2/5 , 7 handed

table has been active with one main whale, whose playing a vpip of around 92 pfr 20, hasn't 3bet yet though. He's in his 70's, does a lot of goofy plays but is mostly on check/call mode. He did a river bluff earlier against 2 other players and looked very confident on the river.

Hero's been playing tag, picking up small pots and here and there, tried to bluff vilain at the beginning of the session, didn't work out too well.

Effec stacks: 1.1k

Main vilain in BB , hero is utg with 97s raises to 20, utg +1 calls, hj calls, button calls, BB makes it 45 (lol wtf). I call, everyone else calls

Flop (225) AsJs3s
Vilain bets 45, I make it 175 folds back to vilain who tank calls

Turn (575) AsJs3s 4d

Vilain checks, I bet 300, Vilain tank calls again

River (1175) AsJs3s 4d3h

Vilain looks pissed and says "****t... not that card" and bets 300, Hero is saying wtfff... ??

Not sure I like the raise pre from UTG, but I understand wanting to mix things up. I think I'd wait for a better position to do it, though.

The rest of the hand is OK, I guess, but the river is so bad. I can't see how you are possibly good here, and I don't think raising is ever good.

For the price, you almost have to call, but I'm sure V knows that.

calling it off but def not raising

Fold and save 300$. For those of you advocating a call at what river size dos it become a fold for you?

I'd try to keep him talking, but from your title you already know that that's a mega mega strength feigning weakness tell.

Here's the thing, even getting 5:1, otr; we really need to line up all of the AA and JJ combos, and then several K and Q high flush combos and after that start to weed them against the 3 AxKs and maybe a KxKs or two, and a rando Bluff every so often. I think if you look at it hard and put maybe a little weight on the read you find the fold on paper.

Pre is easy 4b to 250 or so

As played fold

what?

So you risk 1/4th your stack and fold to a shove?


I probably fold pre - 97ss doesn't play great UTG vs 6 other random hands even if we are 200bb deep. I mean look what ended up happening - you flop gin and don't know what to do on the river.

This is one of those spots where you need to know your donks. Can your donk ever be bluffing here? If he can than you call. If he only has AA - which is a high % of the time since his VPIP / PFR / 3bet% is so narrow - it's pretty clear what your answer should be.

Fold preflop and it's not even close.

Snap call the river IMO. We or getting absurd odds on our call and villans bet seems like a blocker bet with 2 pair plus. Folding river seems absolutely insane.

If the action is correct we can't 4 bet flop as villa donk bet flop. Also 4 bet folding doesn't seem all that amazing. M

I never thought of that, but kind of like it in a sick way. Can you elaborate a little further on why?

As played I'd call. We're getting a good price. Without a better read on him, I probably would have called an all in on river with effective stacks at 1.1K preflop. So 580 at max on river, right?

So tempting to try and 4bet squeeze preflop with your tight image, but I think he is type of player that might not notice (or care) that you are a TAG UTG and he's likely to call preflop and most flop cbets. Calling his 3bet is probably better with 97s. It usually plays well multiway and our hand is somewhat disguised.

Nice flop but our hand is vulnerable. Raise more on flop. I would make it 245 or so with the intent on shoving all blank turns. If he flopped a better flush then so be it.

More PF until better players start to knock you off your ISOs. 20 is too small. and yes, 4b at a decent clip.
I hate flop raise as played, keep him open, plenty of value later in the hand.
AP, it depends on the degree of whaling, but you easily are betting ~300 on this river sometimes as well when ck to... It's a lot closer than you'd like but I'd call>fold and hope for some live read as a tiebreaker.

Diskoteque has you 4b here bc you rarely can play this hand 5 handed profitably esp w relative position being as it is. The lol 3b sizing from a whale should trigger the default 4b switch to get you ISOed. The whale will fold some of the time as well, and its just fine when he doesn't w a hand you know how to play against his range. On this flop, you'd be gleefully stacking off on the turn or sooner.

For the price, snap.

We lose to AA/JJ. Basically only outflushed by KQss (A/J are on the board). His sizing reeks of a blocker type bet with AxKs.

I call and get shown AA or QKspades....price is too good and whales/live players always have that random 10% chance of button clicking spew,add in combos of AxKs and I lean towards a call.

4b is interesting, why so big though? Making it 120-140 does the same trick I think, it's not like I expect the whale to fold either way.

guess i'll elaborate...

on the spot itself - it's a tremendous spot to 4b bluff because our range is uncapped and appears to even non-thinking villains be super strong since we're raising and 4betting UTG. BB (or anyone for that matter) is never minraising with a strong hand with 4 people already in the pot. it's just your typical fish "sweetening" the pot with some hand he thinks looks pretty. at this level even players who aren't thinking about hand ranges know that raising UTG and then 4betting large = super strong and they've already shown they don't have hands to continue vs us, so there's no reason not to just end it here and pick up all of the dead money. personally, this is a hand i'd almost always fold UTG so i wouldn't be in the spot to begin with, but would absolutely make the play with a hand like A5ss or something like that (which would have the added benefit of Ace blocker and even if we're called a hand that plays well vs opponent's calling ranges if someone somehow decides to continue)

at higher levels (5-10+), the callers - MP, BTN, etc. - will recognize this is as a great spot for us to 4b bluff and are capable of either continuing or backraising and be willing to get it in with stuff like 77. but at lower levels i promise you nobody is ever playing back at you in a spot like this. ever.

on the sizing - don't think it matters a whole lot since i think we're getting everyone to fold almost always anyway, but i prefer to go larger like 200+ just to make sure. i have no problems raise/folding ~20% of our stack or whatever since it's such a hugely +EV spot. it's possible ziggy is right with the above post and we can accomplish the same thing going smaller but there's already a lot of money in the pot and i don't want to tempt people to come along by just tossing in a black chip or whatever.

in general though, beating lower levels like 1/2 and 2/5 can be done by simply playing strong hands (not 97ss!), betting -sometimes more often than you're comfortable with- for value with your strong hands, and folding to aggression. you absolutely don't NEED to exploit spots like this to win, but if you are looking to kick your game to the next level and move up i think it is important to step outside the comfort zone and take advantage of these sorts of spots when they present themselves.

I'm folding 3d3c to that speech.

I'm calling ak with those pot odds

I also hate the speech, but we are getting too good of a price to find a fold here i think.


If he was betting larger and by that giving us a worse price to call against his range the speech tell is so reliable that we could exploit him by folding some very strong hands.

Big goofy fish that has never 3bet, min 3bets and we want to 4b with 97s.

Bigger all streets

Just wanted to say thank you for an awesome couple posts man, some of the better ones I've read in a while. I've kinda been stuck in a consistent 1/2 / 2/5 shot take grind/mindset and it's really refreshing to hear some solid higher level logic.

Nice take on this spot.

As played it's an easy call for this price. Why people would advocate folding is beyond me.