QQ and a fish: c/f this flop?

Very soft table. UTG+1 is an unknown, but a tight player so far. This is the first hand they played after 1 orbit. Button is a wonderful little fish, calls down with anything, hardly ever raises preflop, and never raises after the flop. Stats on him are 57/1.4/.4, with flop AF .21 and turn AF .3.

PokerStars 0.25/0.50 Hold'em (10 handed) FTR converter on zerodivide.cx

Preflop: Hero is UTG+2 with Q[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img], Q[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img].
<font color="#666666">1 fold</font>, <font color="#CC3333">UTG+1 raises</font>, <font color="#CC3333">Hero 3-bets</font>, <font color="#666666">4 folds</font>, fish calls, <font color="#666666">2 folds</font>, UTG+1 calls.

Flop: (10.40 SB) A[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img], 4[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img], 7[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img] <font color="#0000FF">(3 players)</font>
UTG+1 checks, <font color="#CC3333">Hero bets</font>, fish calls, UTG+1 calls.

UTG+1 is not a big concern yet, but the fish is... I'm thinking A-rag here, but he could be on a 7 and just calling down like all good fish do.

Turn: (6.70 BB) 7[img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img] <font color="#0000FF">(3 players)</font>
UTG+1 checks, Hero checks, <font color="#CC3333">fish bets</font>, UTG+1 folds, Hero folds.

I check here to see what the fish does. With a turn AF of .3, I don't see him leading out with anything less than an A or the trip-7's. He bets, I just don't see what he could have that I beat, so I lay it down.

So all this got me thinking. When playing against a fish like this, is it better to just check/fold the flop when an A comes against your big pair? Or would that qualify for a skirt? [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] I mean, with an AF of .3, a guy like this is only gonna bet if he has a big hand right? And he did cold-call a 3-bet. What fish cold-calls a 3-bet unless he has an A or a K? I'm trying to figure out if I played this flop correctly or not...

[Buckmulligan]

bet the turn as your last piece of money.

[MrWookie47]

[ QUOTE ]
bet the turn as your last piece of money.

[/ QUOTE ]

[DeadManJay]

I play this hand the same way.

[Aaron W.]

[ QUOTE ]
Button is a wonderful little fish, calls down with anything, hardly ever raises preflop, and never raises after the flop.

...

I check here to see what the fish does. With a turn AF of .3, I don't see him leading out with anything less than an A or the trip-7's. He bets, I just don't see what he could have that I beat, so I lay it down.

[/ QUOTE ]

So... let fishy take a free card when he's behind? If he's calling down with anything, then he can have many hands that you beat. Bet the turn.

[ QUOTE ]
So all this got me thinking. When playing against a fish like this, is it better to just check/fold the flop when an A comes against your big pair? Or would that qualify for a skirt? [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] I mean, with an AF of .3, a guy like this is only gonna bet if he has a big hand right? And he did cold-call a 3-bet. What fish cold-calls a 3-bet unless he has an A or a K? I'm trying to figure out if I played this flop correctly or not...

[/ QUOTE ]

Fish may coldcall a pocket pair. You're ahead of almost all of those. The flop bet is fine.

[DeadManJay]

When you bet the turn and get called, do you fire again on the river?

[Buckmulligan]

no

[DeadManJay]

Thats exactly what I would think, and thats why I have trouble betting this turn. This guy is a fish, as OP said, so we expect him to call turn even if he has nothing. If I think I'm behind on this turn, which I do, I can't bet it.

[Buckmulligan]

do you know that being a fish means that he has a larger calling range? Do you know that a larger calling range entitles you to bet more liberally? From what you have said, villain will call the turn with weaker hands and draws. We don't bet the river because he folds a lot of those draws.

[Aaron W.]

[ QUOTE ]
When you bet the turn and get called, do you fire again on the river?

[/ QUOTE ]

I doubt it. Even though hero's read is "calls down with anything", I just don't think there are enough combinations of losing hands that call the turn bet that are losing to hero's hand (the board pairing was actually bad for hero. It would have been better if a jack or ten fell, as this allows villain's hand range to include many more losing hands when he calls on the turn).

The point of betting the turn is that villain can be peeling the flop with very very weak cards. His coldcall preflop probably includes the classic trap hands like KT and JTs. There might be weaker hands like K8, but even against a 50+ VPIP, that's really pushing it facing a preflop 3-bet. It's hard to imagine calling on the flop with these hands, but it happens quite frequently.

But these hands don't call the turn bet. This bet can be seen as both a value and information bet: value (when villain folds this means hero bet the best hand and it's too bad villain didn't pay it off or chase a losing draw) and information (when villain calls this means that he has *something* and *something* is much more likely to beat hero than lose to him).