flop decision

[aK13]

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Hi ak13,

I agree more with you're initial thoughts, get the most money in for the least cost. The only reason I can think of raising here is if we were protecting something, which is the last thing we should be doing. Our spot sucks right now, and if we had some callers in between, as you said it would be a clear raise, but I think this is a classic situation for some overcalls.

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this is what my original thinking was. however, it seems that we should be raising here because we are likely to have the best hand, as well as plently of outs to improve.

it's one of those "if i raise, and they fold, my pair of 8s + draws is likely to win the pot since we are winning this HU against the PFR about 60% of the time (ala pokerstove)" but also "if i raise, and they call, their pumping my massive draw that will win way more than its fair share"

Raising seems like a win-win situation.

EDIT: I like your new avatar better -- it doesn't hurt my head [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

[Rev. Good Will]

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Hi ak13,

I agree more with you're initial thoughts, get the most money in for the least cost. The only reason I can think of raising here is if we were protecting something, which is the last thing we should be doing. Our spot sucks right now, and if we had some callers in between, as you said it would be a clear raise, but I think this is a classic situation for some overcalls.

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this is what my original thinking was. however, it seems that we should be raising here because we are likely to have the best hand, as well as plently of outs to improve.

it's one of those "if i raise, and they fold, my pair of 8s + draws is likely to win the pot since we are winning this HU against the PFR about 60% of the time (ala pokerstove)" but also "if i raise, and they call, their pumping my massive draw that will win way more than its fair share"

Raising seems like a win-win situation.

EDIT: I like your new avatar better -- it doesn't hurt my head [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

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heh, thanks, thats what I was going for, I didn't want to become the guy with the avatar, you know

I see your point, but I'd feel more comfortable if I had a read on the oncoming players if they were particularly loose

Also, what if a blank falls on the turn? ..crap this is where I re-look at the OP and see no reads posted... if the bettor were passive, I'd like the raise as well, free card possibilities


More analysis later, i gotta bounce and don't want to delete this and interrupt my flow

[Saint_D]

You would raise because you are going to win this 50% or more of the time and there are more than 2 people in the hand. You have a pot equity edge. Problem is, betting out may get rid of callers. Your best bet here is to go for overcalls and pop the turn/river if your flush (or ace) comes in.

[Aaron W.]

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Why not? You have a great hand. Raise for value.

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I've been mulling this over. Let me run some stove action to confirm my thoughts about whether to call or raise.

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Ok. I changed my mind. I like raising.

My fear was that our raise might knock everybody else out of the pot, which I thought would be bad since we have a drawing hand HU against a player who probably has us beat at the moment. However, I ran HU stove equity calculations with this board and our hand vs: 88+, ATs+, AJo+, KJs+, KQo and we have 62% equity, so raise for sure.

I have to re-evaluate here -- I think I've been misplaying these situations in multiway pots. Stick in 1 caller in the middle, and I'll raise for sure, but immediately after the raiser -- gotta look into that.

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I'm a little bit hesitant to give such a broad range of raising hands to villain based on no information provided. For example, most players don't raise TT-99 from the small blind with lots of callers. Similarly, ATs-AJs and AJo aren't super-common raises.

Furthermore, an equity edge does not alone make a "raise for sure". You have to consider the balance of what happens when villain is chasing you (those rare hands like AQ) and gives up after your flop raise+turn bet.

You also need to consider the possibility of getting 3-bet by a better hand, thus putting you in a position where you have the worst hand and no donks to pad the pot for you.

I don't think you've made an adaquate argument for raising > calling. Hero's hand simply isn't strong enough at this point to want to be heads up with PFR.

[Rev. Good Will]

dammit... too lazy to continue...hoping by re-reading my initial thoughts would help my re-write what I wanted to say.... Dammit, Aaron W. brought wrote out the best reasonings anyway.

bah, more or less, in this situation, I don't think we're protecting much, and I think we best use our equity leverage by getting hte most $ in the pot by going for overcalls, raising seems to be only putting us HU with the PFR

[Redd]

There's a good chance we have the best hand here. I raise to protect it from the plethora of overcards that can come for the 2/3 of the time that the flush doesn't hit. And because we have a huge freakin' wad of equity.

