Hand my opponent played badly

[Nate tha' Great]

Party $50 NL. Good, loose table with several notable soft spots. I have a $216 stack. My opponent has a stack of $56.

Anyway, my opponent limps UTG with K [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] 3 [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]. Yeh, that's a bad limp, but that's not the point I'm trying to make. I make it $3 in MP with T [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] T [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]. FWIW, this is my third preflop raise in about five hands, though neither of the previous two hands went to showdown. Looseish players in the CO and Button cold call my raise, blinds muck. UTG enemy calls.

4 to the flop, pot is around $13:

8 [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] K [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] K [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]

Opponent checks his trips to me. I bet $12.34. Note that I've also made a pot-size bet on the last two hands that I raised before the flop. CO and Button fold.

He calls.

This is a huge mistake, no?

(The turn came the T [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]. He checked and I checked behind. River was the A [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]. He bet all-in and I called.)

[ALL1N]

Not really. If he lets you see 2 cards for free and gives you his stack both times then thats about $3.50 he's giving you. Surely if he bet $5 on the river you'd call unimproved. So the flop call alone is not bad (unless you were going to call any flop check-raises).

With a stack so shallow and such a safe board there's really no need for him to be aggressive unless he thinks you'll play looser if he does.

[turnipmonster]

[ QUOTE ]

Opponent checks his trips to me. I bet $12.34. Note that I've also made a pot-size bet on the last two hands that I raised before the flop. CO and Button fold.

He calls.

This is a huge mistake, no?


[/ QUOTE ]

trips aren't actually such a great hand to play a big pot with, because a lot of times you are only getting action from a full. ray zee had a good post about trips a while back. he said something to the effect of "play a big pot here, and watch your money go south".

that said, his river play was much worse than his flop play. if it were me playing K3 against you, I definitely would lead on the flop, check the turn and make a reasonable river bet. a checkraise on the flop is a bad play, he is pot committing himself with a very marginal hand. if you call the checkraise he is a lot of times completely screwed, and damn near committed for the rest of his money.

--turnipmonster

[tewall]

With such a short stack, he's definately going to the felt, so the only question is to how best your money in the pot. The way he played it makes sense if you are an aggressive player. With that board, your drawing out on him is a secondary consideration.

[1800GAMBLER]

Why so low? Even if you are learning NL you are capable of beating the $200.

[Nate tha' Great]

[ QUOTE ]
Not really. If he lets you see 2 cards for free and gives you his stack both times then thats about $3.50 he's giving you. Surely if he bet $5 on the river you'd call unimproved. So the flop call alone is not bad (unless you were going to call any flop check-raises).

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, I don't think the problem is that he let me draw out on him. The problem is that, once he calls my raise on a completely drawless board on the flop, it is obvious that he has exactly Kx, or 88. The only hands that are going to call a turn or river bet of any magnitude are Kx hands that either have him outkicked, or hands that have drawn a two-outer to make a boat.

If, on the other hand, he check-raised the flop, I might well be tempted to call if I had any sort of read on him as being loose, as he could potentially make that play with a much wider range of hands.

Am I totally off-base? I guess I just think that the call makes it too obvious what his hand is, even for an inexperienced NL player like me.

[turnipmonster]

the reason I prefer a bet on the flop from him is because it conveys less information on the flop.

that said, I seriously doubt he is going to check raise with a wider range of hands then he'll call with. maybe he would do it on a bluff, but that's about it. you can't just put someone on the nuts every time they check call you, especially on those party poker games.

if he was a thinking player, his most likely holding in this spot is a pocket pair or perhaps AK.

if he does have a pocket pair, then he knows his flop call will slow you down and you'll see a cheap showdown, which is what he wants. he should want the same thing with a K, and the way to get that is check call, check and then bet.

lots of players will check call the flop in that spot with less than a K. the turn is a different story. if the turn blanks and you bet and he calls, then the alarm bells go off.

--turnipmonster