1/3 nl, 7 players

Sb: $600
Mp (hero A K): $400

In 2hrs sb has never raised.
He limps 30-40% of hands.
All hands he has shown down was at least top pair.
He has bet out on flop with nut flush draw. (He won)

He's good at value betting River when he thinks he has the best hand.


Pre:
Hero raises $12, sb 3bets $35, bb folds, hero calls

Since he's never raised, that 3bet set off major alarms.
This why I just called.

Flop ($73): 6TJ
Sb checks, hero bets $35, sb calls

Trying to hit my gutshot for cheap with (hopefully) free River card.

Turn ($143): 2
All check

River: 4
Sb $40, hero?

Does he have the same hand as me?
What do you think he has?


What would you do on all streets?
Why?

I would check back flop to try to realize equity even more cheaply.

AP, check-back turn is fine.

AP to river, have you seen him make tiny bets like this before? I'd be tempted to raise. I would never call, choice is between raise and fold, imo.

I edited my OP to say:

He's good at value betting River when he thinks he has the best hand.


So checking back flop is better than betting small to get a free River card for a gutshot?
Why?

If villain is playing 35% of hands but has a 0% raising range then I just fold when villain 3 bets. 2 hours is not a long sample but I'm fine with giving this up.

I'm fine with the flop when SB checks. There is a good chance villain has AK also and you can take the pot down here. When he flat calls again I get very suspicious. Turn is obvious given the situation. Villain has shown too much strength to think you can force him off his hand.

River is annoying. If I expect to be playing this guy a couple more hours I might just call to find out what he is playing this way otherwise fold. There is an outside chance of AK but I expect more JJ+.

Because we are getting zero folds in a 3-bet pot on this flop. His overpairs that checked are c/c for pot control and will do the same OTT. His chops are calling that tiny bet with two overcards and a gutshot, and will check turn unimproved whether you bet or not. His JJ/QQ isn't going to check turn whether you bet flop or not. And given description, that's his entire range for 3-betting from the blinds. So overall, you're drawing for the same price OTT whether you bet flop or not, and by not betting you're not giving him the chance to c/r us off our draw.

I'd be very tempted to r/f river, as he should never have sets given the action, and could fold a lot of chops. If I had any read that he could fold overpairs, I'd definitely go for it.

What are you repping when you raise river after checking two streets?

My issue with bet flop check turn is that we haven’t defined his hand at all.

Now we probably have to fold. And if our opponent also has AK, he turns a 50% hand into a 100% hand for cheap. When we could’ve checked back flop and seen how he’d react on turn (he is incredibly unlikely to check a value hand twice).


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We didn't check two streets. We only checked turn. Admittedly, we're still repping pretty thin, especially in a 3-bet pot. Basically, we're repping an oddly played QQ/KK that was afraid OTT, but still wants more value than calling that tiny bet OTR gets us and is pretty sure he doesn't have AA or a set based on the action, or exactly what we actually have, AK trying to get rid of a chop. The thing is, a lot of players won't call looking for a chop, even if they think it's pretty likely.

Like I said, my raise talk is more temptation than solid advice. I'd def be tempted, though.

Grunch.

2 hours of no pfr and he 3 bets an mp open, seems pretty tight range so I like just flatting the 3. Villain rocking TT+, AQo/s+, AJs. Maybe KQs.

Flop I feel a bit crushed as now hands we were beating pre are ahead except AQ. I don't see anything we beat calling our bet or anything that beats us folding. I check back. Also, half pot is kind of big given flop and action and he called it without many draws out there. Players could lol play the flop with TT or JJ like this or his overpairs slowed down because they put you on JJ or TT. At best you're against AT often.

Turn I like check back for same reason I liked flop check back.

River I fold but would consider bluff raising if it was a bit spicier of a river card like a 9 because this looks so much like weak value range. Such a brick turn and river makes it hard to rep anything so I say just fold here.

Check back flop, you’re not accomplishing anything except pushing his equity and possibly getting blown off our equity

granted 2 hrs is small sample but unless our image is that of a maniac I fold pre to the 3-bet

as played checking back flop as we will not get a fold here from V and we have 0 equity

folding river as not calling to only hope for a chop
if I had a better read on V I would raise here but never call.

Can't fold AK pre getting 2 to 1. Even against only QQ+ and AKs we have 33% equity.

this is just a fancy way of saying we are at best a 2-1 dog and trys to justify us tossing away money

a passive player suddenly wakes up
there's no reason other than EGO that makes us want to be table sherriff.

Where is the ego? When I decide to see a flop I try to consider: equity vs estimated range, pot odds, and post flop playability (e.g., do I have position, will villain's betting tendencies put my range in a tough spots) That's a pretty standard way to make a decision in poker.

Is the ego just not assuming villain only has KK+ here? Doesn't feel radical to allow that villain could have more hands given we've only watched him for 2 hours. That's maybe 70-80 hands.

Maybe the ego is when I said "can't fold" in this situation? That's fair, we are able to fold. However, "can't" is common shorthand in poker discussion for "in my opinion, this decision is clearly less EV than the next best alternative" and I don't think it's productive to be discussion sheriffs over stuff like this. Maybe knee jerk labeling decisions isn't too productive either, but I guess since "table sheriff" is open I'd say "nitty af" should be on the table too.

