Is this a punt or a good jam?
Hi all,
I was playing some $1/$3 at my local casino last night:
PREFLOP
Folds to the LJ, a new young player who's finding his feet. He opens to $12 and the C/O and BTN both call. I'm in the SB with K♣J♣ - and figure this is a good opportunity to squeeze, so I raise to $70. Only the button calls. He has $320 behind and I have him covered.
FLOP ($152 after rake)
T♥ 7♦ 6♣
I've whiffed, but I have backdoors and overcards, and I've seen villain make several tight folds in the past. So my plan is to bet small on the flop and hopefully get a fold. If he calls, I'll reassess on the turn. If the right card comes I'll keep barreling, otherwise I may slow down. Out of position I sometimes elect to play a two-street game, so when I bet the flop I'm going to leave about pot behind on the turn and try to balance with two-thirds value, one third bluffs if I decide to jam the turn. I bet $55, villain calls.
TURN ($262)
T♥ 7♦ 6♣ Q♥
Ding ding ding! I've turned an open-ender, and the Q is a great card to apply maximum pressure to any Tx hands and other weak one-pair holdings that called the flop and have now been downgraded. I'm going to jam approximately KQ+ for value here, which is quite a wide range after I 3bet preflop and bet the flop (all KK and AA etc too). I need to balance this with bluffs/semi-bluffs, and this hand feels like a great candidate. It's not ideal that the turn brings a flush draw, but I was willing to take my chances there (villain wouldn't be getting the right price to call anyway, but many low stakes villains will of course still call it off). He's ostensibly capped his range with the call on the flop (despite it being good for his range) and I'm confident that a jam is going to get through a large percentage of the time. If he happens to call, I still have an open-ender as my backup plan. In other words, the stars are aligned here, and it's time to blast off. I jam for $265. Villain snaps and says "I hope you didn't hit that queen". Uh-oh...
RIVER ($792)
T♥ 7♦ 6♣ Q♥ 9♥
Villain turns over TT for a slow-played set. Farewell stack...
You're playing live, not online. Have more reads on your opponent besides 'V makes tight folds.' When has V made a tight fold? What was their V representing, and did their overall story make sense? Etc. What does V do with fat value IP (or OOP) on a board where you shouldn't have the nuts and are unlikely to outdraw them? Raise anyway? Slowplay?
Certain Vs will overcall twice with TT on the button, others will 3! with a caller in-between. Others still will call-4! Knowing which bucket th
I don't remember the details of the hands when this villain made the tight folds. He's not a regular player and I play thousands of hours every year against hundreds of regular opponents. There is no way I can remember the specifics for every read of every player, and therefore it's necessary to generalize. I find the two most important distinctions to make with players are whether they are value/bluff heavy (the vast majority are value heavy, of course) and whether they are callers/folders postflop. I have this villain as a folder, which means I've seen him lay down TPTK+ to aggression, or lay down even stronger hands when the board gets scary. It's not easy to get this metric, as it requires the villain to show the hand they're folding - but I remember this villain doing that in at least a couple of hands in the past. Additionally, you can get a read in a big enough sample if they are clearly folding too much postflop, or are simply visibly uncomfortable with facing pressure. That was my read and understanding of this villain on many occasions.
I'd certainly expect him to raise two pair + on this board, for similar psychological reasons - fear of getting outdrawn - and I was very surprised that he didn't raise the flop in this hand. Even when I jammed the turn and he called, he said "I hope you didn't hit that queen" - that's a good example of his state of mind during play. He's hesitant, risk-averse, and of the belief that if there's any possible hand his opponent could have that beats him, they may well have it. In other words, the ideal player to run down postflop. I just ran into it this time, he did something I didn't expect at all in not raising with his set, and he won. Good for him! But I'm confident that I will win a lot more often than him in a large sample.
This villain is not a big 3-bettor/4-bettor. If anything, I would say he's a small-ball player who likes to see flops with a lot of hands and try and hit monsters (like many low-stakes plyers) - all the more reason to squeeze.
