AQ in HUGE pot - any way to win this pot?

[bilbo-san]

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i don't assume two pair straight or trips based on one bet. but the flop is connected and the pot is very multiway. that dramatically increases the risk to be up against a good hand.
i would raise too, if one small bet would increase my chances to win the pot considerably. but it is almost sure, that it is not the case here. you have neither a hand nor outs that you can protect effectively.

here my reasoning against against the raise from a previous answer:


i don't think the raise on the flop is correct.

obviously you can't raise for value here. let's see if a raise really helps hero's pot equity:

i am pretty sure, the only hands he can shut out are weak one pair hands with a weak kicker, gutshot straights, backdoor flushes and weak overcards. it is almost impossible to win this pot without a showdown.

he might be up agains a straight or a set. in this case the bet is just wasted.
a 2 pair is pretty likely too. if he is up against a two-pair, it won't help to get gutshots out, because it is impossible that the gutshot hits and hero end's up with 2 pair or better.
it's very likely that he is up against a pair and a straight draw. in this case he can't get hand's out that hurt him.

i don't see any likely possibility how a raise on the flop could help hero's pot equity enough to justify that play.

i would however raise it preflop.

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Your reasoning makes little sense. You seem to think that you are ahead pre-flop, but that your outs are tainted post-flop. How did that happen?

Also, you say that the only people that will fold are weak pairs, gut-shots, and backdoor draws, and that your only chance of winning is to go to a showdown.

This is EXACTLY why you raise. You would love hands like Q[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] 3[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] (or K[img]/images/graemlins/club.gif[/img] 3[img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img], and yes, at least on e person here has a hand THAT bad) to fold, because if you do hit your Q you want it to be good.

Hero has outs to call. Raising is almost always better because:

1) A small percentage of the time he has a better hand than the bettor
2) Each fold he induces improves his chance of winning dramatically (again, how much is it worth in pot equity if he gets Q3 to fold? That probably doubles his chances of winning the pot)

I'm still a journeyman with a lot to learn, but I'm pretty sure the flop-raise is correct, and that it's not even a close decision.

Again, no one is suggesting that the flop raise is for value.

[jjacky]

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Your reasoning makes little sense. You seem to think that you are ahead pre-flop, but that your outs are tainted post-flop. How did that happen?

Also, you say that the only people that will fold are weak pairs, gut-shots, and backdoor draws, and that your only chance of winning is to go to a showdown.

This is EXACTLY why you raise. You would love hands like Q 3 (or K 3, and yes, at least on e person here has a hand THAT bad) to fold, because if you do hit your Q you want it to be good.

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hey, that's confusing: at first you ask me how it is possible to be ahead preflop and having tainted outs post flop and a moment later you tell me you want to get hands like Q,3 out. i think you know why some outs might be tainted...

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Hero has outs to call. Raising is almost always better because:

1) A small percentage of the time he has a better hand than the bettor
2) Each fold he induces improves his chance of winning dramatically (again, how much is it worth in pot equity if he gets Q3 to fold? That probably doubles his chances of winning the pot)

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point one is no reason to raise.

lets look at point 2:
yes, if you get a small pair with an A or Q kicker to fold, you will probably double your chances to win. but at the same time you double your investment. that means a raise is only a good play if all the following conditions are met (that's a little rough, but valid most of the time) :
- a call is better than a fold (if a call has negative expectation, a raise with twice the price and twice the chance to win shoun't have a positive EV either)
- a small pair with a A or Q kicker is out there
- the small pair with A or Q kicker would fold if you raise

not very likely that all these circumstances are met.

i want to point out that i dont even think that a call is better than a fold because you may very well be drawing dead or almost dead (against two pair, a set or a straight) and you are exposed to redraws if you hit your pair on the turn. and to make matters worse we have big reversed implied odds here.

[Sarge85]

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3bet PF whole field with AQ? Is it EV+?

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Button is raising a bunch of hands you crush. Hell, some of the limpers might even fold. I do it, but I play pretty laggy especially preflop.

-SmileyEH

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I do 2

Sarge[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]

[RacersEdge]

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Button is raising a bunch of hands you crush.

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Why is this the case with 4 limpers in front of the raise? Are you putting him on things like KJ, AT?

[MCS]

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Button is raising a bunch of hands you crush.

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Why is this the case with 4 limpers in front of the raise? Are you putting him on things like KJ, AT?

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I don't think it's true either, but I still think a preflop 3-bet is the way to go.

