$22, AQs with big draw early

[fjuanl]

Pretty readless here...villain is playing 18/6 through only 33 hands.

Is this the type of hand I want to c/r on this flop?
- Can I expect to get good value if I hit a heart, Q or A?
- Should I be more or less inclined to c/r weak cbets like this one?

When that turn hits and I decide I only can get 1 street of value unimproved, should I make my value bet on the turn or river?

What am I doing on the river?


Poker Stars $20+$2 No Limit Hold'em Tournament - t15/t30 Blinds - 9 players
The Official 2+2 Hand Converter Powered By DeucesCracked.com

Hero (SB): t2985 M = 66.33
BB: t2895 M = 64.33
UTG: t1525 M = 33.89
UTG+1: t6545 M = 145.44
UTG+2: t2850 M = 63.33
MP1: t4435 M = 98.56
MP2: t2795 M = 62.11
CO: t1710 M = 38
BTN: t4270 M = 94.89

Pre Flop: (t45) Hero is SB with A Q
2 folds, UTG+2 raises to t120, 4 folds, Hero calls t105, 1 fold

Flop: (t270) T J 5 (2 players)
Hero checks, UTG+2 bets t120, Hero raises to t400, UTG+2 calls t280

Turn: (t1070) A (2 players)
Hero checks, UTG+2 bets t675, Hero calls t675

River: (t2420) 7 (2 players)
Hero checks, UTG+2 bets t1655 all in, Hero ???

[Im_new]

nh, villain.

This could be so many hands: aggro TT-JJ, AA, AK, AJ, QQ-KK...KQ (?)

personally, I shove over on the turn.

if you're calling the turn, you have to call on that dead river card, right?

[drmcboy]

I like line, I think we fold river, this is the most stunning play by A9 ever. I think if it was J82 flop I would just shrug call but AK/AJ/AT/QK all make more sense than anything else. and could still be a tricky set

[baudib]

ok i consider folding AQ out of the SB vs. someone who seems fairly tight.

If the turn call doesn't slow him down I think we fold river as we beat nothing except QQ/KK turned into a bluff.

[Fjaman]

Fold on the river, standard play, you could consider probing on the turn when the ace appears for 1/4 to 1/3 of the pot

[fulksy]

could we not just shove over on flop, even if he has Kings we have almost 50% equity, and getting i.e. AJ to fold is a pretty good outcome since were still only on a draw

[drmcboy]

hero raised the flop, are you saying he should shove 2.5k rather than bet 400? I'm not a huge fan of balance but you can't shove for 10x the pot here with much besides a draw.

I doubt AJ would fold either way but he'll fold a lot of hands like 77 and Tx to 400 or a shove. He'll also call with a lot of those hands and then fold the turn and or pay us off when we hit.

If we bet 400, he'll call with worse FDs/SDs that we are ahead of and figure to win the pot against whether we hit or miss.

[Penneywize]

I like line

Anyone mind if we digress a bit into a discussion of the turn play? Reading the HH, I felt a re-shove on the turn seemed to me the most obvious course of action. I understand this is not outright bad, but I want to understand why flatting here is preferable.

Let me try and break it down a bit. If we shove turn, our villain has to call ~1800 to win ~4000ish, so we are giving him slightly better than 2:1 on a call.

It seems to me, we might want to do this if we feel villain's on a draw (given line, not terribly unlikely). Are we discounting this possibility given:

A: We hold one of the nut flush draws; and
B: He might have gotten there already (unlikely)?

How likely is our opponent to fold a better hand? I would assume not very, but for the sake of completeness, here is what I have as potential ranges for villain following turn bet:

KQ
All sets
AJ, AT, JT(?)
AK, AQ,
KK, QQ, KJ, QJ
Q9 / 98, potentially with flush draw

(do comment on what you think of these)

• KQ / sets are snap calling our shove, obv
• How often are the two-pair hands folding here? I would think almost never.
• AK or AQ may manage to fold a small percentage of the time. They need ~30% equity to call, and a quick poker stove shows they have this even against a fairly strong range. The possibility that our opponent actually has one of these hands and decides to fold them is rather slim, however, and this should not factor into our decision greatly.

It seems as though we are unable to reliably force a better hand to fold with our shove.

On the other side of the coin - how often are hands we actually beat calling our shove?

KK, QQ, KJ, QJ, Q9/98

• The only hands of those getting even close to proper equity against an estimated 'perceived range' are Qs9s and 9s8s, unlikely holdings overall. So, we're generally not getting called by hands we want to call us.

