Settle an argument, if you will

Floyd Moseby · #1 01-20-2005, 12:08 AM

A friend and I were at odds when reviewing the following hand, specifically regarding the PF action taken (played by another friend of ours). The read on 'Maniac' is just that. He's played almost all of the flops seen, and is very aggressive. Neutral or no reads on the rest. Please review this hand for us and give us your thoughts:

Party Poker 0.5/1 Hold'em (8 handed) converter

Preflop: Hero is CO with 7[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], 7[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img].
UTG (EP1) calls, UTG+1 (EP2) folds, MP1 (MP1) folds, MP2 (Maniac) raises, Hero calls, Button (Button) folds, SB (SB) folds, BB (BB) folds, UTG (EP1) calls.

Flop: (7.50 SB) 7[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img], 5[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img], Q[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] (3 players)
EP1 checks, Maniac bets, Hero raises, EP1 folds, Maniac calls.

Turn: (5.75 BB) J[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] (2 players)
Maniac bets, Hero raises, Maniac calls.

River: (9.75 BB) 9[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] (2 players)
Maniac bets, Hero calls.

Final Pot: 11.75 BB

Results in white below: 
Maniac has 9s 9h (three of a kind, nines).
Hero has 7s 7c (three of a kind, sevens).
Outcome: Maniac wins 11.75 BB. 

My reviewer friend soundly chided the PF call, stating that a raise to go heads up vs The Maniac or a fold was in order. I felt that the call was fine, in hoping that the blinds would at least join the fun and make a decent pot to work with. I do not want to discourage any more callers. If a set happens, I want a decent pot. Our exact comments before the flop were as follows:

Reviewer 1: "I think calling here is the worst thing you can do... fold or raise, I lean towards raising and isolating him if he's a maniac. If you just call and you don't flop a set with these 7's... there are probably 2-3 other people in the pot and you're most likely going to have to fold. Reraise the maniac, isolate him and play these 7's very strongly."

Reviewer 2 (me): "I actually disagree here, but it's because I've been studying Small Stakes Hold'Em by Ed Miller. Miller would advocate a call here as well, which is what I would do. Even if you can isolate and take position, 77 isn't a great hand to do it with in my opinion. I think you call and hope a few more get in here with you to make odds...maybe you can see a cheap turn even if you don't flop the set. A fold is just wrong, though."

Give us your takes. Thanks in advance!

SoCalPat · #2 01-20-2005, 12:21 AM

Who cares about all that gobbledeygook you posted? Raise the freakin' river.

Oh, and 3-bet PF.

The problem with calling two cold PF is that you don't want the blinds involved here. You'll still drag down a decent pot if you can get it heads up with the maniac, because more often than not your 77 will hold up and he'll keep betting with nothing. You'll win that way far more often than you will by flopping a set.

With other players in the pot, your 77 might be good on the flop, but you're very susceptible to draws and overcards, and potential redraws. Anytime you can 3-bet a maniac with something decent (and 77 certainly applies), you should do it.

Aaron W. · #3 01-20-2005, 12:23 AM

I'm not so thrilled with the preflop call, nor do I like a preflop 3-bet.

Preflop fold = bad: With only two players to voluntarily enter into this pot, it's likely to be 4 handed, which is bad for playing a medium pocket pair because it's too many to say you have a strong starting hand and too few to get good odds for flopping a set. (I think Ed would say to fold, as his recommendations are for two players OTHER THAN the raise to have voluntarily entered the pot.)

Preflop 3-bet = bad: You're either way behind another pocket pair, or you're likely 50-50 with two overcards. 77 is simply too weak to be playing to isolate here, especially with the other player having limped in (meaning that your chances of isolating go down quite a bit). And there's a difference between a maniac and a LAG. A maniac is betting/raising every hand, regardless of what happens. A LAG enters most pots, and then becomes agressive postflop with draws/middle pair/weaker type hands (but not garbage). From your description, I think he sounds more like a LAG than a maniac.

(If truly is a maniac, then the 3-bet is fine... but from the play and your description, I just don't buy it.)

I think this is a pretty clear fold preflop.

btspider · #4 01-20-2005, 12:23 AM

against a true maniac, i raise PF and cap the river.

calling is better than folding if you can often isolate him postflop.

incidentally. he doesn't look that aggro with 99.. are you sure he is a maniac and not just a LAG? i still cap the river against a LAG, but I would fold PF against a LAG*.

*edit: such as a 30/15 PF LAG. give me a 50/30 PF LAG and I 3-bet. a maniac is closer to the 90/40 range..

SoCalPat · #5 01-20-2005, 12:26 AM

Horrible advice. Not only do you contradict yourself (get it straight ... is a PF fold bad or clear cut?), but 77 is a veritable monster against a maniac. Isolate and call him down and watch the maniac bleed away his chips.

