Big risk and big returns

20/40 Hold’em


I limp UTG with KsQc. The cutoff, who is a solid, very aggressive player, raises. The button and both blinds call, which accounts for all three fish at the table. I call, and 5 players see the flop with 10 SBs in the pot.


The flop comes Kc 10h 3h. The blinds check, and the action’s on me. I think that the cutoff will probably bet this flop no matter what he has and that the players in between will call one bet with a very wide range of holdings. If I bet, however, the cutoff will not raise unless he has top pair or better, because he respects my play. So here’s my thinking. Usually, I would just bet, because with 10 bets, two broadway cards and a 2 flush, I would like to lead in the preflop raiser and try to limit the field, and I would hate to risk a free card. However, I don’t see this as likely to work, and I also think that I can get a ton of equity in if the check-raise works. Of course, I’m running a huge risk, because a check around is a disaster. What do people think about the decision to check? The cutoff did bet, and all three players called, and I raised, the cutoff folded (!), and the button and blinds called. 4 players saw the turn with 9.5 BBs in the pot. Anyway, I won’t bore with details; I bet my hand to the end and it was good, and I won a nice pot. My real question is about my decision to check the flop, because while I did end up hitting a home run on the hand, I know that I took a big risk to do that. So, what do you all think?


-Dan

Of course, I’m running a huge risk, because a check around is a disaster


Giving a free card to an opponent who would have folded is very dangerous because if it allows him to beat you, a catastrophe has occurred: you have cost yourself the pot.


This reasoning is so ingrained in us, that some start to automatically think that any time they give a free card that allows their opponent to win, a "disaster" has occurred. However, this is not the case. It is only a catastrophe if you give the opponent a free card when he would have folded. If he would have called, all that has happened is that you have missed a bet when ahead. If you were going to lose, there is nothing you could have done.


From your description, it sounds like this is such a situation. Since the chance of your opponents folding is small, your risk as follows: you lose three bets when you bet and a check raise would have worked. You lose three bets when you check, and it check around.


Since the risk is the same either way, I don't believe that your check raise has to work much more than 50% to be worthwhile. You need some overlay, since there presumably some hands they would throw away, and some of these hands will end up beating you sometimes, but if you believe that a check raise will work (for example) 75% of the time, I think it is clearly right, and it definitely sounds like that is the situation. I think your play was right (assuming the assessment you give us of the opponents is accurate).

Dan,


First of all, good job keeping all three fish on your right. That gives you the best position to take advantage of their looseness and mistakes and should add a lot to your win in this type of game.


I agree that one problem with betting is that his raises will usually mean a better hand than yours. He knows he has three loose players yet to act and he will be reluctant to raise with less then a good king. Usually this will be AK. But you will need to call because the pot is big and you have outs.


This check and then checkraise for value may have a lot going for it. Any hand drawing to beat you (except maybe bottom pair) will call anyway. And now some hands that trail by a mile will get trapped for two bets (running flushes and straights would be an example). Even fish won't call raises cold.


Perhaps this is an example where playing in a way to narrow the field won't get the hands that have a good chance out but will drive out the ones that have a very slim chance. Or did I say that last paragraph /images/smile.gif ?


Maybe the key is the location of the fish > .


Regards,


Rick

I like the check-raise if you know the before the flop raiser to usually bet when checked to on the flop.

pokerguy,


With this flop my guess is that the only pre flop raising hand that the solid player might check the flop would be 99 and maybe not even that. He will usually bet all better pairs and perhaps AQ and AJ since he has an inside straight and overcard.


Since he folded to the checkraise my guess is he had QQ, JJ, or 99. He was 16 to 1 on a call to spike a set (a 22 to 1 shot) but if he goes for the set he is vulnerable to straights and perhaps set over set. But with QQ or JJ he has a backdoor draw of his own and I'm not sure how that would swing the decision.


Regards,


Rick

I think you should check raise here more than you should

bet.


You said he was an aggressive player, so he will bet almost

every time. Usually an aggressive player will try to

control their opp's by betting hands like underpairs and any draw, with the intention of checking the turn.


