Probably a pretty straightforward, low drama hand but I was pretty uncertain throughout.

2/5 800 cap at Playground Montreal. Pretty fun game with lots of straddling.

UTG straddle 10 - splashy older guy, seems to be a reg.
UTG+1 straddle 20 - Hero, late 30's WG, obvious rec but playing ok, should be viewed as somewhat splashy TAG

Folds to CO (2k) - $60 - early 30s guy playing snug and pretty legitimate TAG, he's getting a massage.
Folds to hero (1100) in UTG+1 with KJo - calls?

Flop (120)
KQJr H x CO x

Turn (120)
KQJ 10 still rainbow x x

River (120)
KQJ 10 8 H bets 40?

Pre, Im very rusty and didn't really want to blow the pot up against what should be a pretty solid range, KJo seems too strong to just fold though?

Post, oop I was planning on just c/c and trying to get to showdown here, he can have all the sets and I can't. Donking just seems a bit out of line.

Once he checks back the turn I'm bet/folding the river for value, figured he might sigh call a small bet with QJ/J10/Q10, and he can't really raise without an A so easy fold if he does.

All standard?

Yup this looks standard. In theory this kind of hand is indifferent to blocking and checking, but in practice blocking will be better if villain isn't raising enough bluffs. So we block and fold to a raise like you said.

Calling a snug player with a reverse implied odds(RIO) hand oop is usually a bad move. I'd fold pf.

As played, you hit your 25:1 odds against of getting 2 pair or better. You need to start getting money in the pot. You missed the flop because you rightly checked (which is why you shouldn't be calling RIO hand oop pf. Bet the turn. Last thing you want to do is get counterfeited on the river with an ace or 9.

As played on the river, a 40 bet is fine.

Easy fold pre with a reverse implied odds hand OOP against a snug tight player as Venice pointed out. This is how many players bleeds money btw, they make a bad call pre for a small amount of money, but then easily loses alot more with follow up mistakes postflop.

Noob question:

Folks talking about RIO, is that based on the likelihood that KJ is dominated by CO's opening range (i.e. lot of AK, AJ, KK, and JJ) and therefore that KJ hitting the flop would probably still be behind and lead to a big loss?

Yes,exactly. Reverse implied odds against the openers range.

Sent fra min SM-G991B via Tapatalk

Pre is marginal. This isn’t quite the same as if CO had opened to 60 in a 2-blind 10/20 game. In that situation, KJo is an easy defend. Here, I could see fold being best if CO is playing quite snug. CO should be opening very tight in a 4-blind format. Personally, I’m probably still calling, but KJo is near the bottom of my defense range and I don’t expect it to be a very profitable spot. Worst hand I’d consider defending with is KTo.

Turn is WP. Never leading. No need to bet and fold out IPs bluffs. Better to check and induce a bluff.

River is a bet for value IMO. Like your sizing.

Hand is generally WP.

Liked how you added that a player was getting a massage ... haha... Not sure how that information is relevant to the discussion of the hand. Also, it took me a minute to decipher all your abbreviations like “x” for check, when it’s abbreviated with “c” elsewhere. Try to keep it consistent for tards like me to understand.

Straddling:
Not sure if you’re there to make money or to highly gamble. If you’re straddling $20 in a $2/5 game, then that tells me your there to gamble. I bring this up because straddling cuts effective stack sizes down making drawing hands loose their value, inversely driving up the value of premium hands. This straddle (4x the BB) cuts everyone’s stack by 1/4th their size. In this hand, KJo is more of a drawing hand.

KJo:
I would agree with most of the comments already posted that this is an easy fold PreFlop. These “Reverse Implied Odds” hands will get you in trouble especially OOP. They will drag you a small pot or cause you to loose a big one. I’ve lost many big pots and the mental scars still remain *starting to tear up*.

The bottom line here is:
- Straddle less in that position. You’re creating a big pot for someone to play you OOP.
- Tighten up your calling ranges when OOP and avoid “Reverse Implied Odds” hands, especially against NITs & TAGs

Getting a massage at a poker table is a signal that the player has decided he can afford to take a break at the table and play his "C" game (Phil Ivey excepted). If he is snug, he's not raising anything marginal most of the time.

CLP charts have KTo+ as a defend versus a 3x EP open. I doubt CO is opening tighter than an EP range. Not an “easy” or “standard” fold IMO.

Lol at using charts as a definitive answer for these decisions in a livegame.

Is these charts tailormade to exploit livenits and taking into account how unbalanced many of them is regarding opening range when the straddle is on?

Snug TAG in CO to me means he’s opening at least AJo+,KQo, 77+, suited broadways and 87s+. If he were tagged as a NIT I’d have different response.

Anecdote: I’m the tightest player in my 2/5 game and I opened 75s in the CO last week when the $10 straddle was on. I was also getting a massage at the time.

