$40-80 LO8; 9 Handed

I raise utg with AAxx, all fold except for the small blind. He rarely folds his blinds and will often put up a fight after the flop, too. He may not get overly aggressive all the time but he doesn't like to fold right away either. He's not a complete drooler but I wouldn't say he's a winning player if I had to guess.

Flop: KK8

Check/Check.

Turn: 6(completing the rainbow board)

Bet/raise.

I'm trying to play these 'way ahead, way behind' type of flops a little different than usual. And, I know there are several lines to take; some players will just go for pure value and bet every street, while others may freeze up on a particular street(possibly) losing value. I decided that raising the turn after checking back on the flop would be fun. A line I don't use very often. I also thought, that if I was ahead(and I just felt that I was, hence the raise) that some of the other players would get confused by it because I'm usually a "bet bet bet" kinda player and not quite as "trappy". But, I don't know, maybe I'm losing value taking the above approach(?), I just don't want to fall into predictable mode and I'm looking for a few spots to try on my "trappy shoes."

Please chime in. There are never any wrong answers.

The XX seems important, I'm assuming no low cards?

I don't love it simply because I doubt you want to check back hands like AJ24 here. AA and AK are your only hands that don't hate this flop so I'd rather strengthen my betting range than my checking range, which is probably nonexistent.

Also FYI I like this play better with AA2x/AA3x type hands, Letting a low card roll off on the turn won't hurt your equity then, and you can trap a worse two way or low hand that might have folded the flop.

I have not yet read DQ's response. (I see that he has responded, but I won't read what he has to say until I finish my response independently).

SB may have read Hero's pre-flop raise as "possibly AA**." (That's more or less how many players would read it). SB may more or less expect a continuation bet from Hero.

SB checks. But instead of making a continuation bet, Hero checks behind.

OK. (Meh). Sitting in Hero's shoes, I'd more or less expect SB to come out swinging on the turn... probably not with quad kings, but either with or without K***, almost regardless of the turn.

No surprise there.

As SB I would wonder, "What's this? Did Hero slow play flopped trip kings on the second betting round? Did Hero raise pre-flop with something like AK** instead of with AA**?"

Without K*** (or a full house or quads), sitting in SB's shoes I might fold, trusting that Hero was ahead whether he had AK** or AA**. Or especially if I didn't trust Hero, I might plan to call it down, just to see what cards Hero held.

With K*** (or a full house or quads), sitting in SB's shoes I might re-raise, wanting Hero to pay for the chance of possibly connecting on the river.

Interesting.

I think this is probably one of those spots... interesting.

I'll post this and then read what DQ (and maybe others) had to say.

Buzz

If you don't have low cards with your AA the flop check is not so good.

If you have low cards it's ok however if the guy is as bad as you say, why not just value bet him?

With the line you took, I don't understand the point off the turn raise. At that point I would just call. He will call or reraise if you are behind and fold if you are ahead.

I think the point of the turn raise would be to charge or fold out low draws. Not sure I agree with checking the flop though.

not cbetting this flop is bad and extremely unbalanced. taking it down right away is a lot better than letting a bdld suck out for half. would expect most pocket pairs to continue on this flop (in which you are missing a lot of value).

I would lead the flop almost always. No need to get cute here. As played, just call turn for reasons already given.

Agreed, and yes these would be my reasons also if I chose to raise turn.
Agreed with most of this. Except for him folding if you are ahead. He will still probably call with all his good low and/or straight draws, and some JJ-QQ.
I do this kind of flop check-back too sometimes to mix it up etc, and can also help to strengthen my checking-back range in other spots. Although, it doesn't sound like this is really the opponent to do it against, and as said, with no low cards I would lean towards betting here, and get him to fold a lot of his equity like bdlds etc that stay in on the 6 turn.

These were some of the golden nuggets ^ that I definitely agree with.

Thanks again

Rush17, it's been years since i played east coast live. they still got regular blue/black chip mixed games going on the regular???

your question/post looks to me like one of game-theory and balance. how often you check back a king on the flop is pretty much your answer....if you check back AK and A2xx the same amount of time then your play is ok. however, you still miss value in a limit game. big bet is much closer and more manipulative.

if the guy is a calling station and peels no matter what, you missed value on the flop....

Borgata usually has at least two higher limit mixed games going on, one is between 30/60 and 75/150 and is often straight OE, the other is around 200/400 and has more draw games in the mix. They have separate sets of regulars for the most part. Parx also has 75/150 HOE on Tuesdays.

As of now with a lot of people still out in Vegas, the mix games have been hit or miss and the weekend game that's been going is a straight OE game(yellow chips: 80/160).

Re: the hand, the bottom line is that I missed value and as you know it's hard to make that up in limit.

I'm folding a bad AAxx in UTG 9 handed

But post flop, I like the line. I don't mind the flop check which may have given him a low draw because you are charging him for it on the turn. And if the turn did not bring a low draw your flop check may have enticed a worthless low hand to try and bluff. Saying you missed value in that hand seems abit results oriented. Next time you may induce a zero equity hand to bluff a big bet. And how much action is QQxx going to put in?

I'll leave it to you fine gents to debate "balancing" and "game theory".

