1/2 Late Night.

V is a well known 2/5 cash and tourney pro. Very friendly and well liked by the other players. Plays a loose, limpy game. Obv. has good instincts and decent post flop play. Does a lot of check/calling, bluff inducing. Doesn't c/r very often. Frequently limps AQ, AK up front (sometimes he raises AK). Also limping tens. I think he raises QQ+. He makes his money playing a solid game postflop, doesn't really get out of line as far as I can tell. V greeted Hero when he sat down at the table with ''Get a job''. Hero told him he got a BJ from Girly an hour ago, asked if that counts. Laughter ensued.

Hero is 30's white guy. Smiling and chatty. Known as mostly a solid winning TAG. Recently have been adding some craziness to his game (read as maniac donkey play by V). Mostly this just means that if hero's line makes no sense, he is gonna get looked up by V. Not especially relevant here...so who cares. Yada...yada...yada.

V ($600) limps UTG, couple of other fishy limpers, Hero ($500) raises KQ on button to $20, V calls, limpers fold.

($40) flop: T93

V checks, hero bets $30, V calls

($97) Turn: 8:

V checks, Hero???. Plan for the river?

X/f

Bad turn, move on.

^^^^
That

Not a great flop texture but we are heads up with 2 overs and a gutter and bdfd so im cool with the cbet but I'm checking back now. Folding to a river bet unimproved.

Well, you got two options here. Bet, or quit.

If you check behind on the turn, he bombs the river and you're done, unless you're real lucky.

Betting here is tricky. No matter how limpy villain is, he has a restricted UTG range. To be fair, I doubt there are many combos of JQ are in that range, if any, and not clear he calls the flop with it, unless he thinks you are a sucker. AK,AQ possible, although again, not clear that he calls with those, on this flop. I wouldn't be surprised if he calls with 77 or 88. It's OK to play JJ passively with this flop, if he would limp with this pre. And of course he sounds like the sort of guy to let you bet into a set.

What would he call with OTF, that he wouldn't call with OTT? Might could shove him off 77 I guess, although you could just as easily draw a check-raise. Could almost certainly shove him off AK if he's still in. If he calls, though, you don't have much of a backup plan. And I think he calls or c/r more often than not.

I would personally be inclined to want a bit more equity to bet this turn. Let it go.

How about if we change the turn card to the 2?

WA/WB... Get to showdown cheaply.

x/f

Also jam river when you hit your 4 outer and get paid off because of your image

The 2 on the turn is not a good card. I'd check both cards.

Kookie are you thinking about these situations? And when I say thinking, I don't mean, "I'll bet because he might fold", I mean thinking about likely hands that your opponent has and making a decision based off that. What about this opponent, flop or turn makes this a good spot to bet?

In general, BDFD favors the defender.

Comments:

Depends on villain's willingness to limp with speculative hands in EP.

Are sc's in villain's range? He has a rep for limping in a lot, you might think he's on a capped range. If so, 2c puts a combo draw on the board. That puts you in a world of hurt. Note, as long as hero has a fold button, villain doesn't actually have to have a combo draw, he only needs to represent one.

I don't buy it, I think he's on a restricted range here. Even so, he's in a much better position to represent the flush OTR than hero. Look at it this way; if you bomb the flush card OTR, you're going to get called a lot. You're on an uncapped range and it seems unlikely you binked a BDFD.

To be clear, when we talk about capped vs uncapped range, we are talking about the upper bound of a range. We still have to think about the lower bound. If you have a reputation for playing a broad range of hands aggressively OTB, yeah you're uncapped but the lower boundary is open to question. He'll consider the possibility you're on a sc, but I think he will discount it. And that's *if* you have a history of playing sc's for a raise OTB. If you tend to limp speculative hands OTB, he's got ya. It could work, but do you really want to get into a leveling war with this guy?

This guy is good. He has a read on you, and he knows what your read is on him. If you can't say the same, just don't even go there.

You asked for an analysis and that's how I look at it; however, there's a big pink elephant in the room we are ignoring. And that's the question of whether bluffing the river is, in general, profitable. I think not.

I'm not a fan of having a maniac image and trying to get a tricky trappy pro to fold when I have K high and pro very very likely has a hand. So I check behind.

Probably calling a bet if river is a K. give up if river air. b/f 1/2 pot on a K. check behind on a Q. Best plan is to catch the 3 outer.

You mention villain's range includes TT, JJ, AQ, some AK. Is that his open limping range, or is there more? What is villain's open limping range?

check the flop, you're likely ahead and don't have to build a pot and be lost on later streets, especially on a draw heavy board like this.

If you feel you have to bet, bet $15, it accomplishes as much as the $30 bet

I'd cbet all day. Get V to lay down those underpairs. One of the benefits is buying that free river card if we don't get a fold on the flop.

This guy doesn´t c/r unless he has a monster made hand.

He might call the flop and fold to a turn bet with 22-66,AJ-AK,KQ,KJs.

Nice thing is that since you said villain doesn't c/r very much we don't really have to worry about getting blown off our equity. I don't mind firing a turn barrel for a few reasons.
1.) as you are opening up your play villain may peel flop lighter, however even though he is looking at you as more crazy he can't really call turn too light.
2.) Also if he does have a hand that can call turn and we hit river we can bet for value and feel pretty good about getting called as villain could just put us on BS.

Oh OK, well there you go. His flaw is, he limps too broad a range UTG, calls too much on the flop, and has to give up too often on the turn (which goes without saying, given a range like that).

You both kind of have the same problem; difference being, at least you don't play that kind of trash UTG.

OK so how do you make money off this guy.

You think you want to play the turn more often, but you can't just start giving him both barrels every other hand, you're gonna run out of money pretty quickly (we won't discuss how much that lesson cost me, OK?)

So you have two options.

1. Keep your TAG strategy and *occasionally* bluff the turn. You can worry about when, and with what. Or not, it could just be random.
2. Start being more selective in your cbets, and maybe more selective in your opening range if you have to, and come to the turn with more equity. A mix of made hands and semi-bluffs is fine.

If you're on option 1, it's OK to bluff here, just understand that this kind of bluff doesn't stand to make any money in the long run, and it's really kind of a waste of time quibbling over whether now is the time, these are the cards etc. It's just advertising. So, bombs away!

(My definition of TAG: a game of four-card Texas hold'em)

Thanks for all of the replies!

Results:

He would not check any value hand on the turn just so you could freeroll to the winner. He's probably looking you up with something marginal that he doesn't want to pay too much for or get raised off of, perhaps pair + sd. This is an easy check behind to see the 20% of cards that make you a winner. If you bomb turn and he calls, he probably calling any river, otherwise he's just playing bad.

I'm probably double-barreling most hearts (except T ), any ace, king, queen and obv jack. As played, I probably c/f this turn since V is unlikely to fold Tx, QJ and 76 both got there, and there is a chance V picked up additional equity on the turn with a hand like AJ for example.

This.

If he's going to look you up, save your chips on the turn & river.