Bellagio 2/5 Hand

It doesn't feel good because it feels strong but I'd never bet worse for value, very possible it also shouldn't be bet.

I looked it up as much as I could, and everyone in the thread might be surprised...

GTOw 9max NL50 100bb:
UTG opens 2bb
...folds to CO
CO folds QJs/QTs pure (3bets ~50% K6s/K5s)

Smash live cash 100bb RAKE, NO ante:
EP opens 2.25bb
...folds to CO
CO folds QJs/QTs pure (3bets most K6s, and no K5s)

Smash live cash 100bb NO RAKE, NO ante:
EP opens 2.25bb
...folds to CO
CO calls QJs almost pure; calls QTs about 65-75% where both have slivers of 3bet but 23%+ of QTs folds (never 3bets K6s)

...so preflop is fine, as long as Bellagio aren't taking any rake 😉

A principle from Phil Galfond - in spots where our perceived range has few if any bluffs, we should value bet less. In spots where our range has a ton of bluffs, we should value bet more.

This seems like a spot where we'll have few if any bluffs. It also feels like V could be going for a check-raise here, which would put us in the blender.

Checking back seems "wrong", but all the warning bells and lights are going off on this one, so perhaps go the low variance route and just take it to showdown.

While I agree with Phil Galfond, this is still a spot that we should go for light value. Sizing on the river matters here, overbetting river would be a blunder since worse hands fold and better hands call/raise imo, betting too small might induce check raise and we are in the blunder once again, I think 50-65% pot bet is the right sizing in this particular spot. We are still in a 2-5 500$ cap game in vegas, you're not facing Phil Ivey here, and if he does check/raise bluff you, or does it often , you take note of it and re-adjust.

I agree.

V has shown nothing but weakness, so if he is sitting with a boat it is obviously a devious trap from the beginning. If you are doc, you should probably check here because a decent player might be trying to trap him a good chunk of the time. Of course, I'd bet dollars to donuts that Doc isn't getting to this river with only $160 in the pot. When the pot is $400, $500, checking back feels a lot more reasonable. And mostly because if we were betting more aggressively, it is a lot more reasonable (and likely) that V might feel he can trap us and that a jam is coming OTR from us at a high frequency.

To get here with a hand that beats us, V had to flop a decent to very strong hand, turn two-pair or better on a board with a ton of straight draws, and then river a boat. And despite improving on every street, V didn't show any sign of aggression, despite hero betting relatively small. It isn't like Hero blasted the flop, then blasted the turn, with sizing that should expect a jam on the river and V might be catching a punt worthy of Rampage. Hero made normal to small bet sizes, and V let the pot remain small. V's line screams "pot control" to me. V has no reason to believe hero is going to blast off on the river, so it seems like a really weird trap AP. Not that Vs are incapable of weird traps, but I'd bet $100 that it isn't.

Think about it, we're debating whether or not to bet broadway on the river into a small pot. If that is debatable, we aren't betting most of our range that gets here like AQ, AT, KQ, KJ, KT, QJ, QQ.

Are insta-calls weakness?

Being put in the blender absolutely crossed my mind. A xr river is just disgusting

Since it's been 24 hours, I'll post the results of the hand. Really appreciate everyone that contributed, gave me some things to think about.

V is a fish bruh

Yeah, maybe. It's completely possible that I gave them way too much credit. Their profile and UTG open made me give them a fairly tight range.

Before reading the results, I'm not a big fan of assigning timing tells until I have seen an actual difference for the specific V. Some people just play fast. In general, a fast play indicates V didn't feel a need to think about it. So that would trend toward mediocre made hands or strong draws from a player who is never considering raising those hands. The "too strong to fold" but not nutted range of hands.

As far as being in the blender, it's never fun but we shouldn't make decisions out of fear of being faced with a tough decision later. Sometimes, you're going to find yourself in the blender. You'll lose more/miss value a lot more frequently trying to avoid the blender than you will when a V puts you in one. This is especially true at live low to mid-limit poker where you can get a ton of value from value-betting thin as Vs will call too wide and raise too rarely on flop and turn and often arrive at river with a far weaker range than they should.

Having seen the results now, I'll just comment that people get bored. You sit there for many hours and go on a dry spell where every hand is terrible, and a hand that is only moderately terrible starts looking really good. I wouldn't necessarily classify anyone by one poor/weirdly played hand. My WAG is that he planned on bluffing, then caught just enough value not to.

