Squeezed wA7suited

I would fold both times.

Clear fold to the re-raise (unless you are willing to take -EV lines for metagame purposes like livening up the table and showing you aren't a nit).

Regarding the initial $15 raise,

If less skilled than the table then fold.

If equally skilled to the table then 3bet or fold.

If more skilled than the table then 3bet or call.

Very clear fold both times imo.

Never calling at either decision point. And I don't see a compelling argument for re-raising either. Fold, fold. If you have the actual button we could talk about it more

Hero calls
(95) 9h6h5h
H checks, V checks
(95) 9h6h5h (7s)
H checks, V checks
(95) 9h6h5h7s (Jh)
Hero?

Fold pre
Maybe donk flop
Bet turn
Riv x/r vs 1/2 pot or smaller bets.

Treat your hand like the nuts until proven otherwise.

I probably just lean to a nitty fold preflop, especially in the CO instead of the Button. With the Button I woudn't hate continuing too much (and I'm guessing it's debatable whether that should be as a flat or as a 3bet), although I'd probably still fold.

Seems like a trivial fold OOP facing a 3bet, no?

ETA: I think the preflop call OOP to the 3bet is pretty bad. But I'm fine with our postflop play to the river. His line strongly suggests an A high hand. Doubt a bet is going to get paid off by worse, so a bet for value doesn't make sense. About the only reason to bet would be to prevent a bluff, but against most (and this guys passive postflop line suggests he may be like most) that doesn't seem like a concern. So I would just check/fold the river.

ETA#2: Now after rethinking it a bit, it seems kinda unlikely that he wouldn't put in some bets along the way with a big heart with his big Ax. So if he bets now, it might actually be a bluffcatching call?

GcluelessNLnoobG

I was on a little happy tilt, running well and I just thought this guy on the button was 3betting wide. You know, making that in position 3bet, even though he’s got a condensed range.

I understand the fold crowd, I’m usually one of you - but I take chances with suited aces and not much else.

Happy tilt due to running well is a decent leak, imo. Unless he starts proving otherwise, I would always just default a 3bet to what it is (typically a very good hand, i.e. "they're not playing back at me" x3). Calling a 3bet HU OOP with a weak Axs seems really bad to me.

FWIW, I flip/flopped quite a bit on the best river play, curious as to what you / everyone else does. Actually kinda thinking this is a check/call now but could be convinced otherwise.

GcluelessNLnoobG

It’s kinda funny to me that a number of posters are like human solvers…..

You didn’t fold, like I would
so I can’t give you any advice

I’m trying to get my reads together:
Some folks have only criticism, they just want to tear you down - it’s not advice or meant to be helpful. I see what I see.

Others think they are punishing me severely by removing their input completely.

Believe me, I appreciate the maturity of a few with good intentions.

Initial preflop call is debatable 170BB deep with a weak suited Ace. Calling the 3bet is pretty bad.

Would now bluff river small targetting overpairs.

Reveal
Hero bets 75, villain mucks

This is what I thought too
Didn’t want to lose to a pair of nines
Didn’t think he’d fold a heart, but wouldn’t call without one.

I feel like a strong player could exploit me here, knowing I’m probably folding to a raise, with all the previous checking.

I don’t really care if you hate my float

This river was the decision point, I was hoping for feedback - weak showdown value turned into a bluff. Result was good, but was this the best move?

You're concerned the preflop 3better has a 9 in his hand?

As I say, I rethought this, and I think it's very likely from his two postflop checks that he doesn't have a pear nor a heart (as it is very likely he would have bet either at some point facing our two weak looking post flop checks). So this is like two non-heart overcards like AKo a huge percentage of the time. So our river bet most definitely is not a bluff, it's a value bet. But now we have to ask ourselves whether he is more likely to call with A high than he is to bluff with it himself. My guess is the latter, so I think check/calling is the better play.

