Not Quite Threadworthy--Low Stress Strat Questions

ah, indeed i misread the board and didn't see the 6 pop out

yeah never folding here lol, thanks for calling that out

i would keep betting, i think any ax, flush draws and even some random stuff will continue

will be very hard to play for stacks regardless unless river brings in a cooler for the villain

Thanks for the feedback everyone. I think I might have misplayed this hand, but the result was pretty spectacular.

$2/$5 game at Mohegan Sun on a Sunday evening

Simple/happy spot where I just have a question about bet-sizings.

Hero is shot-taking $2/$5. I have only played the stake a few times, but noticed that there was a “VIP player” that I have some history with sitting in the main game (same whale as Dan GK describes here from a game on the same day: https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/170/l... ) so I added my name to this list. This hand is my first VPIP at the new table. I am the Button in this hand and the effective stack at $490.

CO - Fishy-looking middle-aged Indian guy. In three hands I have seen him open limp twice and open fold once.

SB - Bad reg waiting for a PLO seat.

–

98cc

CO raises to $20. Hero flats the button and SB comes along as well.

Flop is 9h 9s As ($65 before rake)

SB checks. CO checks. Hero bets $20. SB folds and CO check-calls quickly.

Turn is 9h 9s As 9d ($105 before rake)

CO checks. Hero bets $65. CO thinks for a moment and then calls again.

River is 9h 9s As 9d Jd ($235 before rake)

CO tanks for an inordinate amount of time. I am willing him to lead because I think he always has Ax or JJ when he leads, but he ends up tank-checking. Hero?

Do we bet ⅔ pot again? Full pot? Shove for $390 eff? I am putting him solidly on a range of TT, QQ, and KK, although a slow-played AA is also possible. In terms of pre-flop, I think flatting the button is somewhat standard versus a player that is splitting their range, but willing to believe otherwise.

I agree that pre-flop is a 3bet spot. BTN is the position where you allowed to have some flats, but CO vs BTN you should still mostly be 3betting. CO has a wide and weak range so you are going to get a lot of folds (as opposed to vs an EP range). He is probably opening hands like A5o that have no hope of continuing. No one at live poker is capable of finding the correct 4betting response as CO so you will not get punished for making this play. Also 89s has the distinction of being the worst low suited connector to call a raise with. This is because it is easily dominated (Villain is opening many more 9X and 8X hands than 7X 6X and 5X) and it makes the idiot end of the end of the QJT straight. I don't think calling is necessarily a mistake, but folding might be better (especially when getting settled in to a new table while shot-taking).

I don't think you can reasonably expect to get called by anything that isn't AX on the river, so you should jam.

My thought process in-game, even three hands in, was that villain was likely open-limping the bottom (and maybe even middle) of the typical cutoff range, but maybe that means 89s can just make a sad fold instead of flatting. I am probably guilty of over-3betting suited connectors in general, but usually only in spots where A.) the opener is playing really wide; and/or B.) a call risks going super multiway OOP with a lot of RIOs. I thought I could get away with flatting here, but you make a compelling point.

Just jam with your quads. With trips on board, he's calling with any Ax, and conceivably KK, QQ, and JX, when we just flat called pre.

Thanks for the feedback, all. I ended up betting $250, leaving myself a little over $100 back. Villain tanked forever, showed his neighbor his cards, and folded. I am guessing he had KK based on his reaction.

In the moment, I felt like I may have chosen the nut worst sizing. His hand is somewhat face-up as a big pair when he check-calls flop and check-calls turn, so I think it's unlikely he calls a bet anyway, but jamming looks a bit bluffier, at least, and wins the max in the instances where he does show up with an A. Alternatively, I could exploitatively bet something like $75 and hope to get called by his exact hand. If he is trapping AA or JJ he is check-jamming anyway.

Trips on board is a rare situation few if any people study.

On the flop, our bet is either A) 9x not afraid of losing customers, B) Ax not afraid of better Ax, C) some PP betting for value and protection, or D) complete horse $hlt. On the turn, it becomes a lot less likely we have 9x, and a lot more likely we have Ax or some PP still hoping to be good after V checks to us on the flop.

