The initial 3-bet is not the correct play. 400BB deep from BB, calling pre-flop is better than 3-betting. This deep, hand values merge significantly, and JJ especially loses so much of its value and becomes much closer in value to lower pocket pairs. Meanwhile, the importance of position is also hugely magnified.

What are you hoping happens when you 3-bet? You are building a pot, but for no sound reason - you will never be able to play a massive post-flop pot 400BB deep and have the best hand with JJ unless you make a set. The 3-bet just creates a larger pot oop without materially shrinking stacks. In this case, V 4-bet. That's probably quite rare. But what about when villain just calls? When villain just calls, the pot is like 170 with stacks of 1825. What good is that? That's an atrocious spot to be in with JJ oop. Since we cannot shrink the stacks, we actually prefer the smaller pot and deeper stacks.

3-betting this deep oop is massively overestimating the importance of pre-flop equity (yes, we're doing pretty OK against V's pre-flop calling range - but so what?) and massively underestimating the importance of post-flop equity (great, we 3-bet pre and got villain to call off 15BB with only 30-40% equity! ... OK, how about the 385BB that remain post-flop while villain has position on us while we have JJ? The small "pre-flop" EV from the 3-bet will never compensate you for the EV of playing the rest of the hand oop).

And yes, there are rare times like this one where villain does 4-bet, and it sucks. That probably happens well < 10% of the time, so that concern does not dominate our strategy, but it is a consideration. But whether villain simply calls the 3-bet (the most common outcome - in fact, 400BB deep in position, it may be correct for him to call his entire opening range) or 4-bets (the less common outcome), the better play would have been for hero to flat pre-flop.

I think we all see JJ oop here against the BTN raise and just assume the 3-bet is standard, but I don't think 3-betting JJ this deep oop is the best strategy. It isn't, and it's the only obvious error in the hand.

This line of thinking is incorrect, not the other way around.

Rather than 3betting with JJ as bottom of your range, you should consider adding more hands.

Position is obviously an issue, but if you cannot play a hand that dominates V's raising range with a raise, issue is much bigger.

Who says you must play a big pot?

So much wrong in this that it's difficult to pinpoint even just few things.

It's quite clear that you are not comfortable with deep stack.

No, it's not that H is overestimating value of JJ, but rather you have no idea how to construct a range.

Rest is sort of just the same thing.

Your argument of flaring is basically the same as someone who argues bigger raise preflop with AA because he lost the hand.

Yes, this is almost exactly it.

There are two possible things going on here: either Villain is 3-barreling his entire range, or he isn't.

bobman's post is trying to explain what happens when he isn't: most likely, there is going to come a point later in the hand where you are not getting the correct pot odds to call a bet because you won't have enough equity against Villain's range. However, that bet could still occasionally be a bluff--just not often enough to justify a call. What that means, though, is that you are not going to win the pot as often as your equity suggests you should--you're going to lose to all his value hands AND all the bluff combos he bets with. You're making a big mistake if you don't take that into account before you call the flop. (Another possibility is that Villain still bluffs enough that calling future bets is profitable, but not profitable enough to recover the $300 you're calling off now. That scenario would also make a flop fold correct.)

So that's if Villain isn't barreling his whole range. But if he IS barreling his whole range, you have a different problem: your pot odds aren't really your true odds because you will be calling future bets at 1:1. You can't evaluate your decision as calling 300 to win 710 and then whatever happens happens; you need to think about it as calling 1700 to win 2110. Those are MUCH worse odds, and given the fact that AK can suck out on you (especially the fact that AK has big equity against you) you may not be able to call down profitably even if he never stops barreling AK.

Just because you're ahead of V's range doesn't mean it's a slam dunk raise. If you're ahead of his continuing range, then it's a lot closer to raise ainec.

There is some confusion here between three very different situations:

1) Villain is stealing wide and defending that range effectively.
2) V is stealing wide but not defending or defending ineffectively.
3) V is not stealing wide and may or may not be defending appropriately but either way his defence vs 3bet range is quite tight.

RIO matter, a lot, but in they have to be considered alongside V's continuing range across those future streets. You cant have RIO in a vacuum.

As an extreme example: playing headsup deepstacked JJ is surely a 3bet for value from the BB vs any normal HU BTN opening range? Or is it not - maybe I just suck at HU

depends if he thinks youre restealing. probs a called. 5bet jamming seems like a pretty fun range merge. you might get QQ, KK or AK to fold...and you might get Ax or 88-TT to hero lol.