ETA: About the only hand we're targeting as a bluff, imo, is something like AJ no-heart... and I'll leave it up to you to decide how often he's aggro 3betting those kind of hands preflop and yet passively checking those down postflop when checked to.

GcluelessNLnoobG

I don't see the point of the largish river bet. It's a middle connected 3-flush flop. So a decent player is likely to check almost his whole range in position. When he 3-bets at low stakes, he likely has a big ace or mid to high pp, maybe JJ+/AK or tighter. If he has AK or other overcards, he folds to your bet, and if he has an overpair, he snap calls. So IMO you are better off checking and evaluating.

Thanks, I think you may be right about check/calling. I didn’t think of it as a large bet, I was just giving villain the opportunity to muck.

My devious mind says check here and he sees weakness and is liable to Jam and make me fold. He’s probably not thinking that, but it would seem pretty sad for villain to checkback and turn over a small pair with a heart.

I’m still debating in my mind
and is there player clues to consider?
What are the main factors in taking a stab?
So give me more reasons a check is best

These orphan pots come up fairly often, but I’m not sure there’s a heuristic to claim them properly. Sometimes whoever makes the first move, makes it hard for the other player to respond properly.

You don't have a hand to value bet or bluff with, so it seems like a clear check.

I can get behind 3!ing vs the LJ if you want to play loose, it's definitely -EV but if you can navigate post flop maybe not too much. But flatting is bad because of what happened. The only good virtue with A7s is that you block your opponent from having some Ax which means you are slightly less at risk of your opponent having what you're pretending to have and if you're going to pretend to have a big A, then you should be 3!ing.

Flatting the 3! OOP is just bad.

The flop is a great one for you because it really sucks for the 3!er. So donking is definitely a viable option.

AP, I don't understand the big bet on the river? V has a lot of Ax. I'd bet smaller hoping for AK/AQ to bluffcatch and maybe a crying call from A5 or A6. Toss $25 in and I think worse is calling a lot, I don't think you have to worry about getting raised because V has to worry that you have a big heart if he doesn't have one. If you're raised you're just beat and you lose only $25 instead of $75.

But I would have considered donking flop and 100% betting turn for value vs a naked Ah or Kh. I think V floats turn with a lot of single-heart hands. You're deep so you can build a pot without being pot committed if V wakes up with a flush and rips it in on you. So I'd probably go for $50ish OTT then OTR you can bluff large enough to push out small hearts. Probably go for like $100

Everyone keeps saying ‘big bet on the river’ and that’s ridiculous. All the checking kept this spot small and 75 might be large relative to pot size, but this is a small pot. People call 75 preflop in this game.

Not saying I played this well, but some of your points make no sense to me. I can go along with betting 25 instead, but I don’t find that critical.

I like your thoughts on donking flop and playing bet, bet, bet - but I didn’t expect villain to checkback after 3betting. Likely a turn donk would be good, but I gained sd value with the seven on the turn.

The only reason not to claim this pot that villain has lost interest in is to see what he’s playing against me. I let him muck.

It’s not really better hands fold, and worse hands call - it’s about nobody showing interest, so bet and take it down. I do this all the time.

Searching for when this thought process is a really bad idea. I don’t hunt these situations down, but when I fall into them, I’d say I take it down 4 out of 5 times.
Note* - this is why it’s hard for me to accept blasting this play - it’s like being told you can’t win doing something you’ve been winning with.

I can be exploited with resistance as I overfold when raised, but I will keep stealing these pots. You have to realize that villain is looking at an old guy that plays few hands and mostly shows down winners.

I appreciate this discussion
I need counter arguments
I respect all opinions

Sometimes I feel attacked on here, but that’s my problem - overall, there’s a lot of good advice. I come here because no one cares and I have to do better. Thanks for your advice.

Not a grunch because I read through the thread, and I'll probably get torched, but here goes...

