Winning Poker Network (Yatahay) - $4 NL (6 max) - Holdem - 3 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

Hero (SB): 122.59 BB
BB: 105.63 BB (VPIP: 21.62, PFR: 20.27, 3Bet Preflop: 9.09, Hands: 85)
BTN: 134.08 BB (VPIP: 39.22, PFR: 27.45, 3Bet Preflop: 16.67, Hands: 54)

Hero posts SB 0.5 BB, BB posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 1.5 BB) Hero has Q Q

fold, Hero raises to 2 BB, BB raises to 9 BB, Hero raises to 27 BB, BB calls 18 BB

Flop: (54 BB, 2 players) J J K
Hero checks, BB bets 17.7 BB, Hero calls 17.7 BB

Turn: (89.4 BB, 2 players) K
Hero checks, BB checks

River: (89.4 BB, 2 players) 7
Hero checks, BB bets 60.93 BB and is all-in, Hero ?

Villain had been 3betting me quite a bit and seemed aggressive. Hadn't shown down many hands. I had not gotten out of line yet and this was my first 4bet at the table.

What do we think his range is after calling the 4bet here?

What are we doing with our full 4bet range on this flop? Are we betting AK/AA for value? Do we check other hands to protect our range? On the river, do we just lay this down?

I would fold. Not many natural bluffs when you block the straight draws so hard. Also don't expect most players to bluff river with A high or stab the flop with a pocket pair under the jack.

Additionally, he has a lot of incentive to slowplay turn with his boats because your hand looks like it's only capable of calling 1-2 streets and he needs no protection.

Well there are only 2 streets of betting given SPR...

What are we doing with our full range on this board? Should we be betting AK/KK+ on the flop? If so, QQ is really the best hand we can have after we check flop, so we should probably call. I probably 4bet TT BvB and x/call the flop as well.

Or maybe we should slowplay KK for balance to protect our QQ hands?

QQ does block a lot of the Kx and Jx hands that Villain could have.

Why don't you sim this spot in piosolver with your range? :-)
I think "what are we doing with our range" questions are better answered by a solver than by a forum.
My guess would be fwiw that you could fullrange cbet this board texture.
If you are going with a polar cbetting strategy, you definitely need to work in some stronger checks.
Checking a capped range out of position on the flop is a recipe for disaster, and never the strategy you should be using.
The logic is that once you check capped at QQ, villain can go for stacks very wide, and once he's stabbing very wide your strong hands start wanting to go into the checking range. There is some equilibrium in the end but it definitely involves checking a decent amount of strong hands.

Regarding river... it's just a bluffcatching spot. Intuitively I like folding because it's a bit of a scary board for people to run bluffs on psychologically, but villain should definitely have a lot of pocketpairs and suited connectors that potentially bluff here, so it's not a mandatory overfolding spot.

^^I'm a rec player just starting to play poker a bit more after taking a few years mostly off. I still only play a little bit here and there outside of my day job. The solver stuff is new to me, and I haven't taken the time to setup the solver and figure out the ins and outs. I really should one of these days but just haven't gotten around to it.

In the meantime, posting to these forums is an easier way of getting quick feedback and learning how folks think nowadays.

Everything you say on the hand makes sense.

4bet size is too large IMO. It's a poor risk/reward for bluffs (risking 25bb to win 11), and also looks more committing, so our opponents may not continue as light with his calls/shoves, either. You can generally accomplish more in this spot with a 4b sizing around 23-24 BB.

I definitely don't mind a whole range bet on the flop for a small amount (~12-14 BB), or trying to build a check range here with hands like {KK, KQ, AQ, QQ} and still small betting the rest of our range. I'm not a solver guy but definitely lean towards playing that group as cks in practice for the most part.

Honestly spots like these can be tricky... In general, in 4-bet pots, your going to have to be willing to take some of your weaker value hands to the river. If you don't your going to be exploited.

