$55 early play - post flop question

[Scuba Chuck]

What are your thoughts on this river bet by villain?
<font color="white"> villain has T4clubs </font>
Party Poker No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t15 (8 handed) converter

Button (t855)
SB (t1000)
Hero (t1985)
UTG (t685)
UTG+1 (t2610)
MP1 (t975)
MP2 (t975)
CO (t915)

Preflop: Hero is BB with 7[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img], A[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img].
UTG calls t15, UTG+1 calls t15, <font color="#666666">4 folds</font>, SB completes, Hero checks.

Flop: (t60) 3[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], 7[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], 3[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] <font color="#0000FF">(4 players)</font>
SB checks, <font color="#CC3333">Hero bets t60</font>, UTG calls t60, UTG+1 folds, SB folds.

Turn: (t180) K[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] <font color="#0000FF">(2 players)</font>
<font color="#CC3333">Hero bets t180</font>, UTG calls t180.

River: (t540) 9[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] <font color="#0000FF">(2 players)</font>
Hero checks, <font color="#CC3333">UTG bets t430 (All-In)</font>, Hero ......

[Apathy]

There are three options:

1. Villian has two medium clubs and is bluffing
2. Villian has two clubs but turned a K and wants value now (unlikely)
3.Villian excessivly slowplayed a 3.

I always feel that most people would raise the turn with 333 to prevent against the flush draw, and for value. Failing that most bet small for value on the river. This leads me to call and hop the villian didn't have the K [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]

[Scuba Chuck]

[ QUOTE ]
call and hop the villian

[/ QUOTE ]

dude, villain's not yugo, or "put the pipe down."

[Degen]

thats a tuffy. as with most of the hands you put up, i don't think there is a clear answer here.

the fact that he came in UTG (hopefully) would mean he doesn't have a 3 in his hand, but i'd say this is what you'd see ~25% of the time. Another strong possibility is that K and he was calling w/ overs on the flop, or less likely but still plausible would be KK or AA.

I fold this just because its so early and you have so many chips here, its not really about reads or pot odds or anything else, its about clinging to your chips.

I probably check this turn as well.


Degen

[Scuba Chuck]

So, let's go through my thought process. What is villain playing at here?

Well, my initial bet and call means very little, IMO.

My turn bet and call means much more. I think it indicates
1)flush draw
2)fullhouse
3)flush draw with a K [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] (least likely, as I think villain would raise here)

What I don't think the turn call represents
1)AA/KK (these would much more likely raise here)
2)trips (these would much more likely raise here)

River: I checked the river for one reason. I felt that a completed/made hand would bet less, to induce a call (or reraise). And I felt a push indicated a bluff. Any thoughts? (I wholeheartedly expected a check from villain, btw)
<font color="white"> time of post 6 Fold : 3 Call </font>

[prepotency]

Ok here's what I think:

You should fold just because there are too many hands that beat you and you are basically just hoping that he stayed in on a busted flush draw. Here's a thought that first occured to me (that no one has mentioned yet). I thought that he probably has a pocket pair around 88 or 99. This would make sense as a limp UTG I guess. It also makes sense because he is weak on the turn and he thinks you are just trying to steal from him with these small bets and by the river I see him getting enough courage to push at you with his mid PP especially given that the K is a definite scare card (i mean, he probably puts you on a 7 at this point: I would). It's either that or he called with overs and spiked his K. Either way, I don't risk this many chips this early in this situation.
Prognosis: Fold. IMO

[TheUsher]

[ QUOTE ]
So, let's go through my thought process. What is villain playing at here?

Well, my initial bet and call means very little, IMO.

My turn bet and call means much more. I think it indicates
1)flush draw
2)fullhouse
3)flush draw with a K [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] (least likely, as I think villain would raise here)

What I don't think the turn call represents
1)AA/KK (these would much more likely raise here)
2)trips (these would much more likely raise here)

River: I checked the river for one reason. I felt that a completed/made hand would bet less, to induce a call (or reraise). And I felt a push indicated a bluff. Any thoughts? (I wholeheartedly expected a check from villain, btw)
<font color="white"> time of post 6 Fold : 3 Call </font>

[/ QUOTE ]

Let me start this off by saying I think you played the hand like crap. [img]/images/graemlins/shocked.gif[/img] Now that we got that out of the way... (i'm just messing with you here so don't get too mad now)

The whole point of playing the blinds is that you don't want to get in trouble early when you don't have to. You should be able to maximize the value from your hands the times you involuntarily have to play hands from the SB/BB with marginal holdings, as well as minimizing the risk of losing a large portion of your stack here when you didn't need to.

Now to talk about your hand... The villain could have a huge possible range of hands that might include 33-AA, some sort of club flush draw such as JT [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], QT [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], QJ [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], KT [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], KQ [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], KJ [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], small [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]'s, or he's just a plain idiot that has Ax or 54/65 type of hand. The river all-in sure does look like either Kx, missed club draw, 77, 99, or the highly like Kx [img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img]. Slight possibility of a 3x or 44-66, 9x but he'd have to be an idiot with those PP's and 9x. If this were me in the hand though, I would have tried to keep the pot smaller instead of betting the exact potsize on the flop and turn. BTW, your river check would be really nice if you thought he was drawing the whole way so you could induce a bluff, which is quite possible here but not as likely as it could be in some other situations.

