A simple level 4 AJs hand

[ilya]

A few months ago, I would have just folded this. That doesn't feel natural anymore, but that's not to say I fully understand what I'm doing. So, couple questions.

***** Hand History for Game 2497529187 *****
NL Texas Hold'em $20 Buy-in + $2 Entry Fee Trny:14646953 Level:4 Blinds(50/100) - Monday, August 08, 00:54:46 EDT 2005
Table Table 13833 (Real Money)
Seat 5 is the button
Total number of players : 6
Seat 1: wireninja77 ( $875 )
Seat 2: tp2k3 ( $1250 )
Seat 3: StneColdCall ( $1465 )
Seat 4: Kramer_AK ( $975 )
Seat 5: MrPaulAllen ( $960 )
Seat 10: Chiefs_2004 ( $2475 )
Trny:14646953 Level:4
Blinds(50/100)
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to StneColdCall [ Jc Ac ]
tp2k3 folds.
StneColdCall raises [250].
Kramer_AK folds.
MrPaulAllen folds.
Chiefs_2004 calls [200].
wireninja77 folds.
** Dealing Flop ** [ 5s, 2h, 3h ]
Chiefs_2004 bets [325].


Folding preflop can't be sublime here, can it? I raised to 250 because I planned to fold to an all-in raise. I planned to fold to an all-in raise because I didn't want to jeopardize more than two thirds of my stack with AJs against someone who had enough strength to re-raise. Given my unwillingness to call an AIRR from any of the 3 medium stacks, perhaps folding is sublime after all? It just feels so weak to me now.

My other question is about the flop fold. I considered raising all-in, figuring I probably had 6-10 outs and suspecting that the big stack would have checked a strong hand. Buuut...I was worried he'd call with most better hands, having chips to spare. And I was a little worried about the 2-flush: this seemed both to make it more likely that he had a hand and felt he had to protect it, and that I would be susceptible to more draws/redraws if he called.

[psyduck]

Your thoughts on the preflop play match mine EXACTLY. A while back, I would have folded easily with AJs in that position. Before that, I would have open-pushed 14BB. Now, I think raising 2.5X BB is just the right move, with intent to fold to a push, because a) 2.5X raise does have a good amount of folding power (even from calling stations), and I've progressed in my ability to play postflop through okay-to-good reads.

On the flop, I really am in a muddle like you. T325 looks like such a probe bet. Really, arguments can be made for both folding and pushing obviously. What about calling and playing the turn accordingly? Maybe if he checks, you can push. Another bet from him, and you can fold. Bleh, flop play is hard here. I THINK that at the 22s, you can safely fold because the idiots there would call quite frequently in this spot with a pair of 5s. Bleh, but this feels weak when you have so many outs...

[freemoney]

make it 300 and push the flop folding equity is way too good.

[proell]

does he rally have that much FE?

It will cost villian ~900 to call. and they have already invested ~600, with about 2k in the pot.

what hands could villian have that he would fold? I think villian calls any overpair, any flush or even straight draw, and probably any pair. That leaves a few hands like AK, AQ, KQ.

what else?

The PF call and then bet out smells like overpair to me. Maybe a good draw. Either way I think villian calls the push.

sucks, but I fold here as well.
(btw, I remember the hand)

[ilya]

bumparoo

[curtains]

Before I get to the rest of it I find folding preflop to be pretty ridiculous.

[ilya]

[ QUOTE ]

Before I get to the rest of it I find folding preflop to be pretty ridiculous.

[/ QUOTE ]

the weird thing is i don't think it would even occur to me to fold this preflop if i was playing live. for some bizarre reason i am more weak-tight online.

[curtains]

yeah because live poker is so freaking boring, takes forever to deal the next hand. Whenever its +EV to just open push with my hand faceup, as I suspect it is here with AJs, I am going to be hard pressed to just open fold when I have 14x the BB.

[tigerite]

I play it the same, 2.5xbb raise, fold the flop, you can open push if you want preflop but I don't like that line so much.

[lastchance]

I like the raise. After all, you are calling AK, and JJ+ here, right? And you're not raising much worse than AJs here, right?

So lead for t250.

On the flop, meh... I tend to fold here, because I tried pushing, and people call you with pairs. 66+ could do this very quickly, A5....

I find people don't call preflop and bet out too much when they have nothing. They will check enough of the time with nothing and bet enough of the time with a pair that you can safely throw this away.

[ilya]

[ QUOTE ]
I like the raise. After all, you are calling AK, and JJ+ here, right? And you're not raising much worse than AJs here, right?

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah, AK/JJ+ is probably exactly my calling range unless of course I know something about the opponent. I won't open with much worse than AJs, either. I would say ATs, perhaps TT. Maybe I should add some more hands to that list -- 99, A9s, ATo, KQs?

[lastchance]

99 is much better than AT. 88 is better than AT, IMHO. I'd open-raise with 99, probably 88, and 77. Nothing worse than that.

[Unarmed]

Try limping these hands for a bit and check the results. You don't commit a big chunk of your stack PF, your FE on the flop isn't affected to as great a degree as you think, and it allows you to limp AA/KK in the same spot without giving away the strength of your hand. Limping works better for me because I don't play with as much aggression. Agree with free that if you're going to raise this pre you have to play aggro on the flop so just shove your chips over the top of his lead and hope its a probe bet.

[lastchance]

I think this play is a lot better at the $22's than the $109's. So many times you get that lovely call-check to you on flop, and you're going to get folds a lot of the time too.