Would u have bet 5th or even 6th here. I bet the river cause I didnt want Andy bustin my chops..

Any tips on reading hands for a rookie. I think I'm always fearing the worst when I look at my opponents board.

He called me with 3 pair on the end!
Should I value bet a King into this guy on the end?


Razz ($3/$6), Ante $0.25, Bring-In $1 (converter)

3rd Street - (0.67 SB)

Seat 1: xx xx 4___raises___calls
Seat 2: xx xx T___folds
Hero: 2 6 5___raises
Seat 4: xx xx 5___calls
Seat 5: xx xx Q___folds
Seat 6: xx xx 6___folds
Seat 7: xx xx 3___folds
Seat 8: xx xx K___brings-in___folds

4th Street - (7.00 SB)

Seat 1: xx xx 4 T___folds
Hero: 2 6 5 4___bets
Seat 4: xx xx 5 7___calls

5th Street - (4.50 BB)

Hero: 2 6 5 4 9___checks
Seat 4: xx xx 5 7 6___checks

6th Street - (4.50 BB)

Hero: 2 6 5 4 9 4___checks
Seat 4: xx xx 5 7 6 7___checks

River - (4.50 BB)

Hero: 2 6 5 4 9 4 8___bets
Seat 4: xx xx 5 7 6 7 xx___calls

Total pot: (6.50 BB)

WHen he checks to you I bet 5th. Unless he knows your going to bet in this spot and he's a tricky player setting up a check raise, bet out.

How long did he stay after that? I'm wondering if he thought he was at Stud or HiLo?

Use your betting action to help define opponents' hands. Move down to 1/2, where losing will not seem such a big deal, and start raising 3rd with good hands, check/raise 4th sometimes, put some pressure on them. Just watch them and make notes of who plays a brick and so forth.

What are you reading besides this board?

The Razz section of Sklansky on poker.
I read Hellmuths "Play like the pros" , he likes jamming 3rd with good hands so you can correctly call later, Sklansky opposite so your opponents can make mistakes later. I read that article about peeling on 4 th on your blog and I'm confused.
Maybe this should be a new thread , let me know.
My 4th line is usually fold if I brick with only a completion or limp on third , I need a really good reason to peel.
If there is a completion and a raise , its my understanding that 4th is automatic call(HU).

Just started reading your blog too.

Given that he finished with 3 pair, wouldn't he have bet 5th street if he thought he was playing Stud or HiLo?

No, the call on the end isn't the worst ever -- actually, pretty far from it. He's never good often enough to justify the call on an EV basis, but he can make the call for metagame purposes -- either he wants to find out your range for betting the river, or he wants to plant a seed in your head that he's a donkey, or both. Or it might have been a misclick, or he misread his hand...

Then you'll read "Calling the 4th Street Brick" and know that this is one of the most common misconceptions in Razz. It is not an automatic call on 4th with a completion and bet. Sklansky never said that and neither do I. Hellmuth is jamming 3rd so he can see 5th.

What you'll find over time is that you should call it more than a straight Sklansky player would but fold it more than the "1 raise on 3rd is a mandatory peel" players do.

Not necessarily. If he thought they were both going for lo - checking it down is reasonable, he might not have thought he was very far ahead yet for hi, at the end, he figured to split the pot if OP had a good lo.

I think I have a handle on what your saying and it makes sense.
Is what Hellmuth's Razz section worthwile , I've always been a "Sklansky" guy , I don't wanna get to nitpicky here but here's a quote from "Sklansky on poker"

He's talking about not putting a double bet on 3rd esp agaisnt weak players
p.126-27
"Unfortunately by putting in a double raise on 3rd u eliminated that edge because now you are almost forced to come again on 4th street regardless of how the cards fall. This is a very important concept. By making a double raise, u have made 4th street automatic. By keeping it to a single raise u give him an opportunity to make a mistake."

I've been told I need to raise third more the above idea is why I try to keep the pot small:

Ex: A 7 completes and its folded to me with no small cards to raise out behind me I call with (24)6 to keep the pot small.

Obviously this is oversimplified and is opponent dependent.

OK here is what I"m thinking now. Agression on third street is a balance between pot size manipulation , isolating bad hands or weak players , pure value , and deception.

Here's a question:
If I'm 4-1 agaisnt outflopping villian on 5th (all other things being equal) then isn't that all the pot odds I need? (I know, I'm a pain in the ass)

It really depends on a lot of factors, which I think you understand, so mostly it's a question of figuring out which factors and when.

Sure - as long as out-catching him on 5th will give you a 100% lock on the hand. Oh, it won't? Then you need better pot odds! In fact, out drawing him on 5th will very rarely win you the pot right away, and when you're ahead, you won't be ahead that much.

There's also the situation where a player may be stealing on 3rd - if you have any playable hand you need to raise so that you have taken away his opportunity to steal the pot on 4th by hitting good with you hitting bad (since he may have started with a poor hand to begin with and therefore may still be behind you on 4th). In that situation its important to give yourself proper odds to see 5th and eliminate his chance of the steal being successful on 3rd/stealing the pot on 4th by drawing better than you.

