2/4 stars TT vs Extreme LAG... Missed bets??

[Hotrod0823]

Button with TT, suits unimportant.

Folds to the LAG in CO who of course Raises. He has been raising any PP, any 2 face cards and those are only the ones we see.

I 3 bet with my T's, all Blinds fold and LAG caps. Again any 2 picture cards and virtually any PP.

Flop comes A J 4, Rainbow.

LAG bets, I just call.

Turn 8, LAG bets, I call.

River 4, LAG bets, I call.

Final pot, 35.00.

Should I be raising this flop or the Turn? He could almost literally have any two cards or is calling down the best option I don't want to fold the best hand HU vs a LAG but I don't want to lose bets either.

Comments?

[Duffman]

I play it the same. I'd raise if I thought I could get him to fold, but given your read, he's not folding.

[mojobluesman]

I'd play it the same unless I thought a flop raise could get him to tip his hand or fold. You didn't say whether he's aggressive all the way or just pre-flop. If he's the type of player that would only re-raise with top pair or better, I think it's worth 1 small bet to find out where you are.

[toss]

Perfect.

[W. Deranged]

[ QUOTE ]
Perfect.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yep.

The key to playing against lags when you have a marginal hand with showdown value is basically to ensure than a bet goes in on every street but to be careful not to open up the betting so that you get punished when the lag actually has a hand.

Think about the way in which Lags succeed:

1. Their aggression allows them often to push people out of pots when the lags have inferior hands and so to win a lot of pots that others normally wouldn't.

2. Their aggression and the resulting impact it has on their opponents' play allows them to generally make huge scores when they have real hands.

Now consider why lags ultimately fail:

3. Lags generally put in way too much money in situations where they don't actually have any fold equity and have inferior hands, and so tend to make a lot of hugely -EV bets.

So you basically need to play in a way that counteracts #1 and #2 and takes advantage of #3. What that basically means is to give the lag the opportunity to continue pressure-betting an inferior hand, but also not to put in huge amounts with a marginal hand yourself and pay off the lags real hand.

Lags tend to thrive in tiny pots and monster pots, either by stealing the pots that no one else has any interest in or winning monster pots those times they hit real hands and their opponents have hands as well. They tend to do quite poorly in medium-sized pots, where they neither have the advantage of taking down pots through sheer aggression nor the extra lag-value they get in big pots with real hands. So force the lag to play a medium-sized pot.

[W. Deranged]

Just to avoid confusion, I don't mean to say that we shouldn't bet and raise aggressively against lags when we have real hands. Since they like to play big pots, we should be totally willing to do so when we have the goods. When we don't have huge hands, though, the key is to make sure that they continue betting and building a medium-pot for our showdown value hand.

[toss]

Thanks for explaining, I couldn't have said it better myself. It's true, I started to type out an explaination then gave up.

[Hotrod0823]

Thank you! That really summed it up.

I wasn't folding given his previous range but raising opens me up for too much risk given his tendancies.

Hotrod

Any Guesses as to what he had?

[W. Deranged]

[ QUOTE ]
Thank you! That really summed it up.

I wasn't folding given his previous range but raising opens me up for too much risk given his tendancies.

Hotrod

Any Guesses as to what he had?

[/ QUOTE ]

I think you won, so I'm guessing KQ, KT, or a non-set pocket pair.