Put yourself in V's shoes. What hands do you have by the river, knowing that he can't have 9x? He can have Ax, and TT-AA. Not really much else that gets to the river.

Obviously we can target AA/JJ and Ax with a big bet. The question is if KK/QQ/TT calls a big bet. Some might, but most won't. Most won't even call a small bet, because we have no bluffs, only worse value, and how likely is it we're going bet-bet-bet with worse than JJ?

It sucks to have such a nutted hand on an ace-high board. Only thing we can do is try to target his AA/JJ and Ax by jamming. Those hands aren't folding.

Except BTN called CO's open ... so "B" is very unlikely (maybe AJ/AT) and population doesn't tend to bet 66 here much, if ever, and again BTN doesn't have JJ+ so "C" doesn't happen much.
So BTN's range is mostly 9x,ss and 5% random insanity 1-2 lol.

Yeh, no. I understand that our suited combos. drop in half when the 3rd 9 hits ... but not when H bets again.

Like maybe H bluffs again sometimes with like KsQs/KsJs or something trying to fold out whatever, and maybe he bets any small pairs that also bet the flop like 66 ... but that's not a lot of combos. H can have 5+ (A,J,T,8,7) suited combos of 9c, and K,Q also very possible. 69s gets played too much for lolz, esp. on the BTN. Then a lot of randoms will have enough 98o/T9o or worse that CO has to be scared.

Most Ax don't bet turn, and esp. not for this size. Ask yourself what are you trying to have happen when you bet AJ on the turn here?

The assumptions that V just snap calls an overbet shove with all Ax on the river means either everyone is in better games than me, or maybe much worse ones.

Like if you had a read that V never has 9x here and you have a hand that can't beat Ax ... then 100% bet big. Maybe shove is slightly better as a bluff shove than betting near pot, but who knows.

Sizing in itself can be a tell of a big hand. For that reason, I agree with the jammers.

(Sizing and playing with your chips is a dead giveaway. )

Do you see people fold this spot? I get that they should, I just don’t think that they do. I am racking my brain and searching my session notes for spots where I’ve seen someone fold a nut full house. I think I vaguely recall it happening once in a hand that I wasn’t involved in. Obviously OP’s hand looks face up as quads but I don’t think that really matters unless the opponent is a good thinking player.

I would just assume that most fishy opponents are not capable of making that play and go for the max. I think I would be less surprised by seeing KK call a jam there than I would by seeing AX fold. Villain has to fold AX a significant percentage of the time in order for $200 to be better than jam for $400.

I would go the other way and say I've _never_ seen people call my river shove here at a casino. Obviously sample size is lol because it's hard to get quads even if you play too much live.

Yes, people overvalue absolute hand strength ... I've seen people 3bet shove nut worst FH on the river, and never even think of folding it in other spots. But my experience is very different on a tripped board.
Maybe if it was J9992 overpairs call enough that shove is better.

Also wouldn't be betting 200, more like 85-115, and I guess it's possible you get called for 400 often enough that it's slightly better than 85 esp. if you have any read V is a calling station ... but again, I can't think of a single time at a casino that I shoved for pot+ holding quads on the river, with trips on the board, and got called (again, lol sample size).
Maybe the reverse poker thing of "well he can't have quads because he bet too much" works with a shove on the river.

Maybe H gets called more as he's younger, but he's done nothing but bet after the flop and I would be very suspicious of an assumption that H is betting big on the river with Ax or bluffing big with air anywhere near enough.

I would say there is a key difference between seeing your opponents folding in this spot and seeing your opponent folding top full house in this spot. Especially in OP’s situation where AX is effectively the second nuts.

I actually don’t think I have had a spot similar to this one (in position with the betting lead with quads and trips on the board) in a live game, so maybe I am way off. Isn’t Zeebo theorem a thing still??

Hero being younger, being short-stacked, and playing his first orbit at the table all bode well for him getting called in this spot too.