Not only that, but villian did exactly what you said a maniac does ... yet he's somehow LAG? Whatever ...

davelin · #6 01-20-2005, 12:34 AM

I agree with the raise or fold sentiment. I don't think you can guarantee enough callers to just cold-call.

Floyd Moseby · #7 01-20-2005, 12:44 AM

[ QUOTE ]

incidentally. he doesn't look that aggro with 99.. are you sure he is a maniac and not just a LAG? i still cap the river against a LAG, but I would fold PF against a LAG*.

[/ QUOTE ]

I didn't witness the table, just the hand history. What was stated to us was that Maniac was playing 'most' of the hands, and raising with anything.

Now, I have a question: How can you like your hand much on the flop if you're heads up and ANY overcards come out? Just because he's playing lots of hands doesn't mean he's immune to catching something. I don't mind being heads up if it's only for the 1 big bet PF, but anything more seems reckless to me. I would think that 3 betting here depends an awful lot on Maniac completely missing the flop. Is the strategy just to maybe raise on the flop no matter what hits and then check-call down vs heavy resistance?

SlantNGo · #8 01-20-2005, 01:12 AM

Okay, my logic here might be totally backwards, so someone please correct my logic if I am wrong. Who cares if overcards flop? You're heads up against a guy who's playing almost any 2 according to Hero. If you're afraid to raise for value after the flop, just make the decision to call down on every street after you 3-bet pre-flop. You're probably ahead before the flop, and if you're really unsure of how to handle him after the flop, pretend you're playing blind and call down because you're still probably ahead, i.e. the closest thing to pushing all in here in a NL game. That flop would have to hit him awful hard to make calling down after the flop (not taking the flop into account) for it to be a -EV play. That said, you should be able to extract more value if you can play your hand well postflop in this situation.

Aaron W. · #9 01-20-2005, 02:56 AM

[ QUOTE ]
Horrible advice. Not only do you contradict yourself (get it straight ... is a PF fold bad or clear cut?), but 77 is a veritable monster against a maniac. Isolate and call him down and watch the maniac bleed away his chips.

[/ QUOTE ]

That "preflop fold = bad" is a typo, and if you read the text you'll see it makes no sense if you read is as fold. Clearly from content, I'm talking about call, but I admit that the typo is my error.

[ QUOTE ]
Not only that, but villian did exactly what you said a maniac does ... yet he's somehow LAG? Whatever ...

[/ QUOTE ]

I commented that the play itself and the description doesn't sound like a true maniac.

The play: This hand he raised 99 against one limper. 99 is not a terrible raising hand against a limper, especially a loose limper. Agressive, certainly, but not maniacal. Second, when I read maniac, I expect bet/raise at every opportunity. There was no 3-bet with better than second pair on the flop, which I would expect from a maniac. This looks more like standard LAG to me.

The description: "played almost all of the flops" and "raising most hands preflop" are very different characteristics. When I read maniac, I expect raises to come better than 25% of all hands. LAGs may play many pots, but may not be coming in for a raise that often (LAG could be as low as about 10%).

Against a LAG, I would expect him to have a single overcard some 20-30% of the time (raising A3 and potentially much worse hands like K5s). Against a LAG, I would expect to see two overcards most of the time (maybe JTs, A8, K9s...). There's a tremendous difference between the two.

Basically, a maniac is an extreme version of a LAG. I'm sorry if I did not articulate these things clearly in the first post.

Aaron W. · #10 01-20-2005, 03:26 AM

The blind calling down mode (assuming you manage to get it heads up) is the following game:

Wager 4 BB (1.5 preflop, .5 flop, 1 turn, 1 river) to win 5.25 BB (.75 blinds, .5 limp-fold, and the same 4 BB that you invest from maniac). Of course, by value betting/raising you can improve this game slightly, but you really only get to do this when you flop a set or other miracle (some 12-15% of the time).

A majority of the time you have something like a 53:47 edge (on average against overcards) and the rest of the time you'll likely be a 4:1 dog against an overpair.

For the sake of being able to put numbers to this, suppose that 25% of the time he has an overpair and 75% of the time he has two overcards.

75% of the time you win 5.25 BB 53% of the time = +2.09 BB
75% of the time you lose 4 BB 47% of the time = -1.41 BB
25% of the time you win 5.25 BB 20% of the time = +.26 BB
25% of the time you lose 4 BB 80% of the time = -.8 BB

This is a .14 BB EV situation if the numbers (75 to 25) actually hold. It's a break-even game at 70-30. Against a LAG, I think this might be as good as 80-20 but against even a slightly more reasonable opponent, this could be as bad as 60-40.

There are some other factors which mess this calculation up. I've already mentioned value betting/raising which sometimes happens, you may not always get all 4 BB out of the maniac, the limper may see the flop, sometimes you get capped when he has a better hand (you'll still call him down)... It's a winning game if you have a good enough read on the opponent.

But the presence of the limper is really what turns me off to this play.