Anyway, if we don’t have specific reads we can just assume CO is opening 10%+ and then KJo is a profitable defend in a vacuum (according to charts).

The charts are tailormade as defaults for live 1/2, 1/3, and 2/5.

You think a “legitimate TAG” is limping in frequently in the CO? Or is he raising most of his VPIP range? Isn’t a “legitimate TAG” VPIPING at least 15% in a 9-handed game? Shouldn’t he be raising at least 15% from the CO?

Maybe this guy isn’t really a “legitimate TAG” and he’s limping with most of his range and only raising 5%. But that info wasn’t specified. Idk why you assume it to be true.

At what stack depths?

Thanks for the responses guys, helpful and appreciated.

I think preflop is one of those spots which is probably not profitable for me (worse position, probable skill disadvantage), but which should also be played if my goal is to improve and battle etc.

Re. his opening ranges etc - I played with him for 5/6 hrs and intentionally stated 'legitimate' before TAG because you see 'TAG' and 'LAG' thrown around a lot in these parts when in reality they are somewhat rare IME. I'd guess that his range was a little tighter than the CLP chart, but not significantly.

Re. the hand - he sigh called with 99 for the dummy straight.

Thanks again!

100BB… but should work for shorter stacks too. I guess short stacks might weaken the value of small suited connectors, but I’d expect big cards to maintain their value down to 50BB.

Re preflop: I think one of the key questions to ask is what is the typical reactions to the straddle being on. Were most players limping because they didn’t want to bloat the pot? Did you see the player in the CO limping when the single or double straddle was on? If he’s limping his weaker playable hands then his open raise range is gonna be a lot stronger (might push KJ to a fold). The fact he open raised 99 rather than limping it is reassuring.

Yeah it wasn't a table littered with egregious calling errors like the archetypal LLSNL game. The fishiness was all skewed towards over defending blinds and splashy aggression post flop.

Villain in this hand had a zero open limp and virtually zero overcall range, raise or fold guy.

Straddle responses were sensible too.

Maybe it was just a tough table, but if that's typical post pandemic poker it must be tough to be a grinder out here!

Okay, thanks. That’s what I understood “legitimate TAG” to mean. Agree that TAG gets misused and thrown around too frequently on this forum.

Also, reverse implied odds become less important with shallower stacks.

One thing I will say (which I think you've already touched on) is that a 3x raising range over a double straddle will tend to be much stronger than a 3x raising range over a normal blind. I suppose 3x is just the standard raise in some games, but in most of the games I've played 3x tends to represent a very weak range. However, to a typical 2/5 player, a $60 open is quite large and may actually be the largest they will open, regardless of holdings.

I'm kind of indifferent between calling/folding/raising preflop but it does beg the question as to why the hell are we double straddling if we aren't even willilng to at least call a raise with KJ when faced with a 3x open from the CO. If the straddle was mandatory ok, otherwise stop straddling or grow some balls.

IMO the way that most people think about reverse implied odds is incorrect. Sure, we get dominated sometimes when we hit our K or J. But that's no different from saying that 99 has reverse implied odds because the times we flop an overpair, we are dominated by TT+. The thing is we will still be ahead a good chunk of the time, make money from villain's thin valuebets, as well as have very good potshare the times villain checks behind.

I don't have a strong opinion on whether KJo should call or fold, but I would try to think about it in terms of equity/equity realisation instead of reverse implied odds.

I'm hardly ever flatting pre, so I'm either 3betting or folding but I'm not 3betting a "snug" player who just raised to $60 from around MP pre. I'm tossing my cards away without a second thought.

How do the charts know what the villains range is? Do they know he's a tight player, and wouldn't that have more credence over a chart? Flatting pre with KTo is horrible, for the most part. Using charts is almost as horrible, tbh.

If villain is really TAG and I don't think he's loosening it up IP because there's 7.5BB in dead money, I'll fold.

Without that information I probably play the hand exactly the way OP did. But I also wouldn't double straddle if I wasn't willing to defend that pretty liberally.

At the top of the chart it says “EP vs BB
” so it means that this is estimating the optimal GTO defense range against an EP opening range. EP opening range is top 10-12% (including AQo but not AJo/KQo). When you’re applying charts to real life you need to start by estimating how wide V is. That’s given by a percentage. If you think V is opening 20% that’s closer to HJ range, so you’d look at the “HJ vs BB defense chart”. In this case I gave V the tightest possible range for opening in the CO…I used the EP opening range for V. KTo+ is a profitable defend facing the 3x open using this tight estimate on Vs range

This isn't a "3x EP open". It's a 3x raise after a double straddle.

I would advise extreme caution with using your charts and thinking about "GTO" in these live sutuations. I crush players all the time who think and play that way.