2/5 , I've only played an hour with villain, he's somewhere in his 20's, comes across as a thinking player trying to play well. Effective stacks $800

I limp 44 after a couple limpers in late mp, he calls behind in co, bilnds come along, 6 to the flop ($30)

Flop comes 10, 9, 4 rainbow. Checks to me, I bet $25. villain calls behind, the rest fold.
So heads up to the turn, pots ~$75.

Turn is an 8 (suit unimportant). I bet $75, villain raises to $250, I call.

River 7. I check, villain shoves $530 more.

Comments/thoughts on any decision appreciated.

I would fold the river, since his semibluff hands such as JT just got there. QJ is highly likely given the flop and turn action and the possibility you're holding a bare J or a set makes his shove less of a wild overbet (tho' it's slightly less than pot, you might argue it's big for a value shove on a 4-straight board) than an EV-seeking move.

The turn is your big decision point. We can talk about how to respond to the raise, but let's first consider your initial bet.
In this hand and the other flopped set hand, your bets were pot sized just when the turn brought out the threat of a completed straight draw. What is your motive in doing this rather than making a smaller bet that is easier for weak hands to call and gives you more leeway should he raise?

The critical point is on the turn when you faced the raise, not the river. Up until that point, you're value betting someone with TP or even 2 pair. However, he saying he can certainly beat TP (he doesn't think you have an over pair). The problem you have is that he has you on possibly two pair or a set because you lead out on the flop in heavy traffic if he's thinking. Of his range at this point, you really can only beat a bluff.

If you call, you have less than a PSB left. If he has a draw of some sort, he'll probably call a jam on the turn, but could fold on the river if he misses. If he has air, he's not betting the river after you call or the jam. Of course if you're beat, he's never folding.

Lee Jones wrote that if you didn't lose a lot of money with a set, you didn't play it right. At the same time, I don't believe a thinking player is raising the turn with two pair after facing a PSB on the flop and turn often enough to make it worthwhile to stack off. Therefore, I'd fold and let people think I folded KT. If you want to get it in, just jam the turn.

The worst play is to call the turn and fold the river.

venice, I respectfully disagree with your post. Calling the turn here and folding the river is fine. 3betting the turn is probably better, but as played folding the river is fine.

Flatting the turn and reevaluating river is not bad here. Our hand range looks really weak and we're almost always extracting another bet on the river from two pair hands. If we 3bet here, we're still probably getting that extra bet in, but we're giving him an opportunity to fold two pair hands and we're going to play a really bloated pot drawing at a board pair a big chunk of the time.

Also, I'm always leading this river. You can get thinnish value and if you get raised, you can just fold as villain's repped range is pretty strong and he's probably not turning two pair into a bluffraise here on the river. You're still beating a decent chunk of his range here though even when he c/r's the turn and your hand is underrepped. It also looks like a good card to bluff from villain's POV so you might get called kind of light.

I don't know how to multi quote or quote specific lines (lol, i know. my computer skills suck)... but I called the turn with the intention of reevaluating the river because I thought there was enough of a chance he had 2 pair hands he was value betting that I was ahead of, or maybe had a hand like j10, plus I had outs to beat straights. Not sure if this was right or not. He should have viewed me as pretty tagish as I'd been raising/taking pots on the flop a bit. But still, It was obvious QJ got there so can I really jam here?

MOM, good point on the bet sizing, I guess I was looking for value/build a pot and got what I asked for.

Putting 35% of your stack in and folding on the river on a blank doesn't seem to be winning poker to me. If the villain is raising with 2 pair on the turn, they're probably stacking off on the river. He may even stack off with TP if he's raising on the turn.

IF, if, if about villain. But is he? IF he's raising two pair on the turn why wouldn't he raise it on the flop? That move just went from a trap to a bluff with the arrival of the straightening 8.

