Fundamentals

[BobboFitos]

A situation like this hasn't come up for me in a while, and I'm probably thinking results oriented, so I just need someone to objectively clarify the right play. This wasn't even a hand w/ alot of thought process for me at the time, it just I'm not sure what the best play is at all, and... I should. Here goes.

5/5 game this week at TS, UTG makes it 15. (~700) He is a big fish who has varied his opens from 15 to 50, with 50 being good hands and 15 being what he considers playable. Two seats over, a guy in a texas long horns hat, I doubled through him when I sat down, makes it 40. He has been VERY aggressive preflop, raising more then his fair share of hands. I think this is an isolation raise, so it COULD be a big hand, or even just a big ace/etc. He has 1.2k. I'm the CO with KK and cover both, big stack at the table. This is a clear call to me, but maybe I [censored] this part up. I called.

We take the flop three way 130 in there. Q [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] 8 [img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] 2 x

Fish checks, PFR bets 100, I call. I dont think he has a draw, and if I raise he'll only play on with AQ but drop JJ/Ax everything else. I might've [censored] this part up, too, but here I get to see what fish does, whereas if I raise I'm committed vs him. (Even though I very very likely have the best hand, shipping him easy money there isn't fun) Fish folds.

Turn: 330ish, 9x. He bets 150. He is still very deep, and if I raise he doesn't fold AA. He probably dies w/ AQ, too; he was overplaying (successfully..) top pair hands to get his stack. So I just call again.

Anyway, how bad is all of this? Or is this good? I thought then it was good. I dont know. Help me.

[JKratzer]

PF call is okay in this situation I think, you don't want to scare off fish. I think I probably raise on the flop, something small like 200/250ish. While this might result in losing more to the fish, it makes the hand a lot easier I think. If I call flop I definitely raise the turn. You need to raise somewhere I think. Otherwise it makes it difficult to put him on a hand.

JKratzer

[Allinlife]

Rob, preflop looks fine because I think raising here will definately scare away many worse hands and you can extract a bit by merely calling you have position too so it'd be pretty hard to misplay this one in position.

flop call maybe fine in HU situation given your read, but think of the fiiiish. A raise is mandatory here I think.

It also makes this hand VERY easy to play, you'd just check that river 9 and call bet and bet if checked to.

that's my 2 cents.

[amoeba]

just play it like you would play a set.

[DrPublo]

Do you have the Kd? This is important because if not he could be firing with AdKd or AdJd, and against those hands you definitely want to raise the turn.

The Doc

[Leptyne]

Texas 101: Capital "T" always. "Longhorns" is all one word, and of course upper case "L".

You are forgiven re: Longhorns. I'd be very careful when making any remarks about our other school. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

[lapoker17]

I call alot of the time w KK preflop, but in this case, I think you have to raise. The PF reraiser sounds laggish, so his range of hands is wider than your average player and therefore more difficult to play against, so YOU have to define his hand by reraising him.

I posted a hand a long time ago about flat calling some maniac PF with AA. Long story short, flop came 832 rainbow, we got it all in on the flop - about $20k if I remember correctly - and he flipped over 82. I suck at finding old posts and linking, but I probably posted it in OCT 04 - 10/20 Bellagio AA hand if someone wants to find the link...

The moral of the story, I guess is that you can call preflop w AA/KK, but try to limit it to tight guys whose hands are defined simply by their PF raise.

[BobboFitos]

Thanks guys for answering. First...

[ QUOTE ]
just play it like you would play a set.


[/ QUOTE ]

I dont get that.

[ QUOTE ]
Do you have the Kd? This is important because if not he could be firing with AdKd or AdJd, and against those hands you definitely want to raise the turn.

The Doc


[/ QUOTE ]
I dont remember, but I dont think I did.

[ QUOTE ]
Texas 101: Capital "T" always. "Longhorns" is all one word, and of course upper case "L".

You are forgiven re: Longhorns. I'd be very careful when making any remarks about our other school.

[/ QUOTE ]

lol, ok.

