Am I over-aggro? Jc4c in 15-30 Party

[nykenny]

game is on the tightish side. semi-aggressive. not my favorite type of game. but i have no choice, this is the only game with the 3 seat open (which is the only corner open on my screen).

everyone folds. I raise on button with Jc4c (steal). SB reraises, FF folds. i thought about it for about 0.01 sec and capped (actually i clicked the raise check-box).

flop comes QhQc6c. SB checks, I bet, he calls. (i am praying for a club or a 4 or a J).

but alas, turn was a As. SB checks again, what??! get the hell out of here! I ... CHECK.

river: 4d [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]. SB bets, I call quickly.

Thoughts?

Kenny

[astroglide]

from soup to nuts, it was played awfully. bad stealing hand, bad cap, bad turn check, bad river call. presumably you won due to the post, but the amount of 3betting hands you can actually beat here is ridiculously low.

[Nightwish]

The SB almost certainly has a better hand than you pre-flop. I don't like capping this pre-flop, and I'll tell you why. By capping, you're trying to send a message that you really do have a great starting hand. But the problem is that the SB has something, your raise looks like a steal, and it'll take a LOT to move the SB off a legitimate hand. Instead, I would call pre-flop and, if you're still thinking about getting the SB to fold, raise on the flop (almost regardless of what flops). That way, it looks like you tried to steal pre-flop, got caught by the SB, but then actually flopped some part of the garbage that you were trying to steal with. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] If the SB calls your flop raise, then you have a good chance of getting him to fold if a blank comes on the turn. If he instead re-raises you again, you can safely fold (well, in this case you actually had a club draw, but I'm talking about the cases where you don't flop anything). Of course, this kind of move has to be done very sparingly.

In this particular situation, I think you're beat 99% of the time on the river. I think the SB either has a mid-size pocket pair or an A (in the latter case, he was going for a check-raise on the turn).

BTW, I highly recommend a monitor that can do 1600x1200. Of course, you also need a video card that supports it. That way, you can play 4 games at once with no screen overlap. If you need to play more than 4 games, most higher end video cards can run two monitors at 1600x1200, so you can get yourself that setup too.

[jujujaja34]

nykenny,

Ok, you know stealing with Jc 4c is a bad idea not to mention capping with it, but moving on...

Why not bet the turn? The ace could very likely be a scare card for him as well. He might fold to a bet, if he check-raises its an easy fold, and if he calls it will be checked to you on the river.

Bottom line, given that you actually played that cheese, betting the turn makes the hand play easier.

jujujaja34

[nykenny]

[ QUOTE ]
Why not bet the turn? The ace could very likely be a scare card for him as well.

[/ QUOTE ]
that's why i didn't bet, it was a scare card for me. and i was planning to fold if i don't improve on river.
and i was scared of C/R.

[ QUOTE ]
and if he calls it will be checked to you on the river.

[/ QUOTE ]
free showdown here means nothing to me.

[ QUOTE ]
given that you actually played that cheese,

[/ QUOTE ]
agreed, it was cheese.

[ QUOTE ]
Ok, you know stealing with Jc 4c is a bad idea not to mention capping with it,

[/ QUOTE ]
it was wrong to steal. i usually muck even 97o on the button first in...

i guess i played bad.

Kenny

[nykenny]

[ QUOTE ]
from soup to nuts, it was played awfully. bad stealing hand, bad cap, bad turn check, bad river call. presumably you won due to the post, but the amount of 3betting hands you can actually beat here is ridiculously low.

[/ QUOTE ]

I couldn't beat anything real. And I didn't. SB showed me AKo and took down a huge pot.

moral of the story, stealing is bad, capping in position is good, checking on the turn with a draw is good, calling river with bad cheese is stupid.

lesson learned. [img]/images/graemlins/crazy.gif[/img]

Kenny

[nykenny]

[ QUOTE ]
BTW, I highly recommend a monitor that can do 1600x1200. Of course, you also need a video card that supports it. That way, you can play 4 games at once with no screen overlap. If you need to play more than 4 games, most higher end video cards can run two monitors at 1600x1200, so you can get yourself that setup too.

[/ QUOTE ]
thanks [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img].

in fact my monitors do support 1600x1200, but my eyes don't, not anymore. at 1280x1024, with my glasses (stigmatism), i am still able to read people's names and the chat msgs...

oh, u don't like my play either? not even any part of the play??? sign... am i that bad?

Very friendly yours,

Kenny

[astroglide]

stealing is bad

only with hands which you will hate when called or reraised

capping in position is good

once you are threebet preflop i think capping is awful. they are less likely to release their hand.

checking on the turn with a draw is good

again, i think the turn check was bad. this was your only real opportunity to pick up the pot against something like a pocket pair after (improperly) signalling so much strength.

calling river with bad cheese is stupid

agreed

lessons learned

it doesn't sound like it

[Nightwish]

[ QUOTE ]

oh, u don't like my play either? not even any part of the play??? sign... am i that bad?

[/ QUOTE ]
Well, stealing with J4c is certainly questionable, but I'm not going to say that it should NEVER be done. It's probably OK to do it very infrequently.

However, as I said already, the pre-flop cap is just meaningless. It doesn't accomplish anything. Look at it from the SB's perspective. He just put 2.5 bets into the pot completely out of position. He doesn't even know if the BB will fold (though I'm guessing he hopes that he does). The SB obviously has something. You won't convince him that you have anything better than what he's got until some cards come out.

But anyway, the biggest moral of this story is that it's almost always better to just muck J4c pre-flop and spare yourself the grief.