Defending with trash and flopping the world

Pretty easy fold preflop. However, I did find the write-up entertaining.

Thanks. I have a lot of fun writing these.

Just out of curiosity, what's the worst suited gapper you are defending against these two?

I know we should be tightening up OOP versus a whale, but I legitimately thought this guy was going to blow $1500 before I had a chance to get in a hand with him...

1. Pre
Don't Straddle unless everyone is doing and it's expected
Fold-Pre but you know that anyway
2. Flop: Call flop is good since you have zero fold equity with these two jokers
3. Turn: You have a lot of equity, but you're still marginally behind say AT (and he may have better) with one card to play, and given fish going to call a raise with whatever, let's just call

So did I.

I doubt the button is very strong here, just calling the whale's open, UTG or not. I also don't think they're that fishy. 70 also isn't enough of a bet to keep you from drawing to a flush, if the whale nearly always pay off when it hits. It seems like either a blocking bet for a diamond draw or a 1/2 pot bluffy bet meant to kick you out of the hand, IMO, and see if their 1P/w-e holds up vs the whale.

Just feels like they'd bet more with a T or better, and I'd think they 3! a Axdd pf.

Is there a high hand promo? (Lol)

I don't think UConn has total air, but I think a jam does get him to fold superior draws, some 1p hands, and maybe even a T. And I don't want to fold a very dirty 14-17 out draw just yet.

Prefer 3!-f pf to calling. I don't think the Whale 4!s you unless they have it, and this way, you likely get heads up or win. Or fold is always good, ofc.

Oh, and I think we're currently ahead of the Whale with our 1p.

I can safely say without checking a solver that I'm never calling preflop with 42s in a raked pot against two opponents. I also can't see myself ever calling or raising with a one-gapper unless it's AQs.

It looks like the solver is fairly indifferent on most of the suited connectors, meaning it often wants to either raise or call close to 50% while folding the other half of the time.

Appreciate the thoughts!

I am never the first person to straddle on a table, but if there are fish at the table who are straddling, I basically always put it on as well. I know it's -EV though, and should probably be more judicious.

In this instance, the whale was practically begging people at the table to straddle and virtually everyone else (save one other guy) was dismissing him to an extent that bordered on "tapping the tank" IMO. Shortly after the hand in OP, the Whale started putting on the blind $10 raise and then the blind $15 raise whenever I put the $4 on, so I didn't really want to stop once I started, haha.

I agree that the button likely does not have air, but also did not seem strong. He bet pot into two people with an overpair earlier and is only betting half pot here. His bet is also exactly 2x the whale's cbet, which seemed like a bit of a sizing tell.

In-game, as I was considering my options, I thought that he would show up with a lot of merge-y stuff like JT, 99, 88, or two overs and a diamond draw, all of which would likely hate getting raised. I didn't give much thought to folding once I saw the size.

And there is no high hand promo at the moment, only the BBJ.

I never voluntarily straddle, even if nearly everyone is doing it.

However, "never straddle" ranks up there with other useless pronouncements like:

"Never LRR"
"Never show your folded hand"
"Always top off to the max allowed"
"Never limp"

Some posters forget that poker is a social game and a hobby for most of us, and all of these "rules" can occasionally be broken without a causing a downswing to fester in your nooks and crannies.

That is fair; there are very few absolutes in poker. I should have asked "Why Straddle?"

I wasn't meaning to pick on you, but there often are posts here opining forcefully about some absolute or another, and I think it can confuse or even stunt a player's development (and enjoyment) to play by absolutes.

I'm not a fan of straddling if we end up less than 100BB deep, however if these players are really bad then you just want to make the pots as large as possible. For the same reason I won't hate on the preflop call too much although even against hopeless players you're going to struggle to find a path to profit with 42s OOP multiway.

I'd probably just call the turn, expecting the bad player to overcall sometimes and with a very straightforward face up strategy of open jamming river if you hit.

We usually want to keep the pots smaller against bad players, since smaller pots allow us to use our skill and/or positional advantage more easily.

Curious, what tell do you believe that exact sizing is saying?

Tell me if I'm wrong, but Whale seems like they're unbluffable if they have any piece of the board, and only somewhat unbluffable with total air/starts taking phone calls from OCONUS at the table. Is that right? If so, and if it's obv to most, I don't think UConn is continuing on that flop with absolutely nothing. Despite what I'm giving him as a 25% to 85% range, being in position with a whale opening maybe 75% of hands from UTG or wider.

I'm stunned he didn't 3!, now that I think about it. So likely a hand that doesn't want to call or shove over a 4!, but doesn't mind if the blinds and you come along. I.e., suited connectors/1 and 2 gappers. Or smaller PPs. Which unfortunately, connect with a lot of this board.

I would anticipate a raise over the cbet if he had a set, given 2 diamonds, and the stickiness of the whale. So, a diamond draw, a PP <10, but not a set, a SC with a 6, or something like 98. All of which has enough equity vs you, I think we'd like them gone.

If UConn can hand read, what would he think of a Turn X-shove? If you'd a set, you'd have X-raised the flop, right?

