river shmiver

[mike l.]

20-40. i hold QQ in the sb. there is an okay utg limper, another good caller, looser but decent cutoff raises, i reraise, utg calls, next guy folds, cutoff calls. 3 of us see the flop.

flop is JJT. i bet, utg folds, cutoff calls.

turn is another J. i bet, cutoff calls.

as the river card is being turned i realise that i dont really care what card it is so i bet. as my chips land on the felt i see it is an A and i start to sweat a little. was that bet a mistake? what is the correct river play?

[devinthedude]

Well, I dont see how the cutoff can possibly have AA or KK, since he didnt reraise preflop and didnt raise on the flop. When the 3rd J comes, I dont think he can call with AK or AQ on the turn. I don't think he would have slowplayed AJ with that flop and your preflop 3 bet. The only think I can think of here is something like 99 or 88, but with the A coming, I don't know if he can call your bet, but I also can't see him having you beat. I think he will call more often with 99 than he will actually have something that beat you here.

So I think it was a good bet

[bobgreen]

I would guess:
if you bet,
cutoff might call with a T or a lower pocket pair:
cutoff would call, not raise with any hand that beats you except full house or better;
cutoff would raise with full house or better.
If you check,
cutoff would check with any pocket pair and maybe a T;
cutoff would bet with any hand that beats you.
So he'll call with more hands than he'll bet. A bluff river raise sure seems unlikely, so I suggest bet and fold to a raise (unless he has proved himself wild and ballsy.)

[bobgreen]

In my experience there are many players, maybe the majority, who would call the turn w/ AK or AQ and who would slowplay a J. Would I, heads-up? Yup, some of the time.

[SoBeDude]

I think there is an added benefit to betting dark here when the ace falls. Your opponent won't be afraid of it as he'll correctly surmise it doesn't help your hand. this should slightly help in getting him to call the river bet.

-Scott

[brad]

for some opponents this would induce them to raise with a hand like 99

[elysium]

hi mike
the bet is a mistake. i think you can check-fold. the fold will make you appear looser than you are. in other words, some players who fold in this spot are read for having folded QQ or KK. the fold does nothing for their image; they are still perceived as tight as ever. because of that, often the tighter player will call. he now calls because he fears folding his QQ will inspire others to take stabs at him in future similar situations. his call, even though he knows he will lose, has some value; maybe a lot of value.

you, on the other hand, should fold. why? well, i may only be a 2 year old in this game, but i will tell you this much; ain't no one in their right mind mind gonna take a shot a you. folding will put you on hole cards a lot looser than QQ, and can substitute it for a loose starter; in other words, you won't have to make a genuine loose play for variance. and yes, i know; you have a loose play snowball going where the looser you play, the more calls stick to your initial bet, and you roll the snowball by playing loose and continuing to get the calls. in your snowball fight, you've taken this strategy of rolling, and rolling a monster size snowball onto your opponents and thus winning the battle. but that requires loose play to keep the snowball calls coming. if you tighten, it melts. and the problem with playing loose is that you find yourself packing your snowball with your own snow, rather than with the snow of your opponents. worse, this strategy calls for a double size snowball to get things rolling, but ok.

and summer has arrived; snowchips are harder to come by.

what to do. one thing for sure, you can't begin sticking your own snow chips onto the snowball again and expect any real growth because you're just displacing weight from your pocket and adding it onto the weight of the snowball. but, yes.....snowball loose play does require that you keep the loose play snowball rolling, but fortunately that doesn't mean using your own chips to do so.

once you have the snowball going, and are perceived as being loose, in this situation and ones similar to it, you should make tough folds when those folds will make you appear being looser than you are. in other words, you will use the snowchip monies that you would ordinarily invest to keep opponents from throwing snowballs at you, and turn those snowchips into tough folds and thus essentially sticking the tough call monies onto the snowball and using that in place of actual loose play that you would otherwise have to do to keep the snowball growing. but you know by over-playing the loose play card that the money comes from you to keep the snowball growing. now, since no one will take shots at you anyway fearing catapult aggression, when you make a tough fold UNDER THE RIGHT COONDITIONS when you know that fold will make you appear looser than you're actually playing, they will all look and say,'mike's still playing loose. we will still call mike's bets. anyone heard from henrietta?' and they will remember what happened to henrietta last march when she took a stab at you. 'no. haven't heard from henrietta.', they'll say. ten days from Lent when henrietta returns, you can throw in a couple of genuine loose plays; bring out the catapult. but until then, you can find strategic areas in your game that will feed off of your already loose image without you having a 500 pound snowmonster reaching his hand into your pocket for snowchips he wants to stick onto his chest. and so you joust.

didn't your father ever tell you these things mike?

tough folds aren't the only way you can appear to be looser than you are. and not all tough folds will make you appear loose. but this situation is a perfect example of just such a fold, or better yet, opportunity for a loose player who already has the loose snowball rolling, to appear looser than he actually is, so that he can play tight as all get out and continue getting called thereby increasing the size of his snowball with snow provided by his opponents and not himself.

[Ian M.]

[ QUOTE ]
in your snowball fight, you've taken this strategy of rolling, and rolling a monster size snowball onto your opponents and thus winning the battle. but that requires loose play to keep the snowball calls coming. if you tighten, it melts. and the problem with playing loose is that you find yourself packing your snowball with your own snow, rather than with the snow of your opponents. worse, this strategy calls for a double size snowball to get things rolling, but ok.

and summer has arrived; snowchips are harder to come by.


[/ QUOTE ]

This was a hilarious post.

[Gabe]

Well, he is a favorite to have AK or another hand that beats you. This was not a good spot for him to be raising with a small pair before the flop after two limpers. However from his point of view, you could have a smaller pair and were using his raise to force out the limpers with your reraise. If you weren’t already beat, he probably called the flop with a gutshot and overcards. The turn left him with overcards, a possible chop with the three T’s and a kicker for the case J. (The case J is one of the reasons why you care what card comes off on the river.)
If he would have checked after you when he spikes his ace, then you made a mistake.
If you could have check folded here, you have made a mistake.

His hands:
AK(12)
AQ(6 or less if he raises only w/AQs)
AJ(2 at most)
AA(3)
KK(6)
ATs(2 or 3)

QQ(1)

TT(3)
99(6 if he raises with it preflop after two limpers)
88(0 he probably draws the line here, if not at 99, pre-flop)

KQ(16 or less depending on his suited tendencies) This is only counts if he calls the river with a straight.

He would not bet TT, 99, KQ for value here, if you check.

Are there 3 or more odd-ball hands here, that he will bluff with?
If yes, then check call.
If no, then check fold.

[mike l.]

fortunately i wasnt put to the test with a raise and he did call. my hand was good. so by dumb luck my value bet worked but i now think that it's a check-call hand. it means losing $40 sometimes but not risking being put to the test with a raise; a raise where my tendency is to call far too often.