Overall I'm just not convinced folding AK pre to a modest reraise when we have position is going to be a highly profitable exploit. It's nitty af. Flatting tight opens from out of position has lots of merits though in my opinion because playability is rough oop against the opponents continue range if we 3bet (especially for an EP opener).

Against a guy who has literally never raised a hand in 2 hours, I think there is some argument for simply folding to a 3bet preflop. I can get behind a call in position, but we're definitely going to need it in order to balance our poor IO (against hands like QQ on A/K high flops) versus our poor RIO (against hands like AA/KK on K high flops).

I check back the flop. I was already worried about the top end of his 3betting range and now his bottom end has crushed this flop too; I just take my free card here. If we both have AK (which most probably c-bet once 3betting preflop) then we'll have a couple more streets where we can figure out whether that is the case and whether we can get him off a chop.

Think I would mostly fold to the river bet even though the small sizing certainly indicates weakness. My guess is that a raise might be better than a call (although we admittedly rep little and might get hero looked up).

GcluelessNLnoobG

I point this out in many threads and get flamed for it, but immediate odds on early streets are of little consequence in NL with stacks behind. At least in this case we are in position which will help us maximize our IO / minimize our RIO (I'm not hating on a call by any means), but it is still questionable (or at least debatable) whether our meagre IO + current pot will outrun our massive RIO with this particular hand against this villains perceived 3betting range.

GcluelessimmediateoddsnoobG

2 hour sample size isn't enough for me to not 4b near the top of our range her IMO. I would want a 5hr+ sample size and/or see him limp/call with monsters preflop (JJ-QQ, AJs+, etc). That's only about 50-70 hands, and in a 7,8,9 max scenario that is nothing.

I would still 4b preflop to around $100ish. If he jams, you can decide from there whether to fold/call of (Probably better to fold, although close to neutral.)

AS PLAYED:

I would check back this flop, preferring to bet with suited varieties where I can pick up FD equity on the turn. Betting here is trying to get a fold from 99 and below, which isn't in his range according to preflop logic/reads. His most likely hands include TT/JJ for flopped set, QQ-AA (not folding) and AK/AQs. Not enough hands that will fold here to a bet from you.

You also run the risk of getting check-raised a small portion of time when you bet this flop.

Turn is fine to check against this villain. I would bet/fold here a decent clip, but not against this player profile.

River seems like an easy fold to me, even for that price. my guess is he has JJ-QQ

ok without labels
using your numbers we are a 2-1 dog here.
why throw good money after bad?
so we call to see a flop because we have position ;
not terrible considering; but not the best choice
given the limited info we have V likes to see 40% flops, never raised pre before.
why bet a whiffed flop when V checked?
V is clearly not folding any of the range you gave him.
had we checked back flop
we could have folded to a V turn bet after seeing another blank hit.
so I say fold pre because we don't play post flop well even with position.

You get flamed because it's ignoring basic math and common sense.

Right, with the basic math typically being explained something along the lines of I can play whatever I want from wherever I want against whomever I want and against any range I want cuz I'm getting better than 1:1 preflop for pennies.

Gnotahugefanofbasicmath,obviouslyG

Aren't you the guy always bitching about never wanting to play out of position, and now you get a top 10 starting hand in position and you want to fold? o-0


Why isn't every single post you make on a thread just shorthand to "Play ubernit pre, nut peddle post?" We can all have our laugh and move on, and you will get much less negative replies.

If V is a thinking player at all, I don't know what hand you can reasonable rep you can make on the river, apart from Garick said about QQ+ oddly played, and I would think KK+ 4 bets here pre. I find a fold here on the river personally. I think even ig V has mid pocket pairs, weakish J or 10, he will hero call us down because he sat around for 2 hours without actions, and our line doesn't make sense as a rep.

Folding is absolutely out of the question. We have 2 hours of live poker. Unless we’ve literally witnessed this dude call a raise with queens from the sb, we shouldn’t even think of a fold.


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This post is literally a huge math fail. It doesn’t matter if we’re likely to lose the hand. We just need more than a $23 share of the pot after we call to justify putting $23 in.

Even if we think OP played it badly, he was able to realize all the equity in his hand for just $45 postflop. And if he made his hand, there’s a good chance he would’ve been able to extract a fair amount of value on the river due to his positional advantage.

Not to mention given our sample size on this guy, there’s literally no planet where we should be folding to the three bet. We don’t know if this guy is 40/1 or 40/15 or anything like that.


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Maybe re-read my post. It's slightly more nuanced that "fold pre", but if that's what you want to boil it down to in order to fit your narrative, fine with me.

FWIW, there are two others in this thread who also suggested that folding preflop should be a consideration. Feel free to direct responses at them too.

FWIW#2, the two undercards that QQ+ wants to see the least in a raised/called preflop pot just appeared on the flop, so his postflop line could hardly be considered shocking if that's what he shows up with. And this is all part of the RIO stuff, but who cares about that when we haz IO, amirite?

GcluelessNLnoobG

Lol. Yes, something something RIO pre flop with AK. It isn't Aces so every particle in your body is screaming to fold. Maybe don't try to dodge or hide behind nuance and just say "I would fold a top 10 hand in position to a mild 3 bet."


Who else other than Snow (whose entire line seems to be that SB has no 3b range lower than QQ)? I wouldn't range an OMC that tightly as I think they might occasionally mix it up with AQs/JJ

What are you even talking about? Are you that scared of getting stacked with this hand on a King high or AQ board that you can't realize any equity what so ever?