Full Ring No Limit Poker Forums

Full ring live. Table pretty tight no recent action that is significant.
Hero (~$430) - TAG/rock image
Villian (~$225)- asian ~30 yrs old been playing about 1 hr. Seems tight, no memorable hands.

PF:
Folds to villian in mid position. Villian opens to 10.
/* This raise is higher than a normal open. Normal action is limping or opening to $6 or $7. Sometimes people open to $12 but pretty rare */
Hero calls with AKo /
* I often raise here but sometimes flat against large raise. I'm assuming he has big pair TT-QQ, AK, or something in that range. Why the larger than normal raise? I'm looking to flat and hopefully flop something to go forward with. Might fold on flop if I get a big cbet on board that doesn't hit my hand. I definitely thought about raising but not sure where I would go with that on missed flop. */

F: K98
Villian bets $12
Hero raises to $40
Villian calls
/*here I hit my card and should be good against nearly all of his range. This is pretty much what I'm looking to flop. I can't see much in terms of set of 99s or 88s and the draw just doesn't seem like it wold fit a larger than normal open . I'm a little confused but think he can definitely call with worse (i.e. TT, JJ, QQ, KQ, KJ, etc. ) I wouldn't be too surprised to see AK from villian as well*/

T: K987
Villian ($160)- leads with middle size bet leaving approx. $120 behind /*I can't remember exact size but nothing out of ordinary. The pot should be something like 20 + 80 + 60= $160 */
Hero - (~300) ??

/* I know my numbers aren't quite right for stack sizes bets etc. but villian definitely opened for 10, hero called 10, hero raised 3-4x on flop which should be enough to price out any weird straight draws */

I should mention that this opponent had a weird set of chips. He had transfered from another table and brough his stack with him. 1/2 tables normally are mostly all red chips with a few $1 blues and $2pinks for blinds. One reason I had a little hard time figuring out his stack size is becaus he showed up with only a few reds and two mini towers of blues and pinks. these stacks were probably 40 chips high so that's 40 blue and 80 in pink for 120 plus some of the reds which I figure adds up to about 225?

It is very rare to see that many blue and pink at the 1/2 table. this looks like a winning 1/1 stack that transfered. It was just an odd point and drove soem of my post flow decision making when I was sizing up the effective stacks.

Weird that he would lead out again after you raise him. In my experience players who raise bigger than normal pre in live low limit games have hands like 10s/JJ/AQ/AK so they can "win" the hand preflop because the dont know how to play it post flop. Ive seen guys at a 1/2 table raise to $20-$30 pre just so they dont see an Ace on the flop etc.

Im probably continuing to call, i dont think raising is great since he most likley fold everything you beat and if he checks the river you can bet an amount that could get him to commit all his chips anway. E.g like $80/$90 if he has $120ish left

I probably spoiled it by calling it "big pot". The dynamics made me feel like I was good here and i wasn't totally sure how much he had back with all the weird chips. I figured that if I flat called and hit I would get it in. I was having a hard time seeing any set of 8s or 9s here or straight draw. I had him covered by a lot so just shoved. He turned over JTo for straight. I was thinking that if I called was I going to fold the river with the size of the pot? Probably not so I just shipped. How bad is that? In hind sight I probably should have raised PF? Not sure? I think he made a mistake calling my raise so i'm thinking my play is ok.

Side note is that I had several pots tonight similar in a way. Big pre-flop raises up front, me flatting with more suited connecting type hands which I like much better than AK. I made 2 pair twice but lost to sets. First one with full stacks. Dumb guy raised big UTG, I call with Ts9s hit the two pair by turn and shoved. Lost on QT29 board to the set of queens. Villian played QQ as expected but hit set.

I need to think more about folding out hands that I beat and getting calls from better hands but I like to keep the pressure on and keep hammering bets to get value. I think it's ok to run into some of these hands. The JT from original post was pretty big surprise though.

thoughts?

Why did you raise the flop? Did you expect him to call you down with TT-QQ? I don't think your hand strength vs his hand range justifies raising to set up potentially playing for stacks. I think the hard turn decision is really a consequence of your overaggressive flop play. (But your turn decision is between calling and folding. You seem to be raising all-in because you don't want to have to make another decision on the river. Lastly, you could (and should) have asked the dealer for a count of his chips.)

PS - There's a Live Poker forum now, so that's probably the best place to post live hands.

I'll move it to live forum next time.. Sorry.

Why did I raise?
- I do think a lot of 1/2 players would call down with made hands if they get pot committed. I've definitely seen worse plays.
- I'm trying to "value bet" more
- per Bart Hanson I'm trying to bet/fold more and push thinner value
- I thought I could get called by worse
- If there was a draw, I wanted to price him out as to make a mistake with respec to pot odds (which i belive he did)
- I could win it right there and be done with the hand
- Effective stacks were in the range of 100 BB vs. something like 200 BB which I think makes my decision easier
- I thought calling turn would put me automatically on calling river based on being pot committed so why not give myself the option of winning there. I didn't really see call/fold as an option (maybe I should have?)

To be honest, I think you are right about not wanting a river decision. I suppose that if I would have controlled the size of the pot better that would have helped. I suppose I pot committed myself by the aggressive play but I thought maybe that was better.

Regarding asking for chip counts of opponents, I don't think that is an option in FL. I've never seen it done anyway. If someone makes a bet you can get a count on those chips but i don't think you can get a count on someone's stack. You also ca't get a count on the pot unless it's a pot limit game.

I saw that player again tonight and he had a similar stack. I now realize that he must buy in with those chip colors which is very out of the ordinary.

jason

It sounds like you're trying to incorporate good concepts into your game, but that you are misapplying them a bit.

