The biggest thing I'm happy about for the weekend was that I made a good quit every time I sat down. Whenever I felt myself get even a little tired or gambly I forced myself to fold all non-premium hands until right before my big blind, then left. After a pretty bad cooler where I got 180 bbs in with the turned second nut straight against the flopped nut straight (I had 8d9d against KsQc on a ATJ7xxhh board), I sat out about three hands then bought in again only after making sure I wasn't steaming or tilted. However, I think that I made some costly mistakes, and I was hoping people could give some advice on how to play better in these spots.
This hand happened at the Borgata early Saturday afternoon. I had been at the table for maybe 50 hands. Hero has about $400, V1 has about $90, and V2 has hero covered. V1 is a bad aggressive player. V2 is an ABC player who "likes to see a cheap flop" and will usually only raise or call a raise with a hand that has a good chance to flop an overpair or TPTK. V1 is in the small blind, and V2 is UTG. V2 limps, and it folds to hero in the CO who looks down at A
A
.
Hero raises to $8, V1 three-bets to $17, V2 calls, and Hero makes it $45 to go. V1 calls, and V2 audibly sighs, tanks, then calls. The pot is $137, and I have about $350 behind, which is a great SPR for my hand. At this point I think that V1 could have any pair "because he's ahead of AK and can hit a set," AK, or AQ, and I think that V2 has a much narrower range of JJ-AA (maybe TT, but he probably puts me on too strong of a range to call with this, especially because I don't have enough back to make set-mining profitable, unless he always stacks me) and AK.
The flop comes: K
J
8
V1 checks, V2 checks, and hero bets $80 into $137. V1 calls for the rest of his stack, and V2 shoves.
I think the obvious move here is to fold. V2 has barely showed any aggression at the table, and when he has, he has always had it. I think I may have made an error, though, by not checking behind on the flop. JJ and KK are crushing me and I'm unlikely to get value out of QQ. The only hand I'm ahead of here that will call is AK. There are 6 remaining combos of JJ/KK, and 8 remaining combos of AK. In retrospect, I realize that he would fold some percentage of AK combos by the time all the money gets in the pot, and so it may have been good to check for pot control.
Am I better off checking to keep QQ in V2's range, and hope that he'll attempt to value bet that in addition to AK on later streets, or was it better to bet the flop to get maximum value out of AK?