There's this like 70 year old regular in the 500NL game they have in my town who plays pretty tight, but out of nowhere he will just open raise to like $85 pre. I had a discussion with a friend who's played with him a lot and basically says he does this with only AK/AA/KK. He says he will call with all kinds of hands since he knows he can bust him with 89s on a K89 flop.

He basically tells me since he knows his hand he can play perfectly against him.

For the sake of discussion let's assume villain's 15x open raising range is AK/KK/AA 100% of the time, and that villian will stack off 100% of the time on all flops.

Here is my question: How deep must villian be to justify calling a 15x raise preflop if we know he has AK/KK+?

I might be wrong but I think even if I know his hand I can't call 100bbs deep since the odds of say, flopping two pair is around 48-1 which means i'd need to make back over 48x the amount I invest. So if I'm calling $80 pre, i'd need to win over $3,840 to break even? That sounds wrong.

Also, if I had a set, i'd need to get over 8-1 assuming he stacks off 100% of the time.

What is the math behind this?

There's no easy math for this, but the standard rule of thumb has been it's always OK to call 5% of your stack or less, never OK to call more than 10%, and in between is read dependent (how strong are you implied odds?) In this case if villain is ranging a 1.5% range then I would usually call up to 10% of my stack. That means if he's raising to $30 in a $1/$2 game we would need to be at least $300 deep for me to call. Of course having other players in the pot can make this better. I called off $30 just the other day $200 deep but the pot was 4-ways.

Small PP's go way up in value in these cases and suited connectors go way down. I try to avoid calling more than 5% of the effective stacks pre with SC's because so often you will flop a draw and have to chase postflop. You pretty much nailed why junk hands are unplayable, even if you know he is AA and will stack off on any board. You're just not going to hit often enough. Plus his equity on the flop isn't terrible if you have 89 vs. AK on a K89 board.

Sorry there's no math, but when it comes to calling speculative hands, my rules that work OK are call 5% or less effective stacks with suited connectors, 5% or less small PP's vs. a wide range, and 10% or less small PP's vs. a tight range. This assumes heads up. You can loosen up a tad multiway.

If this guy is only making plays like this once or twice a session.... I am staying out of his way for $85 every time with everything but AA or KK.

If he was making his huge bet $25 or $30 and we both are mod deep I would call, with a reasonable hand to crack with.

Don't see any value ever calling 17bbs pre against one nit. It's a rule I live by.

Pretty much this. Any time you both have enough to make it worth your while to call, he isn't stacking off with that range. Frankly, he'll get up and call it a night most of the time if he's that deep. Let him win the blinds.

What is the logic behind the 5/10 rule?

$1700 on the low side, and more like $2000+ would be a decent number to work with.

And your friend is horribly incorrect.

Even all the latest books muck this up pretty bad. Stack odds are somewhat useless. Wrote formulas (5-10) are lol. And I don't say that out of my own thinking only, but it has been proven meticulously by NLH phenoms such as CTS and WoT (who did the math section of videos at DC).

Before taking his advice ask yourself "Is my friend a winning player in this game?"

In your example in the OP you are still only a 25% favorite to win on that flop. and KyddDynamites post made me lol for some reason because its probably right on.

^^^this is horror bad advice. Being a winning player does not make you a great coach, or says you play properly. Being a winning player is cool. But its how they win or how they can coach you to win is the biggest key.

There is a winning player for all types of styles. TAG and LAG are not the only winners.

To be honest its only common sense the best teachers of the game rarely are great players.

Just check the authors of so called "great" books. Most are just good pros not great.

This is also bad advice. I know some pretty horror-bad players who are winners.

When I first learned online, I consistently found winners who were calling stations, loose passive fish and weak tight who were consistent winners.

I knew then that day any style can win in poker.

That's why some people never really change there game, they think they can win without advanced thinking.

Basically what I'm saying it takes more then a winner to teach holdem. Plenty of bad advice everywhere and some of that advice actually works.

In this example, what I'm really saying is "There is zero chance your friend is a winning player when he's calling $85 with ATC to try and crack a hand range of AK, KK+. You should not take his advice because he is probably a giant loser in the game." I just phrased it a little more gently in my first post.

If advice works then it isn't bad advice. Also, if advice works sometimes, but is still -EV then you wouldn't say it works.