Will is absolutely correct.

this deep you should almost always call. Yes JJs doesnt play great oop but I dont expect vilain to go to crazy in a 4bet pot and so I will expect him to play pretty straightforward postflop.

I find RIO a bit hard to work with in real situations. If he's bluffing in a roughly balanced fashion (obviously a huge assumption), you can think about future situations by just assuming you fold whenever he bets (since calling and folding with a marginal bluff catcher should generally be equal EV at equilibrium). Then you can just assume you lose the pot when he bets and wins the pot when he checks a hand he's not allowed to bluff. Then you can just replace hot and cold equity with how much equity you can actually realize and look at the odds you're being offered that way.

As vernon indicates, if he makes mistakes on later streets, it's more complicated. He will either bluff less often (which is easy because you still fold whenever he bets) or he bluffs to much (which is harder because you still have some equity in the pot when he bets because you have a profitable call).

It's still more complicated than that.

Even if we are not ahead of V's continuation range, sometime it still makes more sense to raise. If we are not ahead of V's continuation range, then it's possible that we're also not ahead of V's betting range or even calling range in future streets, so why give free card to all the hands that have potential to beat our hand?

Not this early in the hand and this deep. There are plenty of times to try to get worse to fold. We're deep with a big pp, I want to keep as much junk as possible in V's range so I can win a big pot. This isn't the time to win a small one. Be okay losing small for the opportunity to win huge.

Why not?

I never said I was looking for a fold. It would be a value raise in this spot and I fully expect V to call with worse at this deep.

You won't win a big pot unimproved with JJ in this scenario. You're missing some pretty faulty assumptions.

By setmining with JJ?

You can setmine with weaker PP, not with JJ.

Most players who are arguing not to 3-bet with JJ in this spot are simply not comfortable playing deep.

1900/125 is about 15. We have nothing on this villain so how can we assume we have enough (just over break even) implied odds? If he was someone like a lag who will go broke with AA deep, then yes call.

I think we are too far behind the default 4bet range of an unknown to happily make the call.

why would he want you to call if he had AK... I think he was FOS and thought you had an over pair that would call vs his aces. People love to say "you should have called I only had AK" when they're upset you didn't call.

I said already, for the chance to win a big pot.

Why? OP said all he knows about V is that he c/f'd a couple of flops after calling a raise pre. Saying his continuing range when raising and facing a 3-bet is wide enough that JJ is ahead of it is just making things up. What reasons do you have that that's the case?

You can if you keep TT in V's range. And "big" doesn't need to be allin, we can get value on 3 of 4 streets and I'd call it a big pot.

I don't want to setmine, that's why I want to call or 3-bet smaller. The bigger you 3-bet, the more you narrow V's range, and the more it becomes a setmine.

I'm not saying just mine in this hand with JJ, but you're allowed to mine with JJ, there's no rule against it. Managers used to say you weren't allowed to swing 3-0, look up how many 3-0 HRs David Ortiz has. Nothing's this extreme.

You have 1 pair, you're oop, you're 380BB deep, these aren't the conditions to play a huge pot.

Diesel, would you posit that because we are so deep, there is really no purpose to 3! JJ here because V's continuing range (plus position) (plus ~400 BB's deep) will make our life hell moving forward?

If that is the case, I can get behind a flat because it keeps our range wide (though JJ is probably the top of it) and we don't have to worry about playing for stacks?

The thing I agree with Pete on is that, just because I 3! this hand, doesn't mean we have to play a huge pot for stacks. Why can't we play a medium 300-500 pot? Obviously when V 4!'s it sets the stage for a stack commitment pot but when I 3! that is not the case just yet.

I definitely think that there's a level of deep where 3-betting any hand any size is meaningless. That's not exactly my reasoning here. I wouldn't mind a 3b IP as much. If you plan on playing a medium sized pot are you going for 3 small streets post?, 1 check and 2 solid streets? V needs to be incapable of stabbing once you give up the lead if you plan on checking 1 or more postflop streets, otherwise there's just too many boards that suck and too many opportunities for V to win worse cards.

Might just be my best style of play. I look for tables that fit my best game, it's a stationy game where I plan on winning a small number of big pots by keeping the pot small early and before V knows its we're ott and he's committing so much of his stack he'd rather just get to SD even though he'll lose than fold and have nothing to show for the 40% of his stack that's already dead money. It makes for very little 3b'ing pre. The conditions of this hand are familiar to a lot of hands I play via that style.

