I’m trying to shed old nit habits and bet the bottom of my range, which I sometimes still just fold. TJo is in my opening range for the CO but not the HJ. I wonder if I should have just folded this hand preflop.

V1 (120) has played tight preflop. He made a massive bluff on the river with ace-high with a busted flush draw and got called.

V2 (220) is a weak pimply loose passive with greasy hair. He looks fifteen but is probably twenty-five. He seems stuck in adolescence: his poor hygiene reflects poor self-control and absent self-reflection. After the table was talking about a game with a 72o bonus, he limp-called preflop and got called on a massive river bluff with air, showing 82o.

V3 (305) is a calling station. He’s a cheerful sixty-five year and has enjoyed at least seven drinks. He’s open-limping, limp-calling preflop, and calling bets with bad hands to showdown. He won $250 for the single-card straight-flush promotion with an A8o.

OTTH

V1 straddles to 5 on the button. V2 in BB calls, V3 in UTG calls. Hero in the HJ with JhTc raises to 30. V1 and V3 call.

Flop (92 after rake): 863r.

V3 checks. Hero checks. Button bets 40. V2 calls. Hero folds.

Yes, this is too loose. JTo is a very borderline RFI in the HJ. It is mostly a fold but you might open it depending on how weak the players left to act are. However, this is not an RFI spot. With 2 limpers, and a BTN straddle who is liable to defend an extremely wide range in position, you have to be opening much tighter than the normal HJ open raising range.

Post-flop is played very sensibly, I would say.

The way I was instructed to think about ISO raising spots is that with 1 limper, you can isolate with your normal RFI range. If there are 2 or more limpers, you should be isolating with the range of one seat before yours. So with two limpers in the HJ, I am isolating with the LJ range. So I would be folding JTo pure and even a hand like QJo.

The BTN straddle further changes things. The BTN has less incentive to fold than a normal big blind or small blind does because he has position. This means you should be attempting to steal a lot less, so you can no longer profitably open many of the worst hands in your range.

Something weird with the hand. Who is calling pre? All three of them? JTo is too wide for me unless we're pretty deep. I like it more as a 3-bet or open IP when I want to iso a limper/opener who has been too active and its only likely going to be HU. There's some people that play so face up at my game that it's fine when but I got burned the other day with it.

Fishy russian opens 11 in MP, I raise to 40 with JTo, only russian calls. Flop Q-J-X, he checks, I bet, he calls (meh, he can still be behind). Turn Q-J-X-K. He checks, I barrel with my added OESD, he calls. River bricks and he leads small like 1/4 pot. I hate my life and call getting such a great price. He has AJ.

What is the rake structure like? Interesting spot pre. I would like to get involved in pots with V2 and V3. At the same time, I typically want to be isoing fairly tight vs 2 limpers. On the other hand, if we limp behind, we are forced to play OOP to at least the button and possibly more players. But even if we do iso, button straddles tend to cold call iso raises fairly wide, then v2 and v3 will overcall a lot, and being OOP + multiway is not great. Even if button straddle folds, v2 will call a fair amount and v3 will call behind a fair amount, and even though v2 and v3 are playing terrible and we are in position, being multiway sucks.

All things considered, I think limping behind is the play. I actually don't hate an iso though if we are very confident in our postflop play. V2 limp-called with 82o. I feel like our hand is going to have 2 live cards, at least 1 over, and possibly 2 overs a fair amount of the time vs, and villains will whiff flop fairly often too. Normally not an iso, but vs this specific villain type, maybe.

Postflop as played, there isn't much else you can do.

The way I learned to think about iso spots is that with one limper we should tighten up for our position, because our normal opening range has some weaker hands who are profitable because of sometimes taking down the blinds. (We "can no longer profitably open many of the worst hands in [our] range.")

With a limper, we are going to take down the pot rather less often. With two limpers we ought to tighten up even further, because now we will often have two horses to outrun rather than just one.

This is true; and at the same time there is a compensatory effect of the pot starting larger compared to the straddle (1.75 straddles) than a conventional blind structure does to the big blind (1.5 blinds). The bigger pot incentivizes us to play wider ranges.

That said, in this actual situation, from the HJ, any raise we make has to get through four players: the CO and the BTN straddle, both of whom have ATK, and the BB and UTG, both of whom have condensed their ranges by limping in. I want to make my iso size 7x the straddle: four for the first limper, one for the second, one for the straddle, and one more because the straddle will have position for the rest of the hand. And since we're raising so big, we ought to consider how tight our range should be to make this raise. I don't think JTo makes the cut.

Fold pre.

This straddle structure sucks.

The problem is your raise has to get through the BTN straddler, the loose-passive kid, and the drunk whale. At least 2 of the 3 V's don't sound like they like to fold pre.

JTo isn't a terrible open if most V's are likely to fold, or are weak pre-flop, and we have position, especially if we have a skill advantage. Otherwise, once V2 and V2 call the BTN straddle, I think JTo is mostly a pure fold, and occasionally an over-limp.

Given BTN is tight pre (but doing button straddles?) ... I might limp. Fold pure might well be better, could easily go strongly one way or another if we have any idea why BTN is straddling.

I don't mind how OP played this since there's a lot of dead money out there, but I'm def folding before limping with these types of hands in the CO (btjmoc) and newer players who are still learning should default to folding pre also.

Just because there is money in the middle doesn't mean it's dead money. V2's extra $2 from the BB (and his equity) is the only thing we gained by raising, and it cost us 6x the limp size.
You could argue that tight preflop players will fold their BTN straddle more, but my experience would heavily disagree ... and UTG is probably never folding unless V2 limp/3bets.