Information
Villain SB : 45/26 in 288 hands: has seen him make 2 weird plays
Villain BTN: 33/27 in 56 hands

Hand

$5/$10 Limit Hold'em Cash, 5 Players

Preflop: Hero is BB with A Q
MP folds, CO raises, BTN 3-bets, SB calls, Hero caps, CO calls, BTN calls, SB calls

Flop: (16 SB) A 3 7 (4 players)
SB checks, Hero bets, CO folds, BTN raises, SB calls, Hero calls

Turn: (11 BB) 8 (3 players)
SB checks, Hero checks, BTN bets, SB raises, Hero?

Question
1. Any merit in fastplaying the flop, instead of calling. I called because my silent
alarm went off , when the SB calls two bets cold
2. Is 2 weird plays by the SB enough to continue or is this just a snap fold, because we are sandwiched now?

I'd just play str8forwardly and 3b the flop. There's a case for waiting for the turn, but you better have a good plan for all eventualities.

with all that action pre. your hand isnt as good as it looks unless you know the two behind you are maniacs.
not many spots does ace queen play well against a raise reraise and cold call being oop as well and in the middle of the bettors.

So perhaps its better to invest less and just call pre then. I think the suitedness makes a small different right?

Are there any suited connectors you would cap in my position, like 9Ts,JTs,QTs,QKs,AKs or is this specific action and our position not great to cap any at all even AKo?

im not saying its bad thinking or stratgey.

but the way u sound is " well i got screwed in this hand so ill play more passif or scared" is a mistake.

the situation up there doesnt come out often and has M. Zee said, vs maniacs u wouldnt fold.

look at this board, u have a pretty good hand so if this happens often in this spot vs them , probably its because they are very aggro or very tight pf, cause they cant have a hand stronger then u often.

dont base your general strategy on few situations happening .

Trying to give this post the benefit of the doubt, but I'm having trouble coming up with reasonable ranges for the 3 villains where we're not a favorite with a significant equity advantage preflop. I mean- cutoff open, button 3bet, loose agressive player calls in sb when he could have capped, and we have AQs. Am I missing something?

Out of all the opportunities to cap out of the big blind with AQs, this one is second best only to a button raise and a small blind 3 bet. Yet look at the hand. There was one raise on this dry flop and then one raise on the turn and op is in a tough spot with one pair.

I'd 3 bet the flop and go from there. As played you put yourself in a spot where it seems correct to coldcall 2 multiway with a bluffcatcher since you've underrepresented your hand; not a fun spot.

wow ray zee comin out of no where.. sup ray

i did say maniacs and it doesnt play well. both are true. against players that are going to have reasonable hands in that spot your ace queen out of position doesnt do as well as it looks.

shorthanded against aggressive bad players i aint letting it go either. but oop hands in big pots that get jammed on you, you need to have better reasons to play or reraise and build the pot.

imo, in this spot you shouldn't wait turn. If you think you have more than 33% equity 3b flop, otherwise play as you did. just looking at stats, it is a borderland decision. AK to 3b and AJ to call.

As played snap fold turn. If they show a worst hand; curse(not in chat), take a note, maybe a small break and move on.

Agree with Leader, I usually 3-bet the flop. As played, I don't fold the turn. You've under-repped your hand and there is definitely reason to believe your still ahead of SB at this point given your read. The pot is huge now.

Ray, this is LHE, folding preflop is ridiculous against anyone in these positions preflop given the action. Capping is easily a profitable play. (I'm assuming you're referring to preflop in your responses, otherwise your description of the action doesn't make sense.)

well you may not want to fold pre. and that particular game may warrant that. but overall watch out. you will see over enough time.

certainly the 4th street fold is right. so the board was good for his hand and he had to fold it anyway because of the action. and this action was telegraphed pre.

It seems like you're underestimating how aggressive these games typically are.

Equity Win Tie
CO 21.51% 20.41% 1.10% { 22+, A2s+, K7s+, Q9s+, J9s+, T8s+, 98s, 87s, 76s, A2o+, K9o+, QTo+, JTo, T9o, 98o }
BU 25.73% 24.20% 1.53% { 44+, A2s+, KTs+, QTs+, JTs, T9s, A9o+, KJo+ }
SB 21.19% 20.43% 0.77% { 88-22, ATs-A2s, K9s+, Q9s+, J9s+, T8s+, 98s, 87s, 76s, 65s, AJo-A8o, KTo+, QJo }
BB 31.57% 29.68% 1.89% { AQs }

I'm sure some would quibble with these ranges, but if anything they are narrower then they should be. We can't fold AQs here.

