TPTK on a non-dangerous board

[kyro]

PP $55. No reads, first level or so. Villain in this hand is at one of my other tables. So my assumption is he's decent.


NL Texas Hold'em $50 Buy-in + $5 Entry Fee Level:1 Blinds(10/15) - Thursday, August 04, 19:11:08 EDT 2005
Table Table 12196 (Real Money)
Seat 5 is the button
Total number of players : 9
Seat 1: hairyy ( $1000 )
Seat 2: Pimpmich ( $880 )
Seat 3: FLOGAR ( $600 )
Seat 4: Hero ( $975 )
Seat 5: sushi_ ( $1415 )
Seat 6: c1black ( $1620 )
Seat 7: jeffm81 ( $1385 )
Seat 8: i1k2mvitmvit ( $970 )
Seat 9: CRIXXX ( $1155 )
Level:1
Blinds(10/15)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to Hero [ Kc Ad ]
>You have options at Table 18978 Table!.
i1k2mvitmvit raises [45].
CRIXXX folds.
hairyy folds.
Pimpmich folds.
FLOGAR folds.
Hero calls [45].
sushi_ folds.
c1black folds.
jeffm81 calls [30].
** Dealing Flop ** [ Tc, Ks, 3h ]
jeffm81 checks.
>You have options at Table 18971 Table!.
i1k2mvitmvit bets [125].
Hero calls [125].
jeffm81 folds.
** Dealing Turn ** [ 8h ]
i1k2mvitmvit checks.
Hero bets [150].
i1k2mvitmvit raises [450].
Hero...

[tigerite]

I wouldn't be too sure, I saw an utter donk at two of my tables at the same time (no, it wasn't ebaundy, lol). But I think you're probably beat here.

[axeshigh]

I don't think I've ever folded TPTK with AK in a situation like this on PP. /images/graemlins/crazy.gif

[bluefeet]

FWIW, I would have SIGNIFICANTLY raised the flop. His pot sized bet is all the interest I need to see from him. Anything between t400 and pushing would do. I'm basically ending it right here.

If you're convinced you're ahead at the flop, I see no reason to give the turn card to a PF raiser that suddenly might feel compelled to make a move on the turn with your cold-call on the flop.

[Unarmed]

Nice post kyro.

I like the flop call. There's no reason to change the dynamic of the hand here. If you push/raise you make it impossible for Villain to make a mistake, so just call.

On the turn Villain checks, so he's most likely drawing to 2 outs or whatever. Just check behind. Betting accomplishes nothing really, he'll fold everything you beat and call/raise when you're smashed. You only have TPTK so keep the pot small. But really, the most important reason to check behind is to give your opponent a chance to bluff into you on the river.

So you bet and get check raised. He either has a monster (TT, etc) or nothing (this includes an underpair in this case). The latter line is one that all you constant c-bettors will have to learn as you move up in stakes. When you are a known c-bettor, many opponents will look you up on the flop by bluff calling with position. As soon as you check the turn they take the pot. It's a decent line and considerably cheaper than raising the flop. The counter move to the bluff call is a turn C/R, just as villain did here. Now, I'm not saying you're definitely ahead, as it would be a sophisticated move on Villain's part, that's just something to think about.

Anyway, you're C/R'd. I'm not laying this down. Most opponents with a set will just keep betting into you to get max value. You showed no aggression on the flop, he has no reason to think you'll bet the turn. So you should be ahead a good percentage of the time here. Should you raise? HELL NO. If you raise he'll just dump his bluff and call with his monsters. Again, you make it impossible for him to make a mistake. Just flat call. F*ck, run your timer down too. He'll push all his hands on the river and you call immediately. You're going to lose to a monster anyway you slice it so you want to forget about the possibility he may have that and focus on maxing your value against bluffs/underpairs. Calling the turn and the river accomplishes that goal.

[wildzer0]

I usually don't mind flat calling with AK in the early leve,s but I think with the relatively small raise, it might be better to bump it up to ~100 to make sure you fold the blinds and see how much villian likes his hand (you'll see a fold fairly often here).

I don't like the flop call at all - I would raise to ~350 with the intention of getting all my chips in the middle then or on the turn. Since you just called the bet on the flop, I might be inclined to open push the turn. Not sure if that's the best move there though.

As I continue to study this game and try to improve, this is one of the hardest skills for me to develop: how much credit do I give to opposing players? If he is a sophisticated player, he could very well be playing you with a monster. Or, he could just be a good player that wasn't sure what to do with his QQ. How to decide? Maybe this is just a hand you're either destined to win big or go home with, and just chalk it up to poker. I don't know.

