2/3/5, 400, 8 players

UTG is an older man who previously changed from the seat immediately to my left to the seat to the left of a 2k stack. I've been short stacked for some time.

AhKh LJ

UTG opens 15, I raise 45, he calls, all others fold

Flop Td5d2c check check

Turn Jh check check

River 7d UTG bet 35

Call or fold? Also what would make a flop c-bet good here?

I think you played if fine. He often has a jack or ten that wants to squeeze a little value out. Your hand realized 100% of its equity and the runout just sucked on this sample. I just fold river.

I think this is fine. Flop check is fine, you could consider a cbet if there was a heart on the board, but this is a whiff plus you sometimes have the best hand. Turn card also feels like one to check on.

River does feel very bluffable, I just wonder if UTG is sometimes going to end up bluffing with the best hand (88 or similar). Probably just let it go, it was a bad runout, next time he'll have AQ and it'll come Axx on the flop, can't win em all.

Okay yeah makes sense.

RESULTS

rts

I don't see any reason to hero call him there and yeah I would cbet there too

Bet either flop or turn. Yeah, T52 two to a suit isn't likely in your range, but with both straight cards on the board and two to a suit, 1/3 pot seems OK.
Nobody believes you connected, but take your overpair and see what happens on the turn.

Other than that...good on you for not calling.

Also what do you mean by "straight cards"

I'd like a bigger raise pre. I know 3x IP is the industry standard, but it's live, everyone hates folding, especially the old men who open UTG. We can go 4x, or even slightly more. Nothing wrong with taking the pot down pre-flop, without having to make a pair, and avoiding the rake.

Think I'd probably take a stab at it when he checks again on the turn, betting around 1/2 pot. He probably would have 4B pre with AA/KK, and maybe QQ or even JJ. He's not checking twice with TT or any Jx. There's a reasonably good chance we can push him off a chop.

River, I might call if the 7 wasn't a diamond. If we had the A or K of diamonds in our hand, I might raise sometimes. As played, I might still call, getting 3.5 to 1, in a spot where even an OMC might find a bluff after the previous two streets checked through.

We only need to win about 28% of the time to break even here. I don't like paying off big bets from OMC's, but I don't mind paying off a small bet, if only to see if he's capable of getting out of line.

Knowing this guy is capable of opening and calling a 3B pre with K7s in UTG is worth losing $35 in this game, when he's sitting 2 seats to your right.

Yeahhh my brain gets happy raising 3x but I think it's not strong enough to get anything done live, I was thinking of moving to 4x/4.5x/5x or something.

I wonder if the river bet was for value, a bluff, or just clueless clicking.

Holdover from reading too much Omaha strat and not fully explaining what I mean. Either a T or a 5 is in any five-card straight. This board has both of them on it already. In Omaha, the turn isn't likely to make any straights, but it probably will give everyone a gazillion straight draws that you'll have to dodge on the river. Inapplicable really---though 98 does end up making one here---and extraneous to this discussion, though how many turn cards are we happy to see beyond an A or K?

Are we ahead of UTG's open call range? Establishing some parameters on that would be a good exercise. Do we believe he's trappy, since he'd be HU, though OOP, and might not 4b his premiums? Assuming No, I'm guessing...JJ-66?, AJs-AQs, AQo, KQs? Way too conservative? (LOL, reading the spoiler, I guess it was!!)

(I'd thought we were ahead on the flop, but plugging that range in, we're 60/40 dogs now. Oops and TIL...)

Before I did the math, I thought we were still ahead, with a hand that isn't going to likely improve, and is vulnerable to a lot of the deck. That motivated me more towards c-betting and heavier than I might normally. Despite realizing that T52dd doesn't connect with much our LJ 3b range. Or an UTG open/call range either. If we want to rep diamonds later, we'd also want to bet this flop and start building a pot.

Since we're actually not ahead of that range, and we're not going to try to rep diamonds, I think your c/back is fine.
As played, I think the turn J helps him more than you, c/back is great, see if we can bink a non-diamond Q. We didn't, the flush draw came in, he donked at us, and we still have only ace-high.

I'm cool folding, despite only needing to be right like 22% of the time. I think he looks you up if you raise him. Sorry for the book.

So...as a beginning player, I read about X raise sizing as being "correct", without asking why or being given (or perhaps not understanding) the math and logic of how initial and subsequent raise sizes relate to our starting stack size. And there was nothing about rake. The book said raise 3x, I raised 3x, because that's what the book said to do.

Then it was like, oh, raise smaller OOP because you're at a positional disadvantage and don't want to play a big pot. No, raise bigger OOP because you want to disincentivize players IP from calling. No, raise smaller when you're short stacked, and bigger when you're deep-stacked, but then go back to smaller when you're super-deep-stacked.

Wait, raise bigger pre to avoid rake, but smaller in tournaments or time-raked games, but then go smaller with your 3B/4B sizing. But don't forget to add 1x for every player still in the hand, and 1x more if you're OOP. And don't lose track of the SPR or you'll be pot committed to stack off with any pair post-flop!!!

It's dizzying. Let's be logical.

It makes sense to raise bigger in games where the pot gets raked post-flop (no flop, no drop), especially when the rake is larger compared to the blinds (like 1/2 or 1/3, compared to 2/5).

It makes sense to raise bigger in loose-splashy low-stakes cash games, especially against weaker and sticky opponents who are prone to make bigger mistakes as the pot gets bigger and on later streets, because small mistakes made pre-flop compound on each subsequent street.

It makes sense to exploitatively raise bigger against certain opponent types, with certain types of hands, in certain situations, like when we have AKs IP against an OMC who opens kinda small UTG, and we don't want to give other opponents behind us good implied odds to call.

3x used to be kinda standard, but 4x is more money.

It was VERY fast, so it could have easily been the last one lol

Is non-clueless clicking a thing?

I don't want to give V too much credit. I'm just wondering if he figured he could bet a pair of 7's super-thin for value, and hero would never raise as a bluff when there's three to a straight and three to a flush on board.

Like, if hero was on a draw that got there on the river, he probably would have bet it on flop or turn, so - again, maybe giving V too much credit - he can target AK/AQ for value.

Or maybe he just figured hero would have bet with a better 1P, so 7x could be good enough to bet, whether he can get called by A-high or worse pairs or not.

Thanks for breakdown. The rake at this game is $7 postflop compared to $2 preflop. People are often pretty sticky in these games though. I agree with the premise of 3x just being the thing the book says to do lol

Geezus. That sucks. They're basically stealing the blinds with the rake in that game. The cardrooms here only rake post-flop, and at 2/5, I think it's like $7 total (10% up to $5, plus $2 drop for promotions).

Welp, the higher the rake post-flop, the more incentive you have not to see a flop, and thus the bigger your raises should be pre-flop.

Yes rake structure here is baaaad. The rake for the 1/2/3 game across the road is literally exactly the same as what I just described so this is the good option.

Although, it does bear mentioning that the game is 2/3/5, with 2 on the button, and so the blinds after rake are still 8, rather than 5 as they would be in the 2/5 game you're describing if that happened.