Good point tx.

How about this:
Sklansky says (Sklansky on poker) if you attempt a steal and are raised u need about a 3 card 9 to see 4th. But if villian folds bricks 4th wouldn't it be right to call any? When I fold to a raise when I've been on a steal I feel it hurts my table image , with people more inclined to play back at me.

Think of it this way - when you have a good hand and are on a steal later, he will be more inclined to play back with more marginal holdings. Then you hesitate a half second and just call. Nice trap.

You are a not a pain in the ass at all, it's refreshing to see someone who wants to learn this much.

There's one thing missing from this analysis. The odds of out-flopping your opponent depends on the dead cards so going bananas on 3rd is correct when you're more likely to smash 4th street hard, never mind pricing yourself in to peel one time.

For what it is, sure. It's a good basic starting guide if you've never played Razz before. You are beyond that now.
Aren't we all - here's the thing, though - keep in mind he is basing all of his advice on playing casino cash Razz at what would be pretty high stakes online. Things evolve, such is the nature of - well - everything. And, Sklansky often said things like "usually" or used other qualifiers. So, you have to marry his good advice to online experience and situational variables.

The above (which I didn't find because my edition has different stuff on different pages - so please us chapter and paragraph) is talking about 3 betting. What people are encouraging you to do mostly is complete in the first place or maybe make one raise of the completion. Part of what's going on here is not having enough experience to get a feel for when you have a strong hand, how often your opponents play weak, the many many things that go into these decisions.

You can play a weak 3rd for deception when you have a very big hand or sometimes when you have an 8 doorcard, say. You complete or raise for many reasons, one is to gain information - the most valuable thing you can have in any poker game is information.

Razz is - well - it's just not any form of HE - there aren't really a lot of rules that you follow in any hard and fast way - the probabilities aren't straightforward like the chance you'll make a flush in two cards or something. Ted Forrest called Razz the "purest form of poker." It's like figuring out how to get honey from a beehive - stun 'em, lure them away, piss them off so they chase you until you trap them.... some other strategy?

Why would you want to keep a pot small when you have not only the absolute best hand but also the information advantage of knowing you have the best hand? The best reason to flat here is for deception. That works better at higher stakes where they expect aggression and will put you on a 7 in the hole or maybe an 8 for not raising. At low stakes, they won't notice so you might as well raise.

Precisely. And the only way to figure all that out is to play about 50k Razz hands.

I think this is a big misconception. Let's explore it - how do you get 4-1 against outflopping your opponent?

Thank you listening for your insights. As I told you in other posts, I owe everything I know (very little still) on razz because of your posts-articles.

Ty!

Tx listening , when u say u have a different edition and want chapter and paragraph do u want me to count the paragraghs from the beginning of the chapter?

This is 7 paragraphs into chapter 3 he's talking about limping behind 1 limper if u are the last low card with bad one in the hole. You are getting about 6-1 (high ante game) that u will out flop him and the odds are only about 4-1. Best if the limper will fold a brick on 4th.

4-1 makes sense to me, possible outcome (obv dep on exposed cards):

good/good
bad/bad
good/bad
bad/good

How do u put different parts of a quote throughout the post like u did here?

I'll do this first in a single post then go back for the rest.

When you hit the quote button to reply - you get the whole post. So, find the end of the first part you want to answer and put brackets with /quote at the end, like this: [/quote].

Then, after you say what you want, take the next thing you want to quote and highlight it and click the quote icon in the edit box - looks like a cartoon balloon - or you can do it by hand by putting [quote] in front and bracket with /quote at the end of that section, like this:

[quote]what you want to quote[/quote]

This is on page 118 of my book if anyone else is trying to find it, in the third paragraph on that page. He wasn't talking about having a bad card in the hole in my book, he was talking about whether to reraise a raise on 3rd. There are a lot of caveats in this portion of the text about his reluctance to put in a double bet - the nature of the opponent and having a mediocre hand. Maybe read it again and then start a new thread just for that discussion. SGspecial is the real expert of all things SoR.

Here is your original question:

If I'm 4-1 agaisnt outflopping villian on 5th (all other things being equal) then isn't that all the pot odds I need?

This good/bad thing and the 25% chance of flopping "good" vs his "bad" is really only useful on 3rd street. And it isn't that useful then, as LT7 pointed out and you also said in the bold part above.

At the beginning, when you can simply outflop your WO (worthy opponent) and expect him to fold when you bet,. it's probably close to 25%. Even with apparent good/good, if you bet first and he has hidden paired or has a brick in the hole, you might still take it down, even with your own hidden pair simply because you bet first.

So let's say 25% is good on 3rd, generally. But things in Razz change very much as you move through the streets. After 3rd, your chance of hitting "good" becomes a thoroughly relative, instead of absolute, probability. You will often be in the situation where you have enough outs to make your 8 that you could draw, but your WO's hand is so low or smooth that hitting it probably won't win you the pot, anyway.

This is why messing about with the simulator can speed your education and save you money. When you start putting in 5th streets and progressing them to 6th, or just put in hands from 3rd through the river, you'll begin to get a feel for how much what he catches affects what your chances are.