Facing all-in on river with flush on paired board.

"Usually has it when he bets big" means what to you? Has a very good hand 90% of the time? 50% of the time? Since his first big bet is on the flop does your tell put him on top 2 or better most of the time? Especially given your hand blocks the best combo draw by being the best combo draw. His second big bet is on the turn. What does your tell suggest about him not caring the flush made? Given your read why call his turn bet? Once you call the turn were you calling to hit the two out straight flush or because you believed vs a near pot size bet you were ahead as he bets more than pot with a full house here?

I'd say 90% of the time he has a strong hand. overpair at worst.
I called turn to see what he would do on the river.
I thought maybe he bets again on turn with an overpair, then checks river if I call turn?
When he fires a third bullet, I'm not beating much and I dont think he has any bluffs.

i honestly want to fold turn. what does he have here that you beat? your cold call looks like a draw and the draw got there. he doesnt have an overpair.

If you call the turn, call the river.

EZ game

So 90% chance a big bet represents a big hand. On the turn an over pair is not a big hand; loses to the flush draw, loses to a top pair that just hit trips. Using your number of 90% only a 10% chance your turn call is good. Why bother to make reads if you are not going to take them into account in your actions? There are many players where you should call down but assuming your read is correct this is not one of them. Now can he be bluffing yes. If your read is correct he does not bluff often enough to justify the call absent information we have not been told.

This is pretty much it. OP, I think you need to do some studying on the difference between relative strength vs. absolute strength. A flush is an absolute strong hand. You barely have a bluff catcher in relative terms.

My point is what do you expect to change on the river? Calling for your str8 flush? This board is incredibly static OTT, so if your hand was good enough to call OTT, it's good enough to call OTR.

The inflection point is maybe OTF, maybe OTT, but it for sure ain't the river.

The river bet should be enough to confirm that what may have been a rather iffy call on the turn (and I do think it's a turn fold, but what's with the pressure off, and I doubt many players would find a fold on the turn...at the table I wouldn't have managed it) should most definitely be a fold on the river. That's assuming nothing changes, but there are some small changes as well: hands which made a slightly dubious flop raise (AJ, KJ, QJ) might barrel the turn but probably slow down by the river; 98 (for the flopped straight) might barrel the turn, but certainly checks river...same for those rare baby flushes; overpairs - extremely unlikely, I grant you - wouldn't go 3 streets; also there might be some give-ups.

(If he turned an overpair into a bluff on the turn, then top marks, but I think it's unlikely.)

I think 3 bet pre ore often than not.

if you were gonna make a big laydown it wouldve been on the turn.

Basically this. Gonna just quote you cuz i agree with almost everything you said.

Yeah i think its definitely a turn fold vs V as described. Cant be mad you didnt find it.

I agree its usually nonsense, but here any non SF river changes nothing. V is a passive player so he isnt giving up on bluffs and he isnt slowing down with medium strength type hands either, so you should expect a jam 100% of the time otr here. This is the type of V who made this extremely flawed logic so commonplace on these forums, is that its absolutely correct against a typical passive postflop player.

Not read any other replies yet...

PRE - looks fine, but if UTG is aggro, I could see 3B'ing KQs to iso.

FLOP - straddle messed up your day by donking with what I assume was either weak value or a draw.

The big info here is the V's raise size. If this was just an "eff you and your stupid donk" raise, he could make it 3x-4x. If he just wanted to iso raise to force us out, he could have made it 2x-2.5x. But he raised huge, polarizing to very strong hands or total air.

If this was heads up, and he was aggro, I'd give him more air, but he did this multi-way, in a spot where we could have all the 2P+, so I think we can give him more thick value that wants to bloat the pot.

TURN - after we call the flop, we should only have thick value or draws to nutted hands, yet he continues to bet big, over 3/4 pot. This looks a lot like a turned boat.

It's extremely exploitable, but I'd probably over-fold against the population, and even more so against a player who always seems to have it when he takes a line like this.

RIVER - pure fold. We lose to all his value, and this is just an insanely under-bluffed line in an under-bluffed spot.

Thank you everyone for all your advice. I do appreciate it.

I did fold the river pretty quickly, and face up, hoping he would show. He did not.

Later in the night, after the villain had left the table, the player sitting next to him told me villain had showed him AA.

I don't believe it, and even if he did have AA this time, it's still a fold long term. I should have found a fold on the turn.

Thanks again.

watch for them colluding.

I'd believe he had AA, with the Ad in his hand. Sometimes otherwise strong players will over-play their value hands, and great players know how and when to turn their value hands into bluffs.

Make a mental note that V is capable of making plays like this, and adjust accordingly when you play him in the future. We could consider 3B'ing this flop with our 15-out combo draws, to balance the times when we're 3B'ing with 2P+.

If you think about it - when we call flop, and call turn, what does AA beat on the river? Nothing, really.

This kind of goes back to why I wouldn't mind a 3B pre. Okay, if we 3B pre, maybe he 4B's, but at this stack depth, and IP, we can flat call and see a flop, more than likely heads up. Doubtful he's going to take this same line in a 4B pot. He'd probably check flop or c-bet small. We can check back, bet small, or call, and get to the turn. With as much equity as our hand has, I could even see raising with it.

Yeah i dont understand why hed turn AA into a bluff.

Preflop I think you can do anything, 3bet; call; fold. Call/raise is more std. esp. suited, but depending on villain raising a straddle it can be meh and he bluffs us off a lot when he has worse.

Flop your hand is pretty much the best hand in your range to 3bet bluff. We have a lot of equity vs. most monsters except for the worst vs. our hand like Ad9d.