You the fact that villain flatted your 4-bet pre is a good sign that you are ahead. You're playing 3-handed. The table dynamic changes immensely and people 3-bet much wider than in a full ring game. Because of this people tend open their 3-bet, 4-bet, and flatting ranges.
Should villain have the top portion of his range here, theoretically he should be 5-betting, and if he is as a spewey as you say he is, he is 5-betting the top portion of his range close to 100% of the time. Think about it. With the fact that he flatted a 3-bet here doesn’t convince me that his flatting range is weighted towards strong holdings when playing 3 handed. Usually when I get flatted in these spots I’m not worried about it.
Going into the hand, you have the range advantage, as well as the best holding a large percentage of the time. When the flop comes, you should be leading with a very high frequency, regardless of what the flop is. The only time I would consider checking would be if I had the near nuts on the flop with while holding blockers. In spots like that you can afford to allow villain to catch up or bluff off.
The flop is Js, Jd, Kc.
Yeah, he could have a jack-x or king-x combo here. If he does congrats, he out flopped you. It happens, it shouldn’t affect your overall strategy. Like I said above you should be leading a large percentage of the time. You can easily rep this flop and define villains range based on whether he calls or raises. But in general, in 3-bet pots, you are going to need to be leading a lot of the time. The only downside to getting called here means that villains range becomes more defined towards having holdings that have you beat. The worst holdings he can have here that he would float with are lower PP, and strait draws.
So, on this flop I like that you checked.
When going into hands, I generally have a plan for ultimately how I want to play the hand. I have a general plan for the lines I’m going to take given certain flop textures and how I should play my hand given certain table dynamics. Going into a hand like this, I would have consoled myself to seeing villain at the river and taking a line that maximizes his ability to bluff. If he has it, gg, snap rebuy.
You should be happy to call him down. Checking here allows him to bluff. So the fact that you check in this particular hand is a solid line. I know you are not loving calling him down here, but you should be ready to go the distance.
The turn is the King of diamonds. This is a very good card for you. It doesn’t change anything. You are either beat or you’re ahead. It does give however bring in the back diamonds. Yolo.
You check, I don’t mind it. I find it peculiar that villain chose to check here. This is a good sign and I would elect at this point to check all rivers other than a queen. Should a queen fall on the river I would elect to bet suspiciously small hoping to call a check raise but not allow any weak PP and Ax hands to get to a free show down.


The river is the 7 of diamonds. Well some backdoors got there, but again usually villain would be betting out with his flush draws on the turn, even jamming the turn. This would be fairly standard for him to do this. So even though some back doors got there, at this point I’m ready to go the distance, and stack off when I check over to villain.
You check, villain jams.
I know you’re not loving it, but you need to now replay the hand in your head and realized ultimately his 3-bet flatting range isn’t that strong overall on a 3 handed table. Giving his previous play style we can make some fairly accurate assumptions and conclude that he would be 5-betting his strongest holdings 3 handed and his 5-betting range would be somewhere between 10-15%. This is a strong 5-betiting range pre, in a 3 handed game. So the fact that he didn’t means we can knock a lot of those holdings out, many of these holdings wouldn’t be checking back the turn. The fact that he checked the turn is key. If he bet the turn he would most likely have to be jamming. If he had any value hands he would be jamming them, and any diamond draws he would be jamming here with a frequency of somewhere around 50% (in general.)
So the fact that he is now jamming the river, ultimately it doesn’t add up.
You are calling his jam here.
The key factors to this hand are you being 3 handed, villain flatted 3-bet instead of 4-betting, villain is spewey and would be 5-betting top % of his range. Villain checked turn, and you took a line hopefully with the sole purpose of letting villain hang himself. You check- calling him down here and not stacking off here, is high exploitable as well.
I hoped this help you somewhat. Please let me know if you need some more clarification on some things. I you disagree with me here please let me know and I would be happy to explain myself further or change my opinion on this hand.
Well played.

Aren't we giving him way too good odds if we 4bet that small? I used to 4bet small, but I've come around to thinking that we don't want to give players an easy profitable flat with their entire 3bet range.

Always checking back JJ and KK. I would mix betting AK and AA. Always check/calling QQ here. I would probably bet all missed hands you have here.

Versus a lot of aggro players, I'm checking back this flop with everything good and will let them bluff away their stack.

I think versus most people I'd check/fold QQ on the river, but it certainly is player dependent. You clearly made the right choice versus this guy since he had 98s.

I would not bet 2BBs from SB. BB has odds to continue with everything. Raise size needs to be at least 2.5BBs imo. I prefer 3x actually.

So on this exact flop, I check my entire 4 betting range SB vs BB. I'd like to hear some more arguments on why we should have a mixed strategy.

I also lean towards folding the river (nice call though).

Really don't like villain's line with 98s.

I think you have a lot of fold equity on this board versus a lot of opponents. So if I'm holding A2s or some random hand that missed, I'll want to have a betting range.

I'm not sure if you were talking about in general or versus this specific opponent, so I assumed in general.