Interesting reveal.

My first thought was that our read on V must be wrong if he's playing A6o from UTG this way - not just the pre-flop open from EP with a garbage ace, but also his post-flop play - it all seems pretty terrible.

The only real defense I can think of - he knew he was getting OOL pre, but then the flop favors his PFR range, so he floated the flop very light, thinking you might check back turn and he could steal the pot with a bluff on the river. But then he turns thin value, and rivers some more, and his hand is now too in-between, forcing him to play it as a bluff catcher (or turn it into a bluff) if he wants to get value.

Assuming that's what he was thinking and doing, and if he is a thinking player, he may very well have been contemplating a check-raise bluff on the river, knowing his hand is no good if you barrel.

Even though we find out he had a hand that we think MIGHT have called a bet, I still think a check back is correct here, when V can credibly rep better hands, and we're hating life if he check-raises.

I think the test or proof is that he checked river with trip A's, rather than block-betting. I think V correctly deduced that he couldn't block bet and get called by worse, so he'd have to check-fold or check-raise. If our plan for the river is to bet-fold, and we think V is capable of finding a check-raise bluff, checking back is a better play.

Before anyone gets on me for suggesting V might have been going for a check-raise bluff - don't. This is exactly the sort of scenario in which V should check-raise as a bluff. His hand has enough showdown value to think he can win if we check back, but not enough to call if we bet, he blocks the nuts, and he has the nut advantage.

I think you made the correct play on the river, OP. Nice hand. Well played.

I think it's an interesting hand to play from V's perspective, with a range of hands that are pretty nutted on the river. As V, I'm not opening A6o UTG, but I would open AA, KK, JJ, 88, AK and AJ. But I would mostly if not always check range from OOP. I might c-bet with AK or 88, but definitely not with AA/KK/JJ or AJ.

If I had AJ, I'm not thrilled to see the K on the flop, and I wouldn't rule out hero having turned a straight. I'd feel better about AK on the flop, and might deviate by c-betting, but might not. Either way, none of the above hands are really loving the turn, and I'd be thinking, "I'd rather have QT" - until the nut-changing river.

If I boated up on the river, I might lead out for value, but it's such a weird and extremely under-bluffed spot that if I got here the way V did, I'd go for a check-raise a lot, figuring hero for QT, worse AX, or maybe something like KJ that assumes I'm weak because I checked three streets on a wet board, but doesn't understand I'm just turbo-mucking all the hands hero would be targeting for value with a bet.

Switching into donk mode - if I was getting OOL pre with some BS trashy AX combo, I hope I'd take the same line, repping a boat with an obnoxious check-raise on the river, recognizing this as a spot where trip A's can't win at showdown when hero barrels off, unless hero is an idiot doing it with KJ.

Putting myself in hero's spot - I'm okay admitting I'm probably too aggro, and I'd start betting the flop with any piece of the board and any draw, and occasionally even air if I think my opponent is weak-tight and will fold all his PP's that hate seeing the K on board.

But I wouldn't get here the way hero did. I'd have 3B pre with QTs or KJs, and a lot of the better AX combos (did I mention I'm probably too aggro?). I'd have checked back flop with QT (because I don't want to get x/r'd when I have an OESD), and over-bet the turn.

I'm not going to barrel off on the river with QT when the board pairs, because WTF is V supposed to have that calls a value bet?

Our hand blocks the combos of AQ, AT, QQ, and TT we'd be targeting for value, and unblocks all the boats V could have that he might play this way (allowing that I'm too often thinking that V would play it the way I would play it, and V took the exact line I'd take if I rivered a boat).

It almost doesn't matter what our read is. If V is good, he'll find this line on purpose. If he's bad, he might find it by accident. This spot is just too thin to bet for value, when we didn't 3B pre, and can't credibly rep any nutted hands. A straight on this board, in this line, is basically a bluff-catcher.

Yeah, not what I was expecting from V lol.

The dialogue has been good here because the basic problem of betting for thin value on river has come up again in an interesting context.

I originally lean against river betting because it's hard to see what worse hands a capable V will call with which we don't block. But the great conversation here has my rethinking.

Thanks to all!

