Fold top 2 pair?

[W. Deranged]

Why does having it capped make you so ill? It's not like we have all that many live outs if behind.

I basically look at it this way: My hand is totally worth putting in 4 total BB on the last two streets. Raising the turn has protection value in case the late position player has a gutshot or something like that. I figure I'm still way ahead on average when that fourth bet goes in. If a fifth bet goes in, I may not be ahead, but I figure the value we gain on bet #3 is greater than the value we lose if it goes to bet #5.

How bad will you feel if you lose this pot to a rivered gutshot? The UTG player is a lag. Don't get so afraid so early.

[mlb3zr]

will button fold here with a piece, though, even if it's just a gutshot? the read has him as calling station extraordinaire. while UTG may be looking LAGgy postflop, he doesn't seem that out of line preflop (I mean in terms of aggression, he's certainly loose). so I suppose it comes down to what do you think he's LRR'ing with? I have certainly seen people pull it with trash, but all in all, I expect even a monkey to show me AA, KK, AK, or occasionally AQ or QQ. I do not expect to be ahead as often as you do.

[fizzleboink]

[ QUOTE ]
will button fold here with a piece, though, even if it's just a gutshot?

[/ QUOTE ]

If he folds a gutshot after you 3-bet, great!
If he doesn't fold a gutshot after you 3-bet, great!

He would be calling incorrectly, thus making you and UTG money. Him folding improves your winning chances, and thus your pot equity.

[mlb3zr]

I don't think we have enough equity here to be raising to try to protect our hand against button (or to hope that he calls incorrectly), particularly since when we are behind, it's going to get capped.

[W. Deranged]

Even if button will call, he'll be calling incorrectly, and so I'm happy to have him put his money in the pot.

The "I don't want to raise because everyone will call anyway" thinking is dangerous.

(Note: this is different than the application of "I don't want to raise because everyone will correctly call anyway" which comes up in discussion quite a bit.)

[mlb3zr]

[ QUOTE ]
Even if button will call, he'll be calling incorrectly, and so I'm happy to have him put his money in the pot.

The "I don't want to raise because everyone will call anyway" thinking is dangerous.

(Note: this is different than the application of "I don't want to raise because everyone will correctly call anyway" which comes up in discussion quite a bit.)

[/ QUOTE ]

I didn't say I don't want to raise because everyone will call anyway. I said I don't want to raise because I don't think we have enough equity to do so, especially since the hands we are behind to will cap here.

[W. Deranged]

All right... let's think about it this way.

Let's make the dodgy assumption that for some reason our average equity here is only 40%. Let's say that the check-raiser has equity equal to about 50%, and the player behind us 10% (with like a gutshot or something... I'm not so interest in a realistic distribution of hands but in the theory at play; and I like easy numbers).

Let's imagine that we raise and we force out the player behind us. Let's say our equity increases to 45% and check-raising villain's increases to 55% (this'll be about right if there aren't weird cross effects and yada yada yada...)

By folding out the villain behind us, we increase our equity by about 5% of the pot, or somewhere around half a big bet. Considering that we will get back on average about 90% of our additional bet anyway (we are only a 55-45 underdog), we notice that the bet which "costs" about .1 BB or so will generate a positive effect of about .5 BB. We benefit about .4 BB or so.

Let's consider the other option, namely villain calls two cold. We take 40% of all the extra money he puts into the pot, or .4 BB when he calls two cold (we're considering the effect of him calling that extra bet, not the first one). We are going to lose .2BB from our big bet to the field, but, again, we get more than that back from villain because he is calling as a significant underdog. We net like .2 BB or something.

This is a VERY simplified model, but you get the idea. Basically, EVEN if we are an underdog to the check-raiser here on average, because of the third player in the pot betting will generally be positive EV whether he calls (because he'll be calling as an underdog) or folds (because we gain equity). My point is that we don't have to be ahead for it to be right to raise.

True, if we honestly think our average equity is tiny here (like <30% or whatever) raising becomes foolish because the cost of our bet is large compared to the benefits of a raise. But we will be ahead more often than that in my opinion so raising is better.

[mlb3zr]

I think we can safely say that we will just continue to disagree about this hand. I think that the LRR, in addition to the trap c/r on the turn, means that he's got a hand which we are likely to split with or lose to. You think we've got a better piece than that. And without being able to agree on that, we won't get any farther. I say tomato, you say tomahto. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

[Mister Z]

It's been talked about quite a bit here, but the overall observation is that the LRR hardly means AA or KK. Less than 50% in my experience. It's usually just a donk who wants to gamble it up and create a big pot because they can.

Usually I would agree with a 3-bet here to push my edge and maybe buy a few outs by folding the button - BUT I do not think UTG would play the hand this way with AQ or AJ, or any other hand that I was ahead of. It's definitely not a fold because I'd only have to win the hand 1/13 to call. For me it was a call-down.

[Mister Z]

River was a blank, I called down and UTG showed 33 for a flopped set. Not that the results matter entirely, but I guess it pertains to the preflop discussion.