Should I hero this whale on a low, coordinated board?

Unless there were other relevant hands, I don't view Lt. Crewcut as a whale, despite his aggressive turn bet in the prior hand and the possible fact that he came from the table games.

Saying that, even if you suspect a bluff (or a stupid "value" shove with a hand like 88), you have so many better hands to bluff-catch with, especially since you don't block diamonds, and you're not even beating 7x anymore.

I've no idea what to make of the live read. I've seen people surprised that you'll fold and get shocked; I've seen people surprised their big bluff might be called and be shocked. (I dig the "pulling chips out of the pocket," read though. Thanks for sharing it!)

I think you have better spots than this to inevitably take his $, but I'd have folded hand 1 to V's turn raise, so you likely have a better handle on V than I do. I'd have folded nines to this turn raise on a monotone flop too.

That said, the 2 doesn't change anything, unless this genius had something like A2. Or 72, but this isn't a home game with a bounty. If you called turn, unless we think he was really overplaying TP on the turn, I think we have to call river, no?

Sets--now boats, 65, diamond flushes, heck, I guess quads could make sense?
All in V's range. I've no idea why the turn raise on both hands by V, except that he's a button clicker who probably doesn't know why himself.

We've got to be right ~35% of the time. Does this guy have that many 4x, 3x and 2x? I doubt it, so I fold.

When I see a player cold-call $15 with J7o and spew-raise the flop, they automatically get the whale tag for me.

My poker skills are very much a work-in-progress, but my ability to tag whales based on a single showdown is elite.

Thanks for the feedback. I agree with you and AF that I have tons of hands that are better than this one to call. My rationale for calling would have a lot to do with the earlier J7o showdown, where the opponent showed that he is playing very wide pre and clicking buttons postflop. I also wondered if this player would raise his sets and two pair on the flop? The river overbet on the paired board eliminates a lot of flushes and straights from his value range for me. It also counterfeits some trashy two pair hands like 43, 32, 42, etc. if he ever has those...

I clearly need to pay better attention---mistaking a flop raise for a turn raise in Hand 1---but why did you call V's flop raise there? T9, QJ, 88---all I would think are solidly in a BU coldcall range against a CO 7x iso. Then V continues firing for ~2/3 pot on a board-pairing turn.

Me, I need to know first they're a "special" V before heroing down that way. Am I supposed to float that widely with top-top?

You might be right that AQ should be a flop fold in the first hand, especially against a pool that doesn't bluff nearly enough in general. I convinced myself that an unknown, younger villain would be likely to 3b hands like QQ and JJ and could trap a flopped straight. I was actually somewhat expecting to see another AQ or even KQ after he raised.

As played, I thought the turned 8 was one of the best cards in the deck because it cut down on his flopped sets and meant he would probably check back river with QJs.

The problem with the read is that it runs counter to the population read for young, nerdy-looking military men who arent drinking, who skew conservative, somewhat cautious, and likely not with deep pockets.

So he morphed from a button-clicker to a thinking opponent over the course of a few orbits? 😀

I don’t like the flop or turn bets in this hand. I think this is a check in most situations (OOP, multi-way, weak hand), and especially so against an unpredictable player who will make merge-y raises with middle pair. I certainly understand why you would want to bet/call turn after seeing the results of the J7o hand, but you shouldn’t put yourself in a situation where you have to bet/call with this hand. Just check and see what happens. There are almost zero good runouts for 99 no diamond on this board (think about how many cards bring 4 to a straight, 4 to a flush, or an overcard) so keep the pot as small as possible and try to get to showdown.

No clue what to do as played. Fold probably?

Thanks. I do try to check OOP multiway a LOT, but convinced myself that there was so much value to be had from these two. The second player in particular appeared to be calling opponents down to the river with very little equity.

I think I kinda had tunnel vision in pursuing value/protection and did not really consider the fact that my hand does not want to play a big pot and is in an awful spot if either player pushes back.