Turn I'd mostly just fold, if playing well. Although unless it's vs. Ad9d you have outs.

If I called turn I feel like I have to call river, but that's probably bad too (although maybe not if he takes this line with AAd).

Not sure AAd should bluff river, or that any player does it anyway ... but anything is possible, I guess. Also feel like when you show 95%+ of the time people will show a worse hand.

So...does anyone want to hazard a guess why some dude who wasn't in the hand would voluntarily offer a lie to hero about V showing him AA?

Assuming he did have AdAx, his flop raise over a donk, on this board, is pretty unusual at these stakes. Very few players at 1/3 are going to turn AA into a bluff on the flop.

Most players at these stakes would be repping exactly 98dd on the flop, which then improves to a straight flush. Yet he just keeps on barreling, when most players would be slowing down, by checking to induce, or betting small.

If V is a good reg, I wouldn't necessarily expect him to show a bluff just because hero showed. He might have a no-call / no-show policy.

If he didn't have AA, then his line looks insanely strong, and I think I'd need at least JT to call him down.

Can think of a few reasons, from trying to tilt H to being friends with the V and he asked him to. Can also have misread V's hand and/or V lied (like V said it was AAd but only showed the Ad).

The size is weird, but he can have a read that straddle is betting way too much and so he raises a lot ... but then H cold calls.
Some chance on the turn V then thinks "well I beat nothing now, but I did raise huge on the flop so I can have nut diamonds and/or fhes and I have flush outs" and then on the river it's well I def. can't win by checking.
It's not the most likely but it's possible.

Pretty sure I don't have JT here, because it just pure folds flop.

One thing here is trying to think about what I call the river with because the Jd blocks a lot of our worse hands. Maybe one combo. of 9d8d, where I'd be tempted to 3bet the flop but mostly (hopefully) not. One combo. of JJ and 3 combos. of TT ... might even just fold 77 on the flop. 9h8h folds turn. I wouldn't even be surprised if we shouldn't call all combos. of nut flush on the turn.
Probably not folding much that calls turn without reads that V is never just trying to fire his way out of a mess.

What hands are you targetting here? Do you think UTG is raising the flop with Jx and overpairs? Or are you trying to get it heads up?

I doubt most people will fold 77, so JT is probably it for value and maybe AdJd can fold at some point... although AAd should give up I guess 😀.
Also not sure that 3bet flop is best, esp. with the raise size (not sure I'd noted that when I replied on flop action) but if we don't 3bet flop with this hand then we shouldn't ever 3bet flop IMO.

I'd have a hard time not raising flop with 98dd, or any 98 combo. I think it's fine to raise 98dd. It's not the immortal nuts.

Probably not raising anything else. Can't fold top 2, sets or NFD's before seeing the turn, at this stack depth, for this bet size.

All the flushes and straights shrivel up on the turn. My continue range is mostly just boats or better, and the way V played flop, not sure how confident I'd be with 77 or even TT.

Not folding river if we get to the turn with JT, but... just wondering if the only worse value hands V has that play this way are TT, 77, and the nut flush, and how often all those hands barrel off instead of slowing down on the river.

Just seems to me that very few low stakes players are going to take this line in a multi-way pot without a pretty nutted hand. If V really did have AA, hats off to him for playing it this way. I think most low stakes players slow down on the Jd turn and check, praying it goes check check.

Maybe I'll reply again, or expand, but quickly:

If UTG declared he was calling on the flop, even if we had $5k it's obviously fine to just put it in with 9d8d. So from that point of view, I agree you can raise 9d8d ... the problem is I don't want to raise much else. Even 9h8h or JJ wouldn't want to cold 3bet the flop without reads.
So given I'm not raising anything I'd try to stop myself from raising 9d8d.

The problem with JT is it has very few outs and if villain is barreling draws he's probably not going to stop on a turn blank. So I'd rather just fold flop and have it be a cheaper mistake (or be ready to call down on bricks).

Hey OP, nice fold on the river. I lost too much money in my bad poker past spewing with non nutted flushes on a paired turn or river.

On whether V had AA: never believe anything anybody tells you about hole cards unless you know them well enough to detect when they are lying.

I generally fast-play my thick-but-vulnerable value hands, so I'd be raising all my 98 combos here. It's obviously not balanced, and basically making our hand face-up, but facing this action in front of us, it looks very much like the main V has a hand he might just go with, and I want to get as much money as possible into the pot on the flop, before a scare card hits.

I'd actually feel a little more concerned about 9d8d than other 98 combos. If we raise and get called, V will have some higher flush draws. We can get away from 98 of other suits if those draws come in, and get paid by other value hands when the flush draw bricks. But it'll be stomach-churning to see another flush card roll off with 98 of diamonds, if V jams.

That's not to say I would never raise anything else. But I probably wouldn't raise anything else against a V who always seems to have it when he starts piling money in. I've seen many low-stakes players who will go broke with AdAx, KdKx, and QdQx here, and many who simply can't fold the NFD before the turn without someone putting a gun to their head.

Against those V's, I'm probably raising JJ and TT. Against the worse rec-fish, or hyper LAGs, I'm also raising 77 and JT.

If we flat call with JT here, I'm not that worried about improving in a spot like this, facing this action, against this V. I'd expect him be alarmed when we smooth call the flop raise, and realize that we might be slow-playing a set or straight, or calling with the NFD. No matter what the turn is, I don't expect him to keep barreling without an insanely strong hand. If he was getting out of line by raising a draw, I think he's checking turn more often than not.

If V is LAG, then, yeah, we need to think about him barreling with his draws. If he's a fish, we just want to get stacks in on the flop with what is almost always going to be the best hand, and our opponents are drawing nearly dead.