Interesting question regarding what happens if I do check instead of bet on the flop. I'm not folding this combo vs a flop float bet. So if he bets, I call - and I might decide to get aggressive on the Q turn (with a check-raise). Or I can simply play more defensively and keep some OESDs in my check-call range on the turn too. Where it gets really interesting is the T♥7♦6♣Q♥8♥ river, because against this player type it's an ideal card to get them off their hand (even though this card/board is much better for his range than mine - villain's psychology is much more relevant in my opinion) and I would certainly at least consider donk-jamming this river. Alternatively, I can check-call, check-call, check-fold and minimize my losses of course - but that's passive, no fun, and just not playing poker imo.
The only questionable street is the flop, as others have already said.
Just to avoid misunderstandings: of course you should not range check flop oop as the aggressor pre, much less HU.
However, this flop favors btn's range way more than yours, plus you have whiffed it with your specific hand, so I like a check (much) better here.
I'd be curious to know what a solver does in this spot (yes, I admit that sometimes I use this forum with the hope that someone runs sims for me ... )
There are some arguments for checking range OOP in HU pots as the aggressor. It simplifies the strategy of how to play your range, it protects your checking range, many villains play worse against a check than they do against a bet, the EV of betting/checking the flop is often extremely close (so you don't lose anything by checking), you can utilize a check-raising strategy with some of your range, etc. That said, in general I do agree with you, and leveraging range advantage is usually what I would lean towards - but I certainly cbet significantly less when OOP than when IP.
Against the general player pool I'm cbetting this flop at a low frequency - I made an exploitative adjustment against this specific villain, and it backfired. Woe is me.
I haven't checked this hand yet but I imagine a solver is playing defensively OOP on this board, cbetting a tight, polarized range, and check-calling with my specific hand. I'll check it at a later point and post results here.
Thanks for the feedback.
1. Yes, for sure - villain in this hand is knowledgeable enough to know that after I go to $70 preflop, fire flop and jam turn that I have all the AA and KK that are trying to get value from a Q, as well as AQ that's trying to get value for weaker queens, etc.
2. For sure my goal in this hand was to target a player who I have seen make many tight folds in the past. That said, I would still make this play against other player types (other than huge calling stations, of cour
Your description of V makes the turn bluff bad in my opinion. As you have said V knows your range and called the flop. At that point when a tight V that will fear your possible over pairs calls you have already driven out a majority of the hands that your turn bet is trying to drive out.
Your description of V makes the turn bluff bad in my opinion. As you have said V knows your range and called the flop. At that point when a tight V that will fear your possible over pairs calls you have already driven out a majority of the hands that your turn bet is trying to drive out.
I'm targeting the Tx, JJ, and weaker pairs from the flop when the Q comes on the turn; it's a great card to apply pressure. An A or K would be even better, but a Q is also good. He has also folded many Qx combos to the flop bet.
There are some arguments for checking range OOP in HU pots as the aggressor. It simplifies the strategy of how to play your range, it protects your checking range, many villains play worse against a check than they do against a bet, the EV of betting/checking the flop is often extremely close (so you don't lose anything by checking), you can utilize a check-raising strategy with some of your range, etc. That said, in general I do agree with you, and leveraging range advantage is usually what I w
nah, this spr you cbet a ton
re your earlier post, idk who marc goone is, but if he's advocating range x in 3b pots you should stop listening to him. idk what youtube content pokercode has but i meant their paid content. is somewhat dated but its hard for solver based stuff to be obsolete.
Ooof. I can see why...
As a genuine question: IYE, what is the prevalance of raises you've seen when cbetting OOP as the 3bettor pf, on a board like this one where the 3b range shouldn't connect with it at all, and V's might?
