better ace, you're not folding, and he isn't with a worse ace.

Don't love gii OTT. It's the way ahead or way behind scenario. But we are not just way ahead of his lower Aces. We are way ahead of his airballs. gii OTT just lets him off the hook.

If he is "mostly calling and X/F" there are few airballs in his leading range OOP. If he limped with AQ+ or flopped a boat, nh.

So the reveal is that he had a bluff? Did he muck before you showed or after?

V said, "I don't have an Ace," and then mucked after I showed.

I see this from fish where they value bet with say 99 then assume they lost when called.