[adanthar]

I was going to say that I think this is a hand I would tend to look up if only for informational purposes. Then I saw he raised UTG.

Unless he is Gigabet lite or some other species of multitabling LAG with reads on everyone he plays, I think his range right now is AK, AA-KK, 88, maybe shaded a bit towards AK. Draw your own conclusions.

Also, I check the turn.

[Dr_Jeckyl_00]

I don't like your call on the flop. You're slow playing and your hand is not strong enough to slow play. IMO, raise the flop and if he calls, move into check call mode. He probably has a pocket pair, and the board did not help him... but you don't want to call and have him hit his set (of 8's perhaps???)

[Dr_Jeckyl_00]

what is a c-bettor? a continuation bettor?

[danger_mouse]

It may just be my style, but I don't like letting the villain take control of the hand. I prefer to hang myself, if you will, with TP/TK. I raise pre-flop, and raise flop.

I agree you should check the turn. You'll still get a chance to pick up chips from him when he bluffs the river. Or, if he isn't bluffing, you loose less to his set of 88s. (just guessing).

[mosdef]

[ QUOTE ]
It may just be my style, but I don't like letting the villain take control of the hand. I prefer to hang myself, if you will, with TP/TK. I raise pre-flop, and raise flop.

I agree you should check the turn. You'll still get a chance to pick up chips from him when he bluffs the river. Or, if he isn't bluffing, you loose less to his set of 88s. (just guessing).

[/ QUOTE ]

what's your plan if you re-raise preflop? consider what might happen:

1. preflop UTG re-raises all-in. you're not calling that are you? all you've achieved by raising is losing chips without even getting a chance to hit the flop with your AK.

2. you get called behind by another player and the UTG. now you are three handed, possibly out of position, with a huge pot. yuck.

3. you get exactly what you're hoping for: a call from UTG and UTG only. now, the 1/3 of the time you hit the flop, what's going to happen? if UTG had JJ, QQ, you get nothing else out of the hand. if UTG had AQ or AJ or KQ, you have him dominated but he's going to play way more carefully than if you had just called behind. the 2/3 of the time you miss the flop, what's going to happen? he leads into you and you lose more money than you would have if you had called preflop. he checks to you and you make a c-bet, which will win fairly often, but since you raised preflop you have built a pot so large that a c-bet is 10% of your stack. that's risky.

in conclusion, these are the reasons i would almost never raise behind here. criticize as you please.

[curtains]

I would raise the flop, and be willing to play for all my chips.

[Apathy]

Unarmed posted some excellent advice, I will just add one thing, your turn bet is far too small and could have something to do with the big check raise your facing here, so you have to call.

I do think the most likely holding for the opponent is 8-8 though.

If you want to bet the turn I think you should consider betting more, and if you want to bet the turn you can't lay down imo. There just isn't room post flop in a raised pot for a bet on two streets and a lay down except in special circumstances on party sngs. Like others have said there is no real compelling reason to bet the turn.

Note however if the board was idential with an ace instead of a king I would favour betting over checking, which may or may not be controversial to some.

[The Venetian]

Tough spot. I had a significant number of $55's played against this player when I was doing SNG's regularly in June/July, so he's at least a regular, and probably decent.

Situations like these are why I was very happy I had good notes on those I had seen several times before.

Knowing this, I'm guessing the worst hand he has is AK. I just don't think there's anything he could have that you have beat. Against an unknown player, though, I'm taking this to the death.

[microbet]

I've played against villian a few times. I probably have a note on him, but not here/now. I don't recall him being a crazy lag or anything.

His turn bet does not make me think he has trips.

I think there is a very good chance he has AK.

If he has JJ or QQ, I wouldn't count on him leading out much after the flop.

I think the biggest mistakes you can induce at this point are a loose call by JJ or QQ or a fold by AK or maybe even AA.

If you are behind, it would of course be better to check/call rather than bust, but losing 3/4th of your chips isn't that much better.

[durron597]

I raise the flop, but I think the way you played it most of the time (nearly all) you are chopping with a slight chance of him having the backdoor freeroll.

[Unarmed]

I really hate raising the flop. Someone enlighten me please.

[danger_mouse]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
It may just be my style, but I don't like letting the villain take control of the hand. I prefer to hang myself, if you will, with TP/TK. I raise pre-flop, and raise flop.

I agree you should check the turn. You'll still get a chance to pick up chips from him when he bluffs the river. Or, if he isn't bluffing, you loose less to his set of 88s. (just guessing).

