Scenario for discussion

Note: I would really like if you would pay attention to what the hand represents rather than the actual hand.

Here's my issue with the hand: Besides with J9/QJ/98, I'm never two barrelling the turn as a bluff. JEM would clearly call a wide range of hands that are the nuts and/or stacking off. Now normally in spots where i am never bluffing I try not to play my made hands like that because its essentially wasting my made hands. The only times i would take a line with only made hands if i felt like calling ranges were wide/pot building is necessary/opp isnt folding with much of anything.

It is clear in this spot none of those factors are present. Therefore, it seems better in this spot to check turn/call down versus likely the only line he'd take as a bluff. Or if he checks behind, because my air range is so wide it seems very plausible that he's not folding the river at all if we bet/overbet/c/r.

PokerStars Game #30972030290: Hold'em No Limit ($5/$10) - 2009/07/28 10:12:40 ET
Table 'Sheratan III' 6-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: JEM87 ($1000 in chips)
Seat 2: kbp00 ($2554 in chips)
Seat 3: heybude ($1244 in chips)
Seat 4: LordPain ($3010 in chips)
Seat 5: PjotrNL ($2092.75 in chips)
kbp00: posts small blind $5
heybude: posts big blind $10
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to heybude [Ks Ad]
LordPain: folds
PjotrNL: folds
JEM87: raises $20 to $30
kbp00: folds
heybude: raises $70 to $100
JEM87: calls $70
*** FLOP *** [7h Kc Ts]
heybude: bets $120
JEM87: calls $120
*** TURN *** [7h Kc Ts] [2d]
heybude: checks

I guess I'm stuck on the "not two barreling" this board as a bluff.

I don't know JEM, so I have no clue how wide his calling range preflop is. But it seems to me that his flop calling range is very wide (and not necessarily that strong) including a lot of hands like AQ/AJ, T9ss,JTss,89ss etc seem possible to me, especially since he probably thinks we cbet this board almost 100%.

Given that, I think most of his marginal hands will just happily check down after you check the turn, but will be in a tough spot facing turn and river barrels.

I guess what I'm saying is that I feel like this board IS a decent board to barrel on (given the number of hands I perceive he's happy to stack off with vs the number of hands he might call one or two bets with but not stack off with), and so I'd triple value hands here for balance.

Why are you not bluffing this board alot more since

-the board contains alot of OESDs and tons of gutshots also.
-Its a K high flop in 3bet pot so we can discount AK (which would 4bet maybe)
-We can have a fairly wide 3bet range vs opp in co which can hold pretty much any gutshot potential hand.
- His range is wide-ish but weak after flop and we can put alot of pressure on him by 3 barrelling.

Problem could be that opp will think of the above and still fold which sucks. I still think we should bet AK here to work with all our 3 barrelling hands. If you think opp will fold to a decent bet then bet smaller with AK on turn and river, how to balance with bluff barrels.

Hmm, this is getting me thinking. Since imo I think 3 barrelling here is awesome then maybe we dont need to balance alot and just fire bluffs this way. So now I think your wanting to play the top of your range
just like your medium hands ie Tx, 99 ,JJ-QQ(?) and go c/c (are u tempted to c/r AK though). Id be certain he will check back a ton of the time on turn though even with his OESD.

I like your thinking here tho I dont know if I articulated myself well at all

Originally Posted by griffey24

I guess I'm stuck on the "not two barreling" this board as a bluff.

I don't know JEM, so I have no clue how wide his calling range preflop is. But it seems to me that his flop calling range is very wide (and not necessarily that strong) including a lot of hands like AQ/AJ, T9ss,JTss,89ss etc seem possible to me, especially since he probably thinks we cbet this board almost 100%.

Given that, I think most of his marginal hands will just happily check down after you check the turn, but will be in a tough spot facing turn and river barrels.

I guess what I'm saying is that I feel like this board IS a decent board to barrel on (given the number of hands I perceive he's happy to stack off with vs the number of hands he might call one or two bets with but not stack off with), and so I'd triple value hands here for balance.

Your right, in one sense this seems like a good two or threebarrel board because of his wide range. But because of his wide stack off hands range, and the fact that he may not even fold a pair to a two or threebarrel (although this occurence is likely), I can't imagine two barreling here without at least AJ. Threebarreling imo is totally out of the question. We're going to get called a majority of the time on the river. I am a very strong opponent of betting into "balanced" ranges.

