Taj 10/20 river decision

[scrub]

Bankroll finally got big enough to play above 6/12. Celebrated by dropping 20 BB over 24 hours of 10/20 play at the Taj. The games were extremely loose and extremely aggressive--reminded me of my first B+M experiences playing 2/4, but paying time... I tried posting this in MSHS, but the sages seemed uninterested, so I'll try again here... /images/graemlins/smile.gif

10/20 at the Taj. I've gotten myself on the right of a solid pro in between him and the two weakest players at the table. Both players are call all the way with any pair sorts, and the player in question open raises from any position with any two cards with pictures on them. I hadn't seen openraise dude go all the way to showdown with unimproved big cards. Neither is aggressive postflop, and neither has checkraised in the two hours I've been there.

I'm in MP with 99. Weak open raiser open-raises, as he is wont to do. I 3-bet. Folded around, he calls. So far, so good, I think.

Flop comes Q95 rainbow. He checks, I bet, he calls.

Turn is another Q. He checks, I bet, he calls.

River is another Q. He checks, I check. He mucks facedown.

Pro later gave me crap for missing a bet. Does this check suck, and if so how much?

scrub

[bunky9590]

Well played, except for the river.

I bet the river as well. What do you think he has? A Queen?
He'll call with a 5 or any PP lower than 99, so its a clear bet. But, I bet too much anyway.

[Mike Gallo]

Why on Earth did you check the river, did you fear the case Queen? If he had a Queen he would have popped you on the turn when he hit his tripps.

[tpir90036]

definitely bet the river. however, in this particular case it seems like your opponent had unimproved (non-queen) broadway cards of one variety or another and wasn't going to call another bet anyway.

[Joe Tall]

I bet the river. AK will call here on this board now and then and you surely will miss a bet more often than you're check-raise.

Preflop was played perfectly. I 3-bet w/99 this weekend vs an open raiser who called me all the way down w/88.

Peace,
Joe Tall

[scrub]

Scrub's rationale:

He's open raising with hands containing face cards, but he has not yet raised from any position with a bad pair, defined in this hand as 88 and below.

In similar situations, he has mucked the river on raggedy boards rather than calling down with what I assumed were unpaired high cards.

Thus, he has, until now, been calling me down with two non-queen broadway cards or with a pocket pair. While I thought he was raising too liberally, I thought it was a question of overvaluing hands containing big cards, rather than a question of the guy being a maniac. Therefore, I severely discounted the possibility that the guy had 22-55, and would have been surprised if he had 77 or 88.

I figured that if he had any PP, he was calling me down, and would likely fold unpaired high cards. Since he didn't cap preflop or raise the flop, I figured his calling hands were JJ, TT, 88-22, and he was folding everything else a very high percentage of the time. I put him on having openraised with JJ or TT more often than with pairs below 99, and thus figured that my bet was extremely thin.

In addition to the fact that more experinced players seem to think the guy has 88-22 more often than JJ or TT here, Elysium wrote an interesting post on my MSHS cross-post about with a rationale for betting even assuming my value estimation was right.

I guess I thought wrong...:)

Thanks for the replies!

scrub

[Homer]

I would bet and expect to see AK/AJ/88/77/66 more often than TT/JJ, when called.

-- Homer

p.s. - What's up with Sklansky's response to you on the MHS forum? I assume you've been playing poker longer than a week, and therefore already know what a value bet is.

[scrub]

I had the decided impression he was being sarcastic. Still, pretty cool that he replied (and that my play wasn't "a crime against humanity... /images/graemlins/smile.gif)

And heck, I hadn't considered the meta-game reasons for betting on the end that a number of posters seemed to think was a significant component of the bet's "value."

scrub