I would counter that hero putting in 100% of his stack with 25% equity is worse than putting in 35% then folding when that equity doesn't improve (and in fact looks worse) on the river. Facing the raise sucks so hero's decision is whether he has (pot+implied) odds to try filling up and/or snapping off a bluff.
If he wanted to avoid a tough commitment decision, he might try checking the turn since the most obvious and likely draw just got there and it is likely that villain will "value bet" two pair for us, while possibly folding AT and KT to our value bet.
And I am trying to think this through without being aware of the fact that villain DID raise and not call.

ya but in this case river is def not a blank.

based on river action looks like we were already beat on the turn.

175->400 (or ~2.5->1)
4->1 to make a boat on the river
175 x 1.5 = ~260

So if u call the turn, getting ~2.5->1 (2.3) u only need to extract ~$270 on the river, if u hit and if u miss and check, he MIGHT check behind...

...am I way off here (I actually feel like I am... it's been a long day lol.)

^this makes perfect sense^

river is not a blank. We were probably beating greater than half of his range on the turn, once the river falls and he bets it narrows his range tremendously and it improves a lot of the hands that we could beat on the turn. Through this redefinition, we have gone from a sizeable favorite against his range to a sizeable dog.

On the turn, he's probably raising all his two pair hands, all sets, all straights, and maybe half of his combo draws. The river betting takes out two pair hands, most of his combo draws got there, so we're looking at sets and straights and maybe he bets his two pairs here like 20% of the time.

We should have led the river to extract value and narrow his range even further in the event that he raises, but just based on the fact that he can bet this river confidently, there is very little in his range he is bluffing and people don't go for thin value with hands worse than a set very often live here.

Hero doesn't have the implied odds to call the raise. This can be a straight or even worse, a higher set. I agree two pair makes little sense.

Best case he's up against a straight. He has to call $175, meaning if the board pairs, he needs to be able to collect at least about $700 to make this BE. The pot is $400 (excluding the call). That means collecting another $300 on the river. However, Hero is oop. If he hits, he's going to have to bet over $300 to get paid off. If he checks, the straight just checks behind. Maybe he gets paid off, but not always. If it is a better set, Hero has 1 out and the best thing that could happen is that he doesn't get the FH.

So calling just isn't worth it to hit and folding on the river sucks too. A shove at least adds some potential FE if the villain has a set (he might not believe Hero wouldn't bet a draw).

Therefore, I believe folding>shoving>calling. This is a classic case of showing the advantage of position. If hero had position, he could easily check behind on the turn and play for a pot more in line with his relative hand strength.


PS. WBN, Hero has less than a PSB left at the river. Can't fold the river getting 5:1 with a set.

why are you taking 2p out his range on the turn? It was a limped pot, he could easily have 10 9, 10 8, 8 9, all of which he probably would have played in the same fashion.

And just because we have less than a PSB doesn't mean we can't fire a block bet here and hero fold getting a great price on villain's shove if villain does shove.

We still have $520 behind in a pot that is now $575. We can very easily bet something like $250 here and fold if villain shoves another $275 behind.

I realize this is an extremely exploitable strategy, and online FR it sounds a bit ridiculous, but playing live deepstacked, this is a rather standard play.

I really think we are being results oriented here a little bit. If hero had called and not posted the river card or action, there's no way people are advocating a c/f line on the river or a fold on the turn. We're only losing to 6 hands on the turn, people! And some of them are pretty unlikely.

I'll agree that the HH would be better if it stopped at the turn raise.

I take 2 pair out of his range because he's a "thinking" player. He recognizes that this is a wet board too and that the SD got there. While Harrington doesn't name it, he writes about Baluga, too so live players have heard of it. Two pair knows TP is folding to the raise, while everything else will probably call.

so you really think 2p is flatting this draw heavy board on the turn if you are some live donk villain? Villain is raising 2p here EVERY TIME on the turn to get value/price out draws.

I'd be super surprised if villain is just calling behind on the flop with top 2. I think OP played it ok.

edit: probably worth justifying a bit. I'll bet a straight is a huge part of villains range, but JT is also big, and T9 T8 are possible. Calling is not terrible, but hero is going to have to fold to a shove if he doesn't improve...but I don't think villain shoves with anything that doesn't beat us, which is cool. Hate the idea of a thin river value bet.

