Bellagio $15-30 against a maniac

[piguy24]

Great $15-30 at Bellagio. Guy in question (maniac) was always very LAG until the river, where he tightened up somewhat. All other players in this hand are pretty loose passive. UTG+1 limps, I raise in MP1 with A /images/graemlins/heart.gifJ /images/graemlins/heart.gif. MP3 calls, Maniac (in CO) 3-bets, SB calls, BB calls, UTG+1 calls, I call, MP3 calls.

Flop (6 players, 12 SB)
A /images/graemlins/diamond.gif8 /images/graemlins/club.gif3 /images/graemlins/club.gif.
Checked to me, I bet, MP3 calls, maniac calls, SB calls, all else fold.

Turn (4 players, 16SB)
Q /images/graemlins/heart.gif.
SB checks, I check, MP3 checks, maniac bets, SB folds, I check-raise, MP3 folds, maniac calls.

River (2 players, 12BB)
Q /images/graemlins/spade.gif.
I bet, maniac raises, I call.

[adios]

[ QUOTE ]
I bet, maniac raises, I call.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not sure what your question is, but I guess it could be

1) Should I have bet the river?

and/or

2) Should I call the raise?

and/or

3) Should I re-raise on the river?

IMO the answer to questions 1) and 2) is yes, 3) is no. Yes to number 2 seems like a no brainer to me. IMO a true maniac with a flush draw, especially with high cards, would give a lot of action on the flop.

[Zele]

A maniac who tightens up on the river is very likely to auto-bet here, and, by definition, somewhat less likely to call you. So check-call.

If he gets passive on the river, then your bet is correct.

[falsefaith]

Why check-raise the turn? You knock out one player at most (MP3) and you allow for the small possibility of the CO checking behind. Remember 6 people called a 3-bet preflop -- are you sure that you hold the best Ace? By time the action got back to you on the turn it was correct to raise, but was that the best course of action originally?

[Nightwish]

Of course he has the best A. No one raised the flop. The only hands he could be behind to on the flop are weird 2-pairs and of course sets.

[Nightwish]

I'm not a fan of the turn check. I would bet and hope to get raised by the maniac so that I can 3-bet (I'm assuming he's a true maniac, i.e. goes crazy with any 2 cards). The river is fine.

[elysium]

hi pi
there isn't too much here that you didn't play optimally, the only two areas i see are on the pre-flop and river.

whenever you have a maniac type in LP in a game that attracts good multi-way betting, and you have AQs or AJs, because of the sureity that a trapping type raise is coming in late, it's better to call the initial bet rather than raise, and then reraise as the raise comes back around. the reason for this is that while this style of limp reraise reduces the chances that you will win the pot, it keeps you within the safety parameters of math in a situation in which knowing that your opponents who have yet to act are capable of calling two cold diminishes the value of your hand.

generally, you don't want to find out something by betting or raising that at cost only reduces the value and strength of your holding. the possibility of acquiring knowledge that hurts you must always be given consideration before making a raise because all raises provide you with at least some new knowledge about your holding juxtaposed against your opponent's. this doesn't mean that raising is incorrect when your hand strength is such that it is knowledge sensitive or possibly dominated. nor does it mean that if you hold something like JTs from UTG you should always raise-in with it since it isn't a knowledge sensitive holding because it's not dominated. JTs is a flop oriented holding. that means that if JTs is cold-called or reraised, the flop is capable of negating the reduction of value incurred through its acquisition of surprisingly harmful knowledge. in the case of JTs, the flop can easily negate the effects of finding out that your tight opponent is capable of levying a devestating pre-flop 3 bet. this is not so in the case of AJs.

that doesn't mean that raising with AJs pre-flop from EP is incorrect though. if the prospects of cutting down the field are encouraging enough, then it is worth taking the risk of acquiring the punishing info provided by an unwanted cold-call or 3-bet. here in this particular hand, the raise doesn't have the sureity of accomplishing what the raise is intended to do to make it correct to take the risk of finding out harmful info about our holding. the reason? once we find out the harmful info, it cannot be eradicated.

the alternative then is to create a less hostile environment for our sensitive holding if at all possible. sometimes this is not possible. sometimes we must risk finding out negative news at our own cost, even if its harmful effects can't be attenuated because we have no means of creating an alternative environment. with AQo or KQo from MP+'s we grit our teeth and raise, telling our opponents, 'i don't like this anymore than you do, dangit. i raise.'. brutally primordial. the danger is knowledge sensitivity. the reward is the pot. you are simply basing your decision that with fewer opponents left to act, the possibility of one of them providing negative info is reduced. this is not a safe haven however. you are not riding the crest of a positive ev wave. it is basic primordial risk verses reward. you think you'll come out ahead and make a subjective decision not backed by the shelter of mathematics. you think. primordial.

the correct way of handling the AJs here, since you won't be getting it short-handed with a raise, is to create a mathematical safe haven using it's 'draw to the nuts' status. be very careful as you build your safe haven that you also avoid the release of negative info of which one or other of your opponents may be in possession, and try to suppress its release by removing the artifice the opponent plans to disseminate the bad news with; a cold-call or 3-bet. you do this by taking into consideration how your action can subtley influence the dynamics of the field's betting action.

notice here that if you call and the maniac predictably raises, none of your opponents can cold-call. thus, none of your opponents can disseminate negative news to your news sensitive hand through the services rendered by a cold-call. can your opposition 3-bet? yes, yes. but this risk is lessened by the maniac himself. any potential 3-bettor will want to build the largest possible pot, something that enhances the framework of the mathematical safety perameters. if the potential 3-bettor is to the immediate left of the maniac, he will be strong enough to sustain a 4-bet, so he would want the largest possible pot, and from the blind, he may elect to call the maniac's raise rather than risk driving out and giving away his hand. of course, if he 3-bets anyway, and you see that the 3-bettor's reraise is going to leave the field short-handed, the info gleened from the 3-bet can be mitigated somewhat with your folding rather than calling the 2 bets. total cost to you? one small bet. so on the primordial end of things, you reduce your total risk and surrender at minimal cost. how often will calling one bet instead of raising pre-flop with AJs in this spot result in the surrender of that one bet? rarely. the maniac positioned where he is causes an orderly and mathematically optimum entry of bets into the pot that more often than not finds you limp reraising your nut draw potentials after having an opportunity to calculate the certainty of the bottom line figure of the mathematical safety haven created by you when you gingerly called to allow the weight of the numbers to swing back around to your side of the scale, all the while keeping the bad news wolves safely at bay. and so you use the maniac, whose raises only inspire more calls, and whose news can easily be repudiated.

but if you think that you can get this heads-up or in a 3-way, then raising pre-flop has merit.

it looks a little like the maniac may have busted. if you think he will bluff raise, then obviously betting out on the river is the only way to go. what did you say about his river habits?.....hmmmm. he tightens a little you say. yeah, i'd check-call his possible busted. betting still has some merit, it depends on how tighter he becomes on the river, but sometimes opponents who give it up on the river, if aggressive enough and heavily invested in the pot, will take a stab at it if checked to, but fold if bet into. this one is close though. i'd check-call it, but your bet out looks sweet. you probably played the river better than i would have.