Sorry for ripping into you here but I kind of felt like it was needed because of all these recent specific hand posts. [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img] Should really focus also on bet sizes instead of just whether to check/bet/raise, etc. I am in no way saying I'm a better player than you but all your posted hands are seriously giving me, as probably as well as others, very specific lines on how you play most every situation presented to you.

P.S. You should really be playing this hand like you have a 3, not a 7 as clearly evidenced by your actions in the hand.

Edit: Oh and if you're going to play the hand like you did this way, you might as well check/fold the flop so you don't get yourself into any trouble. It's just not worth it if you're constantly putting yourself into these tough river decisions.

[DonButtons]

check/fold flop...yuck..


check turn

yuck/yuck

[Degen]

[ QUOTE ]

What I don't think the turn call represents
1)AA/KK (these would much more likely raise here)
2)trips (these would much more likely raise here)

[/ QUOTE ]

I was giving him credit for being a solid player and wanting to make you think this. It is so cliche to call the flop and then raise the turn w/ a big flop. So a lot of solid players will change it up and:

A) Raise the flop and confuse them, attempting to disguise the hand

or, much more risky but way less noticeable IMO

B) Don't raise until the river


I was suggesting that he may have chosen B here, and when you did not bet he decided to display some agression and try and induce a call.


Personally, as I've already said, I don't think you should be too concerned with what he actually had or whether you were good. This is just committing too many chips to a marginal situation when you can outplay the blinds later with your massive stack of chiplets.

(and i don't know if Usher was knocking your posts or not, but i happen to like them...its all the tuff decisions that can make or break a poker career)



Degen

[Scuba Chuck]

[ QUOTE ]
Let me start this off by saying I think you played the hand like crap

[/ QUOTE ]

You can mess with me.

Last night, I posted likely handranges, which I still think holds true, but I should add a couple more.

My turn bet and call means much more. I think it indicates
1)flush draw
2)fullhouse
3)flush draw with a K (least likely, as I think villain would raise here)
4)flush draw with a 9 (most unfortuante if true - but I think it likely villain checks behind on the river, as he can still win this hand without bluffing)
5) 44-66 - villain is a calling station - but I seriously doubt an allin bet by a calling station on the river.

What I don't think the turn call represents
1)AA/KK (these would much more likely raise here)
2)trips (these would much more likely raise here)

Here is my opinion. I was the BB. How likely is it that I could have had a 3? I think villain has to put me on either a 3, pocket pair, 7x, another flush draw, or a bluff. If I did have a 3, I would have bet this flush draw board the exact same way. So, as villain kept calling it down (without a reraise), I felt confident he was on a flush draw.

[ QUOTE ]
your river check would be really nice if you thought he was drawing the whole way so you could induce a bluff

[/ QUOTE ]

Bingo, that was my intent. In fact, in the "gathering of information" vain, I further felt that an allin bet gave me even more confidence that this was a busted flush draw. Frankly, I really thought he was going to check it through. And I would have been more worried had he raised it a smaller amount.

[ QUOTE ]
If this were me in the hand though, I would have tried to keep the pot smaller instead of betting the exact potsize on the flop and turn

[/ QUOTE ]

This is probably not horrible advice. I am beginning to see the advantages of keeping pots small. That being said, I thought my flop bet was appropriate. But, my turn bet was the one bet I needed to get the most information from. Had I bet that too small, I don't know how I would have interpreted that information. By villain just calling the turn (other than raising), it let me know that his hand was either
A) weak
B) draw
C) monster (7s over 3s)

Keeping pots small: I have had some problems with this strategy. I have kept hands in (and lost) that I believe I would have otherwise pushed out had I bet stronger on the flop and turn. I think there are pros and cons to this strategy. What this hand boils down to here, is that I was willing to be content folding this hand on the river had a club hit, an Ace hit, or villain bet 200 chips. I would have folded to a turn reraise.

[ QUOTE ]
Sorry for ripping into you here but I kind of felt like it was needed because of all these recent specific hand posts.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't think you're ripping me. The one thing I want to do here is learn. I play a lot of games. I've played over 500 this month so far. There's more hands I could post. I think you average 70 hands per SNG. If that's true, then I've seen over 35,000 hands so far this month. I like to post specific hands, as they are helpful to the forum, and, more importantly, to me. I hope to help others learn, and to continue to perfect my poker knowledge. I look forward to the disagreements. It benefits me.

As I told SuitedSixes, I post many hands where I am trying out new concepts, and poker knowledge (or lack thereof). What's the point of posting hands that "make me look smart." Everyone knows how to play those hands (or, I leave those posts to the newbies).

With regard to this hand. The one thing I've been trying to learn is how to "read" betting/calling behavior/patterns. The one flaw in my thinking here, I believe, is that villain could just be a calling station. But that was the whole point of the river check. The river check gave me three opportunities to play the hand
A) Villain checks it through (really cheap showdown)
B) Villain pushes - reveals hand, and self, IMO (i.e. less likely a calling station)
C) Villain raises small amount to induce a call of a worse hand (the bet I feared most).

Please, rip me some more. As I hope to learn/benefit.
I don't want the results of this hand to lead me to believe that I am right.