In the games I've played (I'll be the first to say I lack the experience of pretty much all posters here), it's awfully damned high. Maybe those players were insanely aggro, I dunno? Cbetting 1/3 on T76r after a ~6x squeeze, would earn me a raise about 3/4 of the time.
i mean they can't raise you that liberally, you can comfortably stack off with every TP+ at this depth
i don't have like a great idea of what his range looks like and it's going to be weighted and fractional but ip probably has > TPTK like 10-15% of the time, whereas oop got TP+ 35%, (OP+ like 25% of the time), i suppose a bit more because you can go with 99 as the 3bettor too. just no way IP can show a ton of aggression from an equity / polarity stand point (good one pairs are nuts here)
I'm targeting the Tx, JJ, and weaker pairs from the flop when the Q comes on the turn; it's a great card to apply pressure. An A or K would be even better, but a Q is also good. He has also folded many Qx combos to the flop bet.
But you already wrote you believe his range for you emphasizes over pairs and indeed that is what your flop bet is trying to represent. You also wrote he makes tight folds which is why you targeted him. Anyone that makes tight folds so often that is how you define their play does not have many of the hands you are targeting on the turn as they folded them to your $70 squeeze or your flop bet. You are looking at what you might have reached the turn with and putting pressure on that range of hands not what a V as you describe will have as their range on this flop, turn, and betting sequence. You've made your read; understand that the exploit is they fold too often so your squeeze and flop bet fold many hands that should not fold and the next level of exploit is to avoid bluffing into a very strong range. Especially when you get a card that gives you equity so you can potentially win the hand without bluffing.
nah, this spr you cbet a ton
re your earlier post, idk who marc goone is, but if he's advocating range x in 3b pots you should stop listening to him. idk what youtube content pokercode has but i meant their paid content. is somewhat dated but its hard for solver based stuff to be obsolete.
Pio is betting about 53% of the time:
And as you can see, the EV of betting and checking is very close.
Equities run pretty close overall:
I was happy to see that my view that A,K, Q or J on the turn were the best cards for me:
And OOP is blasting hard on the Q♥ turn:
prob stick to gtow until u figure out pio / ranges
3bing range (way) too weak and has the wrong hands in it, probably range for btn is off too, and likely some of the parameters re raise sizing and later street options.
again solver is good but as i keep saying, i pretty sure using it the way you are is worse than not using it at all. you're trying to do advanced micro level research while not really having a good macro game plan
hint: you don't really want suited connectors here yet you have them pure, ato, most of the 9xss, you have some stuff that could / maybe should be mixed as pure but its w/e. the weaker parts of your range though i think are losing a substantial amount in a game where people underfold, you dont need to worry about board coverage, and spr is going to be like 2 possibly multiway
75 bb solve on gtow will give u closest approximation of a range to use but u can also look at 50 or 100, or look at preflop research mode at 3x and how it changes stuff. should also look at what gets added and removed deeper
But you already wrote you believe his range for you emphasizes over pairs and indeed that is what your flop bet is trying to represent. You also wrote he makes tight folds which is why you targeted him. Anyone that makes tight folds so often that is how you define their play does not have many of the hands you are targeting on the turn as they folded them to your $70 squeeze or your flop bet. You are looking at what you might have reached the turn with and putting pressure on that range of hand
Yes my range when I jam the turn is certainly heavy with TPTK and overpair hands. When I'm making the turn decision, he has already called the $70 squeeze and the 33% pot continuation bet. Even a tight player that overfolds is calling a small flop continuation bet, and at that moment I can range him reasonably well to be predominantly weak one pair hands, including a lot of Tx. What this player type is not willing to do is call a potsize jam on the turn when an overcard comes and downgrades all the one-pair hands they called with on the flop - it's those hands that I'm targeting. I am also jamming turn if a low club comes out, giving me a flush draw, confident that he will still fold many Tx hands given the betsize on the turn and his fear that I have overpairs. The Q is one of the best possible turns for me to jam. I'm going to do the same with TPTK+, which I have a lot of here, and so I'm obliged to balance with semi-bluffs like this hand.
prob stick to gtow until u figure out pio / ranges
3bing range (way) too weak and has the wrong hands in it, probably range for btn is off too, and likely some of the parameters re raise sizing and later street options.
again solver is good but as i keep saying, i pretty sure using it the way you are is worse than not using it at all. you're trying to do advanced micro level research while not really having a good macro game plan
hint: you don't really want suited connectors here yet you have them
I'm estimating villain's ranges; he does not 3bet much at all.
