2/5 live game in AC, table mostly regulars with a few decent but not great regs and a few weaker but not terrible players. I've played with several of these players in this game before, villian is one of the stronger players at the table and is there every time I've been in the card room. He generally plays pretty well, pretty aggressively and I've seen him 3-barrel ATo high and get looked up by a guy he probably shouldn't have been 3-barreling against.

I think he thinks I'm pretty tight/nitty because I generally am very tight at this table because the weaker players at the table will call you down too light so I generally just try to go to value-town hard (in fact sometimes not hard enough I think), which means I wait for value hands. Also I may be a tellbox given I'm less experienced live, although I'm working on it and generally always wait a few moments before acting in a big pot and stare at the pot doing my best to conceal emotion.

Hero sat down a few hands ago and has $500, villian has me covered (200 BB buyin max but I always buyin 100 because I'm used to it online).

Anyway I get

Q Q

in the SB. Villian raises to $10 in the CO, where he has a fairly wide range. I make it $40, I know he thinks he can outplay me postflop (has alluded to it before) and will call me wide here, and he does call.

Flop is:

A 9 9

I lead out for $75 into the $80 pot. Villian thinks for just a moment then makes it $200.

I've noticed that when villian flops a monster he usually plays it slowly on the flop, so I didn't think he would have a 9 here, although I hadn't played many 3-bet pots with him. I hate folding here because I know villian wants to make a play against me thinking I'm a nit, and what is he really representing? Raising a weak ace here seems like a strange play, since from his perspective he'd rather I continue betting out my KK/QQ instead of chasing those away and keeping in the hands that I beat him with.

I'm a little worried my hand is face-up, although I would play AA, AK, and AQ pretty similarly and they are also in my range, along with KK and JJ. My biggest fear was that he had a weak Ace and thought I'm a nit who will spazz out my KK/QQ/JJ. I'm also not exactly sure how I would play a hand like AK or AQ against a raise like this, because it's unclear what he's representing, and if I put him on a bluff, I should just jam with my QQ. Thoughts on the whole hand and my range in general in spots like this appreciated.

Pre I think you can 3-bet more.

OTF I think a c-bet of 50ish accomplishes the same thing as 75.

If you do put him on a bluff, I guess it would be best to flat and let him jam the turn and call it off. Now, if you had QJ and you thought he was bluffing, the best move would be to jam.

I think villain almost always has you beat and even if he has a weak ace he will call it off with so much chop potential. His raise/call-3bet in position range is probably pretty wide and includes a bunch of 9x. Don't level yourself here. Fold. If he's bluffing it's a really really really good one.

This is a textbook ck flop, if he cks back then bet turn and rvr small for value situation...

I agree 3-bet was a bit small (though I'm not sure how much more he will call, and I do want him to), and c-bet was a bit big. If I had AK, I could still bet $50 and get it in by the river. If he raises my flop bet after that and I have AK/AQ, I think I have a crying call down?

I don't understand how checking this flop is a good line, much less a textbook one. Am I also checking AK/AQ on this flop? If not my hand is totally face up and super easy to bluff, and if I do, I'm missing a lot of value against weaker aces. What am I getting value out of on the turn and river by betting with QQ? Checking the flop to bet turn/river with AK/AQ for value, and check/folding maybe check/calling turn/river with QQ is an approach that makes slightly more sense to me, though still less than betting the flop to represent AK, and continuing to fire each street with AK, while giving up with JJ-KK.

I hate folding but I think it's the play. You have the best hand here a lot imo but if you call flop and V bets turn I don't know if you can just hold on with QQ on this board...

As described/played I'm shutting it down and folding to the flop raise.

Based on description I wouldn't put it past him to have Ace-whatever (TPGK) here and figuring (correctly) to be way ahead. I think you're pretty close to face up here.

To me, the big Cbet says 'I want to play for value/stacks' and his raise says 'I have an ace, nine, or I'm going to level you and lets do this'.

IMO there is no need to get into a leveling war with as-good or better players who cover your stack on a board marginally bad for your hand.

I think a lot of knowledgeable players will raise this flop with their entire range facing a cbet bc it's really hard for the cbettor to call with TT-KK.

This is exactly what I'm worried about and I was wondering what line will protect myself best against this play. I ended up folding after a minute of talking myself out of continuing, because even though my instincts were screaming that he was raising any two cards, I just didn't see how I could keep going with such a weak hand. He ends up showing 3s4s for the dreaded 4 high no draw, and says something about how I acted made him think I had KK, and he thought I would fold KK-JJ. Now granted I may need to work harder on not being a tellbox or getting my own live reads, but I think his read isn't super hard given that big pairs are a huge part of my range. I'm thinking that besides slightly better bet-sizing, making sure I 3-bet against villian with AK-AJ and don't give up on flop raises is the best idea, but I wanted to put it up for discussion in case there is merit to something like checking flop, or if 3-betting more/less would give me an easier spot.

On the other hand, I have such a hard time imagining him not waiting until the turn to raise a 9, or not just calling down TPGK - in which case I shouldn't be giving up here at all, because his range is all bluffs.

I'm not too worried because the better players aren't your primary source of money at the table, but I can't fold QQ pre so I wanted to make sure I play well against the tougher players as well.

100%

If you did have AK/AQ on that board you'd check back to keep some bluffs in his range.

Even the villain calling and/or especially raising a ~1PSB hero flop bet is especially strong. Him raising from the CO an be with any Ace-Rag and suited connectors or suited-one-gappers which include a 9.