Folding pre is completely ridiculous to me. If someone has a big sample they can check this exact spot and see how this and slightly worse hands fare against a raise+3bet from late positions. The SB calling is only further incentive to not fold.
I can guarantee you it really isnt close tbh.

Turn is tough but i think the fact u have seen him do weird stuff in the past makes me want to not fold yet.

On this flop id be curious what Btn raised with . If hes stronger then you this would be a good case to wait for the turn to raise and if he is weaker there is no reason to raise either. Maybe hes playing alot of tables and just raised his Top Pair without paying much attention. Sb play looks extremely strong and I think folding is best here, however since you have seen making 2 wierd players I think he can show up with a weaker ace here or a backdoorflushdraw here plus you arent always drawing dead.

Preflop obv standard

We're dead on the turn a very high % against any normalish players.

If we 3bet the flop and are capped we're likely not doing well either. Its pretty obvious you have at least AJ and are never bluffing.

I don't 3 bet flop. I'd rather drag along a weaker ace(s) and limit how much we lose vs ak, sets. There are no draws.

It's co vs btn vs bb, I doubt that Ax is folding to a flop 3 bet or turn and river bets. That is unless bb has a really tight image, but I assume otherwise.

Post more plz.

edit: just realized 4 way action, that changes things a bit, but the pots huge so I still don't think Ax is folding.

[QUOTE=Bob148;36321007]It's co vs btn vs bb, I doubt that Ax is folding to a flop 3 bet or turn and river bets. That is unless bb has a really tight image, but I assume otherwise.

Post more plz.

edit: just realized 4 way action, that changes things a bit, but the pots huge so I still don't think Ax is folding.[/QUOTE

Read the hsnd history before you "post more plz" me.

If theres one thing people understand it's an ace on a dry flop after a 4 bet pf. A lot of players won't raise a weaker ace cause it's a wa /wb spot. So when it's raised and cold called, this should get our attn. We get one extra BB by 3 betting the flop. When we're beat we lose an extra BB and possibly lose 2-4 BB's if villan(s) aren't completely ******ed and can fold A4 after our cap pf 3 bet the flop line on this board.

There it is, thanks.

If it somehow gets checked through on the turn or river it sucks, I do concede.

I actually think it takes a relatively strong player to fold Ax in SB's spot, either facing 2 more on the flop or 2 cold on the turn. Given its unlikely SB is this type of player, I think the chances of him folding Ax postflop is close to zero.

I believe a lot of players in Btn's spot will value raise a fair amount of Ax on this flop multi-way. Not putting in more action just seems way to pessimistic. (I like 3-betting the flop. If I chose to delay to turn we should slow down if its 2 cold back to us.) Even if Btn has a monster he might just chose to cap the flop in which case we only lose 1/2 BB when behind and gain 1BB when ahead.

There was a time when Raise-3bet-coldcall preflop meant you were up again some very good hands. You needed to be circumspect about capping or even playing at all.

That era ended long ago. AQs is a mandatory cap unless you have specific reads showing you are outgunned. Being suited is a huge extra advantage in a 4-way pot.

The flop call instead of 3-betting is bad for two reasons:

1. It's a 3-way pot. You have no assurance you can collect from both opponents on the turn so charge them the maximum now.

2. By feigning weakness you may create insoluble problems on the turn (as actually happened). Button could be c-betting because he is strong or merely because it is his turn. SB could have a monster or merely be hoping to fold you out because you look weak. There is no way to tell and you can expect to make some very costly mistakes.

After you show weakness by calling the flop even a humble donk bet by SB would put you in a very uncomfortable position.

The underlying problem is your hand is not good enough to slowplay. If you had a genuine monster like 77 you would welcome the excessive action and it would be an easy decision to raise or 3-bet. Calling the flop would make a lot more sense.

5 handed 5/10. AQs is almost like AA here.

Leader's pf ranges look about right to me. Easy cap pre.

I like waiting for the turn to reraise because I feel like sb's most common hand is a weak ace that wants to get to showdown and I'm focused on getting the max from him. It's close enough that a fast played flop is fine tho and less likely to induce self-made errors later in the hand.

After sb's turn raise, calling down is probably best (but gross) against a guy tagged as 'weird.'

So if he chose to cap the flop , we fold turn?
Or do you mean we loose 1/2 BB more on top of the BB we calldown, if he caps?