I don't have suited connectors here pure. They are a low-frequency squeeze. The "square size proportional to weight" checkbox is not selected.
Yes, I squeeze wider than usual in this game, and I believe board coverage is important as a general rule.
I'll take a look at GTO Wizard one of these days, thanks.
board coverage is (mostly) meaningless at these spr's - you can see this really quickly if you look at preflop ranges for analogous spots
anyways your sim doesn't really match what im looking at which makes me think you have a mistake in it somewhere
GTOw at least has a preference for larger otf and then the small turn thing won't exist regardless of what flop size u choose
post pic of the parameters page, kind of think IP doesn't have an option to raise the turn given the output you got
board coverage is (mostly) meaningless at these spr's - you can see this really quickly if you look at preflop ranges for analogous spots
anyways your sim doesn't really match what im looking at which makes me think you have a mistake in it somewhere
GTOw at least has a preference for larger otf and then the small turn thing won't exist regardless of what flop size u choose
post pic of the parameters page, kind of think IP doesn't have an option to raise the turn given the output you got
Okay, thanks for the tip about board coverage. I've closed the sim now but it would have been something like this:
parameters seem fine
you get a free solve a day on gtow, 75bb general 500nl rake and look at co open, btn call, then look at sb sqz range but also look at the actual hand here and how it approaches. it's going to size up on this board to try to play a 2 rather than a 3 street game and turn its really just going to jam or x. oddly i see it range betting J / K / A turns but not Q. which makes sense to me at least on K / A but the J is confusing. will admit closer to your output than i thought so maybe i'm just fish
still think hand is wp and also the smaller u size the flop *in theory* the more fold equity u should have later on
likely matters to literally no one in the thread but i think the difference between Q and J turn in the sim i'm looking at is JJ / JT / weaker Tx get devalued more on a Q. also i guess AJ / KJ are weaker on Q than the equivalent hands are on a Jack?
parameters seem fine
you get a free solve a day on gtow, 75bb general 500nl rake and look at co open, btn call, then look at sb sqz range but also look at the actual hand here and how it approaches. it's going to size up on this board to try to play a 2 rather than a 3 street game and turn its really just going to jam or x. oddly i see it range betting J / K / A turns but not Q. which makes sense to me at least on K / A but the J is confusing. will admit closer to your output than i thought so m
Sure I will take a look at GTO Wizard when I have time.
I like the approach of playing a two-steet game when OOP in these spots and indeed try and do so if the conditions are right.
Regarding the cards OOP can be aggressive on, I guess it's probably something to do with range construction and IP having more Qs but fewer As, Ks and Js?
Is JJ and JT really that much of OOP's betting range that the turn Q devalues the range so much?
Yes betting smaller on flop to have more fold equity later is another good tip, thanks.
Sure I will take a look at GTO Wizard when I have time.
I like the approach of playing a two-steet game when OOP in these spots and indeed try and do so if the conditions are right.
Regarding the cards OOP can be aggressive on, I guess it's probably something to do with range construction and IP having more Qs but fewer As, Ks and Js?
Is JJ and JT really that much of OOP's betting range that the turn Q devalues the range so much?
Yes betting smaller on flop to have more fold equity later is another
im not really sure. seems like it though. on the J we don't really have many / any hands that want to check but at least on the gtow sim it's developing one on the q. im thinking maybe button's range is wider / weaker in your sim than gtow's hence the discrepancy. feel bad i was skeptical of your pio skillz immediately though.
im not really sure. seems like it though. on the J we don't really have many / any hands that want to check but at least on the gtow sim it's developing one on the q. im thinking maybe button's range is wider / weaker in your sim than gtow's hence the discrepancy. feel bad i was skeptical of your pio skillz immediately though.
Lol, no worries - as I said before, I'm no Pio expert. Yes the range I used for the button may well be wider than what GTOW uses - I was just estimating for that player of course.
