Full Tilt Poker $1/$2 No Limit Hold'em - 2 players
2+2 Hand Converter Powered By DeucesCracked

Hero (BTN/SB): $200.00
BB: $317.00

Pre Flop: Hero is BTN/SB with 4 T
Hero raises to $6, BB calls $4

Flop: ($12.00) 9 4 5 (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $8, BB raises to $25, Hero calls $17

Turn: ($62.00) 8 (2 players)
BB checks, Hero checks

River: ($62.00) 6 (2 players)
BB bets $46, Hero calls $46


Villain seems like a standard reg. We have no history, so I figured that he was pretty much never checkraising 77 and 97. His range is pretty much {78, flush, air}, so I call assuming that a flush draw bets the turn most of the time. Makes sense?

flop call = bad

Why? We have no history, so his value range is narrow and his bluffing range is wide. Sure, he has 25% equity with ATC, but I'm in position and he won't vbet a 5,6,7 or 8 should he pair it, and he'll even pot-control a paired overcard some % of the time. 3bet/folding is meh, and folding is weak.

It's deepish and you have 4 outs to a decent, playable hand. And the other 40 some cards all suck -- did it hit your opponent? is he double barreling with overs/draws? is he checking with a 9/5? Did he spike that K on the river? Is he betting a busted draw on the river because I checked behind on the turn?

You have no hope other than getting lucky by spiking a card or freakishly guessing right when your opponent bets better hands / bluffs

i have not found the standard regs at 1/2 to have wide bluffing checkraise ranges in this spot.

Checkraising a 5 on the flop without history is something that few people will do. If he checkraised a 9, he'll rarely ever check the turn with it.

So what's the worst hand you call the flop with? 66-88 have the same relative value as our hand (they fare better against the random straight draws he could have, but it's harder for them to improve against top pair/two pair). Weak 9x hands are slightly better, but every card in the deck sucks for them too (did he turn an overcard? did he just make a straight?).

His value range is uber narrow (44 and 99 are mega unlikely, he may or may not play 54s, a lot of people check call most decent 9x there without history). Floating the flop with ATC is probably profitable, let alone doing it with a pair.

I think i muck flop without knowing villains tendencies, for reasons ivan gives. Surely river is 1 of the worst cards in the deck for you against his flop c/ring range?

lol, why couldn't he have been check raising with hearts?

edit: also fold flop

edit 2: also fold river

edit 3: also fold preflop

Actually, I think this hand and your thinking on it is very instructive for two mistakes player starting out in HU make. Your thoughts are -- "I think he's bluffing with some frequency, I have a hand that beats bluffs --> his range is polarized (its really tough to make a hand HU), I'll call."

Also, In your responses you aren't particularly modest or open to the criticism given here, I think this also is a mistake that people make at all levels where they get convinced/stubborn they are right and misunderstood even in the face of fairly wide dissension.

Your thinking is wrong because it ignores how you will play your hand on subsequent streets, also because you don't have any clue about his bluffing frequency other than a guess from the stakes.

I'm not saying its never right to make light calldowns or to turn a weak made hand into a rebluff, or even to play high variance guessing games; but there's nothing in your read here that suggests that you are likely to expect a long term profit from any of these moves in this situation. Since you cannot expect to make good decisions on later streets (mostly you are just continuing to guess), since you also don't have any reason to think you have an edge in guessing, I think this is a pretty clear flop fold.

I'd check the flop here prob

First of all opening 10 4o is not profitable in very many situations, this is not one of them. Calling a c/r on the flop is bad because what do you do when he continues betting on the turn and you dont hit a miracle 10 or 4, fold obv, so therefore you are just throwing extra money away. Ok specific to this example turn goes check check, thats fine, but the river just fold, even some of his bluffs like A4 that he decided to turn into a bluff beats you. The only real hand you have beat here that didnt make its draw is 23, and villain is going to have you beat a ton more of the time than you have him beat considering you only even beat about half of his bluffs.

heh, 23 did get there

to be honest, the only hand that i can really understand villain getting to this point with that you still beat is JT

i think i would have done the opposite of what you did every time it was our turn

Eh if it was a 4 color deck I would have seen that 23 made its draw.

fold pf fold flop fold turn fold river

just fold at the earliest street possible

Fold river>>Shove>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>call

Yeah fold flop unless he's c/r a very polarized range and will shut down with air on later streets. Both flop and river are easy folds unless you have some crazy read.