FWIW betting $85-$115 makes more sense to me than $200. At least then you can get called by something that isn’t AX.

Edit: OK I found an old hand history in my notes that corroborates your post illiterat:

“78s - call raise btn flop 777 V bets 40 I call turn 3 V bets 45 I call river 8 V bets 45 I jam he tank folds 8 face up”

I think you're putting too much of your own thinking into V's head. You're not V. You're smarter. I'm guessing you're not fishy-looking, and you don't open-limp 2/3 of the hands you're dealt from MP to the CO.

It's only the 3rd hand hero's been dealt, and the first hand hero has VPIP'd at this table. V has no idea what hero is doing. Lots of low-stakes players will VPIP by calling a 4x raise from the CO with any / all AX. I'd say just based on the composition of the board and the configuration, Ax is the most likely hand hero has when he bets flop.

More importantly - we know V open limped 2 out of the 3 hands he's been dealt since hero sat down. If he's loose-passive, as that would likely suggest, it's likely he'd be calling on the BTN with all his AX, so in his mind, it's likely hero has a lot of AX.

Unless and until hero shows V he's not calling on the BTN with ATC, let's not give V too much credit for knowing what hero's range actually is, versus what he probably thinks it is, if he's the type who's always just playing his own hand, and will call from the BTN with all his AX and all his 22-99, if not even TT and JJ.

I wouldn't discount PP's from hero's *perceived* range when SB and CO both check. I've seen enough low-stakes players flat call pre with 22-JJ and only 3B QQ+. And plenty will stab this flop with most, if not all their PP's once the PFR checks.

Again, we're looking at hero's play from V's perspective. As the PFR, V might c-bet 100% with AX on this flop, and if the PFR checks, he might stab with all his PP's in hero's spot. He'd almost certainly bet all his AX for value in hero's spot, if he's a loose-passive rec-fish, and the PFR checks to him.

I personally think it's less likely hero would be betting a flush draw here, when the As is on board. Like, how many KXss combos is hero likely to have, that want to stab the flop, at the risk of getting check-raised, just to try and draw to a flush on a paired board? KX can't even count on his pair outs being good.

Would a loose-passive V start betting his flush draws here? Unlikely, unless he's very aggro, and that doesn't sound like our V here, so he's not likely to think hero has a flush draw.

I see a lot of loose-passive V's betting here with AX and PP's, but not as much with flush draws. I guess because AX is a strong hand, PP's need protection, and the flush draws are just dust on any turn that isn't a spade.

Lastly - random insanity at 1/2 is pretty common. But this is 2/5. I don't know that I'd try to quantify exactly how much random insanity happens here, but I think a large portion of the player pool will stab this flop on the BTN when the PFR checks, and they don't need 9x, Ax, or a flush draw to do it.

I was talking about what V thinks hero's range is that bets flop, and then sees the turn 9, but BEFORE hero bets again. The 9x portion of that range on the flop is decreased when the turn puts trips on board.

Whatever V thought hero had on the flop, if he's not dumber than a bag of broken hammers, he should understand hero has half the 9x combos possible when another 9 comes on the turn, whether hero bets or not. It becomes mathematically much more likely that hero was betting flop with AX, not 9X, since the AX portion of hero's range remains unchanged (other than there being less combos of A9).

Once hero bets, I'd argue it's not necessarily more likely he has 9x (since it's mathematically less likely), only that he'd obviously be a lot more comfortable barreling 9x, and perhaps slightly less comfortable barreling Ax or PP's.

But if you want, we can discount AX and PP's to half of the combos hero had on the flop, and the proportion of 9x vs Ax and PP's wouldn't change from the flop, since hero has half as much 9x now.

I'd be more persuaded if the argument was that hero is trying to target V's Ax for value, and V will be less likely to believe hero has Ax if V also has Ax, because there'd be less Ax available for hero.

But V is a fishy looking guy who open limped twice in the three hands he's been dealt since hero sat down. Is he figuring all this out? How likely is it he's releasing Ax on the turn because he thinks hero just always has 9x?

