Failing the A-Q test and a follow-up hand

30-60.


Unknown player has a big stack of chips and hasn't played a hand in an hour. He raises UTG. Everyone passes to me and I make a curiosity call with A-Q on the button. Both blinds, tight players, fold.


Flop is K-Q-x rainbow. He bets, I raise, he calls, Turn is a blank. He checks, I bet, he calls. River is another blank. He checks, I check. He turns over. . .A-K, of course.


Two hours later, after he has played only 3-4 more hands, he open raises UTG again. Again, everyone folds to me on the button and I look down to see. . .Ac-Kc. I call. Both blinds (same players) call this time and we take the flop 4-handed.


Flop is Ad-Qh-9h. Both blinds check, UTG bets, I raise, small blind and big blind both cold-call (!) and UTG 3-bets. I'm getting 17:1 to call, with it likely that both blinds will call making my odds 19:1. I fold.


Turn is Ah and all hell breaks loose. Guess who won the hand (and who would have won the hand had I not folded-river was a blank)?

Andy -


In the second hand, I like your fold on the flop. Previously, you had seen UTG play AK very passively (although he may have been concerned about KQ, but if he's worth his salt, he probably knows that you wouldn't call his preflop raise with that, I don't think).


But now, UTG is being much more aggressive. It goes without saying that the presence of two more players mandates that he plays it more aggressively, though, to make the draws pay.


There is something else at work here. In the first hand, he may invoked the "way ahead, or way behind" philosophy, hence the check-call strategy.


In the second hand. . . BB had 7h8h, SB had A9d, and UTG had QQ, so SB wins. Or maybe not.


One question I have for you is, would you have called UTG's 3-bet on the flop if the board was a rainbow and only one blind called two cold?


Secondly, would you have called UTG's 3-bet if there had been a club on the flop? Just curious. . .


Worm

"One question I have for you is, would you have called UTG's 3-bet on the flop if the board was a rainbow and only one blind called two cold?"


Yes, and I might even cap.


"Secondly, would you have called UTG's 3-bet if there had been a club on the flop? Just curious. . ."


No. A backdoor flush draw or lack thereof will only lead me one way or the other if the decision is close; in this case, I was sure of my fold.

Like you said, though, you were getting 19:1. The backdoor flush is a 23:1. . . you throw in a tiny % for the backdoor straight, a tiny% for a backdoor fullhouse, a tiny% for you already having the best hand, and a call here can't be too wrong, can it?


Slap me once I get annoying.


Worm

I felt I was behind in at least one place. Therefore, I needed to help on the turn. With what? An Ah or Kh would probably give someone a flush; any other king might give someone a straight. The As might be a perfect card, but I put UTG on pocket Queens. I thought I needed to catch two cards, perfect-perfect and if I caught semi-perfect on the turn it would get very expensive.


Let's say I had a 1% chance of winning a hand (or the lottery) and were getting 100-1. I'd be doing the right thing by calling, then, since I'm getting 100-1 on a 99-1 shot. But I'd lay down every time. Too easy to miss 100 or 200 times in a row. Plus my figuring might be (in fact tends to be when I see all those chips in the middle) rosy colored; I might in fact be drawing dead or much thinner than 100-1.


I save my thin calls for last man to act on the river.

Andy-


Curious why you didn't 3-bet pre-flop with either of these hands?


I'm in the camp of folding AQ against solid legitimate raises. But if I do play, I'm very inclined to re-raise. This goes for AKs as well.

"In the first hand, he may invoked the "way ahead, or way behind" philosophy, hence the check-call strategy."


if that is the case then that is just taking that idea (which is really turning into a bit of a cliche around here) too far. think about it guys. it's an easy way to justify playing weak tight isnt it? "well i was either way ahead or way behind man, that's why i wimped out and missed earning an extra big bet and a half with my top pair top kicker." (btw no that was not a direct quote from a jim brier article. he wouldnt say "man".)


arent many situations in hold em a case of being way ahead or way behind? especially in heads up or three handed pots that arent bloated to 15 big bets on the flop like in LA? isnt it pretty common to actually have only 3-6 outs or something when youre beat (but dont realise it of course)? does this mean you should slow down any time you might be behind?


take the hand above where utg can worry a little about KQ just one step further. anyone with AK against a weaker player and a board of Axx rainbow could be worried about Ax, but is that a reason to start thinking "way ahead or way behind" and move into check and call mode? WEAK-TIGHT. BAD.


the only reason utg shouldve checked the turn on the hand above was if he was planning to checkraise. perhaps he wouldve folded if andy had bet the river!

You touch on an interesting point about the reasons to wimp out and go passive.


In several threads there is much talk about holding back on the flop with a set when there is a semi coordinated flop cause you'll be glad you did if a scare card comes up on the turn. Well, then, with that reasoning you can hold back with everything on any street until you're sure you're ahead. But, is that what we're supposed to be learning here?

"isnt it pretty common to actually have only 3-6 outs or something when you're beat"


Yes, but it's less common to be certain enough of that situation to fold, and then actually follow through by folding.


The one that gets me all tangled up is when I think I'm outkicked on the flop. With a beefy pot, the lure to draw to three outs is too much, and I succumb, probably too often, given the pot size and chances of getting outredrawn and all that.


But at least when I make that play, I'm rarely drawing dead to two pair, meaning if I have A-10 and the flop is A-x-x, and I catch my 10, I'll have top two, whereas in Andy's hand, with a card on board higher than his kicker, he can hit his kicker and STILL be drawing to hit it yet again on the river to win. Very bad.


So as a rule of thumb that I didn't even realize I had until now, I draw to the three-outter when I'll make top two if I hit. Of course this all requires a situation where we are mighty sure that we are outkicked in the first place.


Mike, I'm not disagreeing with anything you said because, well, I can't remember why I started replying. OH! Here it was. When people say "I was either way ahead or way behind," and use that as a reason for wimping out, the balanced emphasis of the two phrases is false and misleading. What they usually mean is, "I was almost certainly way behind."


Tommy

"Well, then, with that reasoning you can hold back with everything on any street until you're sure you're ahead. But, is that what we're supposed to be learning here?"


right, no i dont think it is.


i think the reason we see this is because the "tight" in tight aggressive is the easy part for a lot of us. and when we tighten up our play as much as some of us do (certainly not me) it's easy to tend toward tightening up our betting as well. weak and tight (rock) just go together a lot easier than tight and aggro (roll?). just as aggressiveness falls in line much easier if youre playing relatively loose (me).


that's why expert play is such a hard thing to get right. even the very high level of player that posts on this forum is usually posting because they were leaning a bit too much to one extreme or other at one point in their recent session.

I'm been really interested in way ahead/way behind types of situations lately. It came about when I noticed that the pots I won were small, while the pots I lost I put a lot of money into.


I decided this is a symptom of weak-tight play. It's too predictable, If your opponents have nothing they can fold comfortably. And your opponents will try to take shots at you, since you know when your opponent is telling you you're beat. You're losing the war of information.


Way ahead/way behind situations are siutations for tactics in the war of information. By calling down, you disguise strength when you're ahead, and limit losses when behind. If your opponent is trying to take advantage of you, then that's the time to sucker him in.