After going through all of this, it seems I've answered my own question. If I understand correctly, the argument for a call is as follows:

• Our hand is somewhat vulnerable, and we may still win at showdown if we don't improve
• We don't want to forfeit our equity, but we also don't want to play for our stack
• We may still improve and beat a once-better hand on river

Now it seems pretty clear why a call is preferable. I'd still appreciate some commentary on my analysis, if only to make sure I'm thinking this shit through correctly. I've decided to take a new approach to my game and have begun challenging the assumptions I had been carrying with me for so long. So, yeah, any and all criticism would be welcome.

[fjuanl]

On the other side of the coin - how often are hands we actually beat calling our shove?

KK, QQ, KJ, QJ, Q9/98

First of all, you did a good job explaining how a turn shove doesn't fold out better.

Out of the hands you listed that we beat, how many want to bet for value on this turn? KK, QQ, KJ, QJ all hate that turn card. He has position and can check behind and hope to showdown cheaply. So when he bets the turn, his range is made up of a) AQ, AK, 2pair, sets and b) bluffs. To figure out how many bluffing hands he can have, first decide on what hands make a 4x raise UTG+2

[Im_new]

hmmm, I guess the turn call is goot. Fold river is goot too. I stand corrected.

Nice work, Penneywize.

[Penneywize]

First of all, you did a good job explaining how a turn shove doesn't fold out better.

Out of the hands you listed that we beat, how many want to bet for value on this turn? KK, QQ, KJ, QJ all hate that turn card. He has position and can check behind and hope to showdown cheaply. So when he bets the turn, his range is made up of a) AQ, AK, 2pair, sets and b) bluffs. To figure out how many bluffing hands he can have, first decide on what hands make a 4x raise UTG+2

Well. Taking into account blind level and perceived tightness of villain, I think a pf range of AT+, KQs, and 88+ seems appropriate...?

You're definitely right about the KK, QQ, KJ, QJ bit given position and the transparency of villain falsely representing an Ace given action on previous betting rounds. They'd likely prefer to check behind. The latter two hands, while they may make sense for flop purposes, don't fit in the range I just outlined, so we can eliminate them. Q9 and 89 are highly speculative hands and may have made sense if he had different position preflop, but he didn't, so we eliminate them too.

Unless I totally botched the pf analysis, this does not really leave him with much to bluff with. 99 or 88? I can't see these hands calling hero's raise on the flop. Come to think of it I can't see em betting out 1/3rd the pot behind; he'd have given us good odds to draw even to a gutter... I must say you've got me rather pensive. Is villain bluffing here ever?

[drmcboy]

We are only about a 3/1 dog if he always has sets or KQ, so it doesn't matter if he is ever bluffing, we have to have some implied odds if he is that strong. If not, we have more outs or even the best hand and can't fold at this price.

I guess it could be bad if he somehow bluffs all brick rivers and c/fs the ones we hit but if he does that good for him.

[baudib]

How bad is donking turn?

[Penneywize]

We are only about a 3/1 dog if he always has sets or KQ, so it doesn't matter if he is ever bluffing, we have to have some implied odds if he is that strong. If not, we have more outs or even the best hand and can't fold at this price.

I guess it could be bad if he somehow bluffs all brick rivers and c/fs the ones we hit but if he does that good for him.

ty drmc. Yeah when I was messing around with pokerstove on this hand I saw that we'd have something like 26% equity against top range, and the bet isn't quite large enough to fold us out

Not to be too elementary (and I realize some of you play ridic higher stakes than I and you're purely indulging me at this point) but what do we think of the preflop range I posted - about right?

Also I've been wondering about:

- Can I expect to get good value if I hit a heart, Q or A?

If we're bored of this hand, that's cool, I should be posting a few of my own in the coming days

[drmcboy]

pre flop based on the stats I'd assume top 15% weighted up which looks more or less like yours. this is 15% from stove 77+,A7s+,K9s+,QTs+,JTs,ATo+,KTo+,QJo. Personally I open more scs and less Ax/Kxo but this range is probably better given those sorta iffy stats. with the small sample I take less from the actual numbers and more from the passive ratio.

I think if we hit a heart we'll get paid off by most two pair hands and all sets/straights if they got there at least 1 bet and usually two if the river bricks.

Q/A small net value, we will get called by worse sometimes when betting but also will end up paying off better sometimes. These cards also help us get the full value on our draw since they make it easier to call turn even if we don't pull ahead.