Hey looking for some feedback on my line in this hand and whether or not river shove is too thin among other things.

2/5 6 handed.

v1 (550) - relatively new to the table, been raising and 3 betting a lot (could just be a good run of cards). did a poor bluff where he c bet flop, checked turn and bet river and got called by ace high on j103710 but other than that seems pretty competent.

hero (800) - tag image

otth:

EP limps, v1 CO 25, button calls 25, hero SB KQo calls, EP calls. 4 ways to the flop. Should i be calling here, folding or 3-betting? Online this would be an auto fold or 3-bet since i don't think i have a sb flatting range but live im not so sure what the best play here is.

Flop ($110): KhQhJh. Hero leads $80. EP folds, v1 calls, button folds. I notice that v1 seems fairly comfortable. Better to check/call, check/raise here? or is this fine? I kinda don't want to peel a free turn card 4 ways but donking seems wrong. Not so sure.

Turn ($270): 6d. Hero bets $160. v1 starts counting his chips, pulling out $160 and seeing how much he has left. He then calls.

River ($590): 3c. Hero jams for v1's remaining ~$260. Is this jam too thin? does worse ever call? surely i'm not check/folding here. What about check/calling to induce Ah bluffs?

Any thoughts on the hand are appreciated.

How deep is the button? I like 3bet/folding here to $90. Should be enough to fold out weaker Ax from CO. He will probably continue with his smaller PPs thinking he has set-mining odds so I'm c betting a lot of flops HU.

If button is short I don't like this as much obviously

ETA: I like donking the flop. This gets checked through way too often. I'm betting again on this blank turn. Once villain calls again, I'm removing strong flushes from his range (except maybe straight flushes) because you've shown interest and he should be afraid of losing action if another h, or broadway card rolls off. On river I like c/c. Let him bluff with the Ah blocker. I almost feel like shoving is turning our hand into a bluff against baby flushes. But I don't think they make up a large part of vs range and he's probably not folding.

Grunch

Pre. Recommend fold - oop w dominated non suited cards. Trouble hand.
Flop. Agree with the donk bet.
Turn / river. If you're behind against a set or flush, you're spewing at this point. I would recommend check/evaluate on the turn and river for fold/call.

why do you think betting flop is better than checking?
if it is, why do you start checking when a total blank hits?

Pre depends on BTN image. Is he aware CO has been aggressive? Is BTN passive? Thinking player?

I agree w/flop & turn as played.

River - I would check to induce given brief history.

pre flop is a great squeeze spot. 3bet to 125. Calling is the worst option and folding is giving up a pretty good opportunity to gain initiative vs a wide opening CO with dead money and/or take it down pre.

flop is good, when he only calls I would narrow him down to mostly draws. Straights, sets, and small flushes are prob raising.

River could be a check vs this guy who has shown he likes to bluff at pots. The draw missed, and maybe we can let him hang himself.

fold pre

I find that hands like this are the ones that get me into the most trouble on later streets in the hand, which is essentially what we are talking about here. I am increasingly finding myself folding these situations but 3-betting when it feels appropriate to the game.

thanks for the replies

i wanted to 3 bet at the time but i kinda chickened out and flatted which was pretty bad i definitely should've folded instead if i didn't pull the trigger on the 3 bet.

i think the next big mistake i made was not check/calling river and letting him bluff his missed draws which make up a big part of his range. i'm kinda turning my hand into a bluff on the river but at the same time i feel like a big part of his range that beats me raises at some point (flopped straights, baby flushes, sets, etc). Maybe he heroes with KJ, AK type stuff with the Ah or something.

Anyway, he ended up having Ah10x for the flopped straight with the nut flush redraw. He kinda nit rolled me by taking forever to call but i guess my line was pretty strong.

Listen to this. This guy nails it. I love the squeeze here. And check/bluffcatching river. Very fine with your flop and turn play.

given how monstrously strong he flopped, and how strong his redraw was, he played this hand like an absolute nit/weak/tight player. I cannot agree with your description of V in the intro.

still, you are going to stack off here to just about all of your V's, except for the super nitty type. Which this particular V is. When he flats the turn, alarm bells should start to go off. only other hand he would play this way would be AKx

How would you play the hand in v1s spot? He has position and can inflate the pot as much as he wants on later streets why would he fast play with such a strong holding that doesnt really need protection. Just genuinly curious

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I think KQo is a fold from the small blind when it looks like it's going 4 way. Would be much more likely to call if it would be heads up. KQs is probably a call for me, so this is close.

Think you played flop and turn fine. Think shove on river is too thin. He has 16 combos of AT, 4 combos of T9s and 5 combos of JJ-KK. Hard to say how many flushes he could have, but say he just has A9-A2 of hearts, which is 8 combos. All these hands are calling, so you need to find 33 combos of hands you beat that call the shove. 8 combos of AK, 6 each of KJ and QJ, which is only 20 combos. He could have AhQx, which may call, that's two more combos. Does he ever get to River and call with KxTh? That's two more combos. Hard for me to find enough value combos he calls with.

I probably check-call River to add more bluffs to his range.

I shove turn if I'm V1. You lead into 3 people, and he has the Ah so you're pretty much never bluffing. You've invested about 50% of effective stacks, so you're basically never folding. However, OTR a heart could kill the action and the board pairing could kill his hand.

If he shoves 260 more on turn I assume you're calling? I certainly would against a V that is capable of bluffing.

PRE - Depending on reads and tells, I could see folding, calling or raising with KQo in the SB, facing a CO open over 1 limp, but I somewhat prefer either a fold or a raise to a call.

FLOP - if we flat call with KQ pre, I think we can just check-call this flop, when we're not blocking the flush or flush draws that will likely semi-bluff.

We're not just losing to flushes, we're also losing to flopped straights, which aren't folding yet, and also potentially some sets.

Just play a defensive, check-call pot-control line, unless we boat up. Let opponents bluff. We have a hand that can call across multiple streets, but probably isn't going to be best if we donk-lead flop and go bet-bet-bet, and get called down the whole way.

TURN - AP, I'd slow down and check. Let V1 take the betting lead. Check-call anything 1/2 pot or less. We're basically bluff catching at this point.

RIVER - AP, mostly check-fold, absent any tells. If we check-called flop and turn, we can still check-call a less than 2/3 pot sized bet.

Preflop
Fold or 3bet. I think against a CO open I would squeeze this one at some frequency. A cold call is almost certainly a mistake. I lean towards folding if I don't know how wide COs range is.

Flop
This is the problem with flatting pre. We have a good hand but COs range is still super wide (not to mention other players). He has a ton of heart combos that we didn't make fold by 3betting. All of his suited connectors and small suited aces are still in range, as well as hands like ATo. And of course he has all sets with JJ+. I don't have a SB flatting range really but if I did...I think all of my range wants to check/call or check raise depending on who bets and what sizing they use.

Turn
As played on flop. I think a check/call would be better. It almost feels like we're bluffing if we bet. Not a lot of worse hands call except Ax with Ah.

River
As played on turn, we're in a bad spot. If we jam we only get called by better. If we check we probably induce a naked Ah to jam, and we hate our life and probably have to fold. I reckon check/fold is probably best if we get here like this.

It's interesting seeing how poker thinking has changed over 7+ years.

FWIW, there was a spambot that bumped a bunch of 2016 threads, of which this is one.

This is incredibly interesting. It's crazy to me that people would have ever recommended folding pre here, given we have the perfect situation for a squeeze.

Any other thoughts out there on how to approach this postflop? I feel like I've lost tons with two pair on wet boards over the years so probably not qualified to comment.