[/ QUOTE ]

what's your plan if you re-raise preflop? consider what might happen:

1. preflop UTG re-raises all-in. you're not calling that are you? all you've achieved by raising is losing chips without even getting a chance to hit the flop with your AK.

2. you get called behind by another player and the UTG. now you are three handed, possibly out of position, with a huge pot. yuck.

3. you get exactly what you're hoping for: a call from UTG and UTG only. now, the 1/3 of the time you hit the flop, what's going to happen? if UTG had JJ, QQ, you get nothing else out of the hand. if UTG had AQ or AJ or KQ, you have him dominated but he's going to play way more carefully than if you had just called behind. the 2/3 of the time you miss the flop, what's going to happen? he leads into you and you lose more money than you would have if you had called preflop. he checks to you and you make a c-bet, which will win fairly often, but since you raised preflop you have built a pot so large that a c-bet is 10% of your stack. that's risky.

in conclusion, these are the reasons i would almost never raise behind here. criticize as you please.

[/ QUOTE ]

A lot of people would play the AK like the hero. I'm capable of this line as well, from late position. Just calling (like hero) from mid position has two common negative results

1. You give later hands much better odds to call (as you saw in the example). You don't want to play AK three-handed.

2. You give up control of the hand. AK is a great hand. Yes, it isn't made yet, but your opponent doesn't know it. I'd wager 70% of the time you're going to win this pre-flop, or on the flop with a continuation bet (you have position!!). IMHO, AK's value goes WAY down unless you are willing to play it strongly in position. I look at AK as the best pre-flop semi-bluff available. Every hand, I try to put my opponent to a decision. Raising with AK protects your hand and gives you the aggressor's momentum (which is often all you need to win the pot).

[mosdef]

[ QUOTE ]
1. You give later hands much better odds to call (as you saw in the example). You don't want to play AK three-handed.

2. You give up control of the hand. AK is a great hand. Yes, it isn't made yet, but your opponent doesn't know it. I'd wager 70% of the time you're going to win this pre-flop, or on the flop with a continuation bet (you have position!!). IMHO, AK's value goes WAY down unless you are willing to play it strongly in position. I look at AK as the best pre-flop semi-bluff available. Every hand, I try to put my opponent to a decision. Raising with AK protects your hand and gives you the aggressor's momentum (which is often all you need to win the pot).

[/ QUOTE ]

1. yes, but when someone raises in front of you already the likelihood of getting called behind is already reduced.

2. i don't know why you feel the need to absolutely take control of the hand. this often makes the hand easier for the opponent to play, not harder. let the opponent do something, he'll mess up often enough to make it profitable. i agree in principle with what you're saying, but go back to my post. how are you going to use your position if you raise to isolate in this particular hand? remember that your one opponent raised UTG, so you are facing an opponent with strength. this dramatically reduces the power of your c-bet as a steal on the flop when you miss.

[curtains]

[ QUOTE ]
I really hate raising the flop. Someone enlighten me please.

[/ QUOTE ]

You don't have to flat call the flop everytime you have something. It's not like by calling you will suddenly get JJ to throw all their money at you, and of course you also give them 2 free outs to bust you. People are also untrusting of flop raising sometimes, and will have a tough time folding QQ/JJ/AT and of course you get all of KQ's money when raise flop. You really think these donkeys at the $55s want to fold QQ-JJ just because you make some smallish flop raise?

But ok you are going to face a few opponents who will basically never bluff the turn with 99 if you flat call. In this case you are just giving them 2 absolutely free outs to beat you and win basically all your chips. For instance if Im the original bettor and I missed the flop or don't have top pair, you are basically giving me a free shot (albeit a small one) to win all your chips and giving yourself almost zero chance to make any more money from you.

[45suited]

[ QUOTE ]
I really hate raising the flop. Someone enlighten me please.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not being a wise ass here, but isn't the fact that the OP is now faced with this decision on the turn a good example of why raising the flop can't be too bad?

What is so wrong with raising while you likely have the best hand? Should we only raise as a bluff? Sometimes a flat call is more suspicious to an opponent anyway. Now the OP has let the villain take control of the hand and he is faced with a very hard decision.

Again, I'm not trying to be a wise ass. I just like to keep things simple. Sometimes the obvious, straightforward play is seen by your opponents as a bluff (they're thinking that it's so obvious, it smells suspicious). Anyway, I raise the flop, but maybe I'm missing something.

[curtains]

45suited, if this guy illmatic is supposedly a solid player, than I really hate calling the flop. If he has a small pocket pair, a large % of the time you are risking your whole stack just to hope to win one more bet that you often aren't going to get. These 2-4 outers do come sometimes. Best case is he has some crap like AQ and an ace comes on the turn.