I don't straddle but of course in good games where most everyone is straddling it's fine, especially if the games are deep since weaker playes can easily overplay their hand for 250 bb's (when it would of been 500 bb's without the straddle, I see that when I play at TS's MTS game).

As played the decision is easy because it's a simple math problem, we don't have good odds enough to call. I would just fold since we don't even know if we have FE or not, I would wanna be more sure such as if it was against someone I have more experince with to jam but that's just my style (smart and conservative).

Diamonds, 2s, 4s, 5s might all be outs; that's more than enough for the direct odds. Even if we discount a lot and assume a ton of them are dirty (e.g. he has a set), our implied odds will likely more than make up the difference.

Basically just a middle-strength hand (or middle-equity draw) that is monkey-betting the turn. I see this all of the time in the games that I play -- players putting in small-ish turn bets, often with the intention of "buying a cheap showdown" or just trying to shake any other draws that floated the flop -- and have been trying to attack it more aggressively.

With the above read, I think I could shove a hand as thin as AT, not to mention turned straights, two pairs, and the odd trapped set. That being said, I don't know if the villain will be putting me on all of those hands, and a turn shove could look a little face-up as an aggressive younger player going balls to the wall with a combo draw.

I'd just call the turn bet. A check raise, while interesting and sure to generate action in future hands, is selling the story that you hit a gutterball or janky two pair or were slowplaying a set. And those who monkey bet do not like to fold top pair in this large pot when your story doesn't "make sense" or seem likely. I mean, maybe he gets gobsmacked or has like 99-88, but most likely it is something like AT-JT and is just going to shrug call

So that brings us back to preflop where you have a hand that needs fold equity to be profitable...

Just fold pre. ... if you play 4 high it has to be to play it very agro. when you hit something ... check calling down with 4 high is not good. You don't think you have any fold equity so just fold now.

If I make it to the flop I probably just shove. Calling is very likely worse than folding.

On the turn you are in a terrible spot, again I'd be tempted to shove but we have a bunch less equity when called now (although we are beating a bunch of draws that were crushing us before). Again, calling is pretty bad but maybe not worse than folding now (assuming you don't get bluffed out on rivers).

Going backwards...

1. We are playing 4 high OOP and apparently can't semi bluff.

2. Against certain kinds of bad players this is _maybe_ okay advice ... but in general I would not agree. Like if we have AA and they are bad enough to call it off, open shove is obviously the best play. If they are playing any2 and calling any pair and any draw it's going to be _very_ hard to know if our good one pair is still good on the river... if we have position and they never bluff, that's kind of fine. Also if they are horrifically bad, they will be giving money away to someone every hand they play ... we need to take as much of it as possible when we play hands vs. them and have something.

PRE - seems sketchy to get involved with 42. Seems like an easy auto-fold, but with assumed implied odds from fish and whale, whatevs, we'll let it slide.

FLOP - ugh. I dunno. I might actually make an "eff this" fold here. We have the worst possible flush draw and an inside straight draw, OOP, facing a 70% pot bet, and a call, and we're short stacked to start the hand. We've only got three clean outs, and we're not even drawing to the nuts, if one of these clowns gets here with 74. Even if we drill the straight on the turn, are either of these guys folding a flush draw? If not, we still need to hold up on the river.

TURN - if we assume fish doesn't really know what he's doing, his 1/2 pot bet could be for value or a bluff. Seems like we have enough going on and the right odds to call, but I'd be hating myself for finding my way to this spot.

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As for how wide to defend pre... at this stack depth, we're not deep enough to get involved with any S1G's. I don't know that I'd make an exception just because V's are bad. The worst SC I might happily play would be 65s.

Thanks, Doc. I appreciate the insight. I was extremely on-the-fence about posting this hand because pre-flop is so dubious, but was actually inspired by your recent thread where you limped and then called a raise with 63s, haha.

I have been mostly successful in tightening up my range over the last two years (I am a post-pandemic poker newcomer) but still sometimes can't help myself in these kind of spots, closing the action against two bad players.

Without spoiling too much about the hand in OP, I just played a hand where I overlimped the CO with 54s in a button-straddle game and ended up defending three ways when the button squeezed. In that hand I xjammed an OESD and bdfd on the flop and ended up getting stacked for basically no reason. Good reminder of how these spots typically go...

Funny, as I was typing out that last bit about not being deep enough to call with a S1G, I was thinking about what a loon I must look like, calling with a S2G.

You should find someone better than me to inspire you, unless you're aspiring to be a splashy high variance degen, in which case, sign up to follow me. I'll teach you my ways.

I am going away this afternoon, so posting the result here behind a spoiler tag:

Id just call turn and fold river unimproved. You cant raise or fold i dont think. People dont double barrel bluff even close to enough to justify it. Id be much more inclined to check turn and then bet river if turn checks thru.

How dare people recommend strategy in a strategy forum. I completely forgot that we oughta be recommending the most SOCIAL line to take in a given hand.

Before you claimed there was “no math” to justify l/rr being EV-, but apparently the new conclusion is that L/RR is a great way to make friends.