Maniac on Left... Reverse Isolation?

[BreakEvenPlayer]

The game is a live 15-30. I'm in seat 9. This is an extremely passive and exceptionally tight table, with the exception of seat 5 (we'll get to him later). I am the only player who has made a 3-bet PF (except for seat 5), and out of the eight other players excluding me and seat 5, there have been 3 isolated incidences of a pre-flop raise in about two hours.


Seat 5 is the king of fish. Plays 100% of hands, raises or re-raises about 33% of hands. But seeing as he is a few seats to my left, there are only a couple hands per orbit where I have a chance for textbook maniac "raise/three-bet isolation."


So there I am after two hours of this and I see A8s UTG; typically in this game a muck, but this time I raise it. Lo and behold, Seat 5 three-bets me, and instantly the 16 remaining cards on the table are flung simultaneously into the muck. I've got it heads-up with the maniac with Ace-high, albeit out of position. This hand I check call a board with two sixes on it and then bet an eight on the river. Seat 5 doesn't typically raise rivers. He doesn't fold them either. My hand is oh-so-good against Q-high.


Fast-forward eight hands, I have K9o in EMP. I raise it up, Seat 5 coldcalls, eight people over the age of 65 shake their heads collectively, but none of them have the will to do anything about it so they fold. This time the maniac decides to go bananas against my trip 9's and I take a big pot.


I try this about 4 more times throughout the session, losing 3 small pots to Seat 5 when those scare-cards (twos through sevens) hit the board. The other time an old lady smiles and cold-calls in Seat 6 and we both fold when she bets the flop.



Am I retarded or is reverse isolation a viable strategy if game conditions like the game above are present? We don't always get the nice seat to the left of the maniac, and those elderly players play long sessions. There are better games to be in, but let's assume they didn't exist for me on that night.