My points aren't very convincing, and I definitely don't hate calling the flop. I don't hate it at all. But to act as though raising is bad is a bit insane to me, and it's my preferred play.

[tigerite]

illmatic isn't that good, I played him in a 33 last night, although that was illmat1k or some such.

[curtains]

Oh okay. Btw Ive called in this spot before in my life for sure. However raising is definitely a fine option. It really depends how I feel....make the board a little less threatening, so that AQ and AJ don't have 4 outs for a gutshot, and then I might call a touch more often.

Honestly I just feel that a lot of PartyPoker players dont respect flop play. Thus if I raise on the flop, a good portion of the time I'll get played with by a worse hand.

[tigerite]

I think arguments could be made for raising or calling the flop here. Either way I don't think I can get away from this hand on the turn.

[45suited]

[ QUOTE ]
45suited, if this guy illmatic is supposedly a solid player, than I really hate calling the flop. If he has a small pocket pair, a large % of the time you are risking your whole stack just to hope to win one more bet that you often aren't going to get. These 2-4 outers do come sometimes. Best case is he has some crap like AQ and an ace comes on the turn.

[/ QUOTE ]

I guess I look at things a little differently than alot of players. I don't view every pot as "I have the best hand... hopefully I can take someone's stack". If a pot is sizeable, I'll take it while I have the best hand. If someone wants to chase, I'm going to make them pay. But I'm not so concerned with squeezing every last chip out of every pot.

I also try to get to certain general chip levels if possible along the way of the tournament. Once I reach these levels, I get very patient. (Like PVS's advice regarding the level 4 play before the structure changed.) Taking this pot would get me to a comfort zone. So I'm raising the flop, pushing if re-raised. Simple.

A huge portion of my chips in SNGs comes from strongly betting the best hands and letting my opponents out-think themselves.

Sometimes I almost think that I'm at an advantage simply because I know what my strengths and weaknesses are and I don't try to get too fancy and outsmart myself.

[curtains]

Yea Im basically responding to those who said raising on the flop was terrible or they didnt understand it or whatever.

[adanthar]

BTW, I raise this flop too although I just call a K83 board or something. I like calling flops where I can safely give two free cards because a lot of those extra chips come on the river after you check the turn. KTx is a little too risky to do that with and he likes his hand a little too much so you may as well raise now. Of course I've called here, too. I call a lot more hands than curtains does depending on the exact board but the stars have to be aligned just right.

So anyway, the mistake in this hand is betting the turn because at this point no worse hand really calls. Having gotten here this way...I dunno. I stand by my last claim that you split a lot, but you are behind a fair bit and almost never ahead.

I think I'd wind up calling anyway just to make myself a note on the guy, because knowing he can do that is worth it.

[45suited]

[ QUOTE ]
I think I'd wind up calling anyway just to make myself a note on the guy, because knowing he can do that is worth it.

[/ QUOTE ]

You mean you'd call him all the way down even if you felt you were behind just to get a note on the guy? Kind of an expensive note, isn't it?

Well I suppose I really don't know what the hell I'm talking about here since I rarely see the same players twice, much less remember them!

[The Yugoslavian]

If you want to bust the villians pp or KQ for all of his chips you probably need to go to war on the flop.

However...if this opponent has displayed some aggression at going after pots even after being called, then I don't mind calling him down (by the river he/she likely will be allin anyway). I don't really think villian has a set....frankly, I think the villian either has 88 or KQ (and to a lesser extent AK) after the turn action. The problem is that your turn raise is so small that you now probably have to chase the raise b/c he could very well be bluffing.

On the flop since the villian showed interst I don't see a problem raising for value. Preflop and on the flop opponents love to call with marginal hands....for whatever reason they can't help themselves. By the turn/river perhaps they are thinking too much or are bored or something but they generally are much more likely to then make their bad laydowns.

I'd raise on the flop, hoping to get called (as then I'm putting the villian on a hand I almost surely beat). If the villian pops me back then you still probably have to call but I wouldn't worry about it too much.

Yugoslav

[Unarmed]

[ QUOTE ]

Yea Im basically responding to those who said raising on the flop was terrible or they didnt understand it or whatever.

[/ QUOTE ]

Ok so if OP raises and Villain puts him all in I assume we're calling right? I don't play this way so I'm really interested in how the hand plays out if Villain pushes/flat calls the raise, etc etc.

Thanks.

[curtains]

Yes, there is no chance I'll fold after raising the flop.