Commerce 20

I have red aces. Tight lady opens cutoff, maniac lag calls button, I three bet small blind, lady caps, maniac calls.

Flop is Q97

I check, lady bets, maniac raises, I three bet, both call.

Turn is J

I check, lady bets, maniac calls, I call.

River is 4

I check, lady bets, maniac tank folds

I'd bet the turn. The presence of the maniac changes peoples value ranges significantly to the point that we should be value betting thinner.

Bet/fold?

No I'd bet call. Plenty of outs vs 2 pair.

Lady shouldn't ever have two pair here, so you can probably bet/fold the turn if she raises. Maniac could have 2 pair or raise a pair+draw though.

So she can't have Q9s? Op says tight lady, not huge nit opens cutoff.

Don't do that. If you're not bet/folding this, you're not bet/folding anything (since the rest of your value range should be at least an overpair + gutter at this juncture). The non-FD AA is a perfect bet/fold candidate.

Not when tight lady caps it up pre and raises the turn on Q97cc-Jc

With a maniac in the pot, I'm not bet folding any value hands, ever.

In that case I think 3 betting the flop is a mistake.

Leak here IMO.

I think we do better by check calling potential bet fold hands as an exploit.

Now we're missing value. But really, I don't see players like described CO raise here with anything red AA has any sort of equity against. It's not AQ. It's not KK. It's not a bad bluff/FSDR with TT. We also have plenty of hands to defend against this raise against (AcQ, QQ, 99, 77, AcA, KcK, AcKc, AcTc, JJ maybe, QJs), so we certainly aren't obligated to call red AA if we decide to bet and face a raise.

If that's true then I disagree with the op's "maniac" read. Maniacs make bluffcatchers go up in value.

Do we have to 3b the flop? I think I'm okay with flatting here.

We aren't even discussing folding to the maniac. There's a lady in this pot who has capped, and now bet and called two cold on this flop. You really want to call down her raise on a turn Jc?

Couldn't she had KK with a club ...AA with a cluB.
KQ or AQ with a club ?
She might raise for a free SD ,etc.
She might have QJ so we have outs as well.

I am never folding AA here on the turn to a raise.

Ps I am calling the river and I am pretty sure c/c turn is better than bet fold .
You can bet fold red KK or AQ instead of AA unless you fold all those hands as well ....?

KK with a club no. The other two aces maybe. Our equity is still terrible versus the hands she'd elect to raise us with. Yes we should be folding very rarely, but the two red aces seem like the nut hand to be doing it with.

Edit: I'll give you my unadjusted range of hands that take this line for me:

Flushes: AcKc, AcTc, KcTc (3)
Straights: null (0)
Sets: QQ, 99, 77 (9)
Two pair: QJ, Q9s (12)
Overpairs with a club: AA, KK (6)
Overpairs without a club: AA, KK (6)
Top pairs with a club: AQ, KQ (6)

I'd check this turn w/ my AQ/KQ no club, so the worst bucket of hands to continue with facing a raise is obviously overpairs without a club. Of the 42 combos here, if we choose to drop 3 when she's risking 2 BB into a 12 BB pot, we are far from overfolding.

Of course versus the maniac, he can just win his money here against us if he were to raise our bet because folding overpairs to him is a bad idea.

I think she would be hard pressed to raise KK AA with a club on the turn against my action there.

If she'd ever make this play with the remaining AAc, or the 3 KcKx combos, that's 1 you tie, and 3 you beat out of the 14 combos you're presumably giving her (9 sets, AKcc). The Qc, Jc, and 9c are all on the board so you'd have 2 outs to crack a set. It costs 2 bets to win 15 (assuming maniac folds turn). I think it's awfully close. If she could ever have AcQx, it's really not that close.

It sounds like hindsight, but it's why I don't hate flatting the flop and not putting ourselves in this position. On a maybe unrelated note, I think flatting pre is also viable fwiw.

Unlikely you have two aces to crack a set; the ace of clubs is more likely than not to give someone a flush.

I think in these spots you can ask tight lady a simple question like ''big hand?" and be pretty confident in your read. It's takes a special type of tight lady to turn a hand we beat into a bluff. It's more plausible she turns a set into a bluff than a AQ, KK no club combo. Also don't think villain bet/folds anything in this spots.

No but we should be discussing the way the maniac's presence will affect proper play here. I think that once we 3 bet the flop, we should pretty much never fold unless we are sure we're beat and are drawing too thin to call. If you're sure we're beat if and when the lady raises the turn, then I don't fault a fold there.

I think you played it fine and I would fold river I guess.

Hola ninefingershuffle,

Porque check?

Con mucho gusto,

ErnestoCorneliusGuzman