Strange river AQs

[captZEEbo1]

[ QUOTE ]
I don't understand how so many people are so confused by this river check raise.

This is the second time today that I have seen people question a river CR that is pretty SOP imo. If you guys dont understand why he CRed this river then I can gurantee you are not CRing enough rivers after being the last aggressor on the turn.

[/ QUOTE ]

elaborate for those who suck at poker.

[NLSoldier]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I don't understand how so many people are so confused by this river check raise.

This is the second time today that I have seen people question a river CR that is pretty SOP imo. If you guys dont understand why he CRed this river then I can gurantee you are not CRing enough rivers after being the last aggressor on the turn.

[/ QUOTE ]

elaborate for those who suck at poker.

[/ QUOTE ]

Basically, when you are in a pot in which you are able to put you opponent on a pretty specific hand that is strong, but weaker than yours, you have the opportunity to try to CR the river even if you were the last aggressor on the turn. Any somewhat aggressive player will not be able to stand the thought of checking through on the river with a hand like TPTK or better. Keep in mind that they only have to bet slightly over 50% of the time for it to be a profitable play for you, because they will pay off almost every single time when you raise.

Also note that river CRs can be very powerful for metagame purposes because after you have CRed a few rivers, people will start giving you more free showdowns after you have been betting the whole way and give up when you miss (with hands like AK). The fact that they are giving you more free showdowns also results in you being able to more confidently check/fold the river the times that you miss and they do bet. Some common times when river CRs work well would be with an overpair vs a hand that you are pretty sure is TPTK (think Aces on an uncordinated K high board vs an opponent who has raised one or more previous streets) or when you have an even more disguised hand like a set, and think your opponent improved on the river as shown in this thread.

[Danenania]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
We don't have to talk in percentages here because my read is reliable. Either he will do this with KQ/Qx or he won't. If he won't, then it's a waste of money for me to call.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is fundamentally flawed thinking.

[/ QUOTE ]

How so? My feeling is that more than the thinking being flawed, you simply aren't used to thinking in this way. And for good reason: there isn't a whole lot of use for it at on-line 6-max where you generally have only a vague sense of how an opponent will respond to your actions. But that doesn't make it flawed.

[idavid]

I kept waiting to find out the river fold was some kind of April fool's joke. If not, this is a ridiculous fold. You can never be so sure of a specific read that you should lay down trips top kicker for one more bet. The pot is big.

[Danenania]

Okay, in an attempt to take this thread somewhere useful: all those in favor of a river call, how big of a mistake is my fold? I'm looking for a number here, in BB's.

[cjx]

Great reply to a really good question (even if it was obvious to so many of you). I definitely don't check raise enough (on any street) and will look to make this play in the future.

I'm always looking to place a point of emphasis on my game whether it be value betting a slightly scary river against an idiot, walking away from a bad table down (don't be stubborn!), or making more check raises. Now, specifically the tricky river check raise.

cjx

[mistrpug]

[ QUOTE ]
If calling is right, it's not going to be winning me much more than a fraction of a BB either.. Of course I certainly admit it's a close decision. Normally I just call the river to avoid headaches but I felt like playing some poker in this hand.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't think the decision is all that close at all. Easy call.

[sam h]

[ QUOTE ]
How so? My feeling is that more than the thinking being flawed, you simply aren't used to thinking in this way. And for good reason: there isn't a whole lot of use for it at on-line 6-max where you generally have only a vague sense of how an opponent will respond to your actions. But that doesn't make it flawed.

[/ QUOTE ]

IMO, your thinking is flawed because in all circumstances we can only assign probabilities to opponents actions given certain holdings. This is not only because we cannot perfectly know our opponents but also because they are often liable to do different things given the same circumstances depending upon a whole host of factors. So you always have to "talk in percentages" because it is a probabilistic world. Whether the chance of him playing KQ in this way is so small to make your call good is another question entirely, but it should be analyzed in this probabilistic fashion rather than just saying that he either will or won't.

[Grisgra]

[ QUOTE ]
Okay, in an attempt to take this thread somewhere useful: all those in favor of a river call, how big of a mistake is my fold? I'm looking for a number here, in BB's.

[/ QUOTE ]

First: While no doubt you felt like "playing some poker", as you said in a previous post, making a huge laydown for one bet with trips, top kicker, probably isn't the place to do it, Mr. FPS [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img].

I think you're good here 1 in 11 times or so. People have 3-bet me on the river in the 10/20 game with two pair on a four-straight board -- I am NOT folding trips, top kicker here. I mean, wow. Not even a flush or straight possibility, too.

So if your odds are 10:1 (minimum, I think), and you've got 16:1 odds, you're leaving about a half BB on the table after your fold. Not a disaster for the ages, but still, pretty bad.

EDIT: Do you still think this was a good fold? Curious as to what % of the time you think you're good here. Would you have called if you were getting 19:1? 24:1?

[spider]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
We don't have to talk in percentages here because my read is <b>reliable</b>. Either he will do this with KQ/Qx or he won't. If he won't, then it's a waste of money for me to call.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is fundamentally flawed thinking.

[/ QUOTE ]

How so?

[/ QUOTE ]

I see two potential flaws:

(1) A guy you see as 100% reliable/predictable is not really that way. 400 hands is a lot, but I'd still hesitate to be this confident online. For example, any decent player who is seen as tight and predictable will show a huge gain going from zero bluffing to infrequent bluffing. You might not see one of his bluffs exposed over 400 hands b/c he is doing it infrequently and his bluffs would naturally get a lot of respect.

(2) It's possible he is not putting you on AQ. For example, your combo of 3-betting the turn and check-raising the river may have confused him and looked like a bluff. And some folks go overly-bayesian with trips and think you probably don't have a queen since there is only one other queen out there. Granted, neither of these seems particularly likely, but they don't have to be with the odds you were getting.