Possibly two barreling a small bet size on this turn with some gutshots or other hands is good, but threebarreling i doubt is profitable.

My problem with checking the turn on this board is that only a small part of his flop calling range (89,QJ) will feel the need to bluff at this pot on the turn or river. The rest of his range (all pairs, AQ/AJ) will likely just take the showdown. So I don't see where the value is coming from with our big hands.

Why is checking the turn and not bluffing a better adjustment than just tripling wider (JJ+ or something)?

ISF- I missed how light you beleive opp will calldown originally so yea 3 barrelling is poor here.

Since opp is calling down light why not vb thinner and drop the gutshots (griffeys thought)

Im thinking if this isnt an option then I think when we check strong hands here it will protect us alot when we have medium hands in this spot. This can be a good thing when we have a very wide 3betting range. Im not sure if it is more profitable than betting anyway since opp will call down.

Originally Posted by Da GOAT

ISF- I missed how light you beleive opp will calldown originally so yea 3 barrelling is poor here.

Since opp is calling down light why not vb thinner and drop the gutshots (griffeys thought)

Im thinking if this isnt an option then I think when we check strong hands here it will protect us alot when we have medium hands in this spot. This can be a good thing when we have a very wide 3betting range. Im not sure if it is more profitable than betting anyway since opp will call down.

I don't think opp will call down light to threebarrels. But I think most of the time the line he is going to take with AA/KK/AK/KQ/TT/77 is call down. Maybe he fourbets AK pre but given most peoples calling range pre I think thats a pretty bulky range of stack off hands. Now if his calling range on the flop of hands that may fold to a turn bet is QQ/JJ/AT/AJ/AQ/99/88 that seems very comparable to the girth of hands he's stacking off with. If we think he's calling lighter and want to add JT/QT/66-33 we can also add KT/22 to his value range (I doubt he folds any OESD's/dub guts on the turn, I think it would be bad if he did too). Now I understand mathematically that most of the hands he missed with are going to be much more likely holding than his stack off range. But it seems like we'd have to have him fold 80% of the time everytime he doesn't have AA/KK/AK/KQ/TT/77 for us to like bluffing anything but oesd's and gut shots. I don't think we can say thats true.

Now the less % of the time he folds hands other than AA/KK/AK/KQ/TT/77 the better a three barrel becomes and the worse a two barrel is.

The thing is that poker is really simple and the solution isn't complicated if you look at this in a different way.

I think what makes you stuck here is you're looking at an individual hand. Ok, against a solid player like JEM it's unclear whether you should bet or check. But, in poker, you just need to look at ranges and adjust them If he's folding too much, like you think, you should be bluffing this spot more. This is the solution.

Given the neutrality of AK here with your reads, you're basically free to do whatever you want as long you doing that action doesn't encourage him to adjust his ranges in a way that isn't beneficial to you (aka has bad metagame).

Originally Posted by Massimo

The thing is that poker is really simple and the solution isn't complicated if you look at this in a different way.

I think what makes you stuck here is you're looking at an individual hand. Ok, against a solid player like JEM it's unclear whether you should bet or check. But, in poker, you just need to look at ranges and adjust them If he's folding too much, like you think, you should be bluffing this spot more. This is the solution.

Given the neutrality of AK here with your reads, you're basically free to do whatever you want as long you doing that action doesn't encourage him to adjust his ranges in a way that isn't beneficial to you (aka has bad metagame).

This is essentially what I was getting at. I don't think he's folding "too much" on the turn. I think that because of the very high % chance that he calls all his nut hands on the flop that this is not a great board to double barrel bluff. It is obvious that he will adjust his ranges versus a turn check in a way that will be very beneficial to me (a. He will check behind a medium to weak range, b. he will bet his strong hands and bluffs.). On the other hand, his range is still so wide on the turn that betting the turn and possibly river seems like suicide.

You think there's a high chance he calls all his nut hands? This is definitely an interesting board as far as 3bet pots go, i'm not sure what i'm thinking in terms of this board as Jem or as you. It seems like one that'd hit his range much harder than yours.

i would like always 2barrel here and consider checking river

I understand the reason for checking turn but I think betting is definitely better all things considered (meta, balance, etc).