If my upcard is high to the board, say (xx) J with a 2 & a 3 left to act, my hole cards are meaningless. I'm chucking in $20 to win the ~$27. I need folds 43% of the time to make money. Unless you are against huge calling stations this is profitable in the long run, as well as some advertising value when you throw it away or showdown crap occasionally.

6th street was relatively uneventful, despite what my quickly named thread title implied.

Boards looked like this:

(xx) 2 8 T J

(J A) J K 4 5

I bet and he called without much fuss.
Pot ~$260

Plan for the river?

I prefer leading or ch/c 4th. Don't like a ch/r. 5th is a pretty clear ch/c with a plan of leading many 6th streets. His check on 5 is awful.

This river scenario is one of the reasons why 4th is pretty bad. He shouldn't really put you on a ton of straight draws with the line you've taken, so you can't really rep bluffs, and, for that reason, shouldn't be betting one pair. Because of that, I would just check/call all rivers. He should fold 1 pair if you bet and should bet 2 pair if you check..maybe you can raise aces up+.

Had other streets played differently, you could more easily be bluffing and should bet all cards

Cool hand, I like the way you posted it.

I'm with others in that I like to flat my whole range here, and hope to pop it later.

If he didn't catch a heart, I wouldn't mind a c/r but here I think I just c/c most of the time and see what 5th brings.

c/c seems to be the only way to go iyam.

I don't think it's awful if he doesn't have much, but if he has any solid draw I don't like it. Sure seems like you're heading to showdown....

c/c everything.

Am I a nit?

I would reraise on 3rd because I'm opening pretty wide in the CO with a Jack up, low/middling cards all around. In LHE my default is around 35% in the CO. In stud it's way way wider because the bring in is not like a blind. Took me way too long to realize that. Because of my wide open I have all three actions in response to bring in two bet. This hand gets reraised because it punishes a large part of his range, worse pairs.

As played and without the read on 4th I would check-call. But with the read I would bet because getting one bet from nearly 100% of his two-bet on third range makes it clearly better than check-call, which will be some narrower and stronger range. At least that's how I read it. It's possible that kc is better because the read shouldn't be taken literally. Whether betting is better than check-raise, as played, is a good question that I'm not going to chase down just yet.

On 5th, I think it's fairly interesting to figure out how many non-heart hands I would have in BI spot and ask myself whether its worth turning all those into bluffs, how many would I just give up, and whether those give ups needed some protection. Our check is good and his check is just meh to me for now.

On 6th I think we have a clear bet. How would you react to a raise?

On 7th I'm going to bet call most of my 2pair and mostly kc ui.

It all depends on opponents and ante structure, but in general I wouldn’t ope. Anything I wouldn’t continue with to 4th for one more bet

Start crying?

I blanked the river and bet out. I felt like villains range was heavily weighted towards 77 or 99 with no hearts, and I was folding to a raise.

Since my 6th & 7th street cards were so bad I certainly don't have two pair (from my opponents point of view), so either I had two Kings or maybe a broadway draw I took a shot at on 6th street trying to get (23)2 to fold.

Or maybe I had (33) J and he feels his 7s might be good. If he makes 2 pair I'm losing one bet anyway, and I think he bluff raises close to never.

He called and I announced two jacks as if they were good (pleasepleaseplease) and they were, JJ takes the pot.

I want to thank everyone who participated in this thread, stud is a dying game (dead in most places), but I'll play it as long as there is a game.

I found this hand interesting because I thought every street had options, by one or both players, and the way I played it was just one of those ways.

In fact, I discussed this hand with a player I consider to be an excellent 7-stud player, and he said he would have: 3-bet third, led 4th, checked 5th, bet 6th and check/called 7th. Maybe I got too fancy, or maybe I had a soul read, but either way the hand was fun to play.

(Unless he makes 7s & 2s on the river and I never post this.)

I think b/f river is really bad unless you have a sick read on this player, which it seems you do.

Can't believe he called with worse. NH.

You should DEFINITELY have a complete/fold range here. You're either not stealing enough or not folding to the 2b enough.

Betting improvement and checking UI is probably the worst, although most obvious, way to play the river here.

If your river thinking, once he checks Fifth, is that you should bet any card, and you think villain is competent, you should be prepared to call a raise at least some of the time. You can think he won't bluff raise often, but it doesn't have to be very often for him to think, "Sometimes It's Worth A Shot."