The real problem, I think if you bet more often than

not in this spot, then your observant opponents will know that

you don't have a str or flush draw.


Its a bad play to lead into a raise with a draw, and your

opp's should know you wouldn't do this.


The time to bet into him is if you think he is so aggressive that

he will raise your opp's out with almost hand. (Like

if he had 99 and wanted a free card on then turn.)


If he was that over-aggressive then you can just reraise

him no matter what, and take your chances.

Bobby,


Good points. That's part of what I thought, though I realize that I worded it really badly and probably even suggested the exact opposite in my post. Basically, there was no circumstance in which the fish could be made to call two cold in which I'm happy, so the field is only being narrowed when I'm drawing (to three outs probably), and that is exactly when I want the fish still in there.


I only really meant "disaster" in the sense that I would miss getting bets on the flop. I realize that the term is usually resevereed for when something is going to cost you the pot. This could cost the pot, but it seems unlikely, for the reasons you gave.


Good post.


-Dan

I think if you bet more often than not in this spot, then your observant opponents will know that you don't have a str or flush draw.


Wow, that's a really good point. I completely agree. If you check-raise the whole field, it will look as if you have flopped a big draw. If you bet into the preflop raiser, it will look like you want him to raise to protect a vulnerable hand (which you do). So, you get a lot more deception from check-raising. Of course, this is only of value against the cutoff, since the other opponents probably aren't smart enough to be deceived.

I agree that the solid player will bet the flop a very high percentage of the time and I like the check raise. That is if I played this hand by the way. KQ off imo is to loose in first 3 positions, but thats another post.


I also agree that if he tries to spike a set he in vulnerable to people making straights with the same card. I don't think he has to worry about set over set. If anybody had pocket kings I think we would have heard from them preflop. The backdoor draw I would not give much value too. It has a little, but not enough to make me call. Especially since if you get there with the backdoor there is a chance it will only split the pot because someone else could make the same straight. Lowering the backdoors value imo.

Rick,


I agree with most of what you wrote. I just have a question about one thing. You wrote, "Maybe the key is the location of the fish." Ok, the key to this particular play was obviously trapping the field for two bets on a secret installment plan, but if I were the SB and the preflop raiser were the button, then I'd like to check-raise in order to fold the field out on a coordinated board in a bloated pot. So either way, taking advantage of the "predictability" of the preflop raiser by check-raising has its advantages.


-Dan


On the flip side, this is actually one of the big reasons why I have stopped betting flops after raising preflop nearly as much as I used to.

This has been great reading, lots of intelligent, inciteful observations and deductions about a specific instance in which check raising might have been the best play.

I disagree and think this is a bad play and a bad habit to get into for the following reasons.

1) We are looking to make profitable long range decisions at the poker table, I think long range this is not the correct play as occasionally it will get checked around, often your check raise will tie one or opponents on the pot to outdraw you but most importantly a good solid, aggressive opponent will probably be thinking raise or fold if you bet into him on the flop.

If you are the type of person who sometimes bets their draws on the flop - even in a raised pot then he will often raise with nothing more than a gutshot overcard which is good for your hand as it makes it very incorrect for the fish to call behind him.

Sometimes he might fold which is good too as it will be you against the fish.

So what do you really want?

The fish tied on to a big pot when you only have one pair with the good player being able to 3 bet or just call in order to torture you on the turn or a simple bet that help you define your hand and maybe narrows the field too.

This particular situation is a rarity and as such is not that important.

The more important aspect of this post (IMO) is the general concept of whether to check to the raiser or not -whether you intend to go for the check raise or not I think the answer is the same - the bet in this spot is generally the better play.

I hope this amkes a little sense and although I think you played the hand in question very well according to the particular situation I think it's very important to hold on to the fundamentals of what is correct generally.

Daniel,


A quick thought.


We have to fight human nature when attempting to evaluate the merit of a play that increases the chance of winning a significantly bigger pot while at the same time increasing the chance of losing that pot. The pot you lose because you didn’t make the conventional play (in an attempt to build a bigger pot) sticks in your mind and we tend to lose sleep over it. But the extra bets we might gain are either forgotten after the fact or difficult to quantify.


