Q-Q in SB with rag flop

Full Ring PP $100 NL.

Villain is in late position with $90. Hero is SB with $97.

Everyone folds to Villain who makes it 6 times the BB to $6. Folded to me in SB and after thinking about it, I make it $18. BB folds and he calls. Villain seemed to make a few questionable plays and certainly wasn’t worthy of a lot of respect, but didn’t seem to be a complete moron either.

($37) Flop: 8c 6d 4d

Hero bets $28 and Villain calls.

($96) Turn: 10h for a board of 8c 6d 4d 10h

Hero pushes in the rest of his stack for $43.50 and villain calls.

($178) River: 3d for a board of 8c 6d 4d 10h 3d.

My thought process preflop was that I had the best hand and didn’t want to let him suck out for cheap. Was a bit worried when he called but really thought I was ahead. I figured I had to bet into that flop, even though I was a bit worried about aces or kings but figured he could easily have 9-9, 10-10, J-J, Ad-Kd, or something goofy. I was real worried when he called the flop, and not sure what to do on the turn. I figured he could easily have something I could beat and with only $43.5 left and the pot at $96, I thought there was high enough probability that I had the best hand that I couldn’t check fold, so I figured I might as well pushed it in. What does everyone think? Any suggestions are welcome. I’ll post the results after getting a few responses.

The flop call is very very fishy. I mean the guy is willing to call a big OOP raise which brings him down to half his stack. With the range of hands he's willing to call with there I think there is a good chance you're behind. Here is a perfect example of why not being in position in NL hold'em sucks.

The only conceivable hands that he can call with here are AdKd, 99, 1010, JJ, KK, AA, 88, 66, 44 or an already made set. You lose to 5 hands and at best you beat 4 (you have to wonder if he'd even call with those four.)

After the flop you're pretty much pinned to the hand, seeing as half of both of your stacks are in the pot. Especially on a 10, which is pretty much meaningless...he will call any bet...
A) because he's pinned to the pot
B) if he called the flop, a 10 came out, what makes you think he's going to fold to a 10, especially with your pf raise?

I think your best move is to check the turn, and make the call on a read that you have on the player. No read, I would probably fold this hand.

[stu-unger]

im not really sure on this one, ill give u my 2 cents. I don't mind the re-raise preflop. the problem is he has made a huge opening raise, and u r likely to get it heads up with out the raise+ u r OOP. i guess this is a preference thing. since u raised preflop i think leading the flop is the right idea, i think u want to lead at it for more though. doing this will likely get u pot stuck though and u r OOP with no info on villains hand. on the turn i think i check and pretty much concede the pot maybe thats weak tight, but given the range u put him on u aren't ahead of much and nothing is dead to u. if u think your hand is good a push is the only option just realize u have like zero fold equity and a flush with overs has odds to call which u want them to do.

my weak weeenie line= call preflop, lead flop for pot, check/call-check/raise turn, reavaluate on the river.

[djoyce003]

unless you have this guy marked as a moron he's probably got you beat. I think he walked the dog on you with AA or KK. Your huge preflop raise with QQ basically tied you to the hand. His $6 raise is suspect to begin with...does he normally raise so large? I generally raise $4 and most people raise less than that. The only hand that might call a flop bet that you are ahead of is the AK of diamonds...if so that got there unfortunately, but I think AA or KK is likely. If you are REALLY lucky he has JJ which also might call down here, and is likely given the large preflop raise...looks just like a hand that doesn't want to see a flop too bad.

I don't play much full ring sticking mainly to 6 max, because of the 4 extra seats I think you will see AA and KK more often, making queens that much more dangerous. I might have considered a little pot control here and flat called preflop and made a play at the pot on the flop....that might give you a better indication of where you are in the hand, and at least gives you a much smaller pot that you won't be tied to.

yeah, I was thinking about pushing on the flop, but to be honest, I wanted the option to fold if he pushed since I was worried about possibly aces or kings. I bet out 28 into the 37 pot figuring that was more than enough to push out something like A-K but 28 was small enough that I can fold if he reraises me. And I'll emphasis that while this guy was not a complete moron, he made plenty of questionable plays.

Yeah, I think I kind of like the idea of trying to keep the pot small and betting out at the flop, assuming no ace or king. But again, I was pretty sure I had it preflop, and I didn't want to call and give the BB odds to call with a small pair. But maybe I should have run that risk in order to keep the pot small as you suggest. I will definitely keep that in mind next time I'm in a similar situation--ie, "small big pair" OOP.

turns out the guy had 9d-7d. So I guess he was a complete moron to call 18 preflop with 9-7. Anyway, he hit both a straight and flush draw on the flop so he was a slight favorite after the flop. And of course I was drawing dead after the turn. I wish he would have pushed the flop so I could have gotten away from it.

so what happened

[bfc]

I would have raised more pre-flop. You're giving villain slightly better than 2:1 to call so he's going to call with a wide range of hands hoping to outflop you.

I think the flop bet is fine and the decision on the turn is very difficult. If I were the villain I could possibly call your bet with nothing hoping to take it away from you if you checked the turn. I would put you on AK, JJ-AA and could reasonably expect to take the pot away from you if you were making a continuation bet with AK or if another diamond came on the turn. If I had any outs to beat an overpair (e.g., a flush draw or even a gutshot) then I probably call your flop bet (depending on the read I had on you).

Although villain calling your flop bet may well indicate you are behind, I still think there's a fair chance you are ahead. By checking the turn (and then folding to villain's bet) you are essentially giving up a $96 pot for the cost of a $44 bet. I can't do the exact math on how often you need to be ahead on the turn to make pushing the correct play but my intuition is that it only needs to be around 30%.