That said, you can bet any blockers to his two-pair or flush whether you improve or not, and check-call cards that don't block his hand whether you improve or not. This will give you a range of bets and check-calls that each include enough of your Sixth st range to be unexploitable, though you'll still need a plan for potential SIWAS.

Using blocking effect as a bet randomizer means that if we check and he bets he more often beats us, but it also means that when we bet we'll get value-raised less often.

I agree with a bet/fold. That Razz hand posted above has a different dynamic.

In your Stud hand the following is true:
1) Unless you have something like (QT)JK your hand is heavily weighted to something with some real showdown value
2) Your opponent given his check probably indicates some showdown like a wired pair of some sort
3) You are at the bottom of your value betting range, in theory I don't think you need to call in order to not be exploited
4) He's not raising two pair (his check on 5th indicates no big pair in hole) thus his real value raising range is very narrow and strong

Therefore in the Stud hand he has to be taking a hand that can beat some bluffs and turn it into a bluff and trying to knock you off a hand most likely with good showdown value. And he's doing that after not betting three hearts on 5th.

In that Razz hand there are many more theoretical outs Brandon could have that makes a six low.

Just curious, do you guys also have a flat all policy with an ace up?

I posted the SIWAS thread not for the first hand but because it's an epic thread full of guys thumping their chests about river bluff-raises. That was a little vague, sorry.

Villain should realize by the river that A) an underpair is no good, B) his board is coordinated in several ways and blocks our door card, and C) we have very little equity vs a big part of his value range (trips, flushes, backdoor straights). I mean, give him 9 or 7 in the hole and the world is his oyster.

So if he sees all that and thinks we will bet/fold then he has a few more raises on the river.

Ok I guess I’m basing some of my thinking on the fact that he should know that we know he doesn’t have a 4 flush. My grandma would bet a 4 flush and a pair on 5th.

Anyhow I think the bet on 7th is a little thin anyway. If we think we may have to b/c on 7th I like bet less. And if there is some universe of his better hands that would check I like a check even more. I can think of one such hand at least, QQ.

3rd I don't have a strong feeling on call vs 3! But 4th I much prefer xr if you are confident he bets. K is a good card for your range so I think normally leading is better since he can checkback. Check on 5th seems fine and your lead on 6th seems quite marginal. You are mostly repping 2p or better at this point, with 1p we don't have much of a range advantage. Unless villain folds 2p incorrectly on the river to another bet I don't like our line, villain is going to be able to take much more optimal lines vs hero with position and his board. Even xc on 6 is not a great spot, do we xc river unimproved?

I just went back to look at his 6th street board, I definitely check 7th, I c/f it actually

My guess is he had two black nines in hole

He could not have 7 or 9 hearts as it would be either 77 or 99 and he would always bet 5th

After discussing this hand some more with my friend, he had an interesting point. That is, if villain was planning on calling me down he should have jammed 6th street and if he didn't get a fold just check back the river UI.

Your assessment of villain as solid, thinking player seems a bit off imo. Especially call on the river unless he had a worse jjxxxxx hand

Another jack is remote but it is the only non wired pair hand he could have but he would have to have checked a four flush on 5th.

I’m still going with wired 9s, only hand that makes sense. He called c/r on 4th light with 9s, aces, and kings or the jack as definite continue cards

Sure, I just don't think a solid villain calls river with a medium 1p against heros line. Especially after calling 6th.

In the games I play in against tougher players, I'm perfectly capable of having (33) KJ or (AQ)KJ in this spot, which is why I thought he'd have to call the river. That's why he needs to bet 5th or jam 6th.

Yeah this is a great spot for a free-showdown raise by villain. Villain declined the aggressive/repping option on every street, which makes me think he's exploitable as passive but showdown bound, and Hero did a good job on him. Especially fond of the river bet.

Working back, if villain bet Fifth he could see two cards free. If he raised Fourth and barreled he probably wins the pot with his board.

Obviously stud isn't thriving, but I think there is some room for something of a comeback. It is a complex game - and I think the younger players are drawn to that. Hold'em just doesn't do it for everyone. I play at Foxwoods (I'm kind of assuming that you do to because, well, where else is there a 20-40 game?), and there is a decent 20-40 crowd. Some of us are not even collecting social security yet. I'm also interested to see if the arrival of Encore Boston will enhance stud with high limit games. Hold'em is king right now (with PLO not far behind), but I wouldn't be surprised to see stud stick around.