First time posting here so not sure if this is the right place. Feel free to call me fish and smash me. Wanna hear different opinions and your thoughts about the hand.
Live Cash at the Casino. Blinds 2-3. 3 Regulars, they are friends with each other on the table. 4 Recreational, 1 of them very bad and loose (on my right). Old Chinese woman, who played aggressive but straight forward so far.
After 4 hours on the table, I have been pretty much card dead. Played a couple of big pots where I played aggressively vs 1 recreational. I didnīt Cbet most of my OR as I was getting 4 or 5 callers and not hitting, no range advantage. I have the feeling people on the table thing I am very neat, specially the regulars.
UTG +2 ( Young Regular 1). Had a couple of hands against him before. He fold a previous 3bet vs me. He is openning around 30% Raise 15 $
HJ (Young Regular 2). A bit more loose and aggressive than the other two regulars. I think he tilts easy. Called 15 Call 15 $
CO (Young Regular 3). Called 15 Call 15 $
Dealer (Recreational super loose, worse players at the table) Call 15$
TOTAL POT 68$
SB (Hero) playing a stack of 325$ (around 100bb) with Ajo raise to 110$
Thoughts: I am usually raising here Ajs+, JJ+, Aqo -Ako, sometimes A2-A 10s, I think because of my image on the table, it is a good spot.
BB fold, utg +1 fold, utg + 2 fold, HJ call (around 100bb), CO and Dealer fold. 2 players to the flop
TOTAL POT $288
FLOP: 3 5 9 rainbow.
POT: 288$. Hero 215$. Villain: 170$
I bet 85$ he goes all in while he says " Donation" for 170$. He said the same when he paid a short stack an all in preflop of 30bb with Q9s $543 has to put 90$
Thoughts: His range: 66-10 10 (I think he would have 3 bet JJ+), A10s -Aqs, Aqo - Ako,KQs. I donīt think so but He may have sometimes A5s or similar + some random suited connectors?
Odds too good to fold, aren't they even tough I am behind for sure? I called T 5 R 6. He showed AQo
Thoughts in my head: Once the flop came: Should I donk bet all in to try to make fold hands like AQ, AK or does a bet of ž of the pot give me more credibility? I think I would bet 1/3 or 1/4 with all my hands in that texture and my range here is: Ajs+, JJ+, Aqo -Ako. I thought he may even put me in AK, JJ+... In this case I was out of my range with AJo.
Thoughts: I usually play NL 25 online, this was my 3 time this month playing LIVE Cash, table were a bit harder yesterday than previous time. Extra Question: How many regulars would you think is reasonable/profitable to have in a Live Cash table? When do you decide to change table at your cash game?
Hand: can you explain the reasoning behind your bet sizing both preflop and on the flop?
As a general guideline, if you ever feel committed to calling it off after you bet with a bluff and got shoved on, something went horribly wrong before that.
I don't consider myself a great player as I have much less experience than the players in this forum.
I don't mind the raise in the SB. However, I think you need to think about how many players called in the pot which is already a raise over the limper. That is why I would prefer calling with AJo. Most players in a $2/3 live game when calling a raise from UTG+1 are stronger than the original limper and even UTG+1, and will play AQ or AK and try to play to see a flop so they can see more flops when they call with hands like J10o, or even a garbage hand like K6o in a big multiway pot.
Now, once you raise out the bad hands, are on the flop, it makes sense to continue betting, given villain probably missed unless he had 99 sometimes 55 and 33. Usually, live players at the low stakes at casinos interpret this size of a bet on the flop as a bluff and will gladly go all in with AQ or AK. Unfortunately, that is bad for you when you bluff. But even if you have AA here, on a flop of 3 5 9, would you really bet $85? You would probably bet a smaller size, and hoped he was holding 1010 or JJ, or maybe call with QK-AK. Depending on how aggressive your opponent is you might even choose to check.
I would fold pre but if you raise, you are raising as a bluff because nothing worse should call. Of course who knows but pretend you are villain, would you call this massive 3bet with AT or 55? So what range do you put villain on when he calls? So when you get this flop, how is your equity against his range and how much fold equity do you have? I would suggest not much of either.
Think we can shove J or A high flops or a dry K-high flop where mid pockets pretty much have to fold and otherwise accept our bluff failed and give up.
AP run the calculations because I can't be arsed but I guess you likely have to call now.
1) AJ is raise or fold here IMO. Very few Flop make us really comfortable out of position. 'All' Ax hands can possibly have two pair whereas a raise should get most of the Arag hands to fold out, unless suited.
2) "Why so much?" A very common phrase at low limits. A 'kind of' rule of thumb is the that large raises like this are 'go away' bets. Typically not middling hands, but hands that really don't trust very many Flops when OOP (out of position). Are you betting the same amount with AA? The pot would be $83 if you flat, so I'm inclined to raise to between $70-100, possibly as low as $65, whatever you feel 'should' get you to a HU spot or take down the pot. It's never really fun to put 25-35% of your stack out there and then have to fold. But I think you should be able to get the same effect at $75-85 that you get at $110.
3) We actually get what we want, the loosest Player is the only one to call. Or is that really what we want? Some Players are very 'bad looking' but they 'always' seem to win the big pots ... don't underestimate a Player's ability to change gears by the River. IMO AQ is still a pretty loose call with the stacks involved against a large raise. You could easily have AK at worst but your previous activity will influence this as well. You've shown a history of checking when you miss, so he can steal this pot quite a bit perhaps ... and there's a bunch of dead chips in there too.
4) Due to our PF (Pre-Flop) sizing we really only have one choice here, which is to shove for less than pot. 'This' opponent is never just calling here, it's all-in or fold, so you might as well get all the chips in there and apply max pressure. He might call anyway getting better than 2 to 1 on his chips, but at least you didn't make it easy on him. With a 9-high Flop a Player 'sees' that you could have AA-TT here and they have two overs to the Board. Against TT-JJ it's almost a fair fight for the called off chips with the A and Q being live and two cards to go at 28%-ish.
5) If you had 3-bet smaller PF, you still could've shoved and offered less pot odds for him to call it off. A $75 bet would've made the pot $215 and V stack would've been $205 .. a much harder call-off IMO. The 'donation' comment tells me that he was not happy about this sizing but was holding out hope that at least one of his cards was drawing live.
6) As another indicated, once you 3-bet AJ it's as a bluff. So you need to act on the Flop the way you would with a better hand. Would you bet 'only' $85 with AA? Remember your PF bet looks like scared money, so would scared money really bet less on the Flop than before .. with these size stacks? It's very possible that the V calls it off anyway, but at least you don't give them HUGE odds to just call and see a Turn.
Nice try, IMO just two things to consider ... I would 3-bet smaller PF so that the pot odds aren't as good when we shove (not value bet) most Flops (against this opponent). GL