[Redd]

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Furthermore, an equity edge does not alone make a "raise for sure". You have to consider the balance of what happens when villain is chasing you (those rare hands like AQ) and gives up after your flop raise+turn bet.

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I think that Villain will probably see the pot is getting big and would be hestitant to fold overs here. But the pot is big enough that I don't really mind if I push him off of it.

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You also need to consider the possibility of getting 3-bet by a better hand, thus putting you in a position where you have the worst hand and no donks to pad the pot for you.

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IMO, even if we do get 3-bet, and get no cold-callers (which doesn't seem THAT likely), we're pretty close to break-even with all of our outs and the implied odds of reverse-dominating SB.

[JKDStudent]

I'm going to point this out again: he raised from the SB. Not the button, not the CO, but the SB. Raising standards are much higher here. And then he bets without hesitation into four other players with a K-high board.

There's no way a pair of 8's is ahead here.

[Aaron W.]

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Furthermore, an equity edge does not alone make a "raise for sure". You have to consider the balance of what happens when villain is chasing you (those rare hands like AQ) and gives up after your flop raise+turn bet.

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I think that Villain will probably see the pot is getting big and would be hestitant to fold overs here. But the pot is big enough that I don't really mind if I push him off of it.

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His overcards to your pair are almost certainly Ax, where x is a big card. Holding AQ, facing a flop raise on a Kxx flop and turn bet, you shouldn't be peeling to see the river. Most players recognize this as a bad situation since you're probably drawing to your ace outs, and even then it's iffy.

Having him fold his hand would mean that he's playing correctly, and by FTOP you don't win as much as you could have won had he played differently.

However, people have a tougher time laying down pocket pairs, so you're still going to get called down by hands that are leading you, like QQ-JJ. So you get called down by better hands and worse hands folds. That's not so helpful.

I still don't see a flop raise as being that much more beneficial than trying to encourage overcallers. Again, this has to do with the strength of your hand and the fact that you probably don't want to be putting in extra bets with the worst of it (even if you're only behind by a little bit it's still bad for you).

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You also need to consider the possibility of getting 3-bet by a better hand, thus putting you in a position where you have the worst hand and no donks to pad the pot for you.

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IMO, even if we do get 3-bet, and get no cold-callers (which doesn't seem THAT likely), we're pretty close to break-even with all of our outs and the implied odds of reverse-dominating SB.

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The argument is not whether raising is profitable. I'm sure that it is. The argument is about which play is more profitable. Holding second pair with a king on the board and the preflop raiser being in the blind isn't a highly profitable heads up position for you. But it's an excellent multi-way situation. Why? It keeps coming back to the fact that you most likely do *NOT* have the best hand right now. I don't think you appreciate how much that takes away from raising now. Had you flopped an ace, a raise is absolutely crtical because you reasonably have the best hand and need to protect.

A raise here is strictly for value. And the value you get out of it is very small. Had there been a couple callers trapped in the middle, raising becomes much more profitable.

[Aaron W.]

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I think my main problem with raising is that the pf came from the SB. From my experience, it seems that raising standards from the blinds are usually much stricter than other positions. SB raised pf and bet into the field on this flop. I would say that he's got AA, KK, QQ, AK, maybe JJ.

I strongly doubt we're ahead here, and I'd value the Ace and 8 outs as only two total (.5 for the A, 1.5 for the 8) We need the flush to win, and I don't want to chase the extra money out of this pot. I maintain a call, and 3-bet or cap if it gets raised behind.

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That's severely under-estimating your outs. You should be able to compute the average number of outs based on the hand range you've given (which I think is a little too narrow... I'd throw in JJ as a full possibility and AQ).