100/200 hand

[jason_t]

sLAG opens UTG+2 and Hero 3-bets from MP2. It's folded to villain who calls.

Flop: A/images/graemlins/heart.gif Q/images/graemlins/spade.gif 7/images/graemlins/spade.gif
Villain checks, Hero checks.

Turn: 8/images/graemlins/heart.gif
Villain bets, Hero calls.

River: 3/images/graemlins/heart.gif
Villain bets, Hero calls.

What does Hero have? Why did he play the hand this way?

[toss]

My best guess would be KK scared of getting CR'd on the flop.

[PokerSparky]

Fordet it, I don't have a clue.

[flawless_victory]

[ QUOTE ]
IMy guess is you have AK and want to induce action from a worse ace, or an underpair.

[/ QUOTE ]prob not a good guess.

[PokerSparky]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
IMy guess is you have AK and want to induce action from a worse ace, or an underpair.

[/ QUOTE ]prob not a good guess.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah, right after I posted I realized that was pretty bad idea.

I'll go with KK too. Afraid of ace, but can't fold to a LAG.

My second choice is KQ suited (no flush draw), calling it down because you think he might be trying to push you out with a pocket pair or spade flush draw (bluffing at the river when he comes up short), but fearing the ace and hearts.

[flawless_victory]

hero prob had KK... because no overcards can come to his pair and he will never be folding, his play is ok, but there are some problems with this line...
what if the other guy had 88 this hand... you just checked him into the winner... he prob wont give you action UI, no matter how many times you check, so you are supplying infinite odds without an upside. basically, ppl will play there hand perfectly against (if they are not stupid).. they know you arent folding.
ex. hand from yesterday.
party 100/200
LAG player OR CO, i 3bet KJ in the SB, he caps (uh oh).
flop A97
checkcheck
turn 8
checkcheck
river T
bet call
he had KK... n1.
another problem is that you are giving up value from a Q or gutshot that wouldve called.
also this is just bad for metagame reasons. you always want to have some kind of balance, but checking this flop HU in pos shouldnt be something you do often against typical players... it doesnt make sense.

Looks like KK trying to get the maximum from a Q, and lose the minimum to an A. Still, unless the villain is prone to checkraising I'm probably betting the flop with KK.

[flawless_victory]

[ QUOTE ]
also this is just bad for metagame reasons. you always want to have some kind of balance, but checking this flop HU in pos shouldnt be something you do often against typical players... it doesnt make sense.

[/ QUOTE ]in case this is not clear...
you dont want to start checking here with KK/JJ/JTs/whatever because then you will have to start checking AA/QQ/AK/AQ sometimes for balance... this of course will kill your action when/if you raise the turn and is clearly not best for max value.

[flawless_victory]

[ QUOTE ]
. unless the villain is prone to checkraising

[/ QUOTE ]in an online 1/2, thats like saying unless the opponent is prone to breathing.

[jason_t]

[ QUOTE ]
Still, unless the villain is prone to checkraising

[/ QUOTE ]

Any game at this limit will be extremely aggressive.

[Chris Daddy Cool]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
. unless the villain is prone to checkraising

[/ QUOTE ]in an online 1/2, thats like saying unless the opponent is prone to breathing.

[/ QUOTE ]

you're a wizard with the words.

ah, silly me. then again i haven't played much 100/200 /images/graemlins/tongue.gif

[W. Deranged]

K /images/graemlins/spade.gif K x, probably, though I guess one of the K's doesn't have to be a spade.

Any hand with an A is betting here. QQ is betting here too assuming hero isn't REALLY lame (as I assume he's not given he's playing 100/200).

I rememberd hearing an interesting idea that "if you are playing a heads-up pot with KK, and your line involves folding at any point, you should probably find a new line." Hero seems to be doing that... this is a WA/WB line in position aimed at preventing hero from ever having to even consider folding his hand, as it will be best very often and is vulnerable to few cards when ahead. Playing the hand this way induces villain to bluff or to be a worse hand, like KQ or JJ for value.

