PokerStars - $0.50 NL - Holdem - 9 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

SB: $90.56 20/3 (682)
BB: $44.39 41/3 (40)
UTG: $83.45
UTG+1: $42.00
MP: $40.78
MP+1: $20.00
MP+2: $47.50 25/18 (133) ATS 7/14; Fold to 3bet 5/6; Flop cbet 6/8
Hero (CO): $68.81
BTN: $38.50

SB posts SB $0.25, BB posts BB $0.50

Pre Flop: (pot: $0.75) Hero has A J

fold, fold, fold, fold, MP+2 raises to $1.50, Hero calls $1.50, fold, fold, BB calls $1.00

Flop: ($4.75, 3 players) K 2 J
BB checks, MP+2 bets $3.01, Hero calls $3.01, fold

Turn: ($10.77, 2 players) Q
MP+2 checks, Hero bets $6.00, MP+2 raises to $17.00, Hero..?

Preflop flatted rather than 3bet due to hand strength against villain's opening range and their high fold to cbet, also wanted to try and get the two fish in the blinds to join the party.

Comfortable with the call on the flop, but lost my way on the turn. Reviewing the hand I had nine clear outs to the nuts with a bunch of tainted outs to two pair or better as well. Would welcome thoughts on shove/call/fold at this point...

I'd consider mostly raising preflop from this position, and this hand illustrates why. You are in a pretty difficult position given how narrow your range should be here.

If you're flatting with this, I'd assume you're re-raising like AQ+, TT+, KQs, maybe some A5s and suited connector type hands to balance.

That means you're flatting with something like AT/AJ, KQo, some suited connectors, suited aces, and pocket pairs. Does that sound about right?

Your strongest hands here OTT are AT, 9Ts, KQ, KJs, QJs, and maybe 22 if you flat with that pre. That's 32 combos on this board. Some of that will be raising preflop, 9Thh/dd probably folds flop, but let's say you have something like 20-25 combos of very strong hands you want to bet for value and need to balance.

Your opponent has all of those hands, plus 22, JJ+ and AK which you don't. This means they can aggressively put you in a horrible spot with a variety of lines. Even if your opponent isn't playing particularly aggressively, it means you'll be putting money in with a weaker range than them.

The strategy I usually use on a texture like this where I have some very strong hands that benefit from protection, but my opponent have an overall stronger range, is to bet bigger with those hands (1-1.5x pot) and balance with weaker suited hands and hands with less equity but good blockers. Something like A8/89 with a FD or JT/QT.

In general, though, you're going to want to do a lot of checking on this board, even though your range is relatively strong. If you're betting AJ you're probably also betting KT, QT, JT with a flush draw, at which point your checking range becomes really weak.

As played, it's a weird spot, because I wouldn't expect my opponent to check-raise this turn much. In practice, most of villains very strong hands will probably just continue betting given how wet the board is. Hard to imagine two red jacks taking this line very often.

A check raise here seems like either a hand that has both strength now and redraws. Something like AK/AT/9T with a flush draw, or just a big combo draw, like QTcc.

As played, you can't fold. You only need to call $11 to win $44 immediately, plus you have the opportunity to cooler them on the river for the rest of their stack. Given that a weak club draw is the only hand you get value out of now that you might not later, re-raising seems a little thin. Curious to know what others think.

Thank you for the analysis and agreed - would normally have been a 3bet except for trying not to fold out the fish in the blinds.

I don't mind the flat IP pre, bit nitty but fine. As for turn play I like the bet, maybe a bit bigger and as ahellofanelk said can't be folding here and no point raising because we won't fold better. With rivers I'd call a jam on any spade/J/T and if checked-to I'd jam any spade or T and otherwise check behind.

You've obviously played against me then

The rest of the hand is...

Turn: ($10.77, 2 players) Q
MP+2 checks, Hero bets $6.00, MP+2 raises to $17.00, Hero calls $11.00

River: ($44.77, 2 players) 6
MP+2 bets $25.99 and is all-in, fold

MP+2 wins $42.77

I think the whole hand narrows villain's range to AcXc, QcTc Tc9c? Actually happier with how I played the hand now than I was at the time - had an instinct I should have shoved the turn but don't think there was a lot of air in his range, having cbet 3 ways with a fish in the hand, then check raised on that turn card.