15/30 The blinds war!

[FletchJr.]

15/30 tough game.

I'm in the BB with QJ of hearts,
all fold to sb, who raises.
I 3 bet. he 4 bets.
Flop 8c, 3h, 7s
He bets. I call.
Turn Tc
He bets, I raise.

River 4d

he checks, I bet.
Results and comments to follow.
Please comment on the play.

[Pot-A]

I'm not sure why you played this so strongly. I don't have any information about your opponent, but it seems hard to believe that, on average, all that extra agression is going to do anything but cost you lots of money.

[elysium]

hi fletch
fletch, if you had called the turn, opponent knowledge wouldn't be quite as important as it is here. sometimes on hands like this one, a little opponent info can go a long way. but i don't think on this particular hand it's vitally important. it's just usually on these type hands it is vitally important.

of course, we're assuming that you had bluffing conditions, etc.

i like the turn semi-bluff here. one thing though fletch; notice on the flop that you call when your opponent bets into you. a better strategy may be to raise for the free-card. now, if the turn produces a draw with overs, you have a better semi-bluff raise. if your opponent checks, you can bet and call any raise more confidently, and have correct odds of course, although you would never raise the flop to improve your odds or even factor that into your flop decision.

if you raise the flop and a T turns, your position allows you to accept a free-card. and since this holding is free-card oriented, although the action is more bet to fold-ish, if that 9 hits, you may get unlimited action, and if the Q or J hits, you can confidently bet if checked to or call if bet into.

when you win, you win more money playing it your way, especially if you win on the river after being reraised on the turn. you also win more those times that you hit that 9. if your opponent has AJ or AQ, and neither of you improve, if your capable of a river bluff raise, your way is better.

but if getting a lot of bets into the pot in a marginal situation isn't that important, and you don't think that your opponent will fold after having capped it pre-flop, and you have position, then raising for the free-card becomes an option with a lot of advantages those times you don't think he will fold and you're not a 60% favorite when you bet and he calls that bet, keeping in mind that the 60% favorite criteria in a steal-raise pot doesn't carry the same weight in normal short-handed situations. but you still use it as a guideline, only you don't need it to make betting correct and yes, you should tend to bet to get the fold in these situations, unless there is some reason to suspect that your opponent will not fold. then you have to start thinking about that free-card if you have position. and i think that is the case here.

will you likely get the free-card? the chances are better than you think. he may attempt a turn check-raise, so the flop raise would be a free-card / turn check-raise inducement type raise; kinda scaring him on the one side, and making him greedy on the other. he will check to you 1 in 3 or 4 times, maybe a little less frequently. also, you gain a little info. if he reraise you on the flop, you'll need to improve on the turn. and at worst, if you don't think he will fold to a bet, the flop raise costs just 1 or 2 small bets.

i see that you called the flop to represent a stronger hand on the turn, but you have already done that on the pre-flop. he already believes that you have a hand. and the 4 bet tells you that he's gonna be tough to fold; not looking good in the folding department. so you need to give your hand the cheapest means to improve and a free-card may be the way. if things go awry, you will need to improve on the turn to continue.

by the way fletch, if you planned to semi-bluff raise the turn, call the pre-flop raise.

[turnipmonster]

why did you bet the river? that seems like a very thin value bet to me. he can probably beat Q high.

--turnipmonster

[storm_madden]

Don't repop SB raiser preflop unless you feel comfortable you can out high card him at the river. My opinion is your preflop did not mesh with your postflop play.

Semibluff on turn is bad because pot is big he aint folding. Better to pop flop and try free card on turn IMHO, but his 4bet preflop means he's ready to get busy on the flop I think.

Check-calling flop and turn is better. But I think you should flat call preflop and check fold the flop.

I get into these wars at 15-30 too so I know where you are coming from, but I think you need more than QJ here to do serious battle.

[bruce]

I don't like your reraise unless there are other hidden factors besides the obvious. QJ headsup has poor high card strenght. You can't even beat Ace Deuce. By reraising and then getting reraised you have made the pot so large that
the only way you can win is by making a desperation raise
on the turn or hoping to suck out on the river. With you
turn raise if your opponent is any good he will call will almost anything because of the pot size and he should also call the river with a big Ace. If you would have just called the preflop raise and folded on the flop or after taking a card off you would not have been in this desperate situation.

Bruce

[Yeknom58]

It's not a value bet it a bluff. At this point its the only way he can win this pot?

[Yeknom58]

The SB showed major strength and you totally missed the flop. Time to leave. Unless you think he's bluffing what hand can you beat exactly? Unless he has exactly AK I don't think your bluff on the end is going to work.

[FletchJr.]

He calls the river and shows me 55.

It was a very surprising showing. Honestly I don't know too many players that 4 bet preflop heads up and then don't go 3 bets on the flop when they get popped.
The guy read me like a book. I guess i should of played it a little more conservative.
I just hate that weak-tight image though.

[bruce]

A couple of things come to mind.

Firstly: When there is not a card bigger than a Ten on the flop its awfully tough to get your opponent off pocket Fives when he can beat bottom pair.

Secondly: This is probably unlikely but do you have a tell? Or is your play very predictable?

Bruce

[Tommy Angelo]

"15/30 tough game."

Games with players in it who spray multiple bets around with no pairs and no draws and underpairs are only tough if you yourself spray ships around likewise. The best way to play your hand, IMO, would have been to call preflop and fold on the flop. Weak tight is way better than strong broke.


Tommy

[bad beetz]

if you want to do this kind of crazy [censored], I like raising the river better than raising the turn. It has more an effect, and you won't have to worry about whether you have to call his turn three bet with gutshot+overcards that aren't good.

[Philuva]

You got Q high with not much of a draw on the flop. I am not sure why you invested so much into the hand. It appears with the SB going 4 bets pre-flop and betting into you twice, that he has a hand. Once he calls your turn raise, I can't imagine a hand he would have that we would fold on the river, so your river bets seems pointless. With the relatively non-scary board, he is going to call you down with a pocket pair or probably a big Ace.

Plus it would really suck if you got 3 bet on the turn, so I hate the turn-raise. I think given the way you played it pre-flop, you would have been better off raising the flop.


I think you would have been better off calling pre-flop with Q high.