In other words, there have to be some plays of this sort that analyzed objectively are worth the risk, even in moderately large pots. But when they backfire we don’t forget it (or our friends won’t let us). /images/smile.gif .


Regards,


Rick


.

Rick,


That's a good point. And it's why I think it's really important to quantify things when possible.


Your point makes me think of something that I think would generally benefit the forum. I think that more responses should try to quantify how often something would have to be the case to make a given action correct. For instance, Bobby said in his response to this post that he thinks a little more than 50% would be the fulcrum. So in general a useful post might look something like, "Given assumption set A, I think that action X is correct if y>= .5". For example, something like, "Assuming that the fish will do action I (with a probability distribution of course), I think checking is correct if the probability of the cutoff betting is greater than .6" And of course you would like to see these numbers backed up with some logic (such as an EV equation or the sort of logic that Bobby used). Then responses to that could take the form, "Well, I don't think assumption set A is correct, assumption set B is better, and if you use assumption set B, then that chages your fulcrum y probability to .7 from .6" Or, another type of response could be something like, "Based on this Bayesian analysis of potential hands, it looks like y is probably about .9, so you have a clear bet". I realize that answering questions with that sort of rigor takes a lot more work (and it's not always necessary), but I think that in the close cases that it would be enlightening. And even just the process of going through the analysis would be enlightening.


-Dan

Sounds like you are proposing some pretty dry reading. I will continue to play a solid strategy, playing less against good players and more against bad players. Works for me and is much less thinking.


Varying play is easier to do pre-flop. After the flop there are too many situational items to consider to make accurate percentage calculations.

Drew,


I'm as lazy about doing math as the next guy and it doesn't come easily to me. But some of my seat of the pants estimates for difficult situations can and should be be written in mathematical or at least more logical terms. To advance as players we simply need to work on this type of thing away from the table and subject our ideas to criticism from others. Math helps us express and refine these ideas.


Regards,


Rick

If you bet into him on the flop. Will you 3 bet or call? On the turn are you going to bet out after being raised? Just curious.


I like betting into him on the flop if I think he will raise with worse hands for the reasons you mentioned. The reason I would go for the check raise is because alot of players are hesitant to raise me when I bet becuase I have a pretty solid image. At least by check-raising I make everybody pay double when my hand is good. The fish I think will chase whether the pot is big or not anyway. And I doubt they will throw gutshots away for a double flop bet as well. And with going for the check-raise I make the original raiser put money into the pot he might just throw away had I bet. Sure there will be occasions when the raiser has me beat, but not enough to make the play not worth it imo. I think it should be mixed up. Sometimes bet sometimes check-riase, and sometimes even check call.

I have no problem with using math to calculate odds or number of outs, I just think it is above 100% of poker players heads to know what percentage of the time they should make this play or that play. All I would recommend is not to forget how you have played the hand so far in consideration of what you will do next in the hand, or during the session.


For instance, you are dealt three legitimate raising hands in a row and you raise. Then, if you are in mid position and raise with 10-9 suited when it is folded around to you just to vary your play of this hand for deception, do you think this is the best time for this play? Surely other players will become suspicious of your raising standards regardless of if you showed the previous hands.


In my example, I may just fold. Someone who has not played a hand in a while should possibly raise this hand as he is perceived as a rock. This just shows how tough it is to apply percentages to certain plays. There are too many factors to consider in my opinion.

Drew,


What I wrote has nothing to do with mixing one's play; in fact, it implicitly suggests (and possibly to a fault) that a given action should be taken 100% of the time if the factors are such that that action is the "correct" one.


-Dan

Daniel,


I reread your post and I may have misconstrued your point, but my reasoning is the same for your example. Good luck applying percentages to your opponent's actions. Like you said that will require a lot more work. This could only be fruitful if you can apply it at the table as well and I don't see that happening (at least with me). If I am still not getting your point, don't bother responding for my sake because I am done reading this thread.