PRE - I try to play 3B or fold from any position that isn't the BTN or BB. But I tend to VPIP too much in low stakes games, so it would feel weird for me to fold a suited ace, and it seems like a super-optimistic 3B, so I wouldn't beat up on anyone for calling the open. I do have some flats, and suited aces are in that range.

The 3x 3B sizing over a call is suspicious, and with a deep stack I might be tempted to continue (yes, I'm a bit of a station), but against unknowns it almost certainly should be a fold.

FLOP-RIVER - as soon as I see this flop I'd be mad at myself for calling pre. It wouldn't be unusual for me to mentally check out and just check to the pre-flop aggressor the whole way. I might try to speed things along by checking dark and holding my cards up to muck.

I generally wouldn't be worried about him bluffing me on the river, nor would I be thinking about turning my hand into a bluff. Occasionally I might do something stupid-fancy like sliding a single red chip out, and I might be curious if V decided to bet large on the river if I checked. But mostly I'd be happy to move on without putting more money into the pot.

I saw the reveal. It seems likely hero was bluffing with the best hand. In this spot, it's actually/probably not terrible to bet, if only to prevent V from bluffing. But we don't need to bet very much to do that. We could do the stupid-fancy thing of sliding out a small bet. V might call with AK and we actually make a little more than we would if he folds.

I wouldn't congratulate myself for a hand well played. I'd be more likely to loudly admit I'm a fish for getting involved with A7s, and make everyone at the table wonder if I was being serious or sarcastic.

They'll never know, because I never know.

Starting to see why my wife almost divorced me a few years back.

I bring this point up all the time, but imo you constantly seem satisfied when you "take down the pot" instead of asking yourself whether the bet that did so actually accomplished anything (as in actually made money).

IMO, your big river bet didn't really accomplish anything. I'll note what I feel are the exceptions to this statement at the end.

The way the hand played out, it was very likely that your opponent had non heart high cards, so you had the best hand and were going to win the pot anyways. So the concern isn't about shipping the pot (that was likely a foregone conclusion), it's about winning more money.

If you bet large (like you did), he folds those non heart high cards and you win no extra money.

If you bet really small, maybe (?) he'll pay off with A high, so you maybe win some extra money.

And if you check, maybe you induce a bluff, and so you maybe win some extra money.

In this river case, ask yourself this. Would you rather have that $75 going in with you betting it and him calling? Or you checking and calling his $75? The former clearly makes no money, right? I mean, as soon as you're called you likely tap the table and say "well, I guess you must be good", which he almost always will be, right? But if we check and call the $75, a decent percentage of the time we'll be good. In both cases the pot itself got shipped to us the same percentage of the time (i.e. the percentage of the time we actually have the best hand), but in the latter case we make more money on the money put in on the river.

Now if we somehow got to the river with Ten high, then there is a very good reason to bet large, as this folds out his non heart high cards and we steal the pot with a bluff (a pot that we were not going to win if we just checked to showdown our hand). A bet with Ten high definitely accomplishes something.

But there is almost no reason to bet large with the hand that we have, as it accomplishes nothing.

The exception to that would be targeting a big Jx with no heart that backed into a bigger pair on the river, but I'm guessing this type of hand makes up so little of his range (as well as other one pear hands that you somehow think he has in a 3bet pot that got to the river this way) that it is nothing to be too concerned about.

The one thing I will say is that I totally missed the fact that a four-liner straight came in on the turn. So it's not completely inconceivable that he checked back a pair on the flop, and then decided too again on this disastrous turn. So if you think that is what is happening, then a large bet attempting to get those big pairs + no heart to fold ain't horrible. But is that your thought process?

Cliffs: Your big river bet here with this particular hand likely isn't accomplishing anything.

GcluelessNLnoobG

I think we should probe turn small, mostly for protection. I don’t think he can call any amount with 2 overs so we don’t need to go big.

Fold pre x2

I'll go a step further.

We could bet $10 and get called by worse. We could bet $30 and fold better. There's no real point in betting $75 on the river given the action to that point.