I think it's more likely that that OP mistakenly assumed that a 2/5 Bellagio reg "with lots of hours" isn't a fish, since raising A6o from UTG is just awful.

Good players don't make this preflop raise, bored or not.

I agree, boredom gets people. But isn't that more of a reason why they *would* xr this river? He didn't break the boredom just to lose at showdown right?

I concede that I might be reading way more into that than it deserves, but bored squirrels running across the road go all the way across, right? :p

Sure, I agree. It is definitely a mental fault of mine that I assign way, way too much skill to most players. I will definitely have to re-calibrate on this one

I appreciate the view from both sides. To your point, I might have very well made mistakes on fourth street too. I don't know why I bet so little. I like the over-bet on the turn idea, I will have to use that in the future.

Yes, a sincere thank you to everyone from me too!

Really appreciate everyone that contributed. I think literally everyone made some very reasonable statements about this hand.

FYI - I've also started a blog here. I'm back to playing professionally, this hand was from one of my "warm up" sessions. Feel free to follow for more.
https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/174/p...

would consider not quitting your day job based on the thread tbh

river is a check at equilibrium it looks like (you should still bet at 500 cap 2/5 live game) which i wasn't expecting but if you can't figure out that villain is fish (look at pre and flop) idk man. your flop and turn sizing schemes are too small for what you're trying to accomplish / how the board is played.

would suggest using gto wizard and running hands through there to get an idea of what stuff is *supposed to* look like and think about why

ev of pre is close and tbh its fine as long as you play post well (i expect people to signif under 3b in your games). if u look at 6 handed 150 bb nl500 rake it mixes your hand, blah blah going to over realize equity / ev because opponents at llsnl are not playing perfectly lol

1) fold pre
2) do you have a spade on the flop? Just curious. But this isn’t a board I’m eager to stab against a competent opponent, though I’ll do it sometimes.
3) you can either polarize and bet basically big hands (this, 88, etc), or try to size down. 3/4ths might be too “in the middle” for my liking.
4) betting ~110 and folding to a raise.

Let's pretend that V thought his hand was suited to explain preflop ... wtf is he doing with it on the flop.

Even if he's checking range OOP, this seems like a bad hand to x/c to me even if we are suited with BDFD.

Then expecting that V is going to find a x/r bluff on the river, "accidentally" or not.

Could maybe convince me that V is often okay but was very tired and played bad on every street, but it wouldn't be my first assumption.

tbh, I feel that as UTG, checking with top value hands so much in this spot is overthinking it. As UTG, I would definitely bet here with JJ, and I don't hate betting the flop with AA, AK, or KQ either. Even with KK, IP should have plenty of one-pair or draw hands that want to continue. I doubt we see enough bluff-raising in a game like this to justify protecting our range that hard.

In the live games I play, I’d even feel pretty good about betting AJ or QQ small to keep the betting lead and get to showdown cheaply.

Question: If we check the flop, what are we doing with AA, AK, KK, and JJ after IP bets?

Range checking when OOP and HU as the PFR has a lot of benefits. Our opponents are going to stab pretty frequently, depending on the board texture, and their bet sizing will give us some indication of their hand strength.

We're not starting out that deep, so we can look to play a two street game with our nutted hands, either by check-raising flop and bombing the turn, or making a large delayed c-bet on the turn if the flop checks through.

Some hands benefit from check-raising more than others. So on KJ8rb, I'd check all my KK/JJ and KJ combos, to check-raise if IP stabs. I'd take a bet-bet-bet line with AK, because we're blocking Kx and as such wouldn't expect the flop to get stabbed as much. I might check or just c-bet 88, because we're unblocking Kx, Jx, KJ and all the draws that might raise if we bet, or stab if we check.

I'm not going to bet AJ or QQ just to keep the betting lead, because there's a good chance we'll just be value-owning ourselves. Likewise, on this board, I'd just check-call with AA, because we unblock KJ and 88, and there's no point in betting when we can check and see what IP does.

It's hard to pot-control from OOP in a no-limit game, so I'm not hung up on getting to showdown cheaply, because we can't control that. To the extent we don't really want to bloat the pot with 2nd pair, we can just check, rather than bet small.

If we're always c-betting from OOP with thin value, we're probably c-betting too much, and making it easy for our opponents to beat us.