Live hand #2: Turned top two pair

[suspicious_mind]

"So anyway... no one is going to tell me to bet the turn or the river?"

That´s how I would play it, I bet the turn. This will give you information. You are representing AQ or KT so if he calls or raise you should be beat and you can give up.
I´m not sure of the amount to bet, it depends a little on the player, if you think he might call small bets with QJ or KQ or something you could make a small bet on turn and river and you might get some value out of QJ, the down side of this is that he might make a min raise on the turn to test you, so a big bet about the size of the pot might be best because he would have to commit a lot of money to find out if you really want to commit to your hand. This will probably only work if your opponent thinks you could play KT this way though.

That´s my 2 cents anyway, you probably shouldn´t take what I say to seriously, I´m only a 1$-2$ player and I don´t even think I´m beating the game.

[TheWorstPlayer]

[ QUOTE ]
"So anyway... no one is going to tell me to bet the turn or the river?"

That´s how I would play it, I bet the turn. This will give you information. You are representing AQ or KT so if he calls or raise you should be beat and you can give up.

[/ QUOTE ]
What's the point of making a bet where you have to give up if he calls it? I'd rather try to see what he does when you give him the opportunity. It seems like Hero has a pretty good read on Villain and Villain is aggressive so let him hang himself. If you bet small, then he will most likely see that as the weakness that it is (as you yourself pointed out) so you have to bet big. But that means he calls when you are behind and folds when you are ahead so you maximise losses and minimise gains. If you check/call, the same amount goes in when you are behind, but you also make the money when you are ahead. And if you check and he checks behind, then you can easily value bet the river. And now that you checked the turn, there is a greater chance that he will call something on the river. I like the way OP played it.

[suspicious_mind]

Ok betting out might not be the best way to play it for the reasons you gave. However check-calling turn and checking the river could be interpreted as weaknes by him and it puts you in a though spot if he bets the river.

He could have KT, that seems in line with how he has played so far but it´s also possible he has 9T or maybe he realizes his KQ, QJ or QT is no good but he reads you for AQ and think he can push you off it. So you will be faced with a tough decision on the end.

The upside of betting big on the turn would be that you won´t be faced with this decision on the river, you will know you are behind if a good player calls on that turn. As you said though betting is no good since you get no value out of QJ or worse hands.

What about checking the turn too see what your opponent does and then when he bets 50, instead of just calling you raise. There is no way he could view that raise as weakness and he will have to suspect you just made a straight, since it is entirely possible you would play it this way.

You will probably not get any more money from QJ or worse hands anyway as he will either check behind on river or he might bluff if he realizes he is beat. The raise will also force him to fold 9T witch has a 8 outer against you.

I think making a small raise could be enough to give you information here and since you were calling anyway it won´t really cost you that much. The benefit of this is that you will pick up 50 against worse hands compared to nothing if you bet out and it gives you alot of information at a pretty cheap price.

I think another possiblity might be to make a big check-raise on the turn if you think it´s possible your opponent could lay down a set or another AQ.

I guess just check-calling it down might still be the best line if you think your opponent is very agressive but I didn´t really read him as especially agressive from the description of him.

[TheWorstPlayer]

With deeper stacks, I don't mind check/raising the turn, but with these stacks you would be pot committed on the turn if you raised. I really think the best line is to check/call the turn and then see what happens on the river. Possibly throw out a bloicking bet on the river.

[suspicious_mind]

I don´t think you are pot comitted if you make a 80$ raise and he comes over the top all-in I mean there is no way you have the best hand unless he regurlary overplays his hand.
And you will only be getting about 3.3:1 on a 4 outer so I could see folding if he moves in on you.

Check-calling down might be good but theres not alot of hands his opponent could have that he can beat, 9T is the only hand that seems somewhat likely, wouldn´t he check behind with QJ, why bluff when his hand might be good?
Maybe a block bet is good but it looks pretty weak here, unless you make a big 100$ bet, that might slow him down but then I like check-calling better.

[TheWorstPlayer]

If you make an $80 raise and he calls you, what do you do on the river? See, it is hard because you are out of position. Do you check? If so, I think that looks really weak. Min-raise and then check the river? If you bet, then I don't see how you are not pot committed on the river.

[suspicious_mind]

My point was that he wouldn´t call a turn check-raise with anything you could beat, so it would be safe to check-fold the river. The reason you raise is to protect against being bluffed out of the pot. If you think he would call the turn raise with some of the hands you could beat with the intention of bluffing the river than that defeats the whole purpose of the raise.

If you think he will bluff enough to make check-calling down profitable then I agree this is the best line but I´m not he will.

[TheWorstPlayer]

Who folds to min-raises? The whole point of min-raising is that you want them to call. I think there is a good chance you get called on your min-raise here by a hand that you can beat. And if you check the river, you can be certain that aggressive opponents will bluff at you. That is just such a weak looking line. If you had the nuts, you might min-raise, but you would never check the river. But betting PCs you.

[soah]

Results.

OK, I included his previous KK hand as sort of a summary of how this guy had been playing. If he has AA-JJ, no way is he limping in. Although I didn't mention my estimate of his VP$IP, I don't believe he'd play Q7 or J7. He wasn't that bad. So when he raises me on the flop, I'm thinking there aren't many ways he could have me beat, and he may be raising me with a worse kicker. So I called to see how the hand would develop on the turn. And once I made top two pair on the turn I was going to have a very hard time getting away from the hand.

In addition to simply demonstrating that this guy would be coming in for a raise with a big pair, I felt that it showed a critical leak in his game -- he was not thinking much at the second or third level. When he put in the third raise preflop for 20xBB against a fairly solid EP reraiser, the whole table (minus the apparently oblivious CO) was sure he had AA. Or at least, we were sure until UTG+1 flashed his aces to my half of the table.

So as my hand progressed, I have it in my mind that this guy is definitely capable of overplaying good hands. And although I didn't give any information in my post to support this, I felt the chance of him raising the flop with a draw was negligible. That simply was not the way the table had been playing. So when we got to the river I felt the only hand he could have that beats me was 77, and I felt that the chance of him overplaying something else was good enough to warrant a call.

I placed my stack of one black, four greens, six reds, and two whites out in front of me as I announced my call, and my opponent quickly said two pair and flipped his cards. I silently flipped mine up as well, and my opponent slammed his hand on the table as he stood up to go rebuy while the dealer mucked his QJ.

[TheWorstPlayer]

[ QUOTE ]
Well, okayplayer and I both put him on QJ, so that must be what he had.

[/ QUOTE ] Ni han, sir!