I played this hand yesterday in a weekly tournament at the local casino. 140 entrants, down to around 60 when this happened.

Blinds are 600/1200/a200. I have around 60k, as does villian. My image is pretty tight as I haven't played many hands in the ~90 minutes I have been at the table.

I open to 3k in MP with Q4. It folds to villain who calls. He has around 40k and is in his late 20s. Seems like a decent, tight and thinking player.

Flop is A98.

He checks and calls my bet of 4k.

Turn is a red K and I check behind.

River is the other red K and he bets out just 3300. I think for 10 seconds and raise it 8k more.

Thoughts? Thanks much.

I would prefer to tripple barell this board, maybe overbet river and rather do what you did with value hands because I don't believe he will fold anything of value versus your line.

Fold pre!

As played, definitely barrel the turn!

I don't like the river raise. Do you have a particular read that he stabs the river with air or a lot of Ax hands that he is going to bet/fold?

Not that I disagree but why do you guys think betting the turn is better than taking the free card?

If we had a value hand we would have bet turn. The only hands we rep for value are KQ or KJ which aren't many combos. That's one reason we bet turn. Another reason is to take him off of hands like JJ that may x/c river when draws miss.

Honestly if you think he is FoS you should just call river. You beat worse busted flush draws and most busted straight draws. You're getting really good odds but he is probably going to show up with hands like AT here a lot as well.

My thought process (which could be completely wrong) is this:

-There's about 16.7k in the pot (you didn't list which position villain was so I can't know exactly). A barrel of 9-10k only has to work like 36-38% of the time to immediately show profit. But if we get to the river we still have equity: Rarely (but still) we beat JT T7 76cc. Also, whenever we hit our flush the pot is bigger so we can justify a larger value bet. So it doesn't even need to work (fold villain) that frequently to show profit.

-Furthering on that, given villain's range and the board texture his range isn't really loaded with hands that are going to check/raise us and put us in a weird spot, so we can barrel pretty comfortably. It's not like the Td or another 9 peeled off. These are cases in which checking back becomes more profitable because as villain's check/raise range OTT grows it becomes harder for us to realize our equity when we fire the turn.

-Potential balance reasons, but this could be a null point or a very important point based on how you play and how you're perceived so I won't get into it.

-People like to float a lot. We're at a point in poker where c-bets are so standard and expected that even the least astute live players have realized that you can't check/fold 90% of flops anymore. There just might be random garbage like 96 in villain's range that he wanted to peel with and now will fold because the second barrel always looks stronger than the first.

My bad. Villain was the big blind.

Why are you raising river?? If he's a tight and thinking player, do you think he's betting a 9 or 8 here? If so, do you really think he's gonna fold for 8000 more into a pot of (3k+3k+600+1.8k+4k+4k+3.3k+11.3k = 31k) when your line reps very very little?

Turn check worst part of this hh. Once you check the turn, gotta check/fold blank rivers, especially this river.

Your line kinda looks like a k. But if he has an ace which he likely does I doubt he's folding.

you have to have exactly a king for this to make any sense and its hard to have a king cause there are two of them on the board. it might still get him to fold a weakish hand that has you beat, though.

believe it or not i think calling might show more profit than raising because i just dont see him having much of a merging range here. its hard for him to get heroed by worse if hes merging like T9 or 87 into you so he would probably just turn those into bluffcatchers. this means i think his range is made up of hands as strong or stronger than Ax, and hands weaker than yours. i don't hate a raise, i don't hate a call, and i don't hate a fold. in-game i prob look at him for a bit and decide after taking body language into account. this is close imo

What if he is doing a wacky waving inflatable arm flaling tube man, will it bring you closer to fold or raise?

Results:

After ten seconds he called me with 86clubs. I wish he had made the flush!

He said that he knew that I knew that he was weak.

River bluff never ever works here, youre better off calling than raising tbh

Barrel turn for the love of Odin

fold

power of live tells

A turn bet is really strong on this board, since your perceived range has a lot of aces and kings in it. When you check back though, you have almost no aces or kings. I think a check on this turn reps some hands with equity like TT/JJ/QQ, but also hands like Q or J high. Then, when you raise, your range consists almost entirely of bluffs. Raising with a 9 or TT-QQ here for value would be really thin. Seems like a valid call with an 8, but I doubt he calls 3 barrels.

Couldn't/wouldn't I check behind on the turn with hands like AQ, AJ and KQ and KJ for pot control? Would it be bad to do so?

KQ and KJ, but I don't see the reason behind checking AQ and AJ other than for inducing otr or getting two streets of value versus nitty opponent with weak Ax. And if you check turn raising river for thin value with Ax doesn't make much sense.

I think a bet on the turn makes more sense. If you are repping at least an A why would you check turn when a K hits? The bet check raise line looks awfully goofy and hard to believe

Because you hit a K

Checking back good aces is really bad, he has so many hands that you're ahead of. KQ/KJ I would check back mostly, against some very special people I would bet and check river.

whatever i'll let you guys in on a secret, this is the easiest shove of all time

Raise Q4s in live MTT with 5 players behind
......
PROFIT

It's obviously a reasonable spot to bluff because it's a lot more likely for you to have a king than him.

...but it's pointless to ask whether it's a good spot because it's basically just a matter of whether he thinks you have it or not.


Against the guy you described - if you're over 60 the raise works pretty much every time. If you have an un-ironic mustache it works almost every time. If you're young, fat and wearing a sports jersey ... forget about it.

pre fold is good.

I don't mind the raise on this river, as there are not many hands he is going to be calling without a K.

Then again he could be thinking that too and snap us with any A