[bilbo-san]

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Your reasoning makes little sense. You seem to think that you are ahead pre-flop, but that your outs are tainted post-flop. How did that happen?

Also, you say that the only people that will fold are weak pairs, gut-shots, and backdoor draws, and that your only chance of winning is to go to a showdown.

This is EXACTLY why you raise. You would love hands like Q 3 (or K 3, and yes, at least on e person here has a hand THAT bad) to fold, because if you do hit your Q you want it to be good.

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hey, that's confusing: at first you ask me how it is possible to be ahead preflop and having tainted outs post flop and a moment later you tell me you want to get hands like Q,3 out. i think you know why some outs might be tainted...



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You are arguing semantics. Your original argument that the A and/or Q outs are tainted seemed to imply it was because you believed we might be up against an A with a better kicker -- at least that's how I interpreted it. And that is precisely the argument that does not gel with 3-betting preflop.

By the way, you also want hands like Kx to fold (please don't tell me they will anyway... these limits are full of people that will call one SB on the flop in a big pot with any overcard), leaving one less redraw. You also want any weak pair/weak kicker hand to fold, also reducing opponents redraws.

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yes, if you get a small pair with an A or Q kicker to fold, you will probably double your chances to win. but at the same time you double your investment. that means a raise is only a good play if all the following conditions are met (that's a little rough, but valid most of the time) :
- a call is better than a fold (if a call has negative expectation, a raise with twice the price and twice the chance to win shoun't have a positive EV either)
- a small pair with a A or Q kicker is out there
- the small pair with A or Q kicker would fold if you raise

not very likely that all these circumstances are met.


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And that's where we essentially disagree. I say we have odds to call, and IF YOU DO, then raising is better.

You claim that I'm saying we don't have odds to call. We are getting 13.5 to 1 (with callers left to act). If we called, we could expect 1-2 more callers, giving us just about the right odds with only 3 outs. Raising is better because:

1) if we get Q3 or A3 to fold, we double our outs.
2) if bad-pair + A/Q kicker are not out there, we have 6 outs anyway, meaning we have a bit of pot equity, and getting any other pairs or draws to fold increases our chances of winning.

Or are you arguing that we actually have no outs, and A + Q are both tainted?

[jjacky]

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You are arguing semantics. Your original argument that the A and/or Q outs are tainted seemed to imply it was because you believed we might be up against an A with a better kicker -- at least that's how I interpreted it. And that is precisely the argument that does not gel with 3-betting preflop.

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no, i didn`t mean that domination is a big threat. i refered the possibility to be reversed dominated.

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And that's where we essentially disagree. I say we have odds to call, and IF YOU DO, then raising is better.


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yes, we disagree in both points. i don`t think a call is better than a fold and i don't think raising would be better than calling if a call would be better than folding.

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You claim that I'm saying we don't have odds to call. We are getting 13.5 to 1 (with callers left to act). If we called, we could expect 1-2 more callers, giving us just about the right odds with only 3 outs.

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no, i DO NOT claim that you are saying we don't have odds to call. i think you overestimate the concept of pot odds. even if we knew we had exactly 3 outs to the best hand and 15:1 odds to call (and no chance to improve the number of outs by raising), a call would be a mistake because we have reversed implied outs (we don`t know which cards are good) and very strong redraws against us.

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Raising is better because:

1) if we get Q3 or A3 to fold, we double our outs.


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yes, IF an Q3 or A3 is out AND it folds to a raise we double our outs, maybe from 3 to 6, maybe from 0 to 0.

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2) if bad-pair + A/Q kicker are not out there, we have 6 outs anyway, meaning we have a bit of pot equity, and getting any other pairs or draws to fold increases our chances of winning.

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most that is true, but the effect is VERY small. you forgot to mention the possibility that we might be drawing dead.

a raise cuts our odds to about 8:1. even if we were drawing to 6 outs for sure, the play would be very marginal (given all the possible redraws out there). even a small probability to draw to 3 or zero outs turns this play into a loser. if you count the 6 cards to improve as 5 outs (which is ways too optimistic) this play would have -EV. really, i don`t have any idea how you can possibly count the 6 cards to improve for 5 outs or more.


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Or are you arguing that we actually have no outs, and A + Q are both tainted?

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i think we might very well be drawing dead or almost dead. there is some chance that one of our cards is tainted. the risk that A and Q are tainted both is very close to zero imo.

i count our cards to improve for about 2 outs if we call, with an increase between 10% and 25% if we raise, to something between 2.2 and 2.5 outs. everything above counting it for 3 outs if we call and 4 outs if we raise is far out of line imo.