Outplaying a bad reg in a very unbalanced spot
This is a hand I've played at 5-10 deepstack against a bad reg with who I have a lot of history. Vilain defended his blind vs my LP raise, and gave me a great leverage to bluff my whole stack on a stone cold bluff. Here is how it goes.
History
Vilain is a bad reg with many leaks, having difficulty to adjust and has a huge ego. Ive played a lot with him a got the upper hand in so many hands, calling him down very light and bluffing him out of big pots. It seems clear to me that I am a better player than he is, but instead of avoiding me, he constantly tries to outplay me back. Having the ability to recognize your edge vs players is a very important skill. Let your ego on the side, and be objective. If a player is more skilled than you or equally skilled, you should avoid as much as possible playing against him, especially in bad spots (No position advantage, no card advantage, no skill advantage= clearly EV-). Im glad vilain could not recognize that, because i litterally printed money vs him.
The hand
Everybody fold to me in Co, I raise to 30 with JhTh (BTN and SB are nits, BB = vilain). Now in this spot, when BTN is a nit, and there is a bad player in the blinds, i'll have an oppening range close to 50%, and vilain knows it and likes to 3bet my raise here. I will raise between 35 and 45 if the blinds are passive, and 30 if one of the blind is very aggressive. That is the case here. T9s plays extremely well vs a bad player IP, so I'm never folding to a 3bet (when playing deep) from aggressive player here. Raising smaller will allow me to call a 3bet and play my hand confortably in smaller pot. BTN and SB fold, BB call.
Vilain has around 2100 and we cover him.
Pot 65$
Kd - 6d – 2x
Vilain checks. This is the type of board I will cbet 100% , regardless of my hand. Its a great flop because its absolutly doesn't hit vilain's range.
Since vilain is 3bet happy (KQo+,KJs+), the best pair he can have here his KJo, in which case he will take a check-call line most of the time. He could have 2's and 6's too, but that's about it. Vilain is very aggressive with all of his draws (check-raise everytime his gutshots, openended and FD), so his check-raise will be very unbalanced toward bluffs and semi-bluffs rather than value. I don't need to cbet big since its hard for vilain to have connected with this and by doing so, I can induce a bluff. I bet 35 with the plan of never folding to a raise here. He just call.
Turn 135, Ad
This is an awesome card for us. It's a great bluffing card. Vilain check, and I bet 75$. I don't need to make a big bet here because I don't want him to fold the turn. If he calls, I can overbet big the river (2-3x pot) to put a lot of pressure on his weak calling range. He check-raise me to 225. This is great! Here is why :
Vilain never has the flush. Here is what he can have in this spot :
2 pairs : A2s & A5s = 5 combos
Set : 2's & 6's = 6 combos and very unlikely that he waits for this card to raise, and would raise 80% of the time with it on the flop.
Flush : QJs-Q7s
JTs-J7s
T9s-T7s
98s-96s
Out of these 15 combos, I would say he check-raise the flop 90% of the time (can't resist attacking the small cbet with with a equity hand) and would only call like 10% of the time = 2 combos
Bluffs : A lot. If vilain doesnt like to fold to me, he will float my cbet on this kind of board with air a lot of the time. Now once he float my cbet on the turn, he's is always going to take this turn card to bluff me. Otherwhise, he can't win the hand. I'd say he have 20 to 50 bluffing combos here since he floats a lot on the flop.*
Most players don't give credit to a call(bet-call the raise) on the turn here. That is a leak in assuming that aggressive players will automaticly 3bet the turn if they have the flush. Vilain should feel good to bet his 2 pairs on river + continue bluffing the river.
Resume? He has 3-4 combos that will call me down vs anywhere from 25 to 50 combos that will bet/fold river. How do we maximize? We can raise the turn here and takedown the hand right now or we can wait on the river and capitalize on even more dead aggressive money from vilain. He has about 1800$ left so he has enough money left for us to make a big raise.
My perceived range? If he doesn't have the flush, can I rep it by the river? Of course. I bet flop, bet turn/ call raise, and bet big / raise river. He definitively will have to put me on a flush if I either overbet river / raise river.
By the way, we are way more happy if he bets the river than if he checks. If he checks, the pot is 585$ and it will be hard to make him fold 2pairs. Overbetting can put pressure on him but it polarizes our range and he can find a call. If he bet, it gives us the leverage to raise ship and looks way stronger than to overbet.
I call.
River 585, 8x
Vilain bets 485, we ship for around 1300 more, vilain tanks and fold A8. We show the stone cold bluff and vilain his on super tilt. Boom. We pounced on almost 800$ of dead aggressive money with absolutly nothing and we just put vilain on tilt for the rest of the session. We are happy
Now it is important on the river to control our stress level. I've been in many situations like that since I've started playing poker and they are still very unconfortable. This is stressing to bluff away 200bb, and its absolutly important not to show that we are stressed. Avoid giving any tells is crucial in that kind of situation because very skilled live 5-10 players can find a call, if they have a tell on you. Avoid playing with chips, don't talk / answer questions, look at the center of the table, and control your breathing. Don't shove to fast, take your time like you would usually do in a value situation.This is what I call execution of the bluff. If its well done , this type of play should work many times on the long run.
I hope you enjoyed reading this hand and don't hesitate to comment
Twitter : @jonathan_spew