[ QUOTE ]
I call alot of the time w KK preflop, but in this case, I think you have to raise. The PF reraiser sounds laggish, so his range of hands is wider than your average player and therefore more difficult to play against, so YOU have to define his hand by reraising him.

[/ QUOTE ]
Yeah, I think this was where I sorta botched it up. No harm taking down 12bbs off the bat. Or having the fish call a big % of his stack pf, which he could've.

[ QUOTE ]
I posted a hand a long time ago about flat calling some maniac PF with AA. Long story short, flop came 832 rainbow, we got it all in on the flop - about $20k if I remember correctly - and he flipped over 82. I suck at finding old posts and linking, but I probably posted it in OCT 04 - 10/20 Bellagio AA hand if someone wants to find the link...

The moral of the story, I guess is that you can call preflop w AA/KK, but try to limit it to tight guys whose hands are defined simply by their PF raise.

[/ QUOTE ]
Yeah, I remember that hand, makes sense.

~~~

Anycase, I felt on the turn it was sorta a way ahead/way behind. Obviously draws were on board, but unless he had specifically AKd or KJd I was safe. Also, the turn wasn't a 9, it was another rag, so I remember thinking 99/TT/JJ / any ace are crushed and will fold, whereas if I raise I'm committing myself vs AA/other KK/QQ and only getting called by AQ (worse hand)

So I decided to let him bluff at the cost of a 2 or 3 outer. Which was sorta my question, I remember vaguely Ray Zee posting a while ago about how if you wont make any money on the river may as well shut out a 2 or 3 outer, no need costing yourself the pot.

Of course though, (bad beat whine! [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] ) an ace hit the river, he bet 200, and I put my head on the table, visor first. I said "wow, I literally am not beating anything," and I wasn't. Getting a good price, and thinking he may be "bluffing" with JJ, TT, 99, and really just wanting to see his hand, I called. (I could / should have saved this money... Just curiousity, I guess.)

he had ATo. thanks again for the replies.

[n1bd]

The fundamental question is just, "What's going to happen on the river if he has XX?"


Case 1: He has a better hand (AA/QQ/88). If you flat call the turn, you are losing another 300-900 on the river depending on how he bets, say ~400 on average (a great player probably overbet pushes the river with these stacks, since he is committed to calling a raise anway, but most players value bet 50-100% of the pot). If you raise the turn, you are losing all 900.


Case 2: He has a worse hand. Since you read him for no flush draw, he has 2-3 outs, say 2.75 on average.

If you don't protect your hand by raising the turn, you lose about 2.75/44 * (pot + amount you pay off on river) = 2.75/44 * ($630 + $400) = $64.

If instead you raise the turn, you lose river bets from the unimproved worse hands that he might bluff or crying call; in a ~$630 pot with this action and board texture, this worse hand river action averages more than $64 for most opponents. On the other hand, raising the turn gets an extra ~$500 in value from the one (?) worse hand he doesn't fold, AQ.


Your hand protection/bluff induction considerations point toward flat calling the turn (induced bluff > money lost to suckout).

How about the "save/extract the last few dollars" consideration? If you force him to put in the last ~500, you lose that 500 the 12/24 times he has 88/QQ/AA and win that 500 the 12/24 times he has AQ. So this consideration is indifferent to your turn action. (This all assumes he is equally likely to reraise preflop with 88/AQ/AA, which fits the isolation reraise profile.)

So in this hand you should call the turn, because 1) your opponent will bluff/bet/call more on the river when beat than you lose to him sucking out, and 2) your pot control/value extraction considerations don't apply. All your considerations point in the same direction, essentially.

The more complicated (and more common) case is where, if you bet/raise in a big pot, you get many more calls from better hands than worse hands. There, your pot control inclination wants you to check, but the other considerations might make betting right, depending on how many outs he has and how often you can induce a bluff.

[n1bd]

Isn't there a big difference between slowplaying AA preflop against a loose hand range when the preflop bet is ~1/30th of your stack, and slowplaying when the preflop bet is ~1/250th of your stack?