Who made the bigger mistake?

[SoBeDude]

72o can flop boats and quads and other juicy hands too, but you aren't going to play that anytime soon.

Buckshot will play that, he'll play anything...

-S

[Buckshot]

You so silly, Mr. 23s UTG.

~stephen

[Baltimore Ron]

I suspect that Andy is being kind, while SoBe is being a little harsh. Yeah, I know, A3o isn't the greatest of hands. Normally this is turbo mucked, but this table, at this time, was that one time out of 50 or 100 that I felt it was worth speculating. I was more interested in the group's reaction to the flop raise with bottom pair to get a free turn card.

When the utg bets out on the flop, there is $70 or $80 in the pot. If I raise and then do improve, I'm counting on another $10 with his call and $40 on later streets (either betting on the turn and river when I improve or raising him on the river when he bets and I improve) bringing implied odds to $120 or $130 for my $20 to raise the flop. He could have ruined this calculation by reraising, of course. It turns out I only received implied odds of $100 or $110 to $20 because he didn't co-operate by betting out on the river after I checked behind. Nonetheless, with 5 outs twice, I like the odds.

And, Buckshot, what's wrong with 23s utg? LOL

BR

[andyfox]

I was not being kind. You did ouplay him.

Playing the A-3 pre-flop is a terrible play, no matter how spunky you feel. In fact, when feeling spunky, it's probably a bigger mistake. We shouldn't play when we're feeling either spunky or funky, it tends to cloud our judgment.

On the flop, if your opponent has a king, and there's no guarantee he does, you're about a 4:1 dog. But if you have a weak-tight opponent who will meekly call a raise and then check to give you a free card, and meekly call when you improve, this is the ideal opponent. (See Mason's recent article, about which mike l. has commented in a recent post.) After all, he limped in UTG with K-9, and then proved that you could indeed outplay him by doing everything wrong with his top pair.

Who'd you rather have in your game: A guy who limps in UTG and then merely calls your flop raise when he has top pair and then checks the turn and checks the river? Or a guy who overlimps on the button with A-x and then raises the flop sometimes even when he doesn't hit the Ace? Yeah, playing the A-3 pre-flop ain't great. But playing K-9 UTG and then playing like Ron's opponent played post-flop if far worse.

[Moonsugar]

Sklansky, in HEPFAP, in the chapter on semi-bluffing a hand very much like this is discussed (A3) and he reccomended, essentially, to play it exactly like you did (except for the preflop). Of course his advice probably wasn't meant for a game with 7 limpers, though.

[Bubmack]

[ QUOTE ]
At least you played the river correctly, although you never should've been there in the first place.


[/ QUOTE ]
You think so? I think a checkdown would have been the best decision. IMO This is a "only a worse hand will fold and a only a better hand will call" situation. The UTG bet represents a piece of the board or a semi-bluff. So assuming the UTG bet was not a dominated pair of 3s - he would either fold his semi-bluff or call his bigger pair.

Bubs

[andyfox]

On the flop, UTG bet and the other limpers folded. So the fact the "seven limpers" are gone. While the pot odds and implied odds make the play somewhat close, if you have a guy who'll meekly call and then check and let you make your hand, and then pay you off when you hit, who could ask for anything more, who could ask for anything more?

[karlson]

I think you misread the original post. The river was a three, giving our hero trips.

FWIW, I think the hand was played well after the flop, given that he seemed to know his opponent. The fact that it was only barely a +ev situation just illustrates that the preflop call was not good.