So...I'm getting that, "I made a loose call and lost, but I had good reasons" vibe from the OP.

1. I wouldn't peg a guy as bad because he pulls chips from his pocket to top off. I'm constantly pulling chips from my pocket to top off whenever my stack dips under 90% of the max buy-in, because I want to have the max on the table. Because I'm a good player. And I never venture out to play table games, so...yeah.

2. When he raised flop in the J7o hand, he actually had a piece of the board. Maybe not the best piece, but not the worst, and I can sort of see the logic from a rec-fish POV - he's got 2nd pair, and wants to see where he's at. I can see barreling turn when his 7 kicker blocks combos of 87 that trip up, and / or if the turn brings in a BDFD to go with the straight draws already out there.

3. Given that he had a piece of the board in that hand, I'd say it's likely he has a piece of the board in this hand. Which piece do you think he has, when he feels emboldened to raise on a monotone board, when the turn is a total brick?

4. If you thought V was blasting off with a worse hand, why not 3B the turn?

5. In what world does V raise turn on a monotone board, get called, and jam river with a worse hand than your 99 when the board pairs? What do we beat here, other than 88 and...66 or 55?

The "dear in the headlights" look could just be his fight or flight instincts kicking in, particularly if he's young, full of testosterone, and recently been through a program of tough-guy indoctrination. I saw a lot of that during my time in the military. No one wants to look weak around a bunch of macho-men.

Let me guess - you snapped him off, and he showed you a monster, right?

Reading through the rest of the responses -

I don't mind the flop c-bet if we're in position and action checks to us. I think it's less necessary when we're OOP and multi-way. We're not folding out any hands with big diamonds in them, so we're not going to get much protection for our hand by betting.

Even if action checks through, and someone with over-cards spikes a pair, they're unlikely to bet huge on a monotone flop, unless they also have the Ad in their hand. We'll be able to call small turn bets and check-evaluate the river.

If we're going to bet, I guess $10 is okay, but in theory, we should be betting less than 1/3 pot when multi-way and on a monotone flop, so I think it's better to just check and see what happens. We can make a delayed c-bet on the turn if action checks through, and possibly rep some over-cards.

If we're going to bet the turn, I think we should size up. That 1/3 pot sizing looks weak, and is going to induce raises. Our hand can't really stand a lot of heat. With no pair on board, we can't even boat up on the river, so I think I just rage-fold to V's raise.

River is a pretty trivial fold, IMO.

I fold the turn and I fold again on the river.

This is me. To clarify, *I* top up because I'm a nit control freak rather than being good, but I'm not a whale and never play table games. I peg people as table game players when they show up with a pocket full of mixed chips including ones not commonly used at the table, and are too drunk and cheerful to be a regular.

I am not pegging him as bad because he topped up his stack. I am pegging him as bad because he cold-called a raise with J7o and then went crazy with second pair no kicker.

To be clear, I am not talking about good regs who keep chips on them to top up to the max. I am talking about fish who come to the table with black and purple chips in their pockets and haphazardly buy in with those large denomination chips.

This might not have been a great hand to share on 2+2 because it's not really a logical, strategy-based spot, more a question or whether or not we can put a player on a maniac range of "any two cards" here based on one showdown. If I am choosing to call 99 no diamond here, it's because I think this guy is going to show up with a completely illogical range of spewy bluffs. Probably that is not very prudent at this point in the session, though...

Doc already pointed out to you that it wasn't "crazy" for him to play middle pair aggressively.

The pre-flop call is loose, and I'd probably peg V as too loose-passive pre, aka a bad rec-fish, but I'd be leery of basing a lot of exploits on that one tidbit of info. Bad rec-fish will find their way into pots with absurd hands, and then fast-play post-flop when they have a monster or just think their hand needs protection.

The post-flop action is interesting, in that we could read it as terrible (for a bad rec-fish), or somewhat sophisticated for a good player, who would be more likely to understand you're not going to have many super-strong hands on that board, and his hand is probably not good enough to win at showdown, but does block a lot of your strong hands.