Yeah, villain is clearly on a draw at the flop and got there on the turn. Even if he was raising on the turn with T7-two-pair, he's not shoving the river when the 7 hits, making the JX-one-liner-straight. Solid live players just don't do this.

Folding a set is nearly impossible, but i think this is a fold on the river. Villain has QJ or J7 way too often.

I wrote more, but the heart of my response is "read the OP" (villain is not "live donk" he is "thinking player trying to play well"). And even if it did not say that, don't assume that live players make misguided plays every chance they get.

it's not a misguided play to raise the turn with two pair. It's gonna be pretty difficult to flat that turn if you're villain and you have top two on a very draw heavy board. Your hand rates to be the best and you don't want to give out a cheap draw. Whether or not raising is the optimal line here if villain has 2 pair I'm not debating; It certainly is not a donkish play though and by far most people are not flatting but raising hero's bet on the turn with 2 pair.

I'd wager a thinking villain with 2pr is raising to price out draws on the flop when there are 4 people left to act, and not on the turn against a hero who has double barreled.

How is flat calling a *potsized* bet HU considered "giving out a cheap draw?"

I really regret not stopping the hand history at my initial turn decision first here. SO, what's the best way to proceed from the start of the turn? Checking can't be right with a draw heavy board(or can it?). Bet smaller, like $40? If so, why?

Also, FWIW, If I were in villain's shoes, I am capable of raising a fairly wide range here against certain opponents, either as a bluff, semibluff or for value. I was giving him the same kind of credit.

without a specific read I dont give most 2/5 players alot of credit for making plays on the turn, esp turn bluff or semi bluff raises. even more so on the river, but in general when you have shown as much stregnth as you have, he cant expect you to be b/f much on the turn. But if you have that read then it is something to consider for sure.

With a set, you should rarely ever stop betting and certainly you don't stop betting until someone tells you that you're beat.

These posts are really driving me crazy in this thread. You are all looking at this from such a ridiculously results oriented point of view. Let's look at this thread from the villain's POV. There's a multiway limped pot. Some dude ahead of us leads pot on the 10 hi flop. He pots the turn when another card lower than the 10 comes. What's his range?

The range where someone pots here two streets is really wide. (our hero's range) It consists of a lot of top pair type hands, a lot of two pair hands, sets, draws, combo draws, pair+backdoor flush draws, straights, etc.

If you are the villain here, you know how wide hero's range is. Are you just going to flat call with a strong hand like two pair or a set? That seems insanely stupid and just so not profitable. You're deep so you have to size a good turn bet to set up your river bet, you want to know where you stand, there are tons of draws in hero's range, you want to get value and price out hero if you are ahead, your hand beats a massive chunk of hero's range. Flatting this board is just so so so bad for so many reasons if you're villain and you have 2p+.

As for the horrible advice given about hero's hand, hero's hand here is at almost the very top of his range in an extremely wide range. So, with the 7th nuts, when we encounter a c/r, we are going to....fold? That makes no sense. Shove? That seems like it would probably be +EV, but nowhere near optimal.

A flat call from hero is fine here, both to extract value and pot control if we are behind to a straight. Flatting the turn and leading almost any river is by far the optimal line AINEC.

what range are you straight potting the turn like that with?

i'm not really crazy about your bet sizing unless you balance it with some marginal 1 pr hands which seems unlikely.

it makes it harder to get value from his more marginal holdings and makes the pot more manageable if faced with a turn raise when the most obvious draw on the flop hits.

also i don't think 2pr is going to raise you very often on the turn with your sizing. you potted the flop into 5 players and then potted the turn... youre showing a ton of strength. i mean what the **** can you have in limped pot other than a set/2pr/straight yourself?

im too tired/hungover to do the math but i guess you have enough implied odds to bet/call the turn in hopes of filling up but i'm not sure. if i had to guess i'd think that you're behind damn near 100% of the time vs. anyone who is thinking/trying to play well. all in all just bet a bit smaller on the turn to make your life easier and balance out your play in the future. and obv fold the river you are smoked.