[baronzeus]

[ QUOTE ]
hero prob had KK... because no overcards can come to his pair and he will never be folding, his play is ok, but there are some problems with this line...
what if the other guy had 88 this hand... you just checked him into the winner... he prob wont give you action UI, no matter how many times you check, so you are supplying infinite odds without an upside. basically, ppl will play there hand perfectly against (if they are not stupid).. they know you arent folding.
ex. hand from yesterday.
party 100/200
LAG player OR CO, i 3bet KJ in the SB, he caps (uh oh).
flop A97
checkcheck
turn 8
checkcheck
river T
bet call
he had KK... n1.
another problem is that you are giving up value from a Q or gutshot that wouldve called.
also this is just bad for metagame reasons. you always want to have some kind of balance, but checking this flop HU in pos shouldnt be something you do often against typical players... it doesnt make sense.

[/ QUOTE ]


your villain is a moron.

[Harv72b]

[ QUOTE ]
another problem is that you are giving up value from a Q or gutshot that wouldve called.
also this is just bad for metagame reasons. you always want to have some kind of balance, but checking this flop HU in pos shouldnt be something you do often against typical players... it doesnt make sense.

[/ QUOTE ]

Any halfway decent, aggressive opponent will c/r this flop with any 2 cards against a preflop 3-bettor; this is especially true if he's flopped a flush draw or even gutshot. And that's on middle limits...I would imagine it's even more likely on 100/200. So Hero hates to fold at any point in the hand, given the possibility that villain is holding KQ, a smaller PP, or a draw. Of course, we're assuming that Hero holds KK.

If Hero holds KK, then unless the villain was raising with QJs or something, Hero is either way behind a paired ace/flopped set & drawing to two outs, way ahead of a smaller pair that's also drawing to two outs, or ahead of a draw that's going to call the bet anyway; and when Hero's flop bet is called, that makes it too tempting to check through the turn & possibly give villain a free draw on an expensive street. So checking through the flop is fine...it's also good for metagame reasons, as Hero may eventually want to check through the same flop HU when he hits a set of aces or top two or something.

If Hero does have KK (and I believe he does, probably with the K/images/graemlins/spade.gif which makes it highly unlikely that villain flopped a 4-flush), then I don't mind checking through the flop with the intention of calling to showdown against an aggressive opponent. But I would really like checking through the flop with the intention of raising a turn bet & either folding to a 3-bet or checking through the river UI.

[jason_t]

[ QUOTE ]


I rememberd hearing an interesting idea that "if you are playing a heads-up pot with KK, and your line involves folding at any point, you should probably find a new line."

[/ QUOTE ]

I think that this another of one of Clarkmeister's many gems.

[flawless_victory]

i got a giggle out of that hand.

[ep510]

[ QUOTE ]
But I would really like checking through the flop with the intention of raising a turn bet & either folding to a 3-bet or checking through the river UI.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not sure I like this line if villian is capable of folding a Q or pocket pair to a raise on the turn.

[Harv72b]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm not sure I like this line if villian is capable of folding a Q or pocket pair to a raise on the turn.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think you have to balance that vs. whether or not villain is capable of folding an ace to the turn raise and whether or not villain will lead again on the river with a hand that we beat, if we don't raise the turn.

[ QUOTE ]
Any halfway decent, aggressive opponent will c/r this flop with any 2 cards against a preflop 3-bettor; this is especially true if he's flopped a flush draw or even gutshot.

[/ QUOTE ]
I'm not a halfway decent, aggressive player, but of course, I want to become one. So, can anybody explain me, why this is a check-raise on the flop with a draw or with nothing? Is this some kind of free-card play out of position? Is this flop with two high cards suitable for a bluff against a preflop 3-bettor?

Concerning the hand, I considered at first hero to have JJ. But in this case, maybe a check-raise on the turn would have been better to make a queen fold, but, if called, to check through the river UI or fold to a bet, thinking villain to hold an Ace. Is this correct?

...Ups, sorry, just found out, that this post is quite old. But I'm hoping for answers, so I post my reply nevertheless. Anywhere, where is the solution?

