Villain: MAWG I've played with him many times before in the past but not recently. He raises a tight range but seems to use the same range from all positions (no understanding of position whatsoever) Type of guy who is just playing based off of his hand and doesnt think about his opponents ranges etc.

Hero: 24 year old white guy. In the past when playing with V I have had a relatively loose image. I now play a lot tighter due to the fact that no matter how tight I play I still get action at this new room. Have been at the table with V for about an hour he has been playing tight, only raised 2/3 times in the last 35 hands or so. I have also been playing tight from his perspective, only raised preflop once since he sat down.

THE HAND:
V is UTG with 325$ and I cover.

Preflop:
V opens to 30$. Normal preflop raises at this table have been 8-12$ depending on limpers. I put him on a range of AK, TT, JJ and maybe QQ. I think he is the type of person to make an extra large raise with these hands because he is scared of seeing a flop and would rather just win now. Also, most people would make it a reasonable amount (3-6 BB) if they want action. What do you guys think about this? What range would you put him on? What range of hands would I even need to defend to such a large open given the minimum defense theory? Can I just fold everything but KK and AA?

Action folds around to me in the SB, I look down at QQ.
Since I think he is on a range of AK, TT, JJ, QQ, I 3bet for value to 100$. (Is this size too small?)

He thinks for 15 seconds or so and jams for 325$

Hero???
At this point I am not sure what the right move is, I think he might jam with AK or JJ but he also might just call. I have QQ so I dont block any AK combos.
What would you guys have done here?

I wouldn’t 3bet a 15x UTG open from a tight villain. If you think you have a read on his range than he should be incredibly easy to play against postflop. Keep your range wide (he’ll probably give you a lot of mid-PP’s) and try to get max value on low flops when he thinks JJ is the nuts.

Wow you're right. That's great advice. I suppose one reason I wanted to 3B was so I could get value from AK before he missed the flop and folds, or get value from JJ before a high card comes out and kills action. But if I flat I can get value when he cbets AK and get massive value when we both flop Overpairs and he value owns himself.

Thanks for you input!

Also, another thing that makes sense about your point which I have overlooked is I dont really need to 3bet to GII vs JJ if he is opened to 30$. If I call there will be 60$ which is an spr of ~5 which (I think) is right where we want to be against a villain with a well defined range.

Obvious 4bet with AA. But he hesitated and given your range analysis lets assume he doesnt have aces.

Who cares if you dont block any AK combos, your a slight favorite over that.

QQ is also a 3/1 favorite over a range of AK, TT, JJ & QQ.

However, if you add AA & KK into his range and i definitely think KK is in there for sure. Now were a slight underdog.

Given the SPR you might have to bite the bullet and call.

If it went 6$ open, 3bet to 18$, 4bet to 60$ then i could find a fold but this is a sticky situation.

Awkward UTG open size. 3bet shove?? I dont know ...

It's a tricky spot but I think it's a +EV call to stick it in. I think he does this with the 4 combos of AKs, the other pair of QQ, and the 12 combos of JJ, there are only 12 total combos of AA and KK so imo it's +EV to call not including the occasional AKo, AQs or TT that will make this play. You're not getting a great price to get it in but you are putting 225 more in to win a pot of 752. It will obviously suck when he as AA or KK but I think you have to accept that he's going to show up here with those hands sometimes. I think your 3bet sizing was good and your read of the large preflop raise sizing by a tighter player was probably correct. I'm a young 20s white guy too and alot of times older guys think we're getting out line in terms of our aggression so I think that also supports a call here.

This. Not like 3bet/get it in is horrible or anything but it's missing a chance to play in position against someone with a very tightly defined range. You can abuse this in all sorts of ways. For instance, if the flop is Jxx and he starts pounding out huge bets, you can actually consider folding. If you think there's no way this raise size pre means AJ - and I would agree - then if he's pounding out huge bets on that board it can really only be JJ/KK/AA.

Well first of all, don't ever do anything in poker without having a plan for future actions. I really don't like 3 bet/folding hands like QQ w/out a very strong read. I also don't like 3 bet/calling off in a live environment because live poker is kind of infamous for being extremely passive pre flop. You're just hoping someone gets frisky w/ AK, or JJ which would be just calls of the 3 bet for almost every live player. Sure, some players you can easily get it in vs, but you should be able to figure out whom I speak pretty easily.

If you haven't already, I recommend getting the equilab equity calculator program. You can do simple preflop range vs range spots like this and it'll show you the equities on postflop situations too. It will really make you a better player.

You have to call $225 to win $425
So that means you are getting 1.89 : 1
So you convert that to a fraction 1/ 2.89 = 0.346
Or 34.6% equity required

http://www.pokerstrategy.com
Equity Win Tie
UTG 59.79% 57.93% 1.86% { QQ+, AKs, AKo }
UTG+1 40.21% 38.35% 1.86% { QQ }

http://www.pokerstrategy.com
Equity Win Tie
UTG 79.30% 75.41% 3.89% { QQ+ }
UTG+1 20.70% 16.81% 3.89% { QQ }


So it depends on if you think AK, JJ, or bluffs are in his range as to whether you call off.

Hero is not even a 2:1 favorite to win here; having ~66.5% equity & ~3.7% of that a tie.

If V has TT+, AKs/o, Hero has ~52.4% equity with ~2.75% of it a tie.

I know its been said already but 3betting to a third of effective stacks and then folding is spew.

Flat call the 15bb open.

As played, I don't know what to do. We showed tremendous strength with our bet of a 15bb opwn from UTG. This is so often just AA/KK.

If it is AA/KK then it is a clear fold.

Meh, I could go either way.

I don't know if he is capable of jamming here with JJ or AK.

You said guy just plays his cards. He opened huge, you raised him and he shoved. Fold your Q’s without much thought. Next time don’t 3b him. Set mine and stack in obvious over pair situation.

I agree with this too. We are playing 1/2 vs a MAWG that opened UTG then shoved over us after we were repping AA KK

The large opens are weird. Sometimes they are exactly 88-JJ and sometimes they are exactly AA.

Thats about it tho

Nah. I see AK a bunch as well.

But yeah either it's KK-AA and the player is like "have big hand, raise big amount" or else it's like TT-JJ, AK and they are petrified of having to play it postflop.