Interesting hand

[Ikke]

Liked this hand, because on every street other decisions can be made, and the way I chose to play the hand would probably be controversial to say the least.

It's 3-handed 100/200. I'm in the BB with QcTd. Button folds and SB raises.

SB is an extremely aggressive player and the reason I like this game. He will continue betting if no strength is shown, and is capable of stealing and restealing. Very hard to get a strong read on, but overplays hands frequently. To his credit, his style of play does earn him some pots by stealing.

So he raises and I just call. This was a strategy decision. I wasnt reraising anything against him when he raised, because I thought I could more easily maximize earn postflop than preflop. When I reraise here he will use the info often fairly well (lots of restealing on low flops). So I chose to play a more "non-info" game, which was paying of well so far.

The flop comes Js 4d 5c

He bets and I call.

Turn is the Jc. He bets, I call.

The river is the Kc and we both check.

Regards

[glen]

I think I know who you're talking about, and if I'm right, this line is just fine. I see the logic clearly and I like it. . . .

[Ulysses]

I definitely like the river check with nut-no-Ace. He's likely going to call (or checkraise) w/ an Ace or any pair, so trying to move him off a better hand doesn't sound like a good plan. Anything worse than that he's either folding or checkraising and I hate calling a checkraise here and being shown 22. So, nice check.

[Ikke]

That was exactly was I was thinking on the river.

But what about the turn call? Too thin? What would you have done if he had bet the river?

Raise/fold the flop?

Regards

[Ikke]

Do you also play in this game?

Against this player, what would you have done on the river if he bet?

Regards

[glen]

You raise an interesting point about the river that affects the whole plan. If he noticed Ikke's way of slowing down here, which apparently he had doing for a little bit, I wouldn't put it past him to bet a bad ace or any pair, even a pair lower than 22. If the board is even semi-ragged, I see this guy (if he is who i think he is) 3 bet a rag flop and value bet AT on the river and get paid off routinely. . . Ikke, would you call the river if it were a 9 and he bet, just for the size of the pot and the chance he could 86h (even though he does fold a lot, I see the suspect raise 39s or T2s from the sb and bet all the way when he misses), or do you think he would give up due to the way you have adapted to him? I am guessing you are calling. . .

"Curiosity killed the cat, but for a while I was a suspect. . . " Steven Wright

[mike l.]

maybe this is pushing it but 3 handed i think it's worth considering.

if you bet the river there may be some better hands he will fold. but also important to factor in is this: he may checkraise you on a bluff or on what he perceives to be a bluff but with a better hand. now im not sure if you try this line whether you should then 3 bet or flat call, but opening up this option may be even more profitable given the set of circumstances you describe.

[Ulysses]

The rest of the hand I think is too player dependent to really give much worthwhile feedback. Some general thoughts, all of which you know already, of course.

Pre-flop, I agree w/ your general strategy against this type of guy.

On the flop, a raise is OK if he ever folds the flop or if he will sometimes call and then check-fold on the turn. But a lot of these guys are very tenacious and will either auto-3-bet the flop (so, now we've learned nothing, just put in 3 bets instead of 1 with Queen-high) or will checkraise-bluff the turn a lot after flat-calling a flop raise. Given those considerations, I like calling the flop and seeing what happens. I very, very rarely would fold the flop given the range of hands this guy could have.

On the turn, I think folding is fine. Calling is fine as well, but to me that often means that I am confident enough to call him down w/ Queen-high because he's going to keep firing w/ 89.

If he bets the river, I'll call some percentage of the time. Again, depends on the player. Does he fire 3 barrels? If he has 89, is this what he does? Does he ever give up?

Here's the tricky thing about all of that wishy-washy answering. Three-handed, so much of this will be based on what has happened over the last 20 minutes. If I've called him down and won w/ Queen-high a couple of times, I'm very likely to just fold on the turn. If I've been folding to a lot of turn bets, I'm much more likely to take my Queen-high to showdown unimproved.

Very complicated and very player dependent. I think game theory considerations are much more important online when coming up w/ a heads-up or 3-handed strategy, whereas live it is much easier to get reads on people's strength and the general flow of the game. Hopefully I'll learn this online stuff, but I still much prefer HU/3-handed live.

One final comment. Against players who just always keep going to battle w/ any two, I've found that it's easy to get pulled into their game where you go to war w/ a lot of marginal stuff and try to make a lot of thin calls/raises to punish them for playing their garbage so strong. That's often a winning strategy, but against a lot of these guys it's just simpler to wait until you have better hands and go to war with them, letting them steal a fair amount of tiny pots in the meantime. It's a fine line between that and getting robbed blind, but I think the more you play like them, the more it's to their advantage. I hope that made some sense.

[stripsqueez]

i agree with everything in Ulysses last post on this thread

i view it as the need to give action - lots of over aggressive players at high limits are good readers - if you choose to "sit" on them by only playing premium hands notionally just above the level where if you played any tighter thier aggressive style would be correct, they will quickly catch on - you have to show such a player that you are fearless too and you have to be able to change up how you play - the last 30 hands are critical - the ability to adjust is the big edge you can have over this sort of player

stripsqueez - chickenhawk

[Glenn]

"maybe this is pushing it but 3 handed i think it's worth considering.

if you bet the river there may be some better hands he will fold. but also important to factor in is this: he may checkraise you on a bluff or on what he perceives to be a bluff but with a better hand. now im not sure if you try this line whether you should then 3 bet or flat call, but opening up this option may be even more profitable given the set of circumstances you describe. "

OR, and here me out here, YOU CAN JUST CHECK