Very nice.

As for saying there is no purpose to 3! JJ here I disagree. Unless you just

1) Know V is calling ATC on the button.
2) Don't want to play OOP against said V.

While winning $30 isn't the optimum situation here, it isn't the worst either. We are OOP and are in a 3-way pot deep.

I think I fold to the 4-bet preflop here. We're hoping he has AK. And we are OOP. I hate being OOP.

If the original raiser opened for 30, got a button caller and I'm in the blinds with JJ, I would def flat pre.

When he only opened for 3x with a caller, that's a small sweetener raise in 2/5 and I would 3bet there like Johnny Buz did and expect to take it down pre a lot or get it heads up with initiative and hopefully an overpair.

But with a normal 5x or 6x raise and a caller I would flat pre. As previously mentioned JJ is not an automatic 3bet.

So let me get this correctly. You want to a chance to win a big pot by passively calling with strong PP.

How does that actually make sense in your head?

Makes even more sense to raise.

Try 390bb effective stack?

OP's 3bet sizing was too big, but it is very reasonable to assume that V would call 9 - 11bb 3bet with almost his entire non-stealing range.

I don't see how you can argue that V would open 3bb then fold to 10bb 3bet. If V would fold to such small 3bet, it is reasonable to assume that V isn't going to call a lot of bet post-flop and isn't going to bet very wide either.

Either way, still makes more sense to 3bet.


See above.

Nice try...way to change your tone in such subtle way. The argument was whether to 3bet, and I like how you are now taking a different position as you write these posts.

Another non-answer answer.

So play it very passively with strong PP and play a "big" pot?

Why do you think a preflop 3-bet is a requirement for a pot to get big?

Like 6 of the 7 biggest hands I ever played I either wasn't the one with the lead or I raised pre but gave up the lead otf. The floor isn't going to run over and prevent you from betting ott because he was signaled that it was only a single-raised pot.

Being deep is a fact, not a reason to know what V's range in a 3-bet pot is. You're still just making things up.

So you agree with me lol. The discussion has started to revolve around the flat option. But my first post was agreeing with CMV's post about flatting or 3-betting smaller.

I don't remember saying V will fold to a 3-bet size of $50. It's an epidemic on here, people read what I say just to claim I said something else.

That was you disagreeing with yourself. You can size a 3-bet so V's continuing range is 99+, AK. Then you can size it bigger so it's JJ+, AKs. And if it's bigger it might just become QQ+. The bigger you go, the more you create a situation where you need a J on board to have the best hand, which is what setmining is. You were in love with the sizing earlier, suddenly you want it smaller.

Sometimes non-answers are able to answer more than you ever thought possible.

Consider it.

Uhh...maybe because it puts more money in the pot?

Umm...so because all the big pots you have played in the past, you weren't the aggressor post-flop, therefore play big PP passively?

Is it really that hard to grasp the idea that in order to play a big pot, you need to put money in the pot?

Uhh...what? How about you actually put up an argument to my clearly laid out premise?


Not really.

If that doesn't go against argument to 3bet, then I don't know what you are saying.

You're just rambling now...


I never once said that I liked the bet sizing, but ok...lol.

LOL, you're doing it again, changing your tone about 3betting.

LOL, how about you actually respond to the argument rather than just posting gibberish?

Absolutely silly debate towards the end, you are making a massive mistake by not 3! here -- his opening range should be relatively wide in there's a lot of value in denying him equity or forcing him to put more money in pre with a dominated range. Unless somebody is trying to argue that V is going to overbet 3 streets and force you to play for stacks postflop, why are we even discussing this. But yes, I'm definitely sizing down to probably 4x instead of 5x, maybe 3.5x

Very insightful comments about RIO as it correlates to playing future streets; that seems to be the best answer to this question. Against a balanced player you are not being exploited by check/folding the flop.

@Sneaky_Pete lmao stop trolling the guy, you already know your right. Although reading this is kinda funny...

Therefore, consider it.

It is difficult to grasp why you think it needs to be pre and it can't be otf, ott, or otr.

You're using "clearly" a little fast and loose. It's a lot like how people from Chicago use "good" when they talk about Jay Cutler.


11 posts and you never said it was poor sizing. You said it via omission.

There are 2 hands of history. In both of them, V called pre, and check/folded otf. He hasn't raised yet. Why does that lead you to the conclusion that his opening range is "relatively wide?"

Because it's folded to him on the button?

How are you arguing these petty fundamental things?