IMO, the flop is a check/call ... bet 2/3 pot on the turn & hope for a fold ... check and evaluate the river if it gets there

If this is the line V can take and you know he is capable just x/c flop and reeval turn. No need to play a big pot with your hand on this board.

The biggish pair on the flop makes it easier to check a hand like AK because you are protected from smaller two pairs, but on non-paired boards or boards with a small pair like A 3 3, checking AK just feels like you're giving hands that will call a bet like weaker Aces or medium pocket pairs a free card to beat you in a decently sized pot. I wonder how many people would actually advise to check AK on this board if it wasn't framed in the discussion on how to play QQ, because it seems like this board is also a 'textbook' bet with AK and yet if you do that then checking QQ here feels like politely asking the other guy to bet you off the hand, especially against someone I've seen 3-barrel with air. I am still leaning towards continuing to bet this flop, but just make sure I have enough Aces in my 3-bet oop range that him auto-raising it will be too costly for him.

Unless you have a lot of bluffs in your 3 bet range...this is not correct...

KK-tt is 24 combo...

AK AQ is 24 combo...

and a lot of players will check the KK-TT on A high board and almost none will bet near pot...(well maybe heroe ).

raising an A high board against a pot size bet from the 3 bettor as a bluff is suicide...

Against most players I check my entire range here.

From the very first chapter of EzGame by Baluga Whale:

The real problem with betting for information occurs when someone bets a hand like KK on an A22 board. Well every time we are called we are behind, so we lose some money (more on this later). Every time he folds we were ahead. He plays perfectly. And, if he's not making any mistakes, we are not making any money. If we are betting for information instead of one of the three reasons, we are usually isolating ourselves with better hands and folding out worse hands. In short, we're making mistakes and our opponent is not. And that's bad.

Maybe you weren't betting strictly for info but you get the general point

Yeah you guys are right, checking does make more sense here. I think in the heat of the moment I wanted to represent AK and take the pot down, but there really aren't many better hands folding anyway and if he wants to be a bluffalo against me then being trappy with my good hands is probably more useful than putting too much money in with my marginal hands.

If you cbet a flop like this, you had better expect a raise from a player like this

Check flop. Let him bluff or minimize loss against the A or 9

As played...think for like 8 seconds and call

If what you say about V is true I think you are removing a 9 and AK/AQ from his range. If so what remains are A-rag, PP, and nothing.

If you jam you would fold out all those hands except maybe A-rag idk??

As played I'd call and check-call all in on the turn

Exactly.

How often should we be checking AK/AQ on this flop?

I think most of the time right? With this dry board we are only getting action from Ax and 9x and don't have to worry about a draw getting there.

Seems like an obvious spot to check/call and if it checks through try to get a street of value out of KK-22 later. If he has Ax and gives us action we can probably get stacks in as we've underrepped our hand.

It depends, but not really.

Generally, I'd bet AK for value quite a bit on this flop to target worse Ax as well as pocket pairs that will stick around but will likely fold on a future street if more overcards come. Against some villains you could even go for 3 streets.

If we had a hand like, say, A2, then yes - check the flop almost always because you're more truly wa/wb (not getting enough value, not getting enough better to fold).

your big cbet on this flop screams "i don't have an ace, so please fold and give me the pot". as others described, a thinking good v can use this as a very good bluff. he can now raise with any two cards here. as played fold. next time check flop and reevaluate the situation on v's action.

I'm largely convinced checking is better here but not 100%.

For one thing, what you just said does not mean I should check call, it means I should bet-call. The way people talk here you'd assume you can only induce a bluff by checking, but what if you're not betting QQ for value, but to induce a bluff? People talk about betting because a worse hand will call or a better hand will fold, but what about when a worse hand will raise? Something I want to give more thought to, obviously it's a villian dependent level.

I'm worried that check-calling against a guy I know can 3-barrel is actually way more spewy than bet-folding UNLESS I am also check-calling AK here, which as I already mentioned is a questionable way to play AK since you're letting hands that you have beat get a free chance to beat you when they would be willing to put more money in the pot when you're ahead.

I do think checking AK here specifically to strengthen your check-calling range here against thinking players is a reasonable strategy though, and you are basically playing AK a little bit worse to play the rest of your range a lot better.

And while a few people claim they check AK here, I've seen enough posts to know that most people bet AK here, and betting AK and check-calling QQ here in my opinion lets opponents play much more perfectly against you than what I did. At least the way I played it I gave a weaker ace a chance to fold, as opposed to letting weak aces take you to value town. I also think his raise looks way more like a bluff then someone betting after you check, because betting when checked to with a weak ace makes a lot more sense than raising when bet at, so you actually get better information (assuming you have the guts to act on it and not chicken out like I did).

I'd rephrase the bolded as "we should bet AK here against most LLSNL Villains." When we have AK in a 3-bet pot on a A99 flop 100bb deep, the objective is to maximize the amount of money the opponent puts in. When we're playing against players who will call three streets with AJ and will rarely bluff raise, yes, obv b/b/b. This Villain is not that guy. With this Villain, we have to think about how he'll play air (is he more likely to fire multiple times as a bluff when checked to, or to bluff raise?) and how he'll play Ax (is he more likely to call multiple bets, or to bet for value multiple times when checked to?).

As for the actual hand, when we have QQ, betting the flop makes no sense unless... A: he'll call with worse, B: he'll fold better, or C: he'll bluff raise often enough for us to continue. A and B are pretty unlikely. If you have a good enough read on this Villain to be confident that his raising range is mostly bluffs, god speed. I'm check/folding here against the vast majority of players.

Don't forget to pot the flop when you have AA in this spot.

This makes a lot of sense, thanks.