You are correct to want to value bet more, but you need to do it in the context of hand reading and range analysis. Most of the rationales you posted were based on your sense that you had the best hand, without going into the specifics of what range of hands your opponent could have and how he would play that range. The fact that he is relatively young and tight would be my first clue that he might not be someone who stacks off with less than top pair, though I'd want to confirm/refute that by observing his play at the table. When you are deciding whether to call or raise on the flop, you should be thinking of how the hand will play out. If you just call, you can insure that 3 bets go into the pot, since you can use your position to call if he bets or bet if checked to. When you raise, you are trying to get a fourth bet to go into the pot. So the most important question is, what part of his range will play for that additional bet? And my suggestion is that on a relatively coordinated board of K98, most of the hands that put in that fourth bet will beat AK. Plus, if he was cbetting a hand like AQ, you give him no chance to make a second best on the turn for you to extract value from.

Also, you should not necessarily be worried about pricing out draws. It is much more important to be able to read hands and avoid paying off players when their draws hit, while sometimes inducing bluffs from missed draws against the more aggressive fish. In fact, despite your very large flop raise size, you didn't really price him out because you ended up putting in 80bbs after his draw completed and your equity was actually 0.

Overall, your desire to play well and develop aggressiveness is really good. But I think this hand is indicative that you haven't fully assimilated the relevant concepts, so I'd suggest going back and rewatching Bart's video series as well as listening to some of his old podcasts, especially those that focus on hand reading.

* One last thought: there is a big difference in value betting and value raising in live poker. Fish constantly call value bets because they are paranoid you are bluffing and just betting because you are checked to (in many cases, that is what they do when they are the preflop aggressor with their whole range because they don't know any better). But when you raise, even dopey fish realize that you are representing a strong hand. Of course, many will still make bad calls, but the dynamic is definitely different. And there are a lot of weak players that are a bit too loose preflop but very nitty postflop that will give up their hand easily to a big raise postflop. Against such players, raising TPTK is a pretty big mistake, as it kills value versus worse hands and only gets action from better hands.

* One last thought: there is a big difference in value betting and value raising in live poker. Fish constantly call value bets because they are paranoid you are bluffing and just betting because you are checked to (in many cases, that is what they do when they are the preflop aggressor with their whole range because they don't know any better). But when you raise, even dopey fish realize that you are representing a strong hand. Of course, many will still make bad calls, but the dynamic is definitely different. And there are a lot of weak players that are a bit too loose preflop but very nitty postflop that will give up their hand easily to a big raise postflop. Against such players, raising TPTK is a pretty big mistake, as it kills value versus worse hands and only gets action from better hands.

That exactly.

This is all very good and i definitely am absorbing what you are saying. Obviously, I feel a little dumb here but normally I don't just get it in with top pair. I was trying to hand read but misplayed post flop. A take away for me is bloating pots and helping opponents play more correctly isn't very good strategy. In the heat of the moment things are different and this will help my future play as I will now have this experience to draw on. I think I need to do a lot of what I'm doing but do a better job at managing pot sizes and not getting spewy when face with decisions.

I'm wondering how this would be any different if instead of AK I would have had 8s or 9s and flatted PF. The question is would that make any difference? A set against a straight has the same value (loosing). Bart Hanson talks about this in the 4 main leaks - not understand hand equivalaency. Looking back at this, if I would have flatted, flopped a set, raised and shoved would that have been just as bad? Hand wise, it's really the same thing. Are we saying that we shouldn't raise the flop with a set either? I'm not a big fan of check calling so not sure here. Maybe wait for clean cards on turn and river then go for value then? I'm worried about that because it seems like I would be giving away free cards. Based on the read I had, TPTK or set is the same.

I should mention that a lot of my line was influence by recent readings of Brunson's Super System. I reviewed his AK strategy and he typically raises, sometimes flats, then shoves depending on his feeling. Generally speaking, it seems like he tries to get it in any time he has decent equity with "some outs" as he says. A lot of that is his image and being an aggressive player making sure he gets paid off. I would say that today (at least at the 1/2 live I play) old people and obvious nits don't get paid off. maybe when he wrote that book it was at the beginning of the concept of aggressive play and he got a lot more fold equity? Sounds like back then it was mostly limit and NL play looked like limit in more ways and he was exploiting it. However, mathematically it seems still very sound.

There's no way TPTK and a set are the same hand before we know that villain happened to have JTo this particular hand. His range of hands on the flop is going to include AK and AA, and those are the hands we are targeting when we get aggressive with a set, expecting to win their stack when they have either hand.

If you had had 99 in this hand and the action went down the same, I'd say nice hand. You can definitely be getting value from worse at all points in the hand. (Even though villain happened to turn the nuts, I could see him playing AA/AK/88/KK this way.) Given how the hand played out, when villain calls your turn shove, I don't expect AK to be good very often (perhaps chopping some of the time, losing most of the rest of the time), while I expect 99 to be good most of the time. (Also relevant is that a set has significant redraw equity versus a straight while TPTK does not. Since I would discount JT quite a bit from his range before we saw the results, it's only a fairly small factor in my analysis.)

As far as Super System and AK, there are definitely times to play AK aggressively, but having a mindset of "I'm going to play AK aggressively" in all situations is a pretty big leak. Especially in live games where raising and 3betting ranges aren't very wide.

As an extreme example, I had AK in the BB. A complete nit open raised 5x in middle position and everyone else folded. His opening range is JJ+, AK and he will sometimes limp with JJ and AK. So I folded. He happened to flash AA before returning his cards, which is partly why I still remember the hand. Of course, this is only time I've ever folded AK to a single raise in a live game, but the point is that my reasoning was based on a situational analysis that focused on the hand range of my opponent.