So if someone told you to play everyhand. Then when you went to the casino you played everyhand. Win 2k in a 2/5 game.

Even though you were a winner does not mean you won in a correct manner.

Get it?

If all of the villains raise 15BB with only AK+ and A/A, then we're actually making money every time they make such raise.

Why? You can safely fold Q/Q or even K/K and save yourself several BBs.

You wouldn't say that advice worked because playing every hand is -EV. To say it worked is being results oriented. To get an accurate depiction of whether or not it is good advice you have to see how it works in the long term - in which playing every hand is -EV and therefore bad advice. So even though I may have won 2k that night I would still be a losing player because I am playing a losing style of poker. DUCY?

That was just an example I could go into a little more detail.

Players who only use pot odds and no manner of effective stacks. Could be long term winners live.

Players who raise to $85 with AA,KK and AK can be consistent winners.

Players who routinely min raise big pairs on the flop with no 3betting pre. Can be a consistent winner.

I pay attention, only high level thinkers care about playing LAG or TAG or both. I like to play advanced level poker even though I play complete donks.

You two are arguing for the sake of arguing...

Calling $75 in this spot just doesn't make sense. Sure you could suck out once or twice, but it's like hitting the jackpot on a slot machine, if you don't stay away, you'll eventually give back the money plus more.

After years of poker, I have come to the conclusion that success in this game really boils down to only one thing: self control.

You can be the most knowledgeable poker player, but without self-control, none of it matters.

While it may be true that some guys can write decent material on math/logic etc. and yet not be able to put it into real time play very well, I have yet to see a losing overall poker player that I wanted to ask anything other than can he introduce me to that hot girl sitting next to him or something. I mean really, think about it.

And this particular player making the statement that he did is just another live low limit player who honestly is so far off track that it is truly amazing.

I will say "emphatically" say this. Of all groups of players regarding online and live players etc., that the lower limit NLH group has way too many players that are farther offbase than should ever be. I do not see this issue in any other forum at 2+2 (except I do not look at micros and for me they do not count.)

Wups, sorry Venice10. I keep forgetting this is an entry level forum, but I take it personal and just want to tell people when they are so far off. I apologize if it comes out wrong.

Anyone that even had one moment of thought that the guy had a point by saying he could outplay the villain calling 15x preflop, really needs to go to bed and wake up again.

Except the micros are the equivalent of LLSNL, because they serve the same role as this forum in the on-line world. The difference is that the speed of play and tracking software makes it harder to maintain the illusion of being a good player when you aren't.

That said, there have been a number of "winning" micro players asking some questions on this sub-forum that suggests deep gaps in their poker education. Remarkably, the low stakes pros who I know (due to playing them when I shot took at 100nl) are winners aren't feeling compelled to ask questions here. Hmmm.

I don't mind that, I want to improve and often the best way to improve is to told you're wrong.

When we talked about this I was not being given advice, we were just talking. The situation is akin to set mining someone you feel has a strong hand, I just wanted to know the actual math behind it.

Also, I don't think anyone's actually answered my question, sure it's a mistake to call a 15x raise 100bbs deep, maybe 200bbs deep, but how deep would both players must be to make the call profitable given the assumptions i've laid out about his range and stack-off on all flops clause? and why?

This is a much tougher question because you include AK in his range. because of this, you dont know whether or not you should be stacking off with 89 on a 9 high flop. Also, I just do not believe he is stacking off with AK without a pair. Hes only putting in $85 out of $500.

Assuming he stacks off all flops, it depends on what your hand is.

Let's say you have a pocket pair. The odds of making a set are about 12%. So if your villain is raising to $32 in a 1/2 game (80 at 2/5), you would need to be over $320($800) deep to make a call profitable.

Assuming this is right, the odds of flopping a gin hand with suited connectors is about 5% so you would need to be over $640($1600) deep to call pre-flop.

I think

You have to be careful with comparing "seeing the flop" to "seeing the river."

A lot of data is provided if we're going to SD, but in this case, we're only seeing the flop. The odds of us hitting a set or two pairs with just flop is significantly lower than hitting them by SD.

I thought I was using flop %s. At least it was my intent. I know I did for the pocket pair scenario.

Oops, you're right on both =).

11% and roughly 5.5%.