Checkraised by a calling station...

[chesspain]

Foxwoods 5-10...We are temporarily seven or eight handed...It gets folded to me on the button, and I raise with pocket jacks. Only the SB calls. He is a loose, bad player--e.g. loves to coldcall, limped UTG w/56o, raised five limpers from the BB with AJo, etc. He has seemed like a non-tricky, calling station after the flop.

The flop is rainbow with two kings and some low rag. He bets, I raise, he calls. The turn is some other rag. He checks, I bet, he checkraises...I fold.

Do any of you not fold to the checkraise? And should I have only called on the flop?

[Nick C]

On the flop, it does seem like a situation where you're most likely way ahead or way behind (though I guess SB could have kings up with an ace kicker). The line you took is cheaper than calling down -- at the cost of giving up your chance of spiking a jack on the river and, more significantly, at the cost of possibly laying down the best hand versus SB's 99 that he thinks has you beat. Some players who are otherwise passive do think highly of their pocket pairs, and SB's preflop raise with AJo from the BB versus a bunch of limpers does indicate, I think, that he might be such a player.

Still, I doubt you laid down the best hand. I might have just called the whole way (and bet if checked to on any street), but your line seems okay to me.

[chesspain]

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[Nick C]

I was just reading through the commentary in Colgin's JJ hand. And while the hand Chesspain posted here is different in many ways, there are some similarities too, and I'm not sure what the best line is, so I'm hoping someone besides just me will get involved in the thread.

[sweetjazz]

FWIW, raising in the BB with AJo after 5 limpers is a fine play. Especially if he is not very good postflop. Anyway, I get your point that your read is he plays too many hands, but too passively. (It sounds to me that he is not a good player, but that you may have overestimated how bad and passive he actually was.)

The thing is, it looks like you're stealing his blinds and the flop is one that a lot of people will get frisky on. But you still have a good hand, there are only 2 cards in the deck that beat your holding (ignoring a freak set or passively played big pocket pair). So I think calling down the whole way, betting if you get checked to, is the best line. The pot is small and you're either way ahead or way behind.

My second line would be to call the flop and raise the turn. But I'd only do that if I expected my opponent to bet a wide range of hands and not to 3-bet the turn raise with less than three kings.

I don't like the flop raise for three reasons:
(1) When you're ahead, you may cause him to fold his 3-outer (e.g. AT). You'd rather he kept bluffing at you.
(2) Do you have a plan if he 3-bets the flop? Can you safely assume you're beat?
(3) When your opponent calls the flop, you plan to bet the turn. Can you safely fold to a check raise here?

I think folding to the checkraise was probably fine given your line, but you put yourself in a spot where you had to make a tough choice. Calling him down without ever raising would have cost just 0.5 BB more.

I think your line is only good when you have control over your opponent, so that he will 3-bet you right away with hands that beat you (a K here), but go into a call-down mode shell otherwise. Then you're extracting an extra 0.5 BB of value (or almost, because he will suckout some of the time). But if you felt icky after folding to the checkraise, then that makes me think your line was not the right one.