"lol you fish" (maybe I am)

[Kumubou]

That was the response from one of the other players after this hand. I'll admit, it did look a little weird.

Absolute Poker 1/2 Hold'em (6 Max, 6 handed) converter (http://www.selachian.com/tools/bisonconverter/hhconverter.cgi)

Villan here is loose/aggro pre-flop (60/20), and has shown some agression post-flop. Goofy agression, though -- capped the turn on a 4-straight board with an overpair, yet called down with TPWK against my SPTK (grr). His big hands have been random -- sometimes he'll jam straight away, sometimes he'll wait until the river. I guess the word here to be used is unpredictable.

Preflop: Heroine is CO with J/images/graemlins/heart.gif, J/images/graemlins/spade.gif.
<font color="#CC3333">UTG raises</font>, <font color="#666666">1 fold</font>, <font color="#CC3333">Heroine 3-bets</font>, <font color="#666666">3 folds</font>, UTG calls.

Flop: (7.50 SB) K/images/graemlins/heart.gif, 4/images/graemlins/spade.gif, A/images/graemlins/diamond.gif <font color="#0000FF">(2 players)</font>
UTG checks, <font color="#CC3333">Heroine bets</font>, <font color="#CC3333">UTG raises</font>, Heroine folds.

To me, this seems like a horrible board to bluff at given assumed 3-betting standards. The only hands that missed this board are QQ-TT, and he would stand to get punished badly by the vast majority of holdings I have. So I figure that he has to have something (Ax, AK, or something really screwey like AA or KK), and that I am likely drawing to two outs. So I decide to just cut bait.

Of course, he could just be making a move here. Bleh.

Final Pot: 5.25 BB

Bonus question: I 3-bet with KQs (and let's assume it's one of the suits on the flop, so a backdoor draw is there). Now what?

-K

[Paxosmotic]

The two worst overcards that could come came and you're not going to be good anywhere near 1 in (pot) times to make up for it. You got bluffed off that one, but you can always respond by saying "so what, my 2+2 avatar is the best in micros, even over whatever the hell Pedro is using this week and that retarded guy Eeegah's got"

[GrunchCan]

He's just pissed you didn't pay off his AQ.

[fizzleboink]

Good fold. He probably raises a lot of aces.

[shant]

If UTG had an Ace here he played this hand like ass. Good fold.

[Harv72b]

If you felt the need to fold to a check/raise, you probably shouldn't have bet the flop to begin with. Especially not against an unpredictably aggressive opponent. Check through, see if the turn improves you (you do have a backdoor straight draw as well as your 2-outer, assuming you're behind), and induce a bluff from a worse hand; with a 20% PFR, he doesn't have to have an Ace or King in his hand to raise UTG.

If you'd 3-bet with KQs and got the same flop action, you have to call the raise. Unless you put him firmly on either a set or Aces up (I don't know how you could do that), you would clearly have good enough odds to see the turn with trip/two pair outs + the backdoor flush &amp; straight draws.

[shant]

You have a lot more outs/possibility of having the best hand with KQs than with JJ on this board. Getting 10.5-1 with ~5.5 outs you would see a turn with KQs.

[Aaron W.]

Checking behind on the flop and calling the turn and river is a great idea that's worth considering.

[Kumubou]

[ QUOTE ]
Checking behind on the flop and calling the turn and river is a great idea that's worth considering.

[/ QUOTE ]
So I can see villan's K5o or A3o. Dope!!! I really think calling down here is just spewing, even against a LAG. Sure he does not need an A or K to raise, but nearly any hand with an A or K is getting raised pre-flop to open.

[ QUOTE ]
If you felt the need to fold to a check/raise, you probably shouldn't have bet the flop to begin with.

[/ QUOTE ]
Maybe. I did not think of folding to a flop c/r; it just happened. My planned line was bet/check/call, but once he c/red the river I just went "f this" and dumped it. Of course, this also does not account for a dooooonkbet on the turn.

Sorry about the KQs question. Was just trying to look at this from an alternative angle... but that was too obvious.

-K

Call/call/call, provided you don't spike flush/2pair.

