Preflop spot with jacks
Playing 2/5 NL in south Florida.
UTG ($850) is a reg who used to be a nut peddler but has recently switched up his game. I've seen him bluffing in spots that aren't really good spots to bluff but he's trying to change up his game and develop a more aggressive image.
SB ($1300) is a fish. I'd only been playing with him for about 15 to 20 minutes when another hand came up with the same players in the same position when UTG opened for $25, I called OTB with QJ suited and SB called. Flop J87r. SB X, UTG $75, I call, SB calls. Yes UTG's flop sizing is large; I was already on the fence about calling with a relatively weak hand. Turn 6, and SB lead jams for 2.5x pot. We both fold and SB shows the nuts (T9).
OTTH...
Again, same players, same positions but a few minutes later. I think we were 5 handed at the moment due to a couple of players leaving.
UTG opens for $25. I 3! OTB with JJ to $100. SB calls the $100, which struck me as weird, even for a fish. I have no flatting range here in this configuration so I genuinely don't know what he might have except for maybe (?) TT or 99. I think all the bigger pairs should 4! but he's a fish? So maybe he doesn't know what to do here with those hands?
UTG shoves pretty quickly. He can 100% for sure have AK here - maybe even AQs. I don't think he has any bluffs here like A5s.
Do we treat the $100 from SB as dead money and shove to shut him out of the pot? Calling doesn't seem to make any sense because if he shoves, it's $500 more to me to win $2500 so I'm obv never folding. Is just folding JJ here reasonable?
I don't really like shoving 200+ BBs pre with JJ, but I don't feel like it's really a great spot to be in, either.
5 Replies
I assume you cover... He's shoving 850 total into 200? I think for this size you can just fold. Depends a lot on your image and how often you 3-bet, if he thinks you can have hands like T9s, QTs etc then I think you can gii.
Technically if UTG is jamming AK or AQs those would be bluffs. If you believe he's got a 4B jam range that includes AK and AQs then it seems like a reasonable spot to re-jam. Even more so if you think he ever does this with TT or worse PP's.
I don't know if any reasonable range analysis would bear this out, but my gut tells me that SB is going to have more AX and KQ than JX in his cold calling range, such that his cold call would seem to make it more likely UTG has AK or AQ and less likely he has QQ+. If SB has any A, K or Q, but few J's, that would seem to improve our equity here.
All that said, if our read is that UTG is a recovering nut-peddler, I could see making a disciplined fold, inasmuch as people tend to revert to their truest selves under pressure.
You are assuming Fish may have very narrow sb range because he shouldn't have a range. He's a fish. Could be very wide. Might also include all the premium PPs. Might include all PPs.
As played, I'm curious why he'd make such a big 4 bet. Could have popped it to 300 with AA or KK, and got the rest in on flop, so I really want to look him up, but it's a 4 bet, and so I might just quietly let it go.
If I did continue, Id call with AA, KK here. Shove everything else.
Would he do this with TT
Villain bet all his chips into two people, one a fish that could call anything, so he ain’t scared. If you want to ‘flip’ for your stack, I think that’s a best case scenario.
JJ that deep vs UTG shove and fish cold-call is just a gross spot. You’re either racing AK or crushed by bigger pairs. If UTG isn’t bluffing much, folding pre is fine. JJ not strong enough to stack off here 200bb deep.