[MEbenhoe]

[ QUOTE ]


What does Hero have? Why did he play the hand this way?

[/ QUOTE ]

if you really want an educated answer to this question you left out some much needed information, such as how many players are at the table, how has the table been playing lately, what is Hero's table image, how has villian been playing lately, how does he play preflop/postflop(sLAG is such a generic term), etc.

[nfscreech]

He has something like TT.

He doesn't want to get raised on the flop.
He wants to get to showdown as cheaply as possible.

[Harv72b]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm not a halfway decent, aggressive player, but of course, I want to become one. So, can anybody explain me, why this is a check-raise on the flop with a draw or with nothing? Is this some kind of free-card play out of position? Is this flop with two high cards suitable for a bluff against a preflop 3-bettor?

[/ QUOTE ]

The latter. Of the hands Hero (or any other normal player) is 3-betting with second in from MP, most of them don't like this flop. KK, JJ, TT, 99, etc really don't like it. AK isn't even all that happy about it, because they realize the distinct possibility that the EP raiser has AQ (or 77). AK probably won't fold, but a lot of those hands, particularly JJ-99, likely will. So, if UTG+1 has (for example) 99, a flop c/r has a fairly high chance of folding out a better hand. The same holds true if he has KJs (and if it's suited to spades, he actually has pretty good equity on this flop).

Then when you get into second- and third level thinking, a player with AQ might check/raise the flop hoping that the preflop 3-bettor will suspect a bluff and 3-bet the flop or raise the turn with a worse hand. For Hero, checking through the flop avoids the possibility of being check/raised and enables him to get to showdown for 2 BBs, or if he prefers, to spend those 2 BBs with a turn raise and maybe fold a hand like AJ or KQ (although folding KQ wouldn't be a good thing if Hero has KK).

The only thing I can figure out is that Hero sat down at the wrong table and didn't realize it until the flop.

In all seriousness, I don't know...

I'll make an educatd guess. You have JJ and there is a %50 chacne that LAG has Aces or queens based on careful observations of his/her play. Or, you have Kx (particularly KQ) with the knowledge LAG may be playing in this manner with any two cards.

[jediael]

Hero has KK.

[ellipse_87]

Assuming for argument's sake that hero holds KK and has checked the flop to elude an auto-check-raise on that street, doesn't he raise-fold on the turn? This costs him the same as a showdown if he's facing an A, extracts more value from a Q, and has him very rarely laying down best hand (I feel villain would not have earned the label "semi"-LAG if he had the capacity to three-bet with just a Q on this turn).

The fact that an advanced player like Jason didn't pull this move on the turn decreases the likelihood of KK, in my view. But I'd be interested in hearing contrary opinions.

I'm still working on my own guess.

[callmedonnie]

I'm thinking either kings or jacks. I haven't seen what a 100/200 game looks like, but I'm sure its tough. Glad to see you moved from 2/4. /images/graemlins/laugh.gif

[ellipse_87]

I have hero with 99, TT, or JJ. I just have a feeling that we would have seen more action with a queen (or KK), given villain's loose pfr standards.

I discount spades because the only call-down for hero would have been KsXs. If hero has this, then he knows that villain is not semi-bluffing with spades, since villain can't have the A, K, or Q of spades. (He can have As, but he's not semi-bluffing then.) That leaves only a gut-shot semi-bluff for villain, which would necessarily involve one of the other Kings, and hero wouldn't call down on the flimsy basis of maybe having a better kicker.

As a semi-LAG, villain's range pre-flop (calling a 3-bet) is JJ-77, AQ-AT, KQ-KT. If hero has, say, JJ, then there are 96 combos in villain's range, 51 of which beat JJ.* The action tilts villain's range more towards the A's and Q's, which would support an educated guess by hero that he's ahead of villain a little better than 1/3 of the time. Hero gets 11.5-4 effective odds to check the flop and call down the final two streets. 99 would be slightly -EV, TT a toss up at best, so...

JJ it is.

* JJ 1
TT 6
99 6
88 3
77 3
AQ 9
AJ 12
AT 12
KQ 12
KJ 16
KT 16