EDIT: With KQ

[shant]

[ QUOTE ]
Checking behind on the flop and calling the turn and river is a great idea that's worth considering.

[/ QUOTE ]
I wouldn't say this is a great idea.

[Aaron W.]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Checking behind on the flop and calling the turn and river is a great idea that's worth considering.

[/ QUOTE ]
So I can see villan's K5o or A3o. Dope!!! I really think calling down here is just spewing, even against a LAG. Sure he does not need an A or K to raise, but nearly any hand with an A or K is getting raised pre-flop to open.

[/ QUOTE ]

Have you stopped to think about what 20% PFR really means?

If a player is willing to raise A3o and K5o, how much is he raising?

1326 total hands, 20% = 265 hands

Bigger pairs: AA-88 = 42 hands
Any ace: AK-A2 = 192 hands
Any king: KQ-K2 = 176 hands

So even if we stop there (and not bother with QJ-QT, etc), we've got a villain whose PFR will exceed 30%. Therefore, any ace and any king is a really bad range of hands.

It's more likely that villain has a raising hand range closer to the following:

Bigger pairs: AA-77 = 48 hands
Medium and large suited aces: AKs-A7s = 32 hands
Bigger offsuit aces: AKo-A9o = 60 hands
Big kings: KQ-KT = 48 hands
Big queens: QJ-QT = 32 hands
Medium suited connectors: JTs-87s = 16 hands

This gives 236 total hands (18% PFR). You can change his PFR by +-5% (about 66 hands) by throwing in a couple more pocket pairs and suited aces or kings, or taking out some of the weaker offsuit hands and the medium suited connectors. But this will give you a sense of what 20% PFR looks like.

How many are you chasing given the flop came AKx?

AA/KK: 3 ways each = 6 total
Ace hands: AK = 9 ways, AQs-A7s = 18 ways, AQo-A9o = 36 ways
King hands: KQ-KT = 24 ways
QQ: 6 ways

That's 99 ways you're losing. I'll let you count the number of ways the other hands can exist (knowing you have JJ), but a reasonable guess would be that there are about another 75 or so.

Given the description of villain, I think that he's likely going to bet the turn and river (after you check) regardless of what he has. So while you're ahead a little less than half the time, you're getting something like 3:1 to check behind and to call down.

A very powerful thought that I bumped into some time ago was that in heads up play, you can GUARANTEE a showdown for 2.5 BB or less every time. (In position, you can often do better.) So if you're in a hand with showdown value against a player who can be overaggressive, you're often getting almost 2:1 to just call down (assuming a preflop raise - which is reasonable to have happened if you have a showdown hand). The choice to put in extra raises will be when you think you can get clear information out of villain (to make folding a clearly obvious play) or when it's for value.

Against a player willing to bet/raise crap, I'm willing to showdown many more hands.

This is an admittedly more extreme case, but it has the same idea embedded in it. Villain is over 50 PFR. I almost threw in a value raise on the turn, except that villain has already joked about my tightness and has proven himself capable of folding when someone pushes him back (I suspect he was a higher limit player blowing off some steam, because he seemed to know to think sometimes).

Paradise Poker 1/2 Hold'em (4 handed) converter (http://www.selachian.com/tools/bisonconverter/hhconverter.cgi)

Preflop: Hero is UTG with A/images/graemlins/spade.gif, 6/images/graemlins/club.gif.
<font color="#CC3333">Hero raises</font>, <font color="#666666">1 fold</font>, <font color="#CC3333">SB 3-bets</font>, BB calls, Hero calls.

Flop: (9 SB) 5/images/graemlins/spade.gif, 4/images/graemlins/heart.gif, 5/images/graemlins/club.gif <font color="#0000FF">(3 players)</font>
<font color="#CC3333">SB bets</font>, BB folds, Hero calls.

Turn: (5.50 BB) 2/images/graemlins/club.gif <font color="#0000FF">(2 players)</font>
<font color="#CC3333">SB bets</font>, Hero calls.

River: (7.50 BB) 7/images/graemlins/spade.gif <font color="#0000FF">(2 players)</font>
<font color="#CC3333">SB bets</font>, Hero calls.

