Two hands in a recent 2-5 game:

1. Have AK in the hijack. One limp, I raise to 30, only BB calls.
Flop is QJ3r, no hearts. BB checks, I bet 50, BB calls. Turn is A, and it goes check, check. River is Q, and I fold to BB's bet of 60.

2. Early position with AK. I raise to 25, and only the SB calls. Flop is 985. Check to me, and SB calls my bet of 45. Turn is 6, and again it's check, check. River is 6and I fold to SB's bet of 50.

Comments?

hand one i probably don't cbet depending on the opponent. if he has a semi tight calling range then he likely connected with this flop. if he is much looser then there is a better chance he missed competley.

hand 2 also depends on the opponent, but you have way more cards that you can plan to barrel ott. also giving up ott and folding river.

think you can size your cbets slightly smaller in hand 2, possibly hand 1 also if you do decide to cbet.

It's really difficult to offer any feedback on the hands without any reads.

Both of those flops are pretty bad for cbetting honestly. The second one, I might still cbet depending on the opponent but #1 I would just check back all the time.

so we hit our card on the turn in hand 1 and don't bet? why?

both are slightly bad c-betting boards

the second is slightly better because we can bet "scare cards" that don't also hit the range of those calling

Hand 1 I'm cbeting but planning on double barreling a lot. JQ hits a ton of his range but it hits it weekly...somthing like 60 combination hit a straight draw (well less as you have blockers but still a lot) and 20 to 30 combo's hit second pair..., you have equity...I bet....

I don't bet it if my opponent is suppler sticky.

On that turn I bet small as a reverse blocker bet on the turn....He picks up a pair and a draw a lot. KQ KJ JT AT. and will call.

Hand 2 I cbet often...again it hits a loose players range but hits a lot of it weakly....Planning to double barrell a lot of cards as a spade picks up nice equity for us... But the 6d is not one of my barrel cards I let it go...

Now depending on my opponent I might make a heroe call on a $50 river, many players this is only a 7 or a bluff....

Stop being a nit, seriously. It sounds so easy to run reverse floats against you. Especially after seeing the first hand, how do you ever fold there?

And I disagree with DK Barrel, these are both decent boards to cbet on - you have outs to broadway on the first hand, but you have to be willing to double barrel.

The second hand you have backdoor spades.

But stop being afraid to run double barrels, I'd start reverse floating you all day knowing that if you check back on the turn I can steal the pot with anything on the river.

In this day and age, you have to be able to double barrel. Everyone knows about cbets and will float them on the flop if you have a tight image.

We're heads up in both hands. I Cbet 100% against one player.

Agree with others, bet the A in hand 1.

C/f hand 2 after seeing turn.

Do you somehow think you're going to win every pot when you enter with AK?

disagree with most in this thread.

hand 1 seems way better board to cbet since this just smashes our perceived range. i cbet hand 1 all the time heads up and probably keep barreling on blanks. i also bet 100 when i turn the A; as played, never folding to his riverbet.

hand 2 i don´t cbet. we have some showdown value; nothing better is folding since they put you on AK or big cards all the time, nothing worse is calling unless it has decent equity. and this board just misses the perceived (and real) range of a tight opener.

We definitely need some info about the villains in these hands...
Are they REGs, loose passive fish, lags?

You are the first post in this thread that I agree with. Hand 1 is a better textured board to cbet than hand 2 (good reads on defender could change that). Also, I really hate OP's cbet sizing in both.

It depends on villains obviously. In hand #1 I c-bet against a tight/competent player because their range will have a lot of PPs that beat us but would instafold to a bet, because these players won't call preflop with many weak broadway hands due to being OOP. Against looser players I would check back because PPs are a smaller part of their range, so for the most part they'll only be folding hands we're already ahead of, and we have some showdown value and a gutshot, making seeing more streets IP (and not risking getting raised off our equity) favorable for us. With weaker hands I'll c-bet if they're fit-or-foldy, but check if they're stationy or bluffy.

Hand #2 I'm rarely c-betting. I don't like to play the "barrel scary turn/rivers on wet boards" game when most of said scare cards hit their range more than ours, since we presumably have a pretty tight range from EP.

Nice thread btw. I think the forum could use more of these. Common spots like these may not be very exciting, but because they come up so frequently, playing them correctly will do more to improve our win rates than correctly folding a full house the 1 in 50 times you're supposed to imo

I disagree that we could use more of these types of threads. While they are common spots, the correct play is often very villain-dependent, so there really is no way to play them "correctly" in a GTO construct (i.e. "game theoretical optimum")

I'm no expert, but I feel like "villain dependent" and GTO are contradictory concepts. Isn't the point of GTO to play unexploitably no matter what villain does, whereas any play that is villain dependent is by definition exploitative rather than an attempt at unexploitability (barring the rare instance in which you determine your opponent is playing a GTO strategy, forcing you to do the same)?