I think it's fair to give you the benefit of the doubt that the kid doesn't deserve that much credit, and he was just trying to protect his hand, using rec logic we don't need to understand.

Okay, that does put a different spin on it. Though I'd be careful about the assumptions we make. I see decent NLHE players coming in with purple chips after a good run at Baccarat. But, here again, I probably wouldn't peg your V as a multi-game crusher.

I'm not trying to talk you out of believing V is super-wide and will have some wild bluffs in his range. You said the prior hand history was "VERY" relevant, and so I'm guessing you qualified it that way to support your decisions in this hand, which I'm further guessing turned out to be right, or at least not far off the mark, whether you won or lost "by accident" (good read, bad result anyway).

I would caution you against making a common mistake among more thinking players - trying to guess what an idiot is doing. If he doesn't know himself, good luck figuring it out. I think it's better to just dial back the processing power and outplay these types with a more fundamentally sound, ABC style of play.

I think this is especially important early or late in a session. Early in a session, we'll have future opportunities to get it in good. Late in a session, we won't have many opportunities to win back money we'll lose if we're off in our reads. Mid-session, if we want to f**k around and find out, sure, okay, whatever.

All that said, the physical tells, and particularly the bet timing tell on the river are interesting. That snap jam on a nut-changing river card is generally seen as bluffy, but I'm not so sure. I seem to have lost a lot of pots snap calling when opponents do that, only to be shown the rivered nuts.

I think there's a sub-set of the population that can't help but snap-jam when they've been bluffing or betting for value with a hand they weren't sure was best, and suddenly the turn or river card makes them the stone nuts.

The big factors in my decision would be the simple fact that bad rec-fish tend to over-play thin value more than run huge bluffs on scary boards. They play their hands, not their range, against the board, not our range. If this guy is blasting off here, I think our hand should just be folded.

He called pre, called flop next to act, raised turn next to act and still multi-way, and jammed river when we checked to him. That's a pretty wild line for a bad rec-fish with a hand worse than ours.

check flop

check turn

as played fold to the turn raise

fold the river

RE: the J7o showdown - I do agree with OP that that one showdown is enough for us to determine that this player is a big fish who will be spazzing off a lot. The pre-flop call is beyond loose (it's not like a standard fish call with J7s or JTo) and the flop and turn play is completely nonsensical and out of the ordinary. However, I don't think it's enough evidence to make me believe that stationing off in this hand is the right play. Villain's actions in that hand (small raise on flop, monkey bet on turn for middling sizing, give up river) is pretty different from his action in this hand (raise is on turn instead of flop, and he follows through and overbet jams river for over 100bb). I think calling down 99 here is a pretty big deviation from standard play which would require more of a substantial read. Like I'd be fine calling here with premium bluffcatchers (as well as all of the nutted hands in range), but I don't think we need to call down with what is essentially the bottom of our range that bets flop and bet/calls turn.

idk man. dislike postflop line and seems like too much money going in for your hand. it also seems like the live read is provided for people to tell u to call

the thing w hands like this is its good vs a tiny subset of players, and if thats the case it's going to look bad in text and you don't need much input from other people. in vacuum i think you have 0% equity ott / r vs the vast majority of player pools. the guy doesnt look great from reads / hh provided but this is a large deviation and i'm not sure people who haven't played with the guy will or should be advocating this large of an adjustment.

Lots of people here are circling around the result of the hand, so I am just going to share it a little early behind the spoiler:

There's no need to bet that flop. You unblock diamonds. They have the 2 pairs, straight, flush, etc. You're playing the lowest stakes, people can have everything. They can even have a pocket pair bigger than yours.

Your issue here is that you created situation where you have to call off the guy's stack. You can call here, but you'd have been better off checking the flop, calling the turn and then calling some smaller bet on the river. He might have you. He might have garbage, but that's easier if the pot is smaller.