Final Pot: 9.50 BB

Results in white below: <font color="#FFFFFF">
Hero has As 6c (one pair, fives).
SB has Jh 9c (one pair, fives).
Outcome: Hero wins 9.50 BB. </font>

[shant]

The OP's hand and that A6o hand you posted are so different that I can't see how you can use that hand as an example as to why it's good to call down JJ on an AKx flop against a player who raises 20% of his hands.

If you've read the HUSH forum, solid players have a PFR of 18-22% there. That's a far cry from someone with a PFR of 50% betting into you on an all undercard flop where you picked up a gutshot on the turn.

[Aaron W.]

[ QUOTE ]
The OP's hand and that A6o hand you posted are so different that I can't see how you can use that hand as an example as to why it's good to call down JJ on an AKx flop against a player who raises 20% of his hands.

If you've read the HUSH forum, solid players have a PFR of 18-22% there. That's a far cry from someone with a PFR of 50% betting into you on an all undercard flop where you picked up a gutshot on the turn.

[/ QUOTE ]

I was trying to link a bunch of things together, I think I was just a little too tired for it to come out coherently.

1) 20% PFR is not any ace/any king. OP's response to me was that he was worried about "villan's K5o or A3o". I think this is an unreasonable expectation. (Also, HUSH's PFR of 18-22 comes from lots of raising from the cutoff and button, not UTG -- I don't expect most 1/2 players of they type OP described to be playing thoughtfully with his position.)

2) The hand count was designed to show Hero how often he could expect to be behind. It's somewhere just below 50%.

3) Hero is getting 3:1 to call down blind, but he can do better sometimes since he's in position (by value betting if checked to on the turn or river -- if he can read villain's checking twice as true weakness -- or checking behind and just getting to the showdown).

4) Against opponents with a tendency to be overaggressive (part of Hero's read of "goofy aggression"), you can choose to just get to a showdown if you have a hand with decent showdown value and as long as you're best (about) 33% of the time on the flop, you stand to make a profit (it's "about" because sometimes he catches up and sometimes you hit a good card and squeeze in a raise or two...).

I think your play was reasonable. With AK on the flop, and his betting action, I'm also thinking he has you beat. However, I want to see the turn here. I want to see if he bets the turn. If he does, and I'm UI, then I fold. If he checks, then another question arises whether to check or bet. Grrrrrr. The truth is I probably bet again, even though I'm expecting a check-raise and will have burned my money once more because at that point I fold. If he calls my bet, and we go to the river UI, then I'm probably calling a bet and checking. I feel like I've screwed up my post somehow. Excuse me while I go get some more coffee.

[chiachu]

[ QUOTE ]
You got bluffed off that one, but you can always respond by saying "so what, my 2+2 avatar is the best in micros, even over whatever the hell Pedro is using this week and that retarded guy Eeegah's got"

[/ QUOTE ]

haha. yea, your azumanga avitar rox /images/graemlins/laugh.gif

But to get back on topic.. i would play this hand the same way, although id feel like i played it weakly afterwards.

[Harv72b]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
If you felt the need to fold to a check/raise, you probably shouldn't have bet the flop to begin with.

[/ QUOTE ]
Maybe. I did not think of folding to a flop c/r; it just happened. My planned line was bet/check/call, but once he c/red the river I just went "f this" and dumped it. Of course, this also does not account for a dooooonkbet on the turn.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think that one of my biggest leaks, especially in SH play, is feeling the need to bet the flop every time I raise or 3-bet preflop. Your opponent is tricky/aggressive, and this is typically a terrible flop for a preflop 3-bettor...I would presume that he knows it. Hell, even I might try a flop c/r with an underpair here from time to time, because it is tough to call it with a hand like JJ.

I don't normally advocate checking through on as soft a game as Party 1/2 6max (a lot of opponents will call you down with a worse underpair, not to mention gutshot draws), but I think this might be one of those cases where it would be acceptable. The problem then becomes what to do when he leads into you after a brick turn...probably just call "small pot" and fold, even knowing that sometimes you're folding the best hand.