I'm too busy drinking, winning, and having fun when I play to worry about all of that

It's hard to fold even a bad AAxx in these games. And unless the game is super loose(which rarely it is), I think raising yields the best results. Your other comments re: postflop have good merit, fair enough. Do you realize that your line was all about balance? Speaking of which...


Who says I'm not drinking and having fun?

It's very possible you make way better decisions with it postflop and could make money with my discards. Personally I think I save chips and keep myself from going on tilt. If I feel good about my decisions, I usually play better. So if I'm in EP I feel okay about folding a marginal somewhat reverse implied odds hand.

Was it about balance? I'll leave that you gize, but just thought your line got hands doing very badly against your hand to put more chips into the pot and was worth gambling half the pot to do so.

Nice man, I'm normally the only one boozing and drinks are free!

...who knows if I make better postflop decisions, I try to make good decisions(and I know when I'm not)and I'm sure there are players who could make money off of my discards, as well. And I'd never tell you that folding a rough AAxx hand was a mistake because even aside from how we play postflop, there's really more to it than just that.

"If I feel good about my decisions, I usually play better." Me too. But I'm open to try new things, too, and some of the threads that I read on here do help me to see certain situations from a different light.

very normal cbet on the flop, we rate to have the best hand and are in position

no need to overthink it


when we raise utg in a 9 handed game only to check flops like these, we are giving opponents a lot of ways to exploit us

how so?

overly passive lines create lots of extra equity for opponents in multiple ways - for starters, cards can be seen cheaper, and ranges sometimes become extremely well-defined

my point is when OP is raising a premium range from UTG 9-handed there is very little (if any) extra value to be created by balancing on this kind of texture by sometimes checking - our continuation bet has such a high value regardless of our exact range that it is extremely difficult for any alternative to be more compelling

What are we planning if Villian 3! I think taking this line gives Villian a chance to outplay us.

With no low draw, we have to give up on the turn, correct?

I know everything always depends, but this really does depend. Overall, I'm not a LAGggy player so when someone does three bet it here, I have to really feel that they got me and aren't just making a play because they know I'm capable of laying a hand down. It's a fine line but with enough history the line becomes more defined.

Let's say Villain plays the top third of the hands dealt him.

If I'm doing this correctly, he possibly can have any one of 35044 hands, 30151 of which have no king and therefore 35044-30151=4893 of which do.

Thus he's 30151/4893= about 6 to 1 to not have a king, assuming he plays the top third of hands dealt him.

I don't know how Villain plays his KK** hands after this KK8 flop. Does he slow play them all? Does he usually slow play them? I think it might depend on the situation. He's only about 1% to have the missing two kings.
(~1% is from 35044-34578=466. 466/35044=0.013).

I think Villain probably raises the turn bet with a single king, to charge Hero for a possible low draw.

Thus about one hand in six Villain is more or less expected to have a hand expected to three-bet after Hero's turn check/raise.

Otherwise, without a king, what does Villain do when Hero check/raises him on the turn?

Well... what about a pair of eights? Could Villain be holding 88**? How often is a pair of eights included in a top third starting hand? Back to ProPokerTools:
35044-34822=222
222/35044=0.006348=~1/158... (about one in a hundred fifty eight). And he probably doesn't slow play the flop with 88** anyhow. Thus Hero can ignore the trivial possibility Villain has 88**.

What about the possibility of Villain bluff three betting after Hero's raise? Does he dare? (I don't think that is likely, but just my opinion).

So I think if Villain does have a king, he does re-raise, and if he doesn't, he folds to Hero's turn raise. Thus if Hero raises here, intending to fold if Villain three bets, I think Hero figures to collect seven small bets six times out of seven and lose four small bets one time out of seven.

I think a turn raise by Hero is a brilliant play (assuming I'm using ProPokerTools data correctly).

Buzz

Specific reads on villain's flop play important here.

This type of player ("rarely folds his blinds and will often put up a fight after the flop") often loves to donk flops he thinks are bad for your range (he's almost certainly not thinking in those terms though). When he does so, his range is generally polarized.

If your villain conforms to this profile, your raggedy Aces can easily punish his depleted checking range. Starting on the flop.

Semigrunching--I read DQ's response but no others.


If our opponent is straightforward and loose, we should bet AA9T for value. If he is straightforward and tight, we bet this for protection because low cards still have equity and we'd like to make him surrender it. It sounds like our opponent is one of these, or perhaps somewhere in the middle.

If our opponent is tricky or at least observant, it's far more important for this case to fit in our overall strategy for how to play dry paired flops, not just be played in isolation.

More thoughts but I'll leave it there for now.

Really? I'd think the reason to check it back is to balance all our near-whiffs where we'd like to see a free turn--things like backdoor lows, gutshots with backdoor flush, etc.

If we're betting Kx here and betting A234 (or 2345, if for some reason we played it this way) then I agree, only checking big pocket pairs here against an observant opponent is bad for that reason. Against a straightforward/unobservant opponent, it's bad for other reasons.

Oops, yes, I'm not playing AhAc9dTs here either. (Probably folding with one nut suit and no low; with a nut suit and an 8 I'd be tempted; with a nut suit and a 5 it's a clear open for me.) In playing this our hope is that everyone but the BB folds and we play against a random hand, and even then we're only 56%. We're laying implied odds with our one-way hand unless it flops a set, especially if someone behind us has a reasonable O8 hand leaving us OOP.