I might just be misunderstanding your point. In any case, while I agree that these hands are villain dependent (I said as much in my initial post), I don't see what makes them more or less so than any other hands we post about. The only difference imo is in the frequency with which the situation arises at the table.

Maybe I was misusing the term GTO. My point was that while there are often threads posted with limited Villain reads on which we still comment, these examples in particular seem so Villain-dependent that there doesn't seem much point in discussing ways to play them in a vacuum without reads.

i don´t think so. we are discussion this hand in a vacuum, and while i believe that board 1 is much better to cbet than hand 2, much better, the thread is separated in those who think board 2 is the better one. so we do have some discussion.

Of the 2 hands. #1 is the one to cbet, and like others have said you need to be willing to double barrel. If the V from #2 saw hand #1 he may have felt you would give up after a flop cbet and shut down. Also many have asked, where are the reads.

Sent from my DROID X2 using 2+2 Forums

Thanks for the responses.

Hand 1 should have been a turn bet. I was worried about a check raise (I get check-raised a lot) with JJ, AQ, AJ, 33, KT. Probably though I get a pair to fold.

Hand two perhaps should not have been a cbet. If I'm not cbetting I give too much away, but I worry about getting called all the way down if I fire the second and third barrel. Undoubtedly this is a major leak and then I wind up just limping with AK (yuk!).

yea I don't know why you're checking when you hit your card in hand 1. If you get check-raised you can thank them for saving you money because check-call check-raise is a strong line and rarely a bluff especially when this board smacks your range in the face so if you get raised on the turn its fairly safe to say you're behind and fold comfortably (unless villain is tricky/bluffy).

Hand 2 I cbet as well but also give up on turn here as this card hits his range way more than ours and the river is terrible to 3-barrel.

I don't like your bet sizing either to me it screams omg I have AK don't call please fold and when you check back the turn both times it confirms this and turns your hand face up. It's very possible you got bluffed in both pots. Like someone said I would have a field day reverse floating you if I picked up on this. If you're going to cbet you have to be double barreling frequently unless villain is a station.

And I do agree this is all really villain dependent.

Why would you worry about a turn check-raise in hand #1? If he's doing that he's basically shouting out loud that he has the best hand and now would be a great time for you to stop putting any more money into the pot.

The only reason I would check the turn is to induce a river bluff from a more aggro than usual type guy who now thinks his pocket tens or A9 suited are best and I'd call the river 100%.

I'd like some reasons for all the people saying hand 1 is not a cbet against a random 2/5 villain, even a clear cbet.

OP gave us no reads, so we can't be real specific at all, but assuming an average lowstakes villain and 100 bb, i think this is def a cbet most of the time

It's a hu pot. You have the initiative and position. You have 4 clean outs to the nuts and most likely 6 good top pair outs

We can put most villains flattin in the bb on a range of pairs 22-JJ, and broadway cards. Some villains will be looser with SCs, or suited anything, and other villains will be tighter with less weaker broadways, but still all the pocket pairs. This is why it's a clear cbet to me, making 22, 44-1010 all fold the best hand. There are also unpaired hands in villains range that have decent equity and we would like to win the pot now against them.

If we check flop back, we are
1)Allowing villains to make +EV turn/river bets (bluffs and thin value) against us
2)Causing mid pairs to put us on our exact hand and get stubborn when the board runs out safe: 74, 22, JJ, etc

There's also a couple hands that he's not folding on this flop like K10, 910 that we want to call

I think checking this flop back against most villains is bad and basically giving up on our pot. Its passive and, I guess, plans on going in to hero-call mode with A hi on later streets against aggro villains, or pray-for-showdown mode, which may be worse.

I also don't understand why OP didn't bet the turn in hand 1 after cbetting flop and then hitting top pair. I would be bet-folding turn for sure, and most rivers as well

You will merely have to learn to play hands with decent equity the same as if you have TPMK and let them figure out if u have it or not. It is an entire subject to explore, and since at NLH we flop nothing over 2/3 the time we have to get good at it for sure if we are going to dominate any game.

You're correct. I think of GTO as a sort of cop out when you can't figure out how to exploit your opponents. Unbalanced, exploitative strategies are almost certainly going to be more profitable at these stakes.