Mid Stakes Shorthanded NL Poker Forums

First session with Villain, seems like he could be the regfish type but I'm not sure. He's running 20/12 over a small sample.

Can I raise the river here? if so, what size do we like....

Full Tilt Poker $400.00 No Limit Hold'em - 6 players - View hand 642774
The Official DeucesCracked.com Hand History Converter

CO: $420.00
BTN: $412.00
Hero (SB): $497.80
BB: $603.00
UTG: $226.00
MP: $420.80

Pre Flop: ($6.00) Hero is SB with J A
2 folds, CO raises to $12, 1 fold, Hero calls $10, 1 fold

Flop: ($28.00) 9 K 2 (2 players)
Hero checks, CO checks

Turn: ($28.00) A (2 players)
Hero checks, CO bets $19.00, Hero calls $19

River: ($66.00) J (2 players)
Hero checks, CO bets $39.00, Hero ?

I would say it's fine.

Unless unknowns are checking back gutshots a lot, something I doubt we have the best hand here ridiculously often and he has Ax very often and sometimes A9/A2.

Don't think we can make it particularly big though since we're mainly trying to get a call from a one pair hand.

And we can safely fold to a 3bet right Good spot for him to re-bluff since you can't have QT at all, not that I think he will...

The river is a super easy c/r. I think shoving is probably good here but without dynamic this may suck, so making it $160 is probably more standard.

The turn becomes close between a c/c and a c/r but early on I like a c/c to see if he uis going to vbet the river light or see if he is going to bluff it. The turn is a better c/c early on because we get to go to showdown too which is nice.

There are merits for a river c/c aswell because not many regs call and its really good to see what his checking back range is. Thats said Id reather do that with A2 here than AJ.

The river is a super easy c/r. I think shoving is probably good here but without dynamic this may suck, so making it $160 is probably more standard.

Shoving?

If we call the pot is 125ish and we have close to 350 left...

There are merits for a river c/c aswell because not many regs call and its really good to see what his checking back range is. Thats said Id reather do that with A2 here than AJ.

I think I check/raise the turn with A2, but otherwise I agree with your points.

ya, i did raise, and was confident about it.

he folded

Is PF standard? I think I fold unless you know he's bad or BB is terrible.

Is PF standard? I think I fold unless you know he's bad or BB is terrible.

i figure he is kinda passive and I don't expect him to be putting me in too many bad spots postflop, so i call here

Is PF standard? I think I fold unless you know he's bad or BB is terrible.

there's nothing wrong with flatting AJo in sb. Unless you know your opponent defends 3bet with hands like ATs, KJo...I don't see any point in 3betting this pre.

seems to me that we always have the best hand here unless he checked AK/99/22 or QT on the flop, all of which seem incredibly unlikely w/out a read.

there's nothing wrong with flatting AJo in sb. Unless you know your opponent defends 3bet with hands like ATs, KJo...I don't see any point in 3betting this pre.

sometimes folding out those hands that we dominate is more +EV than flatting if our opponent is solid and/or has a tighter range that can own us.

like say someone opens 17% utg and you're BB, i think thats a pretty good spot to 3-bet light with a hand like AJo b/c i don't think our hand is good enough to call most of the time, but we have blockers and since we should be 3-betting UTG players at least some % of the time with air, it seems like a good spot to do so given our increased FE. we usually need someone to fold 70% to make a 3-bet bluff profitable given no PE, so in this scenario as long as he's only continuing at most with 5% of the remaining hands we're good. that's something like 99+/AQ+ without taking blockers into consideration...WITH blockers that same range is about 4.2% of all hands. so it would be close but probably +EV if we're assuming we'll get a lot of credit for 3-betting a UTG raise. if we're OTB instead and assume he'll defend less often OOP then the 3-bet would be even better obv, but then again so would calling.

another example (lifted straight from noahSD video hehe) would be if our opponent was just folding to massive amounts of 3-bets, like 80% or more overall. then 3-betting is almost always more +EV than flatting no matter what our hand is. the way noah put it to me was that if he had KJ and knew his opponent had KQ and would call he would still 3-bet every time since the flop c-bet will still be very profitable. KQ guy without the initiative is unlikely to bluff enough to make his flatcall profitable since he'll miss the flop a lot (esp since we have one of his K's).

About 3betting:

Assuming that this is vs a villain that folds enough were a 3bet with any two cards if profitable in a vacuum.

We still can't 3bet all our hands as that would make the strategy unprofitable. If this is a reg we need to keep our own ranges in check. Somewhere there is probably an ideal 3bet frequency.

Seeing as AJ is a +EV call, isn't it better to 3bet something like Q8s that isn't a +EV call?

In that case we win x$ with AJ when we have that and y$ with Q8s. Instead of winning z$ with AJ and breaking even with Q8s.

(I'm by no stretch of the imagination saying that 3betting AJo is bad or that we shouldn't 3bet AJo)

those are good points but i'm assuming that if a guy is folding 80% or something that he's not very likely to be adjusting to light 3-bettors, or that number wouldn't be so high in the first place.

Tuba: Very much a case of "I know you know and you know that I know that you know"

But for the record and anyone that might not know: We still have a calling range vs someone that folds 80% right? And we still have a folding range I would assume.

I think our range construction actually matters a bit in this spot vs a villain like this.

I think we should 3bet AJo here against most players. Oop you want a depolarized range since most villains will be defending quite often.

Tuba: Very much a case of "I know you know and you know that I know that you know"

But for the record and anyone that might not know: We still have a calling range vs someone that folds 80% right? And we still have a folding range I would assume.

I think our range construction actually matters a bit in this spot vs a villain like this.

if he's literally never adjusting then no i wouldn't have a folding range. that said, obv that will almost never happen so yeah you can't just 3-bet every time. i'd have to crunch some numbers i think to really figure out the best ranges against this kind of guy, but i would imagine there is some value to flatting certain hands. someone should do some crazy pokerazor sims...hehe.