So it's a 2/5 game, eff stacks between me and villain is about 140bbs.

I open 4x with JhJs on UTG2 (I mistook the heart for a diamond which factored into my river decision).

LJ rec player calls and solid player (whom I have no history on but hear he's solid and recentley shipped big tounery/ can tell he has good understanding of ranges) calls from CO.

pots about 60~ at this point, flop is 2c3d8d. I elect to go for a check/call here since I figure its a good hand to protect my checking range, also would be more inclined to cbet without the diamond (which in reality was a heart). It checks to CO who bets 35, I call, LJ folds. Turn is 2d I check and he bets 85, I call. River is 3c, I check and he bets PTSB 300 into about 300. Without the diamond I know I should fold, but assuming it was JJ with Jd is this call here or fold?

You've posted this same hand twice from 2 different accounts. Which one do you want left open?

sorry, close the other one. I thought I deleted that one. Thanks.

I don't know that having or not having the Jd is going to swing this decision, since you not having it would mean there's that many more AJo combos V can have that have one big diamond and may want to put on a three barrel bluff here.

I think I'm pretty indifferent to a call and a fold. You're getting 2:1, and you probably have one of the stronger hands in your range on the end here assuming you wouldn't check/call the NFD/nut flush twice. Seems like V realizes that and is PSB for maximum pressure. At the same time, though, V could easily have any flush and be PSB for maximum value!

Overall I'd argue for a c-bet on the flop since you figure to have the best hand a lot of the time, and it keeps your range uncapped if you could be c-betting here with whatever hand you opened with in the first place. I think checking JJ here is significantly complicating the later streets -- in V's shoes, I would say the most I'd ever expect you to show up with here is an overpair, which is exactly what you have, so how does that make you feel?

thanks for the reply. I do think the Jd makes a significant difference because it blocks AJdd KJdd QJdd and JTdd, as well as some ocassional JX one gappers with Jd. As for me only having an overpair, once I take this line thats pretty much all I have, a bluff catcher. Balancing our river calls is what I'm worried about, not whether or not my range is capped. Its going to be pretty capped once I x/c the turn regardless.

Good spot to max his FE but what’s an air balling range here? Has almost no worse for value, so yeah, try to work out what your strongest hand is here and decide where JJ fits. That doesn’t even mean you have to have many/if any calls on a runout like this, but it will at least help you make a decision facing a big bet. I also wouldn’t get all wrapped up in blocker-speak here, to me, it has negligible impact. WP by V.

On more point, it’s not like you’re underrepped to a trained eye just because you checked 3 times, if anything you’re face up otr.

The failure to cbet here against a skilled V is the essential problem here. Once H caps himself oop, he invites all manner of trickery on subsequent streets.

AP: I think JJ is in my minimum defense range here against a thinking pro who may well interpret our passivity as Ak/Aq. With all respect, H’s preoccupation with the Jd blocker avoids the essential questions in this hand in search of minutiae to justify a suboptimal line.

How would we play AA here? Hero agrees he’s capped his range and justifies his subsequent line based on this fact but this fact is the source of his problem!

I'd have to double check as I'm a bit rusty with solver-work but I think this board is one we have to use a larger sizing on when betting, and in general have a lower c-betting frequency since it connects better with the calling ranges than our opening range. So what hands would you put into your x/c range to defend it if you're cbetting all your overpairs on this flop?


44-55 would probably prefer to be cbetting for protection/ it blocks villains floating range and can barrel certain turns, 66-77 can't really x/c more than 2 streets on most runouts, and 88-99 would probably need more protection/ would get value from similar hands so I'd prefer cbetting these over tt-jj (hands which wouldn't get 3 streets of value anyways), and use qq-aa to get 3 streets (on the more dry runouts).

I'm not saying this strategy is right but what would be a better one? If we bet here, v calls and turn comes the same we x/c, river we x and we're faced with same predicament

If we're just bombing this board with all overpairs that would mean we'd have to do same with all flush draws, most bdfd's as well I'm guessing. Both lines which I'd assume are far from optimal.

Another thing to mention here is given the rake in this game I have maybe 1 or 2 combos of 22-33 and 3 combos of 88. So we're put in a spot where we're facing 2 opponents who both would probably each have all 9 combos of these hands.

I'd assume his bluffs here would be hands like KQo, AQo, AJo with the bdfd.

I haven't personally done any solver-work, so you might take this with a rather large grain of salt, but what I've picked up on here is that my default on this board (bet nearly 100% of the time against 1-2 opponents for slightly more than 50% pot) is pretty close to correct. So I think you may have the solver solution inverted here -- I think this is a 100% c-bet for a smaller size.

Which also answers your question about x/c range. I don't. In LLSNL, your opponents will whiff and fold on this sort of board enough that a c-bet should show an immediate profit. On top of that, it makes the rest of the hand easier to play -- regardless of whether you decide to two barrel the turn or not.

The real spot where you'll want to have some balance is on the turn, where sometimes you want to x/c, x/f, and x/r.