3/5 NL. I just sat down 5 hands ago and have $690.

UTG minraises and two players call. I pick up TdTh in the hijack and make it $60. Big stack ($2.5K) in the small blind 4bets to $160 the others all fold, I flat. I don't know him and I haven't been at the table long enough to have a lot of info but he did already seem fairly agro. He then dark checks the flop which made me severely discount any possibility that he had 4bet light since I would think he'd want to bet a lot of flops in that case.

Flop ($350): K Q J
I check behind

Turn ($350): 5
sb bets $140, hero ?

I'm getting 3.5 to 1 and would have almost $400 behind on the river if I call. Nominally I have 10 outs but I think AK-AJ makes up a fairly large portion of his range and those hands knock my outs down to 7 which would make my odds to win 5:1. I also don't think I have favorable implied odds even if I hit my straight since it will put a one-liner out.

What should I do on the turn?

Ha! I was in pretty much this exact same scenario in a live hand last week (even down to C dark-checking the KQJ flop) before leading small on a brick turn!

The reverse implied odds on a River Ten were what pushed me in favor of folding—I would basically need to call another tiny bet on the River if I hit a set but would have no clue if it was good or not. I only saw the four 9s as ours that had the potential to get me real money on the River (just because I shouldn’t have many Tens in my range—pretty much just TT). I couldn’t see a way I could get any sort of big bet called on the River if I hit an ace.

4-bet/dark check? Ok.

If you think AK-AJ makes up a large portion of his range, why don't you just ship the flop and generate some FE? That flop hits the hell out of the range of anyone calling a 4-bet. Very difficult call with AK-AJ.

Well if I'm going to ship that flop I think I'd be better off just shipping preflop, but I know that's beside the point.

Does that flop really nail my range that hard given the circumstances? Should I not be 5-bet jamming AK and KK-JJ pre given that I'm not that deep here? Should I not definitely be folding AT/KQ/KJ/QJ even suited since I'll only have 1.5 pot-sized bets left postflop and I think with those holdings I'd be well behind his range? What's left, AQ/AJ/TT-88? Maybe I get him to fold AQ and AJ anyway since people do just flat with AK/JJ in spots like this even though I don't think it's good. I think AK definitely calls and AQ/AJ might too getting 1.7 to 1.

Also though I think AK-AJ is the largest chunk of his range I think the remainder also heavily hits this board. He can have ATs/KQs/KJs/QJs and though I discounted big pairs because of the dark check AA-JJ is still a non-negligible component. I just don't think I have much FE, but thanks for providing the discussion.

What would you do on the turn?

I snap fold pre since cold 4bets at my game represent a range which crushes TT. YMMV but I'm not calling here unless I have odds to set mine.

AP, I lose all interest in continuing on this flop which absolutely smashes his 4bet range.

Turn is an easy fold IMO since we're not getting implied odds. If we hit our straight everyone can see it there, so how do we get paid off?

I was thinking myself that anyone who does this has so little understanding of poker or plays in such a bizarre fashion that it's tough to put him on any kind of hand, and I think this specific player is so "special" that really any analysis of a hand against this villain is pretty pointless as it wouldn't likely be applicable to anyone else.

Although I am curious to know what, if anything, OP learned anything more about his play by the end of the session.

Fold pre, that 2.5x 4b out of the sb usually is a nutted range. I highly doubt v is taking this sizing pre with AQ/AJ maybe not even AK.

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Normally I agree and would not continue with TT, but there were a couple of factors that made me feel like he could be lighter than standard:

(1) The minraise and two calls in front of me are enticing to an aggressive player, they look ripe to be stolen and he might think that's what I'm trying to do. Because of minraise, the sizes of the bets is smaller than usual. The 4bet size (32x) is about what you'd expect from a hand with a normal sized 2bet and three calls.

(2) My very early read on him was loose aggression. He had already been in a lot of action in the 10 minutes I had been at the table. Jock-looking younger guy in a tank top, very talkative table-captain demeanor, huge stack. The whole table was splashy when I showed up.

I really did feel like he was trying to resteal and I almost shipped pre but decided the smarter move was to use position post.

I agree, I should have folded the turn and regret calling. In the moment I thought there were two factors warranting a call:

(1) I might get paid on an enticing 30% pot bet by a hand he decides is too good to fold at that price to a guy who just sat down like KQ-QJ or AA-JJ.

(2) Despite my sense that the dark check made him less likely to be really light, that could still be incorrect and that he has a hand that needs to bluff the river to win. If that's true he might ship the river if I hit and he also might decide to give up even if I miss.

He was only at my table for a few orbits before his seat came up in a bigger game, but during that time I discovered he was very aggressive. Unfortunately he wasn't made to showdown his hand more than a couple of times before he left despite being in a lot of action and winning several pots.

In the hand I posted the river bricked and he put me all-in for my remaining $390. I folded face up hoping that would encourage him to show and he did:



In the end I'm glad I didn't ship pre because having seen how strong he was in subsequent pots, it's unlikely he would have folded.

Is the Min-raise from utg standard?

Or is he trying to straddle?

It was an ordinary raise, not an attempted straddle