And is it not at least a LITTLE likely that V is at least somewhat doubtful that hero has quads, and will pay to see another card, when his Ax and PP's are now boats, if only to see if hero bets again on the river?

Have to disagree with you here. If the turn is NOT another 9, I see lots of people giving up with their PP's, and slowing down with Ax, because anyone can have a fair bit of 9x here, and it's possible the SB or PFR would slow-play AA and strong Ax on the flop, when the board is paired like this, with two middling cards and a flush draw.

Once the turn puts trips on board, I don't see anyone continuing to bet or call with their draws. But everyone suddenly thinks they're winning because their Ax and any decent size PP's are boated up, and they never believe that someone has quads.

I don't see too many opponents continuing to bet or call with their weak PP's when they got called on the flop. 22-66 starts to get nervous here. So hero's range gets very condensed to Ax or TT, plus maybe JJ if hero flats with JJ pre.

Correct me if I'm mis-remembering. I seem to recall you also play at Mohegan Sun, and that the games mostly suck.

I can't speak to the games there, because I've never been there. In the games I play, I see most opponents call with Ax here, and not too infrequently snapping with worse. If you make quads this way, you're fairly likely to get paid often enough. It just sucks that it's an ace-high board.

A recent hand comes to mind. I don't precisely recall all the action, but I remember I had AT on a board that was like T8828. The loose-cannon PFR bet somewhat small for three streets with JJ, and the idiot behind me called down the whole way, even over-calling me on the river, with 99. Like, what the hell does he think he's beating when the PFR goes bet-bet-bet and I call-call-call?

I'm actually a little surprised our friend from Elm City thinks V folded KK, having seen the idiot in the hand above call off three streets with 99. There are a lot of bad low-stakes recs who could never find a fold with KK here, once they check-call the flop.

I mean, if the guy above thinks 99 can win vs two opponents on T8828, it's not inconceivable our V here calls with KK, hoping hero has worse than AX.

Maybe it's *YOU*?

I didn't get the sense before that you're really nitty, but...are you?

I mean, we're talking about live, where reads rule. There are guys I'd call down here, starting pre, with any AX. Then there are other guys - as soon as they reach for their chips, I'd fold anything worse than AQ on the flop, and never think I might be making a mistake.

To add additional context to my bet size and address the "hero is never/rarely bluffing this spot" allegations (spoiler alert: they are true) I was thinking in-game that some fish will level themselves in these spots, realizing that their line is so face-up as a non-ace hand that they may need to call KK/QQ? Granted, I know that fish aren't thinking about being "top of range" for instance, but perhaps they are sensitive to the fact that they may be getting bullied around for choosing a very passive line.

I think it's possible that I have never run a ~100bb bluff on a trips board in a live game, and I know the general wisdom is that you shouldn't try to bluff fish off of strong made hands, but the responses in this thread make me wonder if it isn't worth trying in the right spots from time to time. Like, both sentiments ("fish won't fold full houses" and "fish won't call an overbet without an A or better here") obviously can't be true at the same time.

Fish will absolutely level themselves into making loose calls with otherwise good starting hands, if they think they're being bullied, and folding will only invite more of the same.

I think a better rule of thumb when facing a fish is to simply not try to get inside their heads and figure out what we need to do to out-play them. Just simply out-play them.

They call too much. You have the thickest of value. Don't worry about whether or not he calls a small bet but not a big bet with KK/QQ, or worse. Just bet something, because if he's calling with KK/QQ, he will also call with worse, and if he's folding AX, he's never calling with KK/QQ.

If you were deeper, I could see debating the bet size a bit. But there's no bet size you can make that doesn't look nutted as hell or bluffy as hell, depending on how V thinks, and we don't know anything about how he thinks based on 3 hands, because V doesn't know f**k-all about us, and all we know about him is that he's fishy, limps 2/3 hands he was dealt prior, and must have a hand he likes if he decided to raise this one up pre.

Don't over-think it man. You'll make yourself nuts trying to outsmart a potato.